Egelric's night is not wasted

Egelric did not know how long he had been walking. The sky was obscured by clouds; he had not the stars to give him the hour, or even a bit of light. And he was cold. His walking had kept him from shivering, but his cheeks were numb with cold, and his nose ran into his mustache.

It was as dark as night could be, as cold as October could be, and he had seen nothing – it had all been for nothing.

He had walked far this night, but he had spent much of his time stumbling through the blackened underbrush of Selwood, and he had returned again and again to the crossroads where he had often met Druze and Midra. It was the best idea he had.

Now he cursed himself for a fool. The valley was vast, and none knew where in it the elves dwelled. It was a sort of arrogance to believe that the woman would attack precisely at the spot where he stood waiting for her.

He would have to return to Nothelm with nothing to show for his night. No… he would go directly to the castle at dawn. Sigefrith had plenty of work for him to do. He would simply not sleep until tomorrow night. And the following day was Sunday, and he–

He stopped and stood in the center of the road, his hand on the hilt of his knife. A shadow had emerged from Selwood and was tearing across the cloddy field. It ran more as if it were pursued than as if it were the pursuer, but it seemed to wear a dress.

Egelric drew his knife and ran down the road. He thought that if she continued her course, he might meet her before she disappeared into the woods on the other side, but the shadow-​​woman ran faster than any woman he had ever seen. She bounded over the furrowed earth like a hare. He would never reach her in time.

But as she neared the edge of the field, she staggered and slowed, and he saw that she no longer held up the hem of her dress but was flailing her arms about her head. Just as she stumbled, her shadow doubled in size, and part of her seemed to fall away onto the earth, and she screamed a single, piercing scream, like a dying hare.

Egelric leapt the ditch and ran towards the confused mass of shadows that writhed before him in the field. He was too breathless and too intent to shout a warning.

He held the long iron knife of his grandfather poised for a downward stab with all the length of his arm and all his weight behind it – but first he would have to determine what exactly he intended to kill.

As he came to a stop, a livid face looked up at him, disfigured by surprise and rage. He glanced down at a second woman who lay amid the clods, though he could see only her pale throat and the bottom of her chin from where he stood. And then the first sprang at him.

Her hands flew to his face, clawing after his eyes, and he only just squeezed them shut in time. The way he held his knife did not permit him to stab upwards into her belly, and he could only reach around her, blinded, and drag the point of the blade down her back as she knocked him over and fell upon him.

But the point of the knife had been enough. She squirmed off of him and tried to crawl far enough away to stand, but her legs were tangled in her dress, and she fell forward onto her face.

Egelric pushed himself up onto one knee and lifted his arm to bring the knife down into her back, but she suddenly vanished. Stunned, he allowed his arm to sink, and he did not see the smaller, darker shadow until it had wriggled out of reach. He hesitated a moment – it seemed to be only an animal of some sort – but then it swelled and lightened into the woman’s body and pale dress, and immediately disappeared again into a dark shadow that hung in the air an instant and then went flapping away on leathery wings.

Egelric sat up and stared after it, bewildered. Had the woman turned herself into a bat? Had he simply gone mad? He touched the edge of his knife – it was wet. He stared at his fingertips in the dark. Blood?

Then he remembered the other woman, who still lay on her back in the dirt, motionless. He wiped his fingers on his cloak, and his knife likewise before slipping it back into its sheath, but he drew the smaller one out of his boot before going to kneel beside her.

Her dress was as dark as the dry earth, and Bertie had said that Hel’s dress had been white. There was not enough light to see the color of her hair, but it was dark – too dark, perhaps, to be red. Amid all the dark, her pale skin seemed almost to glow with its own light. It was all he could see.

This was not Hel. Hel had been the other.

He notched the fingers of his left hand up underneath her jawbone in search of a pulse, but as her head turned towards him and her hair fell back, he thought he could see the dim outline of a pointed ear.

She was not dead.

He moved his hand away from her neck and gingerly touched her ear. Of course. An elf.

He slid his knife back into his boot and rocked back onto his heels to contemplate her. He had saved her, it seemed. Now what was he to do with her?

He tapped her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “Oh! Wake up,” he said softly. Her skin was no warmer than his. A fire was something he could do.

He looked up at the forest’s edge. It was far. It would be safer to carry her to the wood than to carry the wood to her.

She was not as heavy as her height suggested, but her limbs hung sickeningly limp, and he was reminded again of a hare – a dead hare plucked from a snare. She was not merely asleep.

After he had built a fire beside her, he was obliged to return to consideration of what he was supposed to do with her.

“Oh! Wake up!” he said again, feeling increasingly awkward. Of course, if being carried in his arms across the uneven field had not awoken her–

But she awoke and blinked at him. Her wide eyes were dark and wet and frightened, like a hare’s.

And as if she were a wild animal, he sat quite still and waited for her to make the first move.

She sat up and began babbling in a language that was like none he had ever heard, waving one hand out at the field, and pointing at her throat with the other.

“I’m sorry,” he said softly. “I don’t understand you.”

She gasped and fell silent.

Egelric pushed his hair back behind one ear so that she could see the shape of it.

“Man?” she whispered.

He shrugged and smiled sheepishly.

“You… see?” she asked, pointing to her eyes.

“See what?”

“You see… I?” she asked, pointing to her chest.

“Do I see you?” he chuckled. “Indeed I do.”

She gaped at him for a moment, and then asked, “You see Hel?” She pointed at the field.

“Hel?” he asked. He drew his long knife and laid it on the earth before him. “This is for Hel.”

“Hel…” She searched for words for a moment, and then began speaking rapidly in her language.

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand a word of it.”

She sighed in frustration and looked down into the fire for a moment. Then she took a breath as if she meant to speak, but when she looked up at him again, she gasped and stared off behind him, her dark eyes wide with fear.

Egelric snatched the knife that lay before him and leapt up to face whatever had frightened her, but he choked on the deep breath he took as he rose, for it stunk of rotting flesh.

He looked up to see Druze standing just inside the forest, loathsome and naked and sneering.

“You!” Egelric growled, and he spat in a futile attempt to get the taste of him out of his mouth.

“You!” Druze mocked him and chuckled a little before looking past him to the elf and wheezing something at her in their own language.

“Nai! Nai! Nai!” she stammered, coming to her feet.

“That sounds rather like a No to me,” Egelric said to him. “What do you mean to do to her?”

“Take her home!” Druze barked and stepped closer.

Egelric raised his knife menacingly, and Druze stopped and shook his head and lifted a warning finger.

The elf said something to Druze, and he replied to her without a sneer. Egelric’s eyes danced between them. She was obviously frightened of the creature. He couldn’t blame her.

“Do you want to go with him?” he asked her.

She blinked at him, and he could not be sure whether she hadn’t understood the question or simply didn’t know what to reply.

Druze spoke to her again, and she walked slowly around the fire, coming to stand a moment at Egelric’s side.

“You may stay with me,” he said to her, but he glared at Druze. “Let them send a less hideous footman to fetch you home.” But he did not think she would understand.

He looked at her in surprise as he felt her little finger caress the back of his hand, but then she stepped past him. Druze had been holding his eyes – he did not think he had seen.

Had she simply meant to communicate her gratitude to him, or was it something else? He knew nothing of the customs of elves, except that they all seemed to like to strangle him. But he did not doubt that it had been deliberate.

By the time he had recovered from his surprise, she had reached Druze, and they both began to walk back into the woods without another word to him. Her dark hair and dark dress disappeared at once into the shadows, but the glow of Druze’s livid skin faded out more slowly.

Egelric stared after them until even the stench of the dead elf had faded, then turned to extinguish his fire.

The sky was still too dark for dawn. If he returned to Nothelm, he thought he might have a few hours of sleep after all. He had nothing to show for his night, but plenty to tell.