stabbed the staff into the moss at foot and shrugged. “You offered no answer to my query, so I cannot be sure if I face friend or foe.”
“I am neither,” he said and stroked a hand over his bearded chin.
Those eerie eyes assessed her from head to bare toes, a gaze that boldly brushed her being. The sensory assault unnerved her for she was still startled by the tone of the man’s voice. So rough. Not at all melodious. The urge to step forward and scent him was strong, but she remained. Caution, her instincts whispered.
“What is that dangling from your hand?”
She gave the arret a twirl; the sharpened obsidian tip cut the air with a hiss. A simple weapon she fashioned herself. Not fire-forged, but deadly in its swift and accurate flight.
“Looks like that device would hurt,” the man bellowed in notes that knocked at the insides of Gossamyr’s skull. “At the least, leave a mark, should a man find it lodged in any portion of his anatomy.”
Amused by his jesting tone, Gossamyr agreed with a smirk. She had never placed an arret to any part of a man’s anatomy—mortal or fée—but there was always a first time. She lowered the weapon but kept it in hand.
She hadn’t expected to encounter a mortal so quickly. She had just been getting her bearings! Nor was she prepared in any way to converse with him. Did all mortals emit such raw and echoing sounds when they spoke? Gossamyr was accustomed to the musical lilt of fée speak; she had never guessed that mortals would not sound the same.
Well! Her first mortal. (If she did not tally Veridienne—whom she did not—for she, too, had worn a blazon of glamour). The fascination with standing so close to one did stir her blood. She had only ever dreamed to meet another mortal besides her mother. There wasn’t much physical difference between mortal and fée in body height or appendages, save the fée’s defining swish of wings, horns, scales and the occasional spiked spine. And the telling blazon.
Gossamyr gripped her throat. Was it noticeable? Is that why curious blue eyes fixed to her?
“You are alone, fair lady of the strange costume?” Not so grating as the initial tones.
“I am,” she replied. Strange costume? Her arachnagoss pourpoint? It was certainly very average. Mayhap he did not notice the sheen of glamour on her flesh. Better even, mayhap her blazon was concealed?
Two steps took her right up to the mule’s side. She gazed up into the mortal’s hooded visage. Musk and earth and a curious scent of sweetness intrigued.
“Remarkable,” the rumble-toned man said. “And most bewildering.”
“Why so?”
“My lady, do you not fear attack?”
A short burst of laughter preceded Gossamyr’s cocky grin. A spin of the longstaff cut the air in a swift gulp and she stabbed the tip to ground near her foot. “As you have remarked, I carry a big stick.”
“Indeed. As well you could take a man’s eye out with that spinny thing.”
“It is an arret,” she explained, then tucked it away on her braided amphi-leather belt. “Achoo!”
“Bless yo—my lady? Did—did you just…twinkle?”
“What?” Twinclian? She hadn’t moved. Well, the sneeze had shaken her fiercely—
“You just glimmered!”
Impossible—ah! So her blazon was visible!
A step back was necessary. A tug of her pourpoint did not lift the soft fabric any higher than her collarbone. The blazon started under her chin and flowed to the bottom of her collarbone, wrapping around her neck to under her ears.
The fée did not reveal themselves to mortals. Nothing but ill could come from discovery. Another step placed her in the shade of a fat-leaved mulberry.
Yet another startling thought unsettled: this mortal could see her. Mortals were not capable of seeing the fée. Not unless they possessed the sight. Hmm…Unless—no, she knew the fée visited the Otherside completely unseen.
Mayhap a half blood was visible to mortals?
So long as he did see her, she had better distract attention from her blazon, the only telling sign of Faery.
She summed up the man’s attire, long dark cloak, striped hose and an open white shirt with blue peacocks embroidered around the neck. About his fingers danced colors of ruby, sapphire and gold. Various silver symbols hung from a leather cord about his neck. Alchemical symbols, she surmised. A sure sign of the sight. And that she must beware, for surely he dabbled with magic. “You are…a wizard?”
“Far from it.”
“A mage?”
“Are they not two of the same?”
“What are you?” That you can see me!
“Why, I am a man.” Still sitting upon his mule he bowed to her and introduced himself. “Jean César Ulrich Villon III.” Casting a wink at her, he said, “But you may call me Ulrich.”
Ulrich. Who saw her. And whose voice blasted inside her skull and rippled through her body like tiny sparkles of sunlight heating her flesh. Everything about him called to her attention.
Was it the same for him? Did she sound so different? How soon before her blazon faded? Surely the Disenchantment would wipe it away?
And until it did, and she could walk undetected by mortal eyes?
“I shall call you gone.” Gossamyr nodded over her shoulder and made show of spinning the staff in a twirl of defiance.
“The lady is not a conversationalist. And I must heed she is well armed.” The man heeled his mule and ambled past her. “Very well. This forest remains the same. The trees are the same. All…is well.” His hood did not conceal the curious eyes drinking her in from crown to toe. Bare toes, Gossamyr realized as she turned her toes inward. “Fair fall you, my lady. Good…day.” He paused, blatantly staring at her, then, snapping his attention away, nodded. He muttered to himself, his parting words low but audible, “Could she be?”
Gossamyr watched until the man disappeared beyond a rise on the red clay path and the whistles of his renewed dirge became but a figment. Only then did she release her held breath. And only then did she realize she had been holding her breath.
“What sort of skittish maid am I? He presented no threat. He was but a man. A mortal man. I should have…asked him things. Questioned him!” She kicked a tuft of grass.
For all her frustration she had not been trained on mortal relations. Shinn had ever made it clear a trip to the Otherside would never occur. Martial skills served well against the spriggans, hobs and werefrogs of Faery. One did not have to converse with the rabble, merely lay them out.
So what hindrance had befallen her tongue? ’Twas not as if she had never before stood so close to a male. So close as to once kiss, she thought wistfully.
You are exotic…A Rougethorn’s wondrous declaration to love.
Yes, I can love. It is the mortal half of me who loves, I know it!
My lady, did you glimmer?
Ah! ’Twas the man’s notice of her blazon that had thrown her off! That is why she had sent him away so hurriedly. She had not expected to be seen. And if so, she required time to plot how she would move about in this new and alien world.
Yet, for as strange as she suspected her surroundings, the man had made an odd remark about the sameness of the forest. Verily, in a stretched-out, horizontal manner. And yet, far removed from all she had ever called home.
Fact remained, the mortal had seen her. Mayhap they all could? Her half blood had never before been tested by unEnchanted eyes. And if all could see her then all would remark the blazon.
A