Once Upon a Winter's Night

31

Camille sat awhile on the headland above the thundering sea, Scruff clinging to her shoulder and facing into the stiff breeze. Long moments passed as the sun edged further up the sky. Finally, she roused herself and glanced at the growing day. “Well, Scruff, Lady Verdandi did say that when I left the banks of time’s flow, I would lose the stream, and of that I am glad, for time out of joint is not to my taste.”

“ Chp! ” chirped Scruff, as if he totally agreed.

Camille stood. “Though I cannot answer the riddles posed by Lady Urd, still we must press on… but which way, my friend? Which way? Left? Right? Inland?”

Camille scanned the shoreline as far as she could see in either direction, but she espied no sign of habitation whatsoever. Of a sudden, Scruff chp! — chp! — chp! ed, and, rising over the horizon, sails appeared, swiftly growing taller, and then a hull came into view. And driven by the wind abaft, over the sea it rode.

“A ship, Scruff. A ship. Oh, how glorious.”

Camille watched awhile as it hove across the water.

“It seems to be heading somewhere off to our right, Scruff. Perchance ’tis an omen telling us which way to go, for perhaps…”

Camille pulled the stave from the rucksack loops, taking care to not snag a splinter on the cloth. “Lady Sorciere, were it any stave but yours, I would wrap it tightly with leather or cloth, or bind it with straps, all to deal with the splits and cracks and splinters. Yet I deem you meant it to be thus, and so wrap it I shall not. Instead I shall again walk with it, for mayhap, contrarily, it cracks from disuse.”

And, stave in hand, off Camille set, following the rightward shoreline, as the ship asea plunged across the rolling brine, the wind driving her swiftly. And rising across the horizon after, came a seething, dark wall of clouds.

“A storm is coming, Scruff,” said Camille, her cloak flying in the wind. Onward she strode across flowing grass on cliffs above the sea, hoping to find shelter ere the blow came.

On she walked and on, a candlemark and then two, the land rising and falling, the storm drawing nigh, and just as she topped a long upward slope, with a hard-driven blast the tempest did blow ashore at last. And through thickening gray sheets of rain hurled by a pummelling wind, Camille saw spread out before her a broad harbor sheltered by seaward hills, ships riding at anchor within, and a seaport town arcing ’round.

The hard rain pelting down, the wind moaning among the buildings, Camille saw ahead a signboard swinging wildly in the squall, a leaping fish depicted thereon, the words Le Marlin Bleu circling ’round. It marked the very first inn she had come across after entering the town. In the rain and wind she ran for the door and lifted the latch, and a hard gust snatched the handle from her grip and slammed the panel wide.

“Shut the door, boy,” shouted a man above the howl of the storm, scrambling for papers swirling about behind the counter as the panel slapped to and fro. “I said shut the door, else the storm itself’ll blow us all away.”

Camille lunged to catch hold of the panel madly swinging. Then she struggled against the wind to shut the wild thing, pushing it to with her shoulder. Finally, she got it closed and latched, and relative quietness descended, the moaning wind shut out. Thoroughly drenched and dripping, she cast back her hood and turned toward the man at the counter, who yet chased after paper. Shedding her cloak, she looked at Scruff in the high vest pocket, his feathers soaked. Bedraggled, he looked up at her and grumped a short, sharp “ chp! ” Camille laughed and said, “You look like a wet dog, my friend.”

“Who you callin’ a wet dog, boy?” came the voice from low, the man down on hands and knees and reaching under a desk for a loose receipt.

“Oh, sieur, I meant not you,” said Camille, stepping forward. “I was speaking to my companion.”

“I didn’t see you come in with any-” Voucher in hand, the man rose to his feet. “Oh, pardon, ma’amselle, I thought you were, um-”

“My companion is here in my pocket, good sieur, and we would like a room, and a hot meal, too, and warm bath, and a good long drink of water.”

“ Chp! ”

“Oh, and some grain for my friend. Oats, rye, barley, if you please. He is a bit tired of millet.”

The man cocked a skeptical eyebrow at Camille and the sparrow, and Camille fished about in her rucksack and then plunked a gold coin down to the counter.

The man’s eyes lit up and he quickly said, “Right away, ma’amselle.” He turned and called out, “Aicelina, a moi cet instant!”

There came a soft knock on the door, barely heard above the moan of the wind and the drumming of rain on the shingled roof.

“Entre!”

Dressed in a borrowed robe, Camille looked up from her just-finished meal of haddock and red cabbage and green beans and black bread. A dark-haired young maiden, certainly no older than Camille, and perhaps a year or two less, stood at the doorway looking in.

“Mademoiselle, your bath is ready.”

“Merci, Aicelina.” Camille took a last sip of tea, then stood. “Keep guard, Scruff,” she said to the dozing, wee bird, perched on the back of the chair before the red coals on the hearth, wind groaning down the chimney.

“Mademoiselle, shall I add another brick of peat to the fire?”

Camille glanced at the hearth and then at Scruff. “Non, Aicelina. I believe the room is now warm enough. Besides, he is quite comfortable as it is.-Now where is the bathing room?”

“This way, mademoiselle.”

Camille, barefooted, followed Aicelina down the hall-doors on the right, windows on the left-and gusts and rain rattled pane and sash. And Camille said, “Aicelina, I have been pondering a riddle given me. Know you of winds that do not blow, but flow across the sea? The reason I ask is that I have been advised to seek a master of such.”

Aicelina opened the door at the end of the hall. She turned to Camille and said, “Non, mademoiselle, I know of no such thing.” And as wind whistled ’round a corner outside, the maiden’s brown eyes widened and she glanced through the windows at the storm without. “Mayhap ’tis a mage, for ’tis said some are masters of the wind.-Oh, but wait, that would be a wind that blows, rather than one that does not.” Aicelina frowned and fell into momentary thought, but then realizing where she was, she moved aside. “Your bath, mademoiselle.”

Camille stepped into the chamber; a tub of steaming water sat waiting. Aicelina followed and said, “Fresh towels on the bar, mademoiselle, and soap in the dish, three scents in all: mint, lilac, rose. And a fresh sponge is on the board. Is there aught else I can do?”

“Merci, Aicelina, it is enough.”

Aicelina started to leave, but then turned back and said, “About your riddle, mademoiselle…”

“Yes?”

“This is a port town, a seaport town.”

Camille nodded and said, “The very first I’ve ever seen, Aicelina. I’m a farm girl and, but for a handful of drawings in a book in Fra Galanni’s library, I know little of ships and boats. Yet when I topped the long hill above the town and saw all the ships at anchor, oh what a thrilling sight it was. -But what has this to do with my riddle?”

“Well, mademoiselle, your riddle speaks of masters, and there are masters of ships, and the ships themselves-”

“Of course!” exclaimed Camille, grabbing the startled girl and embracing her. “And the ships themselves flow across the sea. Oh, merci, merci, Aicelina.”

Yet after the girl had gone, and Camille had slipped into the soothing water, as she luxuriated in the warmth she frowned. But how can ships be winds that do not blow?

“Well, now, young lady, for a tot of rum, I’ll answer your question.”

It was the next morning, and Camille stood on a dock along the harbor. The storm had blown itself out sometime during the night, and the skies were blue above. Even so, great waves yet crashed against the breakwater at the harbor mouth afar, remnants of the blow.

“And how much would that be? — The cost, I mean.” The eld man looked her up and down, as if gauging her wealth, his eyes widening at the sight of the sparrow on her shoulder. Then he said, “A bronze.”

Nearby, a lounging youth snorted. “A tot is but a copper, ma’amselle.” The oldster shot him a glare.

Nevertheless, Camille handed the man a bronze. “Now, sieur, my answer.”

With surprised eyes, the eld man looked at the coin in his hand, then glanced down the dock at the Bald Pelican, a ramshackle tavern sitting ashore just beyond the planking. Then he looked at Camille and said, “Your answer is tied up at pier thirty-two; she’s being laded for a long run.” He bobbed his head, then turned about and trotted away as fast as his legs would bear him, for ten tots of rum awaited, and perhaps out of generosity for a good-paying customer such as he was about to be, the barkeep would set up the eleventh for nought.

Camille looked at the youth. “Which way?”

The lad pointed.

Three-masted she was, and broad, with a wide and flat low prow and a high deck aft, her length some thirty-five paces in all, and her hull was painted red. On her bow were two glaring yellow-orange eyes, and in slashing black lines, a strange symbol was inscribed behind and below each eye. She was tied up at pier thirty-two, and a bustle of dockworkers labored at loading bales and kegs and crates onto the cargo nets of the large vessel, seamen aboard cranking the windlasses and raising the goods and swinging the booms about, to lower the nets down through the hatches and into the bays below.

The crew adeck were men like none Camille had ever seen: the cast of their skin a yellow-tan, their eyes tilted like those of Elves, yet their ears were not tipped. All had hair jet-black, curled in a loop behind and tied by a small bow. And they spoke in a strange tongue, the words short and sharp and at times harsh-sounding.

Most were dressed in red pantaloons, their arms and chests bare, yet among the crew were warriors, or so Camille thought them to be, for each was armed with two gently curved swords held to their waists by broad golden sashes wrapped ’round vibrant red robes.

“Quite a sight, eh, Mademoiselle Sparrow?”

Camille turned to see beside her a brown-haired, brown-eyed, brown-bearded man of middling years. He glanced at Scruff and smiled, then added, “The ship, I mean.”

“Indeed, sieur, for never have I seen such. But that is no wonder, for, in truth, never had I seen any ships at all before yester.-Do you know its name?”

“Her, ma’amselle.”

Camille turned up a hand, an unspoken question in her eyes.

“All ships are female, ma’amselle; and yes, I know her name, and I’ll trade you her name for yours.”

Camille dropped her gaze from his and turned to look at the ship. “I am Camille, sieur.”

“I am Jordain, harbormaster here, and she is the Higashi No Kaze. ”

“The Higashi No…?”

The harbormaster smiled. “The Higashi No Kaze. I am told by her master it means East Wind. ”

Camille’s heart leapt with hope. There are winds that do not blow, but flow across the sea.

“Sieur, I must see this master.”

Jordain pointed. “He’s there on the poop.”

Even as Camille’s gaze followed the harbormaster’s outstretched arm to see a formidable figure standing on the high deck astern, she said, “No, M’sieur Jordain, I mean I must speak with this master. It is urgent I do so.”

He, too, was dressed in a red robe, though elaborate yellow-gold dragons were depicted thereon. About his waist was a broad red-and-yellow sash. His feet were stockinged in white, and strange black sandals he wore. Like his crew, his eyes were tilted, his complexion a yellow-tan. He, too, had his black hair tied in a curl behind by a small black bow. In his right hand he held horizontally an open red fan. Before him, on the straw mat where he knelt, his two gently curved swords lay in jet-black scabbards, one sword longer than the other.

On his knees on a separate straw mat to the left of the man and a bit behind, the interpreter, one of the crew, said, “Lord Hirota says, there can be no such place, Jordain san.” The interpreter had not once looked at Camille.

On the floor of the captain’s cabin, Jordain and Camille also knelt on woven straw mats-“tatami,” Jordain had called them-Camille to Jordain’s right and slightly behind.

Again Hirota spoke, his words chopped short as if each were cut off by an axe, and Camille wondered if Lord Hirota’s scowl was perpetual.

When Hirota fell silent, the interpreter said, “Lord Hirota says, though there are many strange things in Faery, a place east of the sun and west of the moon is not one of those, for Tsuki Musume, um, Daughter Moon, is quite disobedient, for she sometimes runs ahead of, um, Father Sun, and sometimes lags after, sometimes hides her face and sometimes shows it brazenly.”

Camille, her heart falling, said, “Then he knows of no such place?”

The interpreter yet looked only at Jordain, and when the harbormaster nodded, the interpreter spoke rapidly to Hirota. Hirota turned his head and gazed at Camille, the look in his eyes quite insolent, and, without saying a word, he snapped the red fan shut.

“No,” said the interpreter, looking at Jordain.

Camille sighed.

Hirota then said swift words, his haughty eyes never leaving Camille, and the intepreter said to Jordain, “Lord Hirota says, he has never seen hair of gold before, and he wishes to know if you have any more such as she.”

Jordain looked at Camille, a faint smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, though there was interest in his eyes as well. “Are there?”

Camille blushed, but said, “If I had a fan, I would snap it shut.”

Jordain turned and said to the interpreter, “Tell Lord Hirota she has closed her fan.”

After the interpreter spoke, Hirota growled and looked away from Camille.

“At least he didn’t ask about your sparrow,” said Jordain, “though I have no such reticence.”

Camille smiled. “Scruff is my travelling companion.”

Jordain waited for more, yet Camille added nought.

They walked on down the docks, passing ship after ship, some lading cargo, others off-loading.

“Your port seems quite busy.”

“Aye, for ’tis the season for trading. We have fine wool and wine and cognac and brandy and other such to export, while the ships bring goods from afar.”

“And that’s why the East Wind is in port?”

Jordain nodded.

“Then tell me, are there any other ships herein named after the winds?”

“Certainly none currently in port as great as the Higashi No Kaze, though there are three others who might sail in one day soon.”

“What about ships that are not as great, yet named after the winds?”

“Why is it you want to know?”

Camille sighed and said, “I search for my true love Alain. He is gone to a place east of the sun and west of the moon, or so did Lady Sorciere say. And I was given a riddle to solve, a riddle which will lead to him, or so it is I hope.”

Jordain sighed. “Your true love, eh?”

“Indeed. I love him more than life itself.” Camille’s voice dropped. “It is my fault he is missing.”

“There is a tale here to tell,” said Jordain, “and I would hear it. Yet the riddle first.”

Camille glanced up at Jordain then said:

“There are winds that do not blow,

But flow across the sea;

A master of one might know

Where such a place doth be.”

“Ah,” said Jordain. “Now I see why you seek ships named after the winds. Let us go to the harbor office, and we shall see what ships are harbored that answer to such.”

Registered in port there were currently nine ships with names, some of which needed to be translated, that evoked the winds- Breeze, Windsong, Squall, Little Cyclone, Sea Breath, Gale, Storm Runner, Villion’s Bluster, Wind Walker- and a tenth craft named Puffer, though Jordain thought this last but a small boat named after a fish.

Over the next two days, Camille and Scruff visited every one of these craft, yet none of the masters knew where the place she sought did lie.

“I thought not,” said Jordain. “Most were coastal runners, and not ships that sail across the five oceans and the seven seas.”

“That many?” asked Camille. “-Oceans and seas, I mean.”

“Those are the ones in Faery I know of,” replied Jordain, “though ’tis said there are more-some claim nine oceans in all, and as many as eleven seas.”

Camille stood silent for a while, looking over the harbor, and then she said, “When first we met, you spoke of three other great ships named after the winds, ships that might come.”

Jordain nodded. “Aye, they are the Hawa Kibli, and Aniar Gaoth, and the Nordavind. Fear not, Camille, if any come across la Grande Mer-the Great Sea-and into port, I will send a runner to fetch you. Where are you staying?”

“At the Le Marlin Bleu, but any runner you send must at times find me elsewhere-at mapmakers, for example. Yet I will tell the clerk at the Blue Marlin where I am bound, and the runner can ask him. Oh, and in the evenings, the runner will find me at La Lanterne Rouge, where I will be singing.”

Jordain’s eyes widened in surprise. “The Red Lantern? But, Camille, it is quite an unruly place, and though there are women who work there, I think they are not your sort.”

Camille said, “I will only be singing, Jordain, not, um, not, well, you know. Besides, I have been told that every ship’s captain and crew sooner or later comes to the ’Lantern, and as I did in Les Iles, I shall ask each audience if anyone knows whither lies the place I seek.”

“Bu-but-” Jordain began to protest, yet Camille stopped him with a thrust-out palm.

“As I said, Jordain, I will simply be singing.”

Jordain sighed. “When do you begin?”

“This very eve.”

Jordain shook his head and turned away, peering out over the water. Then he pointed. “There goes the Higashi No Kaze.”

As she watched the red ship tack toward the harbor entrance, Camille frowned and said, “Her sails are not like the other ships I’ve seen leaving port.”

“Aye, they are not,” said Jordain. “But for that matter, the whole ship is different, her bottom is quite flat with but a small keel, and the rudder is long and angles out, somewhat like a lengthy oar. Her sails are called lugsails and have four corners down the outside border; they’re made of coarse cotton and braced flat by long wooden strips running from the haul to the edge. And she’s equipped with oars for the crew to use when the wind does die. No, not like other ships is she, yet quite seaworthy in all, they say, though I myself wouldn’t want to be aboard her in a heavy storm.”

They watched as the great ship made her way to the mouth of the harbor and then on out to sea, where she turned to the larboard and soon vanished behind the up-sloping hills to the headland, her strange sails the last to disappear.

Camille sighed. The East Wind was gone, along with her yellow-tan crew.

There came a soft tap on the door, and when Camille opened it, a huge man filled the frame, his hat in hand. “Miss Camille?”

“Yes?”

“Ma’am, I’m t’ go with y’ t’ th’ Red Lantern.”

“Sieur?”

“I’ll be waitin’ down below.”

He turned to go, but Camille called out, “Wait!”

The big man turned back, brushing the shock of red hair out of his pale blue eyes.

“Who are you, and why are you going to the Red Lantern with me?”

“I’m t’ see that no one does y’ wrong, Miss Camille.”

“Does me wrong?”

“Aye. ’At’s what th’ harbormaster sent me t’ do.”

“Jordain.” Camille’s word was a statement, not a question.

“ ’At’s right. Mister Jordain.”

“And if I need no protection…?”

“Oh, you will, miss,” averred the big man. Then his mouth formed an O, as if he just remembered something. “And, miss, my name is John, though most know me as Big Jack.”

“Well, Jacques, I-”

“No, no, miss. Not Jacques. Jack. And it’s Big Jack at that.”

“Well, um, Big Jack, tell Jordain that I thank him for his offer, and I thank you as well, but-”

Jack held up an admonishing index finger. “No, no, miss. He said you’d like as not try t’ say no, but he gave me instructions, he did, and I’ll not take a no.”

Camille sighed and said, “Well, Jack, er, Big Jack, I suppose it can’t harm if you tag along.”

After the melee at the Red Lantern was over, and after the three men who had tried to carry Camille up the stairs had been smashed unconscious by single blows of one of Big Jack’s massive fists, Camille no longer objected to him being about. In fact, after but two nights, his very presence meant that when Camille took the stage a quiet would descend, for Big Jack would stand up in the center of the throng and glare all ’round; and a hush would fall over the boisterous crowd, each person there wondering if he was the one Big Jack was getting ready to maim. And then Camille would begin to sing, and Big Jack would smile and sit down, to a great sigh of relief. And her singing brought laughter and tears to the eyes of captains and crew alike, and even the ladies of the Red Lantern would pause to listen, some weeping softly. And now and again, as she had done in Les Iles, Camille would sing to a wee sparrow.

As before, at the conclusion of every performance, she would ask if anyone there knew of a place east of the sun and west of the moon, and though sailors and masters looked at one another, none could tell her where such a place might be…

… And thus did eighteen days pass, eighteen blossoms withering to vanish since Camille had been in Leport. Twenty-one blossoms remained on Lady Sorciere’s staff, new splinters and cracks yet riving the stave with the coming of each new day.

“Mademoiselle! Mademoiselle!” cried the lad. “The harbormaster sent me to fetch you. He says to tell you the South Wind has come.”

Over Scruff’s chirping objections, Camille snatched him up from his breakfast of grain, and she grabbed up the staff and followed the lad out from the common room.

Down to the docks she hastened, following the trotting lad, and he led her to one of the piers, where was berthed a ship fully as large as the Higashi No Kaze had been.

Yet this ship had a pointed prow, and her lines were long and low, though a high deck arose at the stern, and a smaller one at the bow. She was three-masted, and brown was her color, her furled sails brown as well. Her name was written on her prow in serpentine letters, letters which Camille could not read. Her crew was dressed in long, flowing robes, their faces dark brown, some nearly black beneath their colorful turbans. At their waists they bore sharply curved swords as well as curved and keen-pointed knives.

Jordain stood on the dock with a small, dark man dressed in pale brown robes, sandals on his feet. He had black hair and a black beard, as well as a flowing black moustache below his quite aquiline nose. His black eyes lit up as Camille approached.

Jordain said, “Lady Camille, this is Captain Anwar, master of the Hawa Kibli. Raiyis Anwar, I present Lady Camille.”

“ Chp! ”

“And her sparrow, Scruff.”

Anwar laughed, and, with a great flourish of his right hand, he deeply bowed. Camille curtseyed in return.

Then Anwar smiled, white teeth showing. “Lady Camille, Harbormaster Jordain tells me you seek a place?”

“Yes, Master Raiyis, I do.”

Again Anwar smiled. “My lady, ‘raiyis’ is the word for ‘captain’ in my native tongue. Please, call me Anwar.”

“And you, sieur, please call me Camille.”

Anwar made a small gesture with his hand, somewhat like the flourish of his bow. “Now, about this place you seek.”

“All I know of it, Captain Anwar, er, Anwar, is that it lies east of the sun and west of the moon.”

Anwar shook his head. “I know not where such a place is. In fact, unless it moves, unless it cycles on a crystal sphere of its own, somehow gliding between those spheres upon which the sun and the moon do ride, I do not know how such a place can even be.”

Tears brimmed in Camille’s eyes, and Anwar took her free hand in his and said, “I am sorry, my dear. Yet do not yield all hope, for strange is the realm of Faery, and your place might be real after all.”

Then Anwar turned to Jordain. “Is the Aniar Gaoth or the Nordavind in port? Or the Higashi No Kaze?”

Jordain shook his head then added, “The Higashi No Kaze sailed away some days past, and Lord Hirota did not know where the place she seeks might lie.”

Anwar nodded. “Then perhaps it is written that the Elves will know

… or the iron-bearing Dwarves.”

“Elves? Dwarves?” asked Camille.

Anwar nodded. “Jordain told me of the riddle you have: ‘There are winds that do not blow, but flow across the sea.’ Camille, many are the vessels in Faery named after the winds, but only four of these are great ships of the sea. If any would know where this place you seek might be, it would be the captains of such. Yet, alas, the master of the East Wind did not, and I, master of the South Wind, know not either. But there are two ships left: the Aniar Gaoth — the West Wind — is a vessel with an Elven crew; her master may know, for he has travelled wide, as has the Dwarven master of the Nordavind — the North Wind. ”

Camille gestured at the harbor. “But Captain Anwar, those two you name, they are not here.”

“Nevertheless, Camille, it is the trading season, and they will come soon or late.”

“Then let us hope they come soon,” said Camille, “for if they come late, it will not matter.”

Another fortnight did pass, fourteen more blossoms gone, when came the word that the Aniar Gaoth had docked. Again Camille rushed to the pier, following the lad that Jordain had sent, Big Jack now striding after, for he had decided Camille needed protecting in the day as well as the nights at the Red Lantern. And so, down to the docks they did go to where the Elvenship lay.

She was long and low and slender and sleek, her bow knife-sharp, her stern club-blunt, her hull a deep blue. No fo’c’s’le nor stern castle did she bear, but instead low decks fore and aft. And her three masts were tall and raked back, with yardarms wide and many. She would carry an enormous amount of sail, all of it now full-reefed, though Camille could see they were pale blue and with a sheen like that of silk. She was half-again longer than either the Hawa Kibli or the Higashi No Kaze had been.

As to her crew, Elves were they all-alabaster skin tinged with gold, tilted eyes in narrow, high-cheekboned faces, tipped ears, and lithe grace. They were armed with glittering swords, and horn-limb bows and deadly arrows, and long-handled, gleaming spears. Silks they wore, and satins, and they spoke in a lilting tongue.

Jordain was waiting. “Welcome to the West Wind, ” he said. Then he escorted her up the gangway, Big Jack following in their wake. Elves paused in their activities to watch this golden-haired maiden with a sparrow on her shoulder pass by, many smiling, some essaying courtly bows.

Jordain led her aft, then down a short ladder to a passageway below-Big Jack bending down to keep from bumping his head-and into a captain’s lounge. At a chart table centermost, a flaxen-haired Elf pored over scattered maps, and he looked up as they entered.

“Cabhlaigh Andolin, I present Lady Camille; my lady, Captain Andolin.” Jordain glanced at the sparrow and added, “And ere he objects, on her shoulder is her companion Scruff.”

Andolin made a courtly bow, murmuring, “My lady,” and Camille curtseyed and replied, “Captain.”

Andolin looked at Scruff and smiled, then turned to Big Jack, who thrust out a hand and said, “My name’s John, but all call me Big Jack.” Andolin’s clasp was swallowed in Big Jack’s grip, and the Elf seemed glad to get back his hand whole.

Andolin then turned to Camille. “My lady, Harbormaster Jordain has told me of your riddle and of the place you seek.” He gestured at the scatter of charts on the table. “Yet I find nought to satisfy your quest, for I think no place can exist that lies east of the sun and west of the moon, not even in Faery.”

Camille burst into tears.

The blossoms withered one by one, until all were gone but one. And there was but one great ship left whose captain might know. Camille no longer had the heart to sing, though she felt she must. Yet night after night none in her audience could tell her where was the place she sought. And every day she had haunted the docks, watching the harbor entrance, watching for her last hope. Yet the Nordavind did not come and did not come, as the blossoms withered away until there was left but one.

And now in the gloom Camille sat on the dock, her songs at the Red Lantern done, and she waited, her hopes all crashed down, but still she sat waiting, waiting for a ship, waiting for the Nordavind, waiting for the North Wind to come.

Camille’s spirits were as black as the night, for it was the dark of the moon. Yet the docks themselves were lit by lanterns scattered here and there and by the stars shining down from above. Off to one side and lurking in the shadows stood a large man: Big Jack yet on guard.

“Oh, Scruff,” said Camille to the sparrow asleep in her pocket, “do you remember what the old woman said back in the very last village on our way to Raseri’s lair? When we asked if any knew where lay a place east of the sun and west of the moon, she said, ‘Only the North Wind would know.’ I do pray that she is right. And I pray to Mithras that the North Wind will come. Yet I have little hope, for the last blossom even now-”

“Make ready to tow!” came a distant call.

Camille stood to see whence came the cry.

At a dock afar she could see the Elvenship alight with lanterns, and a bustle of activity aboard.

She walked down to see what was afoot.

Captain Andolin stood on the stern, issuing orders, Elves haling on halyards and climbing ratlines. Towing ropes had been affixed to bow and stern, and rowing gigs awater and manned stood ready to haul the ship away from the slip.

When Andolin fell silent, Camille called, “Are you and the West Wind leaving, Captain?”

He looked down at her. “Aye, my lady, we are.” He glanced over his shoulder out toward the night sea. Then he turned back and asked, “Can you not feel it?”

“Feel what, Captain?”

“The ever-worsening twist in the aethyr, the growing warp and bend.” He pressed a hand to his forehead as if in distress.

“No, Captain, I cannot. I don’t even know what you mean when you say ‘aethyr,’ and I certainly do not feel any twisting or warping or bending.-Are you in pain?”

“I would not name it pain, my lady, though it is much like an ache.”

“What is amiss, Captain, and is there aught I can do to aid?”

“Only distance will help, Lady Camille, and we are making ready to put such distance ’tween us and Leport as swiftly as we can.” Andolin then called down to two Human dockworkers, “Cast off fore! Cast off aft!” Hawsers were uncoiled from ’round mooring posts and thrown into the water. Even as Elves drew the hawsers in, Andolin called out, “Rowers, row!”

Slowly the great Elvenship Aniar Gaoth drew away from the dock, the men in the towing gigs rowing to pull her away.

“But, Captain, I still do not know what is the matter,” called Camille.

Andolin looked down at her and grimly said, “Iron is coming.”

Then to her he said no more, instead turning and calling out to his Elven crew, the captain totally consumed in swiftly getting his ship under way.

Camille watched a bit longer, then she sighed and walked back toward her place of vigil, a large shadow following.

Iron is coming.

Nigh mid of night, even as the Aniar Gaoth, silhouetted against the stars as she was, slid beyond the harbor mouth to vanish from view, Camille heard the dip and pull of many oars, and a guttural voice calling out: “Roers, gjore i stand!”

In the starlight and the light from the lanterns adock, Camille could make out a long, low craft gliding across the water, many oars stroking, and it appeared the ship was heading for a nearby slip. Camille stood and watched, and oars dipped and dipped, and the voice called out, “Mindre!.. Mindre!..”

The craft slowed, and slid toward the slip.

“Ares pa!” came the cry, and all the oars were shipped aboard. Then the long boat slid into the slip and broad-shouldered, short men leapt out to-Nay! Not men. But Dwarves instead, like those she had seen in Les Iles.

And in the lanternlight on the dock, Camille could make out runes on the bow of the ship, runes she could read, and they named the ship Nordavind.

The North Wind had come at last!

And even as the Dwarven crew moored the vessel to the dock, the very last blossom disappeared from Camille’s split and splintered stave.