Winter Waltz

[Estimated reading time: 5 minutes]

   Grey stone glowed golden in the reach of the old fireplace. It was the only colour left in the room so late at night, all else bleached by the moonlight. Even the ornaments of the lonely Christmas tree had been robbed of any cheer - and, no less, the elderly woman in the armchair beside the fire. She stared off into the flames and through them, or out into the blizzard beyond her undressed windows, seeing absolutely nothing. It seemed, for all good, that she hadn't smiled in an eternity, and that the tree had been put up by nothing but habit, solely as a means of marking the turning of one year into another.
   And so she didn't notice when the fire grew brighter. Nor when it crackled and sputtered, nor when it died out, and not even when she shivered at the suddenly creeping cold. She didn't react. She didn't move. She didn't blink. She just stared on into the night, consumed entirely by something else.
   The chill hardened. A breath of it drifted, groaning, brushing every corner of the room with curiosity, whipping a little around each candle it found like a firefly. Every one of them puffed to life, one after another, until the room blazed with twenty candles or more, not one candelabra forgotten.
   Now, she noticed.
   Slowly, cautiously, she straightened and looked around the room, a deep breath filling her creaking chest as her gaze wandered from flame to flame, searching still for something between the shadows and the night's breath. But there was no alarm around her old eyes. There was hope. Tentative hope, one that promised a payoff in pain, but hope nevertheless.
   Then, among the cracks of silence, a deep, ethereal music stirred, from nowhere and everywhere, pulling her drawn face into a smile. She pushed herself to her feet, heart beating fast and hot in her chest.
   The short chirps of a violin moved slowly from the darkness to the moonlight above it, like stars glinting awake in an empty sky, giving the music its first shape and colour. The air grew warmer with it. She didn't notice the thicker clouds of her breath as she removed her slippers from her feet, and felt as much as heard more violins joining the first.
   Her eyes moved faster, and she spun every few tip-toed steps to keep up with them, searching through the choirs of candles to find shape or face.
   Then, the music thinned. Only the violins remained, powerful, yearning, louder than before, and a strong, punctuating drum struck on every third of the repeated bars.
   A hand grasped hers.
   The music erupted.
   The deep, warm hum of cellos joined the rest and spun around her as she followed the pulling hand, and spotted at last instruments of mist and glittering frost around the room, unmanned yet played to perfection, bowing, striking and plucking themselves in precise time. Cheer tinkled from her voice as she laughed and danced with the phantom force, the drums thickening as the room around her began to glitter. But she saw none of it. The ghost of silver smiled down at her, his eyes twinkling like stars as he led her around in a powerful waltz, holding her gaze with his, and she did not fight against it.
   Magic, of night or of music, had stolen her entirely.
   Around they twirled, her leaning into his hold, he gripping her waist with perfect respect; she with her dress flowering, he with his coattails flicking and drifting, until, finally, the music thinned out to only the deepest violins singing their thrumming, masculine song.
   The other instruments relaxed, and the waning music took gravity with it, carrying the two of them both effortlessly from the ground to dance instead upon the ceiling. And there, he released her to drift and dance alone while he began to conduct the instruments himself, drawing one back in at a time with elegant gestures and curls of his fingers until they all danced and sang precisely as he wished them to, and ghostly voices chanted and hymned along from somewhere above or beneath them.
   Then she was back in her arms, turning and stepping together again as the power of the music intensified, lowering from the ceiling until they danced with nothing beneath their feet at all. A window burst open with the drums, the blizzard spiralled in and laced around them like stars, howling and tinkling along with the crescendoing melody.
   And then, it collapsed.
   The music drifted away like a scattering of birds until only the gentlest hum remained, and the ghost kissed her, warming and freezing her suddenly broken heart in the same moment.
   She felt the ground return beneath her bare feet. It was frigid, covered in snow and frost and glittering around them like jewels. And then, only the whisper of snow could be heard.
   She opened her eyes as he pulled away from the kiss, and she saw him fade before her. But still, he smiled, longing and loving. "Until next year, my love," he promised, his voice hollow and distant, as though shouted over a mile though he appeared right before her.
   But she had expected it, even as a small piece of her heart chipped away at the sound. "Until next year," she agreed. "And before long, I'll be with you eternally."
   And with that, his hand faded from hers, the candles extinguished, and his sad, pained but grateful eyes etched themselves into her vision to linger but seconds after they vanished, erased by a reluctant blink.
   Again, she was alone.
   A heavy breath wracked her lungs, and her old legs wavered beneath her. She sought her chair though tear-drowned eyes.
   The snow and frost had vanished. The fire had jumped back to life. The window had closed itself. There was no trace of what had just happened.
   Nothing, but the cold, red, frosted mark of his handprint in hers.

 

This story is not to be copied or reproduced without my written permission. Copyright © 2025 Kim Wedlock

The Fate of Glory

[Estimated reading time: 17 minutes]

   The storyteller frowned. "What do you mean?"
   "Then what happened?" The girl asked again with no change at all in her enthusiasm, as though simply repeating the question would clarify the matter.
   The storyteller looked bemused across the gathered children while nearby adults chuckled and shook their heads, and those further out continued their merry dance to the tavern's music, oblivious to the scrutiny happening by the fireplace.
   He ended up shaking his own head and helplessly repeating his own question. "What do you mean?"
   "What happened then?" Another child asked. "Did he go home? Get married? Or was he already married?"
   "Was his wife beautiful?" A girl asked, one of the youngest, climbing up onto a table behind the old man. "Did she make him go to work after he did all the heroic stuff or did he get given lots and lots of gold from the king?"
   "Is being a hero a job?" A boy asked.
   "Heroism," the storyteller cried over the continuing onslaught of questions, more than a little exasperated and twitchingly aware of the young girl behind him, "is its own reward...little one."
   "So that means being a hero makes you rich?"
   "No, no, my dear, it means that good deeds make you rich in spirit."
   "So," the little girl was lying upside down on the table now, "his ghost was rich? What about when he was alive though? Or did he die?!"
   "Eventually, y-yes, he di--"
   "What about Frederick of Morne or the Emerald Skyhawk? Did they die from being heroes and have rich ghosts?"
   A wasting sigh heaved from the storyteller, and the adults that had been enjoying the poor man's suffering began shouting support towards him. But it was a young guardsman that finally saved the night.
   "Come on you lot," he called, rising from his seat and waving for the girl to climb down off the table, tossing a wink to the old man as he went, "it's after hours and you've exhausted this poor fellow. Head on home. We'll have to pay him double now to compensate him for your trouble. And you two," he squeezed the shoulders of the two oldest as they gathered themselves beneath a cloud of complaints but followed obediently to the door, "you're both on thin ice with your masters as it is."
   "We just want to know what happened to the hero after his story," the youngest complained again, even as she skipped off ahead of him.
   "And there's plenty of time to find out, but not tonight. Go on, get!"
   The children were herded out through the door to the cold, fireless night, and as it swung closed behind them, the warmest corner of the tavern breathed a sigh of relief. None so heavy as the storyteller, and he wondered, with that breath, if he had made the right career choice. Perhaps he should have found a new field to tend when the last went up in flames...
   An old woman began chuckling next to him. He glanced her way. "You might want to devise some answers for the next time this happens," she smiled. "Children are insightful and curious. They ask the questions adults would rather avoid."
   "Yes," he sighed again, "you're right of course, ma'am. I'll make it a priority. They won't catch me out again."
   "I'm sure they won't. For the moment though, you look far too exhausted."
   "It's the weather, ma'am. The chill is in my bones."
   "Then to bed with a hot sack of oats, perhaps? That, I'm afraid, is all that will help you, because no matter how long you eye the barmaid," she cocked a grey eyebrow as he looked guiltily back at her, "she has neither the time nor the obligation. A sack of oats is easier."
   He rose to his feet, nodding his agreement, took a deep breath--
   "And," she added sharply, "stop sighing so much. You'll blow the fire out with any more of that."
   --He breathed back out in a laugh instead, bowed slightly, and walked away to the tavern keep to make his request, leaving the older patrons to listen to the calm crackle of the surviving fire in his place. The silence was comfortable for a while - at least, she had felt it was - but something in the air had disturbed a few of the others.
   Cautiously, one man lowered his voice and spoke. "What do you think did happen to them?" He asked, looking across his friends. "The heroes I mean, when their job was done?"
   "Oh," the old woman shook her head, reaching then for her tankard. "I don't suspect anything good, do you? Not in the end. No, heroes are just men after all, and most die like the rest of us." She gestured to the fire, though didn't look up from the table. "Bright flames burn the fastest. They either get snuffed out, or snuff themselves out."
   "Yeah, but...they're heroes..."
   She shrugged, a bewildered frown slowly creeping across her face. "So? Their stories aren't letters of immunity, you know, least of all to Death and Misfortune. If anything, they are invitations. You surely can't believe otherwise..."
   "N-no, ma'am," another spoke up, "with all due respect, I believe you might be misunderstanding us. We don't mean heroes in stories, we mean real her--"
   "Yes," she leaned forwards and lowered her voice, her stare rising from the tabletop to look openly across the numerous eyes that had turned her way, "and I'm speaking of real heroes. These 'heroes in stories' - first, well, I ask you: where did the story come from? From the hero's actions, of course! There is no story without the hero. Heroism, victory, or even defeat with morals left in tact - all of these things require a hero first, and they are told on. And secondly, why are they told on?"
   "To inspire?" Someone offered.
   "For history?" Another spoke up.
   "Lessons." Said a third, a younger guard that had been sitting with the children's escort. His eyes were hard. Purposeful.
   The old woman looked at him a fraction longer than the rest, and smiled. "Yes. Lessons. But," she raised a finger, "even beneath the obvious lessons told within the distraction of heroes are others that go untold, ones of equal or perhaps even greater importance. Those of the Person beyond the People, of the unfortunate soul who tasted that fame - willingly or not.
   "But!" She raised her tankard and sat back, noticing the frown that passed across the guard's brow at her words, "these are not the stories anyone really wishes to hear. And answers the questions that we don't really want to ask. And yet...here we are, asking them..."
   All gathered glanced warily to their neighbours. A weight had settled in the room, though the gleeful music, dancers and drinkers a short distance away from their circle seemed somehow oblivious to it. But to those involved, it was demanding, demanding of many things, but of two above all: to be stared directly into, and avoided at all costs.
   For a long while, no one spoke. No one could choose which demand to answer. But the old woman soon spoke again anyway, and no one tried to silence her.
   "How many heroes," she began offhandedly, addressing the low level of ale in her tankard rather than anyone else, "do you think, live on past their moment and still manage to die a heroic, meaningful death? And how many, do you think, go on to live humbly, content and accepting of the fact that their role has been fulfilled?" She looked up. No one answered. The number of listeners had grown from nine to twelve. "And how many, do you think, are honestly beyond the rigours and weaknesses of the rest of us?" She took a mouthful as she waited, then set the tankard down. "I'm asking."
   "...None." One man answered cautiously, at which the weight in the air grew somehow darker and even more dismal. "It's none, isn't it?"
   The old woman nodded slowly. "The actions of heroes are intense, are they not? And what healthy mind would stare death in the face to save others? A valiant one, yes, and so few of us possess that. But what's beneath that valiance? It's a strain of madness, for sure, and it manifests afterwards in vicious ways. Ways unbefitting of how we deem a hero to behave.
   "Many can't help but chase the high when it's over. Others grow embittered by the loss of the fame they had earned, or more nobly angered by the necessity of what they had to do and what they became in doing it. Some grow deluded. And the unlucky few, well...they turn mad, haunted in life by the spirits of those they were unable to save, and in death by those who died as collateral to the hubris of their actions. Actions that shouldn't have been necessary. And that's to say nothing of the would-be heroes that died before they could address the matters first. They're the lucky ones, really...
   "But," she sipped again, then gestured to the barmaid for another, "I digress. Heroism is a young man's game. Swords and armour are heavy, and the stress of sneaking beneath a sorcerer's notice to unravel his plans is crippling. So what happens to those soft, malleable minds and strong bodies? Hmm? Ageing and infirmity is rarely met gracefully by the best of us, after all.
   "A hero complex is, at its core, a sickness. And what happens when they do what they cannot for others purely - whether they know it or not - to feed it? To stay needed, to stay relevant, their whole sense of identity and worth hingeing so delicately on their heroism? They run themselves to the ground. They make mistakes. Become hysterical, obsessive, until they inevitably drive themselves to a struggling death at their own hands and bring others down with them in their decaying attempts to continue to help. Because, rather than let them turn to others who could help more effectively with various skills, the hero jumps in first. It's like he tries to take that barmaid's tray, the mop over there, light these candles and turn the straw on the floor all by himself in a single moment because he can't admit that others could be better suited for a particular task, and has decided that, if he doesn't do it all himself, it won't get done and people, somehow, will suffer for it.
   "And that's just one example. Say the hero complex doesn't take, and they can accept the loss of their fame. What would most likely move in next? Hmm?" She looked across them all, then settled on the farrier. "Farley. Say all the horses in the world were going to be culled, and the only way to prevent it was to kill five horses in every village, but you had to do it yourself. You could get help, but you want to make sure it's done right, that they don't suffer, and that it's done quickly. So, you don't ask for help, you do it alone, then, matter taken care of, the majority of horses live on, never to be culled. You saved an entire species, single-handedly." She cocked her head. "And then, when that fact has settled and the silver on the imaginary reward has dulled and tarnished...what will stay with you? The memory of the glory? Or the memories of those many, many horses dying at your hands?"
   The farrier's hands were already balled into white fists. "I see your point."
   "Say it out loud, for everyone," she replied, softly. "It's important."
   "The horses. The blood. Those are the memories that would stay with me."
   She nodded, and offered him an apologetic smile. The man's fondness for his horses and trade was well-known. "A hero loves his people just as much. So what does anger at one's self or at the very nature of the world do to someone when they are left with time to think after the fact? It erodes both the mind and the ability to feel joy, if they can even remember what that feels like, until they turn upon themselves or upon the very people they had once fought to save. And gods forbid that the cost they paid to achieve their goal was the life of someone they loved. There is no saving the heart of someone who believes themselves the murderer of it.
   "Now," she smiled and thanked the barmaid as she set down a fresh tankard in front of her, and noted both with sympathy and mild amusement the disquiet in her face as she entered and left their moody bubble, "this is by no means to say that heroes are destined to become villains, or to die miserably - though they are certainly mentally afflicted, to a degree. But it is to say that even heroes are subject to our weaknesses, and that the ones we so idolise have paid for their names in ways unimaginable. And those are lessons that, I think at least, are worth telling. They should be respected beyond solely their heroism." She sipped from her tankard. "This isn't ale."
   The men looked at each other. They numbered thirteen now.
   "Did...did that happen to Frederick of Morne?" One asked carefully, as though his heart didn't truly want to know, but his soul needed the closure. "Did he go mad? Did he hate the world?"
   She swallowed the third mouthful of mead, spread her hands and sat back. "I couldn't tell you, honestly. Another thing about heroes is that, after their glory, many of them have a habit of disappearing from the public eye."
   "Hang on..." the second guard piped up, the chair beside him still empty. Law dictated that he should have left with his partner, but instead he'd stayed to listen to her, the intensity in his eyes now even more piercing and his previously proud bearing now insulted. Personally, it seemed. "That means that everything you just said could so easily be untrue... If most of them vanish, how could anyone truly know how they turned out?"
   And there it was. She watched suspicion enter the eyes of half of her audience, and relief enter the rest. Plausible deniability.
   She kept her sigh to herself. "You can decide that for yourselves," she replied coolly instead, "if that makes it easier for you. This isn't something people generally want to be aware of, so I wouldn't blame you. Though," she added offhandedly, "their spirits might."
   "And how many heroes have you known, to be so certain of so dark a thing?" He demanded.
   "Ohhhh many," she smiled. "Heroes of all shapes and calibres."
   Just as the young guard gathered himself to fire another challenge, the music came to a flourishing stop, and the closing bell rang any words into oblivion.
   Her audience rose, Suddenly eager to be away from her, muttering "it's not true"s and "mad old cow"s beneath their breath, yet not too low as to go unheard. But, as she obediently pulled her cloak back around her body, the soldier stormed towards her. She met his eyes calmly, and for a moment the anger in them wavered. She smiled as it returned. "Your training is going well?" She asked before he could find the sharp tip of his own tongue.
   He cocked a bitter smile instead. "Very."
   "Good."
   Surprise collapsed his face as he realised she had moved at incredible speed for his sword, and he grasped for it in an attempt to keep it, but succeeded only in brushing its shadow. She was already turning it over in her hands.
   "And how confident do you feel now?"
   "Give it back," he barked, snatching for it, but she deftly wove it from his grip.
   "Answer the question."
   His eyes narrowed. "...Less..."
   "As I thought." She gave it back. "Work to balance that confidence. The sword isn't the protector. You are."
   He took it back quickly and returned it to its sheath. The movement wasn't as smooth as he had probably hoped, but she turned her attention to the door to spare him.
   "Who are you?" He asked.
   And she smiled easily. "Gladelyn the Reaper Moth."
   He cocked a slender eyebrow. "Oh?"
   "Don't believe me?" She smirked. "How about Eregelda Titanstone?"
   "Ma'am, please--"
   "Enterilngana of the Netherroads?"
   He sighed and rolled his eyes. His anger was gone. 'Mad old woman' indeed.
   She chuckled, then, and patted him firmly on the shoulder. "I apologise. Forgive an old woman her fun."
   Then another bell chimed, this one further away, somewhere out in the western side of the city. The tavern's bell likely drowned out the first ring.
   The soldier's face hardened at the sound of it, and his wearied eyes sharpened.
   "Well," the old woman sighed, "it looks like you had better head back to the Tower. The monks will be out to hunt soon, and if they catch you--"
   "They won't catch me. They'll be in smouldering pieces before I am."
   "Hmm...it must be nice to be so young. Fare well, young master. May your wits be as sharp as your blade, but always in your hands."
   He bowed, briefly, perhaps automatically, perhaps because of her age, or perhaps because a mad old woman was best respected if just to keep her calm, and as he turned and darted out of the door, she wandered for the staircase, took a lantern, and continued up to her quarters.

   The room was small, leaving the shadows little space to dance, but it was enough. It was a temporary stop on her way to the east, and needed only house herself and two trunks.
   She set the lantern on the single flat surface in the room, a small table near the bed as opposed to next to it, knelt down at the foot, and unlocked one of the trunks.
   The hinges didn't squeak, she took far too good care of it for that, and she pulled her night clothes from the selection of cloth-wrapped bundles. They gave a slight clatter as they moved, a sound that, even though muffled, still managed to hurt her heart. There wasn't another quite like it to a trained ear, and nothing that could draw up so many memories and emotions from the past.
   She reached out and rearranged what had slipped, pulling the cloth back over the glint of steel on the long and narrow bundle, and positioned it diagonally from corner to corner, the only way it would fit. The wide, flat oval too needed to be placed just so. And once they were back where they belonged, she closed the trunk tight and locked it again without a second's hesitation.
   It was more than a little unpleasant to disrobe from her travelling clothes in the cold, but she longed to be rid of the way they clung to her and feel just vaguely more comfortable for the night, even if it were only a few hours. She had earned that much of a luxury, if nothing else.
   And so she removed her cloak, untied her blouse, and peeled away the leggings, exposing her scarred skin only as long as necessary to the chill night air, before diving into the night clothes and the bed in one frantic movement. No sooner was she in it than she pulled the covers straight up to her chin. The bed, somehow, was colder than the air. Maybe she should have requested herself a sack of warm oats...
   She sighed - her turn, now - rolled over and closed her eyes, waiting for the bed to warm up with her. But she knew it wouldn't be quick. In fact, she knew it would get colder first. She knew that, within a few minutes, the temperature would drop further, something in the air would change, and she would open her eyes and find herself staring into the ghostly face of her lover, lying in the bed beside her.
   And like clockwork, within the passage of nine minutes, there he was. And he stayed, smiling softly, as her eyes filled with tears, until she finally wished him a good night and he vanished just as he did every other time.
   She closed tear-brimmed eyes.
   "And when a hero fails," she muttered to herself, "the cost feels so much higher..."

 

This story is not to be copied or reproduced without my written permission. Copyright © 2025 Kim Wedlock

It Has Begun

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The Ferryman

[Estimated reading time: 6 minutes]

   The small boat drifted calmly across the sea. Moon and stars danced across the rippling water, and there was nothing else to see or hear. It was a tranquil desert out there that night.
   Manannán would have sat at peace as he drifted, but something tugged at his weathered brow.
   Peering over the edge of the boat, he looked down into his water, and saw only his reflection. And he felt more from it than he should have.
   He sat back down and looked out again into the night. "Come up," he said to the air, and with a soft disturbance of the water, the reflection rose. "Get in." And, duly, it climbed into the boat.
   Dripping wet, it sat down on the seat opposite him. It didn't speak, and neither did he say another word
   The boat drifted on, adjusting course without oar or sail, despite the lack of wind, and Manannán stood and turned his back to his guest, looking off to one side. He was fixated on something unseen that apparently drifted by them - or they drifted by it.
   But the reflection continued to watch him, gaze fixed instead to the back of his head. And when he turned to face it, it had changed. A woman, with golden hair, an ethereal, otherworldly face, elegant in a dress gilded with swan feathers, and he felt his heart twitch at the sight of her. But something about it was wrong. His eyes narrowed.
   The woman changed again, to a younger man, dark of hair with a heavy torc around his neck, kingly in bearing, and sea-weathered. This earned less of a reaction. And when it changed again, to a meek, skeletal child, he turned, sat back down to face her, and sighed. With that sigh, he, too, changed. His hardened, muscular appearance took on a younger, feminine form, with grey skin, pure white eyes, hair of either black or silver, it was impossible to tell, and an otherworldly charm.
   The child didn't react.
   He changed again, to an elderly man with some resemblance to the previous, then an elderly woman who could have been her mother. Then he turned back to the first.
   Still the child didn't react, even as those eerie white eyes stared into her soul.
   What is your name?" He asked once the silence failed to intimidate either of them. But he already knew. The child knew that. It was a test.
   She changed then to mirror his grey-skinned form, and smiled with small teeth. "Nothing that can be pronounced in this realm," she replied.
   Her reflection nodded slowly, but continued to stare. Manannán soon returned to his true form. She didn't change again.
   "You have a painful heart," he told matter-of-factly, but she didn't respond. "And a dangerous road." He sat forwards. "While I appreciate the game with such a worthy player, why have you come to me? What is it that you want?"
   "Your boat." She didn't hesitate.
   He nodded slowly again, and sat back on his seat. The vessel barely rocked with the motion. "Most are after the sword," he muttered, then spoke up. "The boat's not for hire, I'm afraid. I have a job to do, just as you do. Souls won't find their way to Tír Tairngire without us." He spread his hands, as though it was out of his power, then dropped them back to his lap. "You need to cross water?"
   "I do. Alone."
   "No ships. No crew." He cocked his head in thought. "Would the horse do? She's not as swift as the boat, and she will need to stop from time to time, but she can cover the seas just as well."
   The realm-walker smiled. "Aonbharr?"
   "Who else?"
   "Yes," she nodded, her smile widening. "Aonbharr would do."
   He raised his hand to his mouth and unleashed a powerful, echoing call unlike anything she had ever heard, and an answering neigh resounded from the distance. Then he turned back to her with authority in his ancient eyes. "And I'm lending her to you, you understand? I expect to have her back."
   "I am not a thief, Manannán. I will return all that I've borrowed."
   "'Borrowed' is an interesting term," he muttered, though without a scoff. "You stole from Hekate."
   The grey woman waved her hand carelessly. "I borrowed without asking. The keys will be returned."
   "And will Jack O'Lantern be given back to himself?"
   At this, she hesitated.
   "As much so as he can be, I suppose."
   The horse appeared - a horse it was, though there was something different about it that she couldn't quite put her finger on, aside from the fact that it was standing quite easily upon the water's surface, as white as the foam itself.
   "Why did you not fight me?"
   She looked back to him. "For her? I didn't need to. The others were beings of...chaos, really. You are one of balance. I treat everyone accordingly."
   "You did try to trick me, though," he pointed out. Then added: "unsuccessfully."
   She smiled coyly. "Did I try to trick you, though? Or did I just need your attention?"
   He couldn't seem to help smiling at that, but it soon saddened. "Have you never considered just speaking?"
   "Too easy."
   Again he stared at her, and his smile wilted. "You have a painful heart."
   "You've said that already."
   He nodded. "It's worth saying it again."
   A frown flickered across her face at the weight of those words. Then he rose to his feet and held out his hand, which she took and rose after him, and allowed him to lead and help her up onto his horse, which he patted and muttered to all the while.
   "What are you saying to her?" She asked sceptically as she found her seating.
   "That you will be looking after her for now, and that you can be trusted." He glanced up at her deliberately at this point. "To a degree."
   A slender eyebrow cocked. "To a degree?"
   "You have a--"
   "Painful heart, yes, you've said." She sighed and adjusted herself upon the creature's bare back. She'd never ridden without a saddle before, and it was distinctly less comfortable. But if the horse preferred it, so be it. She wasn't about to offend it, nor especially its owner. She looked back down at him and smiled. "Thank you."
   He raised wrinkled hands. "Don't thank me yet. If she doesn't return to me healthy and happy, there will be a price."
   "Somehow I don't think you're talking about money."
   A crooked smile moved across his face. "What use would the king of the Otherworld have for that?"
   "King of the Otherworld," she nodded to herself. "Yes, that's fair. A price. Got it."
   "Good." He patted the horse's rear, spoke in clicks, and off it moved, carrying her across the water. "Now go, with my luck. You will need it."
   "And don't I know it," she muttered to herself, steering the horse towards the nearest shore who knew how far away.