The Silver Creature's Silent Plea

Story So Far

A hooded traveler entered a crowded tavern carrying a satchel of honeyberries and was noticed immediately by Taryn, who mentioned that Brek had passed through earlier with an arrow wound pulled clean by a ranger and that the traveler was two days late. Taryn told the traveler to sit and brought stew and dark bread, then asked if there was anything she should know about. The traveler claimed ignorance of the ranger, said they had been delayed helping an animal in distress, and ate while Taryn worked the bar. At the near end of the bar sat a lead man with his right arm in a cloth sling and his shoulder wrapped tight, a third man staring into his drink with his knife sheathed, and Brek was absent from the group.

The traveler finished the stew, met the lead man's stare, and nodded at his sling; the lead man looked away while two farmers nearby murmured about the north road. Taryn told the traveler to pack more food on future travels. The traveler signaled Taryn toward the two wary farmers, and Taryn served them complimentary cups from a darker stronger back-cask batch sweetened with honeyberries. The traveler raised a cup and asked about the north road, and the farmers reported that something had moved along the Carver farm fence line for three nights running, watching, knocking posts, and frightening livestock, and that Harlen's boy would not go out after dark.

The farmers described a moving shimmer near the fence line and said Harlen had stood staring at it for a full minute, unable to move, before coming inside white as birch bark and had not left his property in three days. The traveler said they would go shake the thing loose. The lead man sat at the far end of the bar with his cup untouched and his head tilted to catch every word without looking over.

The traveler rose, went to Taryn, and told her aloud to give the other two a round on the lead man's coin as thanks for information, holding the lead man's gaze until he nodded. The traveler then sat beside the lead man, who gave his name as Cael. The traveler told Cael that Brek's arm was healing stronger, mentioned three nights of movement at the Carver fence line, reminded Cael that the traveler had freed them in the woods, and asked to hire Cael and the third man, whose name was later given as Tim, for work at the Carver fence line that went beyond their permits. Cael remained at the bar with his arm in a sling, turning his cup in his good hand, and Tim sat at his elbow.

The traveler rose and passed Raslyn by the stairs, made a quiet remark about Cael, and went upstairs, setting a meeting at the edge of town before sunrise if Cael and Tim were in. Raslyn told the traveler to get some rest. Upstairs in a small dark quiet room, the traveler shaped a pack under the blanket like a sleeping body and waited in the far corner with a loose knife. When the tavern quieted, Taryn let herself in with a key and raised a blade at the bed; the traveler sprang out, caught her wrist, and set a hunting knife to her throat. Taryn cursed and froze.

After a long still pause the knife eased back and Taryn hugged the traveler; they sat and talked softly, and Taryn said the creature at the fence line was only part of something larger moving up north. Taryn said she would mend the cloak before morning, told the traveler to stock up before leaving, and said the traveler must see her first because she had something for them. Taryn left with the cloak under her arm and the room went dark and smelled of tallow smoke.

Before the traveler left, Taryn led them to a cold cellar behind a hidden fermenter door, where she sharpened the traveler's hunting knife at a workbench. The traveler counted nineteen arrows into a full quiver and took a dark-staved, clean-strung longbow made for distance and shadow work. Taryn warned that Raslet said Cael would try to leave without the traveler and told them to go because they were already late. The hunting knife remained on Taryn's bench.

Before sunrise the bow-armed traveler slipped out behind the last house at town's edge and waited in shadow until Tim and Cael arrived. The three headed north on the damp North Road past the Old Millstone Marker and reached the Carver farm, where they noted a broken fence, silent barn, tipped bucket, and crooked shutter. Cael said they should get on with it because they were losing daylight. Inside the farmhouse they found a blasted doorway, splinters, smoke, burnt powder, and copper smell; Harlen sat dead at the table with a hole above his left eye, and his son Pell fumbled a long musket with shaking hands. The traveler lowered the bow, called the room clear, and took the musket from Pell's unresisting hands while Cael and Tim came in behind.

The traveler gave Pell jerky laced with paralytic root while Cael and Tim stood back. A faint amber pulse flashed behind Pell's irises and the traveler spread a silent hand signal telling Cael and Tim to stay back and stay cautious. Pell ate and told a low rhythmic story about the fence line, his father, and sounds in the dark while the amber light in his eyes turned steady and Cael's breathing slowed and deepened and Tim went very quiet. When the paralytic hit, Pell's amber eyes flared, his legs folded, the traveler caught him and set a knife flat to his throat, and something wearing Pell laughed. The traveler told whatever held Pell that it had taken the father and must let the boy go because he was innocent. Cael and Tim stood where the traveler had left them, utterly still.

The traveler held Pell near a window facing the Ashenveil while a silver creature hung in the glass. Pell's amber gaze met the silver eyes, a burst of shadow tore from his chest and escaped into the dark treeline, the pressure in the room broke, and Cael and Tim blinked back to themselves. Pell lay cold and barely responsive on the floor with a faint steady pulse; the silver creature was gone and the shadow had escaped into the forest. The traveler gave Cael a short account of the amber light, the paralytic, the fleeing shadow, and the silver creature. Tim got Pell moving, and the traveler sent Tim to a healer before midday and told him to inform the undertaker about Harlen. The traveler and Cael entered the Ashenveil by the disturbed fence posts to hunt the escaped shadow.

In weak morning light among birches, a sound in the upper branches sent the traveler, now named Aldric, climbing while Cael moved low beneath. A silver-feathered creature waited in a small clearing; Cael stepped out, it said "Aldric," blazed into white light, vanished, and a silver-haired woman appeared in its place. The woman told Aldric to come down from the trees and called both of them to come without delay. Aldric already knew her name as Sylvara before she gave it and said she was keeper of the forests, quietly adding all of them. Cael started for his sword, thought of the net and the silver creature dragged through the Ashenveil, and stopped when Sylvara raised her hand; she told him he was not to know and spoke of an old costly battle, a war not won, and the shadow driven from Pell as an ancient bound essence whose chains were breaking.

Sylvara described the Dead woods inside the Ashenveil, where an enchantment turns travelers aside and a massive wrong tree at the center serves as a seal, and said what was breaking free was breaking through that tree. Night fell, Cael took first watch, and Sylvara sat beside Aldric by the low fire and told him to ask what he came there to ask. Aldric pressed Sylvara about his mother, the forest, Taryn's flashes, the cloak, his sharpened senses, and the word herald; Sylvara took his hand, asked what he called her, and after he whispered "Mother," Cael cried "Goblins!" and rose with his short sword toward the northern tree line as the undergrowth erupted with voices and quick feet.

Eight goblins ringed the firelit birch clearing and Cael stood with his back to Aldric, sword raised despite the sling. The largest goblin spoke in an older guttural tongue; Sylvara planted her birch staff and roots bound all eight, but the leader's next words set the roots ablaze, and after it spoke a name the forest turned black and the ground shuddered before the light returned. Sylvara told the leader that speaking that name was a grave mistake. Sylvara then spoke in an ancient resonant voice, the earth swallowed four goblins, wind carried Aldric to a branch fifteen feet up where his hood and enchanted cloak hid him in the canopy, and a breeze healed Cael's shoulder as light armor settled on him. Sylvara said "We fight" as four goblins advanced with blades out.

Moving through the branches with his bow, Aldric's first arrow tripped a goblin and Cael killed it, its blood seeping into his blade and darkening it. Aldric's paralytic arrow dropped one hell hound, Sylvara swept another aside, and a large goblin seized Sylvara's wrist. Cael stood ten feet away with the darkening sword slowing in his grip, one hell hound lay in the leaf litter, another circled, and the goblin mage had not yet spoken. Aldric dropped from the canopy in a wind-slowed arc, hit one goblin in the shoulder and one in the knee, and Cael killed the staggering one. The mage laughed, a birch behind it split, smoking cold chains snapped into the leaves, the mage darkened Sylvara's staff, and Sylvara spoke a forbidden name.