Milkweed abruptly pulled Thistledown's ear to her lips again. "We have been advised to also tell you that when you reach Wayreth, you're to give the coin to a man named Par-Salian, and Par-Salian only. It will prove you took the faerie road, for the only humans to possess such a coin in your world are those who have safely traveled that road in ours."
That said, Thistledown placed the coin in Bram's waiting palm. The minted gold felt unexpectedly warm and heavy and bore the symbol of a disk that was half sun, half moon. On the other side was an image that Bram assumed was that of King Weador. Bram clasped the coin tightly as he gave a warm smile that took in all three tuatha, even the ones who'd never spoken to him. "Will I see you again after I return from Wayreth?"
Bram saw Thistledown's lips move frantically for one brief second, but he could hear no sound coming from them. He blinked once, twice, before realizing he'd unwittingly uttered the name of his destination. In the third blink of the nobleman's eye, the chilly hillside in Northern Ergoth gave way to a lush, green forest.
Bram had entered the realm of the tuatha. * " * * *
Bram's first thought was to keep the faerie coin safe, so he slipped it into a small inner pocket just beneath the drawstring that held up his brown trousers. Only then did he let himself look at his surroundings.
The road beneath his feet, crafted of interlocking blocks of stone worn or carved flat, was the smoothest he'd ever felt. This was no Ergothian dirt path riddled with wagon ruts and potholes of frozen water. His eyes followed its flat, gently curving ways around broad, gnarled trees and protruding boulders.
Above the road the green canopy was thick and close on all sides, making the path resemble a dark tunnel. The trees were a variety he didn't recognize, with broad, flat, oval leaves, some variegated with whorls of white, the rest a solid, blackish green. The bark was smooth and gray like that of a young maple, broken only by huge gnarls where once branches had grown. The underbrush was thick with thorny holly and rosy barberry bushes and a host of common roadside weeds, though how any of them received enough light through the canopy was a puzzle to Bram. Occasional thin slivers of bright blue limned the uppermost leaves, suggesting that somewhere above a sky and a sun existed. Unlike Stonecliff, the air was as warm as Ergoth in the month of Corij.
Strangely, it was a cheery forest in a dark, well- manicured sort of way. It looked neither magical nor foreboding as Thistledown's description of a death- dealing place would suggest.
Bram's fingertips traveled to the hidden pocket in his trousers for reassurance. Through the fabric he could feel the small, round outline of the faerie coin. Bram flung the heavy lapels of his winter cloak over his shoulders, looped the strap of his pack from waist to opposite collar bone, then set off down the road at a brisk pace.
He had not walked very far before he noticed that the forest was strangely silent, so silent he began to hear only his own footsteps. No birds sang, no squirrels chittered or shook the underbrush at the sound of his approach. Bram found himself self-consciously stepping so lightly that his heels made no noise to break the unnatural silence.
The road cut through a copse of draping, willowlike trees when the strange whispering began. Bram spun around, looking for the source of a vague, distant mumbling.
"Hello?" There was no one in sight behind or ahead of him on the road, nor could he see anyone among the denseness of the trees. He thought it odd that while no breeze lifted his hair, the thin, golden vines of the surrounding trees wafted in some mysterious wind.
"Is anyone here?" he called again. His voice echoed back at him three times, but there came no answering call. Just the odd whispering. He looked more closely at the unfamiliar variety of tree that surrounded him. The leaves were long, pink-tinged, and slightly humped in the middle. Though they looked vaguely like willow leaves, what each resembled more aptly was a delicate pair of lips.
The strange muttering began to grate on Bram's nerves, and he hastened down the road, hoping to escape the irritating noise. He left the odd copse of trees behind, and the whispering gradually receded. Bram began to relax.
It was only a matter of moments, however, before he spotted a flock of flamingo-sized birds perched on a single, bowed branch to the right of the path. With bodies of pink feathers and heads of orange fur, they watched him pass as one, five sets of yellow eyes glowing like small suns. They seemed more disturbing than dangerous, yet Bram picked up his pace to pass them quickly.
He had not walked very much farther when he heard a child's voice, thin and reedy, up ahead. The child sounded frantic and in need of help, so Bram broke into a run. His eyes searched the shrubs, looking for the owner of the plaintive voice.
The road curved gently to the right, and a narrow fork, obscured by tall brush, abruptly appeared on his left. Bram stopped at the turn and peered down the smaller path for the source of the voice. Several paces away was a small child, no more than ten years of age. The child wore a grubby, ripped, pink tunic that hung past its knobby knees and brushed the tops of the rags that wrapped its feet. Pale yellow hair dangled in limp, tangled ropes to the shoulders. Bram could not be certain if the child was a boy or a girl.
"Please!" the child cried. "You must help me. My mother is trapped beneath a log near our home, and I haven't the strength with my girlish arms to move it off her. She's been there for some time and near to blue, sir."
Bram hesitated, peering down the path behind the girl, then back to the main road Thistledown had instructed him to take.
Seeing his reluctance, the young girl dropped to her knees. "Please, sir," she begged, holding up clenched hands, "with your muscles, it will take but moments to move the log that traps my mother."
Bram squinted again over her shoulder, looking for a cottage or any other sign of life behind the girl, but all he saw was a path much narrower than the one on which he stood, as dark and confining as a tomb. "Where's your father?" he asked her.
"He's in the forest, beyond the sound of my voice," she said. "The forest is thick and dark near our cottage. He left to chop some holes to the sky."
Bram could make no sense of any of this. "How did your mother come to fall beneath a log?"
The girl had begun to wring her hands. "She wanted to help my father by trimming some trees near our cabin. I warned her not to, for fear a log would strike our little home, but she wouldn't listen." She looked frantically over her shoulder yet again. "It's not very far to our cabin, just around that first bend."
Torn with indecision, Bram ran a hand through his hair. He looked at the road beneath her feet, a path of sorts. He'd been warned to take the third fork to the left, not the first. Somehow he knew the reason Thistledown had not mentioned any exceptions to the rule was because there were none.
"Please, sir," the girl beseeched him, palms pressed together. "I fear this hesitation may have already made it too late to save her. We could not survive without my mother."
Bram looked into her pale golden eyes and found them strangely unmoved, considering her desperate words. "Have you any rope?" he asked suddenly.
The question surprised her. "I suppose that we do."
"You'll need a long piece, more than twice the length of the thickest branch nearest your mother," he said quickly. "Throw one end of the rope over the branch, then tie both ends around the log that pins her. Establish a good foothold, then tug the rope sideways with all your might. The log should lift enough for your mother to roll to safety."