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WILLOW

Ben’s decision to leave Rhyndweir so abruptly proved to be a poor one. The company had barely cleared the outskirts of the village shops and cottages lining the castle’s approach when it began to rain. The rain came slowly at first, a spattering of drops against their faces, light and teasing. Then the drops became a shower, and the shower became a downpour. Clouds blocked away the land’s moons and the distant stars, and everything turned as black as pitch. Wind howled across the flat, empty pastures and fields of the Greensward, thrusting at the travelers like a giant’s breath. It took only moments for the company to decide to seek immediate shelter, but they were already soaked to the bone by then.

They spent the night in a dilapidated, empty barn in which stock had once been housed. Rain blew through holes in the walls and roofing, and there were few dry spots to be found. The air turned chill, and the damp clothing seemed colder than before. Ben and his companions huddled together in the dark in a large horse stall at one end of the barn. It was dryer there than anywhere else in the building, and there was straw on which to bed. A fire was out of the question, so everyone had to make do with a quick change of clothing and a sharing of the blankets from their bedding. Questor offered to try his magic on a flameless warming device he had once successfully conjured up, but Ben would not allow it. Questor’s magic evidenced an unpleasant propensity for backfiring, and their barn was the only shelter in sight. Besides, Ben reasoned obstinately, weathering out the storm in such poor surroundings seemed appropriate punishment for the way he had botched things at Rhyndweir.

“I blew it, Questor,” he said to the other as they huddled in the dark and listened to the rainfall drum on the old barn’s roof.

“Hmmmmm?” Questor’s attention was concentrated on wiping dirt and blood from the numerous cuts and abrasions Ben had suffered during his fight with Kallendbor.

“I screwed up. I mishandled the whole thing. I let Kallendbor trick me into accepting his stupid challenge. I lost my composure; I let the entire affair get out of hand.” He sighed and leaned back against the stall side. “I should have done a better job of arguing my case. Some lawyer, right? Some King!”

“I think you handled matters rather well, High Lord.”

Ben looked at him skeptically. “You do?”

“It was obviously intended that you should fail in your attempt to gain a pledge from the Lords of the Greensward unless you were willing to gain that pledge on their terms. Had you agreed to marry a daughter of one of their households, the pledge would have been yours. You would have had a wife and a dozen in-laws for the balance of your reign as King—a reign that would have been considerably shorter than you would have liked.” The wizard shrugged. “But you knew what they intended as well as I, didn’t you?”

“I knew.”

“So you were right to refuse the offer, and I think you showed great composure under the circumstances. I think that if the game had been allowed to continue, you might have beaten him.”

Ben laughed. “I appreciate the vote of confidence. I notice, however, that you left nothing to chance.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that you ignored my order not to use the magic and conjured up that image of the Paladin when it looked as if I was going down for the count!”

The owlish face studied him, a faint outline in the dark. Questor set aside the bloodied cloths. “I did nothing of the sort, High Lord. That was the Paladin.”

There was a long silence. “Then he has come three times now,” Ben whispered finally, his bewilderment evident. “He came when I was caught in the time passage with the Mark, he came when the demons appeared at the coronation, and now he has come to the Greensward. But he seems just exactly what you called him, Questor—a ghost! He looks as if he’s only an image made of light! What is he really?”

The other shrugged. “Maybe what he appears—maybe something more.”

Ben hunched his knees up close against his body, trying to stay warm. “I think that he’s out there. I think that he’s trying to come back again.” He looked at Questor for confirmation.

Questor shook his head. “I do not know, High Lord. Maybe so.”

“What was it that brought him in the past? There must be something you can tell me about him—about why and how he appeared to the old King.”

“He appeared when he was summoned,” the other replied. “The summons has always come from the wearer of the medallion. The medallion is a part of the magic, High Lord. There is a link between it, the Kings of Landover, and the Paladin. But only the Kings of Landover have ever fully understood what that link was.”

Ben pulled the medallion from beneath his tunic and studied it. “Maybe if I rub it, or talk to it, or just grasp it—maybe that will bring the Paladin. What do you think?”

Questor shrugged. Ben tried all three and nothing happened. He tried wishing for the Paladin’s appearance, hands clutched about the medallion so tightly he could feel the impression of its carved surface. Nothing happened.

“I suppose I should have known it wouldn’t be that easy.” He sighed and dropped the medallion back down the front of his tunic, feeling it catch on the chain that lay looped about his neck. He looked up through a hole in the barn roof as the wind rattled the shingles against their fastenings. “Tell me about the dragon and the Lords of the Greensward.”

The wizard’s stooped form bent closer still. “You heard most of it from Kallendbor yourself. The Lords of the Greensward are at war with Strabo. The dragon is their nemesis. He has preyed upon them for the better part of twenty years—ever since the old King died. He burns their crops and their buildings; he devours their livestock and occasionally their thralls. He hunts their lands at will, and they are powerless to stop it.”

“Because the dragon is part of the magic—isn’t that it?”

“Yes, High Lord. Strabo is the last of his kind. He was a creature of the world of fairy until his exile thousands of years ago. He cannot be harmed by mortal weapons, only by the magic from which he was created. That was why Kallendbor felt safe in challenging you to rid him of the dragon—he believes you a fraud. A true King of Landover would command the magic of the medallion and could summon the Paladin to do his bidding.”

Ben nodded. “It all comes back to the Paladin, doesn’t it? Tell me, Questor, why is it that the dragon hunts the Greensward as he does?”

The wizard smiled. “He is a dragon.”

“Yes, I know. But he didn’t always hunt like this, I gather—at least, not while the old King lived.”

“True. He kept to his own land in times previous. Perhaps he feared the old King. Perhaps the Paladin kept him there until the old King was dead. Your guess is as good as mine.”

Ben grunted irritably and leaned back against the stall side. His entire body hurt. “Why is it that you can’t manage an answer to any of these questions, damn it? You’re supposed to be the court wizard and my personal advisor, but you don’t seem to know much of anything!”

Questor looked away. “I do the best I can, High Lord.”

Ben immediately regretted his words. He touched the other on the shoulder. “I know. I’m sorry I said that.”

“I was away from the court when the old King was alive, and my half-brother and I were never close. Had we been close, perhaps I could have learned at least some of the answers to your questions.”

“Forget it, Questor. I’m sorry I said anything.”

“It has not been easy for me either, you know.”

“I know, I know.”

“I have had to master the magic practically alone. I have had no tutor, no master to instruct me. I have had to preserve the throne of Landover while shepherding about a flock of Kings who were frightened by the sight of their own shadow and who wanted nothing more challenging than the spectacle of knights at a joust!” His voice was rising. “I have given everything that I have so that the monarchy might endure, even while beset by miseries that would break the back of an ordinary …”

Abernathy’s growl interrupted rudely. “Please, wizard, enough of your soliloquies! We are already bored to tears by this account of your sufferings and can bear no more!”

Questor’s mouth snapped shut with an audible click of his teeth.

Ben smiled in spite of himself. It hurt his face to do so. “I hope that I do not number among those unfortunate Kings you have just described, Questor,” he said.

The other’s baleful gaze was still turned on Abernathy. “Hardly.”

“Good. Tell me one thing more, then. Can we rely on Kallendbor to be as good as his word?”

Questor looked back now. “About the dragon—yes. He swore an oath.”

Ben nodded. “Then we must find a way to get rid of the dragon.”

There was an endless moment of silence. Ben could sense the others looking at each other in the dark. “Any ideas as to how we go about doing that?” he asked.

Questor shook his head. “It has never been done.”

“There is a first time for everything,” Ben replied lightly, wondering as he said it just whom it was he was trying to convince. “You said that it would take magic to rid us of the dragon. Who could help us find that magic?”

Questor considered. “Nightshade, of course. She is the most powerful of those come from the world of fairy. But she is as dangerous as the dragon. I think we might have better luck with the River Master. He, at least, has proven loyal to the Kings of Landover in the past.”

“Is he a creature of magic?”

“He was, once upon a time. He has been gone from the world of fairy for centuries. Still, he retains something of the knowledge of the old ways and may have help to offer. It was to him that I would have suggested we go next—even if the Lords of the Greensward had given their pledge.”

Ben nodded. “Then it’s settled. Tomorrow we travel to the country of the River Master.” He stretched, hunched down into his blankets, hesitated a moment and said, “This may not count for much, but I want to thank you all for standing by me.”

There was a mutter of acknowledgment and the sound of the others rolling into their bed coverings. Everything was silent for a moment except for the sound of the rain falling and the soft rush of the wind.

Then Abernathy spoke. “High Lord, would it be asking too much that we refrain from camping out in barns after tonight? I think there are fleas in this straw.”

Ben smiled broadly and drifted off to sleep.

Daybreak brought an end to the rain, and a glimmer of sunshine appeared through the haze of mist and clouds that lingered on. The little company resumed the journey through the valley of Landover, this time turning south for the country of the River Master. They traveled all day, Ben, Questor and Abernathy on horseback, the kobolds afoot. Once again, Bunion went ahead to announce their coming. They passed from the lowland estates of the Lords of the Greensward at midafternoon, leaving behind their broad, open stretches of meadow and farmland, and by dusk were deep into the rolling hill country of the River Master.

The color of life was different here, Ben saw. The cast of things was brighter and truer—as if the failing of the magic had not penetrated so deeply. It was a country of lakes and rivers nestled within hollows and valleys, of orchards and woods scattered on gentle slopes, of grasses and ferns that shimmered in the wind like the waves of some ocean. The mists were thicker in the hill country, trapped in pockets like harnessed clouds, stirring and wending their way from hollow to valley and back again. But the greens of grasses and trees and the blues of lakes and rivers were brighter than in the Greensward, and the splashes of pinks, crimsons, and lavenders did not have that wintry tone that marked so distinctly the plains. Even the Bonnie Blues seemed not so blighted, though darkening spots still marred their beauty.

Ben asked Questor why this was.

“The River Master and those who serve him are closer to the old ways than most. Bits and pieces of the magic are still theirs to command. What magic they still retain they use to keep the earth and waters of their homeland clean.” Questor gave a cursory glance about and then shrugged. “The River Master’s magic protects against a failing of the land’s magic only marginally. Already, signs of wilt and graying are evident. The River Master and his followers fight a holding action at best. The land will fail here in the end as it fails everywhere else.”

“All because Landover has no King?” Ben still found the corrolation between the two difficult to accept.

“Had no King, High Lord—no King for twenty years.”

“The thirty-two failures don’t count for much, I gather?”

“Against a failing of the magic of the sort you see now? Nothing. You will be the first to count for anything.”

Maybe yes, maybe no, Ben thought grimly, reminded of his lack of success with the Lords of the Greensward. “I really don’t understand—doesn’t anyone recognize the problem? I mean, the land is dying all about them and it’s all because they can’t get together long enough to settle on a King!”

“I do not think they perceive matters quite that way, High Lord,” Abernathy said quietly, edging forward on his horse.

Ben glanced back. “What do you mean?”

“He means that the connection between the loss of a King and the failing of the land’s magic is one that only I have made,” Questor interrupted, obviously irritated with the scribe. “He means that no one else sees the problem the same way I do.”

Ben frowned. “Well, what if they’re right and you’re wrong?”

Questor’s owlish face tightened into a knot. “Then everything you and I are trying to do is a colossal waste of time! But it happens that they are not right and I am not wrong!” Questor glared back at Abernathy momentarily and then faced forward. “I have had twenty years to consider the problem, High Lord. I have observed and studied; I have employed what magic I command to test my theory. It is with some confidence that I tell you that Landover must have a King again if it is to survive!”

He was so adamant in his defense that Ben remained silent. It was Abernathy who spoke first.

“If you have finished momentarily with your attempt at self-vindication, Questor Thews, perhaps you will allow me to get a word in edgewise to explain what I really meant when I said others do not perceive matters as we.” He looked down at Questor over the rims of his glasses, while the wizard stiffened in his saddle but refused to turn. “What I meant was that the lack of perception on the part of others was not as regards the problem, but the solution to it. Most see quite clearly that the failing of the magic came about with the death of the old King. But none agree that coronation of a new King will necessarily solve the problem. Some believe restrictions should be placed on the solution sought. Some believe another solution altogether should be sought. Some believe no solution should be sought at all.”

“No solution at all—who thinks that?” Ben asked disbelievingly.

“Nightshade thinks that.” Questor reined his horse back to them, his irritation with Abernathy momentarily put aside. “She cares only for the Deep Fell, and her own magic keeps the hollows as she wishes them. Should the magic of the land fail, hers would be the most powerful.”

“The Lords of the Greensward would accept one of their own as King, but no other,” Abernathy added to his explanation. “They accept the solution, but would place restrictions on it.”

“And the River Master seeks to find another solution altogether—his solution being one of self-healing,” Questor finished.

“That was what I meant in the first place,” Abernathy huffed.

The wizard shrugged. “Then you should have said so.”

Shadows were gathering rapidly across the land as they turned their horses into a small grove of poplar to set camp for the night. A wooded ridgeline crested the skyline west, and the sun had already settled into its branches, filtering daylight into streamers of hazy gold. A lake stretched south of their campsite, a broad stretch of shimmering gray water over which mist floated in thick clouds while trees screened away dozens of tiny inlets and coves. Birds flew in wide, lazy circles against the night.

“The lake is called Irrylyn,” Questor told Ben as they dismounted and handed the reins of their horses to Parsnip. “It is said that, on certain nights of the high summer, the sprites and nymphs of the River Master bathe within these waters to keep their youth.”

“That should be exciting.” Ben yawned and stretched, wishing nothing more exciting at this point than a good night’s sleep.

“Some believe that the waters have the power to preserve youth.” Questor was caught up in his musings. “Some believe that the waters can turn back old age and make one young again.”

“Some believe anything.” Abernathy grunted, shaking himself until his hair ruffled back from beneath the dust that matted it. “I have washed in those waters more than once and gained nothing for my efforts beyond a better smell.”

“Something you might give thought to now,” Questor advised, wrinkling his nose in distaste.

Abernathy growled in response and padded off into the dark. Ben watched him go, then turned to Questor. “That sounds like a good idea for me, as well, Questor. I feel like somebody’s doormat. Is there any reason I can’t wash off some of this dirt?”

“No reason at all, High Lord.” The wizard was already turning away, searching for Parsnip. “I suppose that I had better see to dinner.”

Ben started for the lake and then stopped. “Anything dangerous down there that I ought to know about?” he called back, remembering suddenly the bog wump, the cave wight, and whatever else it was he hadn’t even seen during his morning run about Sterling Silver.

But Questor was already out of hearing, his stooped form a vague shadow in the mists. Ben hesitated, staring after him, then shrugged and started for the lake once more. If nymphs and sprites could bathe in the waters of the Irrylyn, how dangerous could it be? Besides, Abernathy was already down there.

He picked his way through the shadows to the water’s edge. The lake spread away before him, a sheen of silver that mirrored trailers of mist and the colored spheres of Landover’s moons. Willows, cottonwood, and cedar canopied him, like drooping giants against the failing light, and birds called sharply through the twilight. Ben stripped off his clothes and boots, searching the dark for Abernathy. The dog was nowhere in sight, and he could not hear him moving.

Naked, he stepped out into the water. Shock registered in his face. The water was warm! It was like a bath—a soft, pleasant heat that soothed and relaxed the muscles of the body. He reached down and touched it with his hand, certain that the difference in air and water temperature must account for the odd sensation of warmth. But, no, the water was truly warm—as if a giant hot springs.

He shook his head. Cautiously, he stepped out until he was knee-deep in the lake, the shadow of his body stretched back against the waters. Something else was odd. It felt as if he were walking in sand. He reached down again and brought up a handful of the lake bottom. It was sand! He checked it carefully in the moonlight to make certain. He was inland at a forested lake where there should only have been mud or rock, and instead there was sand!

He walked ahead, beginning to wonder if perhaps there was indeed some sort of magic at work in the Irrylyn. He glanced about once again for some sign of Abernathy, but the dog was missing. Slowly he lowered himself neck-deep into the water, feeling its warmth soak through him, giving himself over to the sensation. He was several dozen yards from shore by now, the slope from the water’s edge a gradual one that receded no more than several inches every ten feet or so. He swam into the dark, stretching his body out, breathing at regular intervals. When he came up for air, he saw a second inlet curve back from his own and swam toward it. It was tiny, barely a hundred feet across, and he swam past it toward a third. He switched from the crawl to a soundless breaststroke, head lifted toward his destination. Moonlight flooded the water with streamers of color, and the mist snaked past in shadowy screens of gray. Ben closed his eyes and swam.

The third inlet was smaller still, barely two dozen yards wide. Rushes screened the shoreline, and cedars and willows canopied above the waters, throwing dark shadows toward the lake. Ben dove beneath the water and swam silently into the cove, pulling his way toward the shallows.

He surfaced a dozen yards from the shoreline—and a woman was directly in front of him. She stood not ten feet away, a little more than ankle-deep in the lake’s waters, as naked as he. She made no attempt to turn away or to cover herself. She was like a frightened animal caught in the light, frozen in that split second of hesitation before it would be gone.

Ben Holiday stared, seeing momentarily in his mind someone he had thought forever lost. Water ran down into his eyes and he blinked it away.

“Annie?” he whispered in disbelief.

Then the shadows and the mist shifted where they fell across her, and he saw that she was not Annie—that she was someone else.

And perhaps something else as well.

Her skin was pale green, smooth and flawless and almost silvery as the waters of the Irrylyn shimmered against it. Her hair was green as well, deep forest green, the tresses tumbling to her waist, braided with flowers and ribbons. But her hair grew in narrow lines along the backs of her forearms as well and along the backs of her calves, silken manes that stirred gently with the whisper of the night wind over the lake.

“Who are you?” she asked softly.

He could not bring himself to answer. He was seeing her clearly now, finding her exquisite beyond anything he would have imagined possible. She was an artist’s flawless rendering of a fairy queen brought suddenly to life. She was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen.

She came forward a step in the moonlight. Her face was so youthful that it made her seem hardly more than a girl. But her body …

“Who are you?” she repeated.

“Ben.” He could barely make himself answer, and it never occurred to him to answer any other way.

“I am Willow,” she told him. “I belong to you now.”

He was stunned anew. She came toward him, her body swaying with the movement, and now it was he who had become the frightened animal poised to flee.

“Ben.” Her voice assumed a sweet, lilting cadence as she spoke to him. “I am a sylph, the child of a sprite become human and a wood nymph stayed wild. I was conceived on the midyear’s passing in the heat of the eight moons full, and my fates were woven in the vines and flowers of the gardens in which my parents lay. Twice each year, the fates decreed, I was to steal to the Irrylyn in darkness and bathe in her waters. To the man who saw me thus, and to no other, would I belong.”

Ben shook his head quickly, his mouth working. “But that’s craz … that’s not right! I don’t even know you! You don’t know me!”

She slowed before him, close enough now that she might reach out and touch him. He wanted her to do that. The need for that touch burned through him. He fought against it with everything he could muster, feeling trapped in the emotions that rushed through him.

“Ben.” She whispered his name and the sound of it seemed to wrap about him. “I belong to you. I feel that it is so. I sense that the fates were right. I am given, as with the sylphs of old. I am given to the one who sees me thus.” Her face lifted, the perfect features radiating back the rainbow colors of the moons. “You must take me, Ben.”

He could not force his eyes away from her. “Willow.” He used her name now, desperate to turn back the emotions that raged through him. “I cannot take … what does not belong to me. I am not even from this world, Willow. I barely know …”

“Ben,” she whispered urgently, cutting short the rest of what he would say. “Nothing matters but that this has happened. I belong to you.” She came a step closer. “Touch me, Ben.”

His hand came up. Thoughts of Annie flashed with lightning clarity through his mind, and still his hand came up. The warmth of the waters of the Irrylyn and the air about him wrapped him so close that it seemed he could not breathe. The fingers of her hand touched his.

“Come away with me, Ben,” she whispered.

Fire burned through him, a white-hot heat that consumed his reason. She was the need he had never known. He could not refuse her. Colors and warmth blinded him to everything but her, and the whole of the world about him dropped away. His hand closed tightly about hers, and he felt them join.

“Come away with me, now.” Her body pressed close.

He reached for her, his arms wrapping her close, the softness of her body astonishing to him.

“High Lord!”

Everything blurred. There was a crashing of underbrush and the sound of footsteps. Rushes stirred, and the silence of the evening was shattered. Willow slipped from his arms.

“High Lord!”

Abernathy shoved his way into view at the shore’s edge, panting with near exhaustion, his glasses askew on his furry nose. Ben stared at him in stunned silence, then glanced wildly about. He stood in the tiny inlet alone, naked and shivering now. Willow was gone.

“Goodness, do not wander off like that again without one of us!” Abernathy snapped, a mix of irritation and relief in his voice. “I would have thought that your experience at Sterling Silver would have been lesson enough!”

Ben barely heard him. He was scanning the inlet waters and shoreline for Willow. The need for her still burned through him like fire, and he could think of nothing else. But she was nowhere to be found.

Abernathy sat back on his haunches, grumbling to himself. “Well, I suppose that it is not your fault. It is mostly the fault of Questor Thews. You did tell him that you wished to bathe in the lake and he should have known better than to send you off without Parsnip for company. The wizard seems incapable of understanding the risks this land poses for you.” He paused. “High Lord? Are you all right?”

“Yes,” Ben answered at once. Had Willow been some sort of bizarre hallucination? She had seemed so real …

“You appear a bit distressed,” Abernathy said.

“No, no, I’m fine …” He trailed off. “I just thought that I … saw something, I guess.”

He turned then and moved to the shoreline, stepping from the waters of the Irrylyn to dry ground. Abernathy had brought a blanket and wrapped it about him. Ben pulled the blanket close.

“Dinner is waiting, High Lord,” the dog advised, studying Ben closely over the rims of his glasses. Carefully, he straightened them. “Perhaps some soup will warm you.”

Ben gave a perfunctory nod. “Sounds good.” He hesitated. “Abernathy, do you know what a sylph is?”

The dog studied him some more. “Yes, High Lord. A sylph is a sort of woods fairy, the female offspring of sprites and nymphs, I’m told. I have never seen one, but they are supposed to be very beautiful.” His ears cocked. “Beautiful in human terms, that is. Dogs might differ.”

Ben stared off into the dark. “I suppose.” He took a deep breath. “Soup, you say? I could use a bowl.”

Abernathy turned and started away. “The campsite is this way, High Lord. The soup should be quite good if the wizard has managed to refrain from trying to improve on it by using his sadly limited magic.”

Ben cast a quick glance back at the inlet. The waters of the lake glimmered undisturbed in the moonlight. The shoreline stood empty.

He shook his head and hurried after Abernathy.

The soup was good. It steamed down inside Ben Holiday and took away the chill that had left him shaking when he had discovered he was alone in that inlet. Questor was relieved to see him safely back and quarreled with Abernathy all during the meal as to who should assume responsibility for the High Lord’s disappearance. Ben didn’t listen. He let them argue, spoke when spoken to, and kept his thoughts to himself. Two bowls of soup and several glasses of wine later, he was comfortably drowsy as he stared into the flames of the small fire Parsnip had built. It hadn’t even occurred to him to worry about drinking the wine.

He went to sleep shortly after. He rolled into his blankets and turned away from the fire, his gaze directed to the silver waters of the lake, the trailers of mist that hovered and swirled above them, and the night beyond. He listened to the silence that settled quickly over the hill country. He searched the darkness for shadows.

He slept well that night and, while he slept, he dreamed. He did not dream of Annie or Miles. He did not dream of the life he had left when he crossed over into Landover, nor of Landover or the myriad problems he faced as her King.

He dreamed instead of Willow.