Succat trudged doggedly northward along the ever diminishing trail that led to the Ribbon-wood and the Lianhan Shee.  His spirits were low, dampened by the rain, and fear that he was not up to his task.

The trail was rain slick beneath his feet, his white woolen robe was soaked, especially the hood in his eyes, and his thick woolen stole felt like iron around his neck. 

Succat was sure his quest was of God, but the powers Lianhan Shee were legendary.  It was said, by those who had never seen her, that if you could not resist the Lianhan Shee, you became her slave forever.  Of those who had seen her, there was no witness living.

Miserable, Succat approached a daunting hedge of woodland.  He shivered as the darkness resolved itself into mighty trees rising into the mist. Between the imposing tree trunks there seemed a way, a way into darkness, a fearful way. 

Doubt assailed him.  Phillipians, his soul friend had warned him against this quest at the instigation of Exodus, the abbot.  Without their blessing he felt isolated and alone. 

“Lord God, I know this quest is sent of you.” Succat fell to his knees in the pouring rain, “It is written, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me, but I doubt myself.  Please me, I am weak.  Give me your peace, I am in fear.  I doubt. . .” The rain hammered down without relenting, Succat despaired, “Lord, be with me now, I need you.”

Leaning heavily on crozier, his staff, Succat clambered to his feet.  He was stiff from the cold, shivering from the soaking and from fear. Clutching his crozier for comfort he made his way into the mysterious wood. 

The rain abated immediately.  Beneath the trees, the air seemed strangely close, warm and dry.  the way was lit by a strange glow that did not rise much beyond where he set his feet, but it guided his steps and kept him from crashing into the giant trees that loomed all around.

Succat felt the light brush of things he feared to know.  They might be cobwebs or dry tendrils of moss, and he chose to ignore imagination that paralysed him with fear. Thus he travelled through darkness with light at his feet, until he stepped into a meadow.  Above him shined Bright, the great moon, glowing in her three colors of red and blue and yellow.

God be praised, He thought, Free of the wood and the rain too.  Succat looked up at a normal sky with stars and moon, and as he watched, the Traveller tumbled across the sky.  All seemed well, but then he chanced to look across the little clearing.  He was stunned.

A radiant woman stood at the edge of the meadow. She seemed to gather every bit of light from the moons and cast it out in scintillating brightness.  Her dress was modest, but plain fabric could not contain the sensuality of the creature, the Lianhan Shee, for she was beauty in every line and curve.

With growing fear, Succat recognized her, formed of his fondest imaginings, the image of the abbess of Kirnarven, but voluptuous and fertile, as if she were a courtesan or goddess of love and not an ascetic of a holy house.  The coal of his doubt was blown into flaming fear.

“For what have you come, oh man?” Her smile was inviting, or mocking, or enigmatic.  Whatever, it was utterly enticing to Succat.

The hard wood of his shepherd’s crook, brought him back to his duty. I am bound to God’s work and seeing her only shows it more necessary. If I am fuddled by her how much more a young man? They are helpless against her wiles.

He lifted his crozier in both hands and held it as a weapon, as a shield. “You have no hold on me,” he lied, “you will cease your foul concourse with the men of the village.”

She looked bemused. “Is that truly what you wish to say to me, oh man?” Her laugh was like a tinkling of silver bells, “It is late, and you are weary. I will forgive your harsh words this once.” Smiling she turning away into the deeper wood. “You will find rest, and then we will talk,” and then she disappeared taking the faery light with her.

Succat quaked with fear.  I’ve faced the Lianhan Shee and given my warning, perhaps that is enough.  For a moment he hoped it might be true, but he knew it was not.

The abbot’s edict returned to mind, and it yet rankled.  Succat would rather die than give abbot Exodus the satisfaction of being right, but would he risk his immortal soul?

Shame struck like a blow.  Was this quest nothing but his need to prove the abbot wrong?  He should flee now if this was only a sop for his pride.  No, there was much more to it, the widow Alban came to mind, her tears for her son, Gerald, struck down when it seemed he’d overcome his sickness.

Stopping the Lianhan Shee was the Lord’s work.  Succat knew he must stop the beguiling creature from making tatters of men’s lives, and for Gerald she led to his death. Still, having met her, Succat feared failure even more. 

“No, I can do all things” He reminded himself, In Christ even Succat, the monk who never mastered a book, even he could face her.

How long he warred with himself he couldn’t say, but when he looked for the Lianhan Shee, she was gone.  The forest was again cold, dark, and foreboding.  “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me,” he reminded himself and followed her deeper into the blackness of the Ribbon-wood.

Again his path was lit with a soft iridescence. “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path,” Succat quoted, feeling a bit smug until, with a sick twist in his gut, he realized that this was more likely sent by the Lianhan Shee.

The sound of rushing water grew until he came upon a lovely brook.  The light was more pronounced, a phosphorescence that bled from the moss bearded trees, and even from tiny floating things high above him.  It was a wonderland of soft light in, yellow, pink, and blue.  He drank from the brook’s cool water. Weariness came over him and he barely lay down upon a carpet of soft moss before sleep claimed him.

****

Succat woke to bird song, and sunlight filtering through leaves.  He felt energized, in fact, Succat could not remember ever feeling better than he did after a night on the mossy brook side.  The pastor almost leaped to his feet when his custom was to work the stiffness out slowly.  Here in the Ribbon-wood he felt spry as a callow youth.

Succat saw a riot of flowers filling the border of the clearing, and with a start he noticed berries, ripe to bursting, all around.  It isn’t possible, ripe berries in Spring?  It almost seems I’ve slept all through Summer.  Succat wondered as he sampled the juicy profusion and found it all good.

Shaking his head, he bent down by the stream, splashed his face, and washed his hands of the berry stains.  He drank deep of water cupped in his hands.  staring into the surface of a deep pool, Succat was shocked to see his image on its glassy face.  He hardly recognized the man staring back.

“You look well after your rest,” said the Lianhan Shee. “Are you hungry? I’ve brought something to break your fast.”

Succat spun to face the Lianhan Shee.  In the light of day she might have been any other human woman.  But looking at her, all he wanted in the world was to crush her to him, to kiss those perfect lips, and. . .

He turned away, though it was the last thing he wanted. “You want to possess me,” he managed. “And I would be helpless, but the Spirit of God strengthens me.  I did not come to tryst with you, Lianhan Shee.”

“That is not my name.  Not to tryst, what then?”

“I came to stop you.”

“Stop me? Why should I be stopped,” She laughed, “I stay in my place, I do nothing but good.”

“You are deceitful. . .”

“Deceitful? I break no promises, I tell no tales.  Who has deceived you?  I promised rest, which you’ve had.  I’ve offered you breakfast.  Do you mislike my bread?  Are the berries in your beard not to your liking?  You all come to me and not once have I deceived. . .”

“So! When Gerald Alban came he asked for death?” Succat accused, “No?  Well woman, if he was not deceived by you, why is he dead?”

“Gerald?  The sick boy?  I did him no harm, I would not.  I healed Gerald Alban, just as I healed you.”

“Like you healed me?” Succat was puzzled, “What is this?”

“Simple truth, I do no harm.  You feel that I can do what I say, for I healed your many hurts.  Gerald could not have walked home without my help, and you accuse me.”

Succat was undeterred, “What face did you show him? This one?”

“Of course not.”

“Of course not?  Ah, this face is for me. Gerald saw another, a face so he would love you.  Is that not so?”

“What you are accusing. . .”

“You, Lianhan Shee, always show a perfect face. For Gerald, a face stolen from his dreams, and a different perfect face to every man who comes.”

“They want to give me their essence and they are comfortable with. . .”

“Comfort is it? You make them lust and then you suck out their life.”

“I never do that.  I heal them of their hurts.”

“Oh, but what an awful price, eternal wanting you.  Is that not so Lianhan Shee?”

“Don’t call me that name you despise. You talk of wanting and stealing life, but I never would.”

“Said the pretty face, in form and manner to drive a man mad.  Does eliciting lust, please you?  Does it flatter you that they would die to love you just once more?”

“I don’t understand.”

Succat stared at her, she was rigid with anger, but beautiful nonetheless.  He was sworn to chastity, a pastor among his flock, blessedly free of desire for years, but this creature brought stirrings so deep and frightening he did not know what to do with them.  It made Succat angry.

“Don’t understand?” he spat, “Yet you show me this guise, this, this flesh.  I know you are false, still I, a man of God, would ravish you.  Don’t you understand?  Truly?  Can’t you read my mind?  Isn’t it our thoughts you use to make the perfect flesh to taunt a man, to tempt me?”

Anger flare in her eyes, “I don’t understand you Succat. You talk and talk.” The Lianhan Shee strode toward him, careless of herself and the way her clothing strained against her and how each step moved her in ways he would never forget.  He was only human, he reached for her, but she had already grasped his head in her hands, “Then show me what you want of me Succat, so I will understand.”

Succat thought she was offering herself to sate his lust, but in this he was frustrated.  Her touch paralysed his body, but it unleashed his mind to show her everything he wanted in humiliating detail.

His lust, set free, shocked Succat to his core, and the Lianhan Shee was no less shocked.  She recoiled, trying to cover herself, as if she had not seen that he had imagined her completely.  “I would never want that!” she shrieked and struck him so hard that he fell in a heap.

Succat wept for the shame of his lust, for his defeat, for failing his Lord and his people, and he wept for the ruin of his life. The Lianhan Shee had won and his soul was forfeit, owned by the faery woman.

In growing horror, Succat realized that he was weeping too, for having wanted the demoness, though it was his ruin, he still desired her.  She would never give him what he wanted. “I would never want that!” she had said, words that were a final dagger in his heart.

Cold rain brought him back to his senses.  The mossy carpet was gone, so too berries, the flowers, and everything but the bleak bones of the trees.  All that remained of the wonderland of the Lianhan Shee was the rivulet dancing over the rocks. Had it all been a dream?

Was the healing gone with the mossy bed?  The deep pool revealed nothing, the rain ruining it as a gazing glass.  Despite failure, Succat felt strong. Looking down, Succat saw a younger man’s hands without the rheumatism that had plagued him.  He clambered to his feet without the ache he would expect.  The comforts were withdrawn, but not his healing.  

Shrugging, he stooped to take up his crozier.  He traced the hook and cross with new fingers, but Succat remembered old responsibilities.  He’d failed, but what could he do but return?  Feeling devastated in spirit, but new in body, he headed South through the dreary wood.

As he walked, the new strength in his body brought euphoria.  Without thought, Succat broke into a run.  Whatever else, this battle was over, he had never felt better in body, and youthful exuberance banished his spiritual malaise.

Succat broke out of the wood into a clearing at a ground eating lope.  A man sat on the wet ground, his body was emaciated and his eyes looked feverish with need.

Succat skidded to a halt before the creature.  Succat marvelled that after a handful of breaths his breathing was normal.  “Who are you, and how came you here?” he asked.

The old man regarded Succat from his low place in the mud. “Do you not know this face, Man of God?”

Succat frowned in recognition, “It is the guise of the Fear Gorta you now wear, Lianhan Shee.”

“Lianhan Shee was never my name, a pleasant face for pleasant conversation only, curiosity’s face.  Now I hunger to know, I must know. This face, hunger’s face, is appropriate.”

“I have no alms to give you.”  Inspiration came, “Here, take this crozier”  Succat tossed his shepherd’s staff before the Fear Gorta.

The stick figure man sighed. “It is not your walking staff I desire, Man of God.”

“What then?  Should I thank you for healing me?  How did you?”

“Tis’ easily done, I see in you how you aught to be.  I fix what has gone wrong.  I confess I find your kind endlessly fascinating, you and all the myriad life you brought, so perfect and yet so damaged.”

Succat stared at the old man in the mud, “Thank you for not taking the healing from me. . .”

The Fear Gorta waved away the words with an impatient hand, “I do not require thanks.”  The old man turned his intense stare on Succat, ”I need to know.  You spoke of your god, but you were so damaged, so in need of healing, how could your god be Creator of All.  Yet I know there is but one author of life.  How can this be, oh Man of God?

Succat laughed without humor, “It is age, we grow old and die, it is the curse of sin.  As it is written, Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment, so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.”  Succat shrugged,”And so I wait, and I die.”

“You will cease to be, like you say Gerald has?” Succat nodded but the Fear Gorta was not finished, “and this Christ of whom you spoke, who was he to die for this curse.”

“He is God, and He was a man too.”

Before Succat fully realized his danger the Fear Gorta seized him by his robe.  Succat struggled, but he could do nothing to free himself from the fanatic grip.

“This can not be the Creator.”  The Fear Gorta desperately searched Succat’s face. “Why would he do it?” 

“Unhand me!” but Succat needn’t have asked, the bag of bones had already released him and was weeping uncontrollably in the mud.  Succat backed away slowly, hoping he might escape.

Succat fled.  He ran as fast as he could, hoping the Fear Gorta would let him go.  Ahead he saw a stream of water, fast flowing, that he’d crossed on his way.  by was an apple tree in full bloom of Spring.  Succat hadn’t noticed it when he’d crossed before.  He slowed at the strangeness, he stopped dead when he saw the man of hunger, the Fear Gorta, step from behind the tree.

“You’ve forgotten your staff.” he said simply, but there was nothing simple in the creature.  Stretching out his hands, stems of apple wood grew from his palms.  As Succat watched, they wound about each other and grew into the shape of a staff.  The wood stretched and curled and it grew.  More and more the living thing took the form of his crozier even as it budded, broke into flower, then leaf, and finally dropped yellow leaves over the white flower of its blossoming.   

The Fear Gorta handed Succat a crozier of intricately knotted apple wood.  “Why do you carry this, Man of God?”

Stunned, Succat blurted, “It is my office.  I am a shepherd like the Lord Jesus was, I have gone out into the world to preach.”

“Why do you do that, Man of God?”

“Because He commanded it.  It is written, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature baptising them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”

“Where is it written? I must know.”  Before Succat answered, another idea seized the old man.  “Here is water, why might I not be baptised?”

A hundred objections burst on his mind, but in the end, the need on Fear Gorta’s face drove Succat to his waist in the pool with the withered old man. 

Succat intoned, “Our Lord commanded: baptise them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.  It is in that name I baptise you, Fear Gorta, Lianhan Shee. . .”

“I am The Mind of the Ribbon-Wood.”

Nodding, Succat lowered the man beneath the water, but when he would have brought him back up, there was naught but a drifting of orange mud carried away on the current.

It was a day like many many others.  Her world was a room.  Two paces, cool stone, three paces, rough wood, a door, and in that a smaller door, a tiny one, a food door. Kitsuniko would have despaired, but it was her world and she could remember nothing else.  There was a dim light coming from the light place, sometimes it was yellow, now it was blue.

“Daylight.  The day begins, the words must be said, the ritual must be performed, that I might find my mother, that I might help her in her need.” She gathered herself, moving by feel the proper distance from the wood, from the door. “Body remembers what the mind has forgotten,” In the semi-darkness Kitsuniko moves, fighting shadows with shadow knives.  In the half light nothing is unreal.

Heart beating rapidly, the circle complete, the ritual almost full.  Her body is as it always is.  There is delicious ache, there is need for food, there is life, blood rushing, there is, “This, that I might find my mother, that I might help her in her need.”

Breath in, breath out,  and, there is silence there is discord in her world.

Puzzled, Kitsuniko knows that there should be an opening of the food door, the smell of it, wholesome, needed and there the bowl which ever holds what is needful.

*   *   *

Above there is discord indeed.  The Scholar and the Herb Witch have come before the Shogun of the Pinnacle of the Rice Fields.  They have come to plead for Kitsuniko’s release with subterfuge.  There have been four Shogun since Kitsuniko killed the Shogun the fourth replaced.  That Shogun did not last long enough to release his ally before the third put him to the sword.  All this was most unfortunate.

The scholar was speaking in the way that he had that made men of action’s eyes glaze, “It has been fifty long years since Kitsuniko was placed in that cell.  Apparently, she was a hired assassin and in my research there are tantalizing hints that the woman was a skilled sorcerer.  In fact, there is good reason to suppose that claims that she could transpose herself with another were not just fictions meant to cover misdeeds, but in fact true.  This I have from many reliable sources.  Kitsuniko can, given the right conditions, move from one place to another where there is a victim, and in turn the victim assumes the previous position of Kitsuniko.  I think the Herb Witch can confirm that such is possible though not common.

The Shogun’s eyes were glazed, but he felt justified as a man of action.  He waved off the scholar and tried to get the man to his point, ”All of this is fine to hear, facts and sources and hints, but what exactly or you telling me?”  The scholar blinked stupidly, as if he could not comprehend the Shogun’s clear question.

The Herb Witch stepped forward, “Simply put, the Kitsuniko in your dungeon, is not Kitsuniko at all, but an innocent.  The assassin and sorcerer, Kitsuniko herself, has escaped leaving the poor innocent to pay for her crimes.”

“I don’t see how this involves me.”  began the Shogun, “I didn’t even know this creature was in my dungeon.”

“Most regrettable,” said the Scholar.

“Most unfortunate,” agreed the Herb Witch.

“How can you possibly know?  If it has been fifty years, who would know the assassin?  Besides, I have no complicity at all.  This is not my affair.”

“MMmmm, true, and yet Kitsuniko’s assassination of Warlike Name, brought Sneaky Dragon to power.  She undoubtedly expected quick release.  But when Strong Phoenix overthrew Sneaky Dragon she was never freed.  She has languished there ever after.  Through the unfortunate reign of Strong Phoenix and the grievous mismanagement of Golden Stag even when your father, Wise Griffin, saved our good pinnacle from sure destruction, may he be remembered reverently for all time, and you now ensure our continuance with your strong sword, she has been left to rot in the deepest darkest dungeon.”

The Shogun, Rising Tide, shook himself.  His eyes had glazed again, “I don’t see the problem. You keep talking and talking and I wish to understand, but I see no problem in this for me.”  The old scholar looked dazed himself, perhaps he wasn’t totally immune to his own droning.

The Herb Witch stepped forward again to explain, “Only this my lord.  Kitsuniko might well be in great anger at the Shogun of the Pinnacle of the Rice Fields though you are not the foolish man that did not release her as promised.”

“But that was Sneaky Phoenix’s problem . . .”

“ummm, Sneaky Dragon, my lord.”  corrected the Scholar helpfully.

“Fine, Sneaky Dragon, but how could this assassin hold me accountable for something done long before even my father, . . .”

“May he ever be reverenced,” intoned the elders

“. . . Wise Griffin was Shogun before me?”

“Fifty years in prison might cause one to be unhinged. . .” said the Herb Witch.

“Assassins . . ,” furnished the Scholar

“I thought you said she had escaped by changing places with another.”

“How to know but to look and see?” asked the Herb Witch.

Being a man of action, the Shogun, seeing an action to be done, did, “Guards attend me.  You Scholar, and you Witch, come also.  There is no need to wonder when we can see.”

The trip down into the deepest darkest dungeon was revealing, this was a place where a prisoner was sent to be forgotten.  The Shogun wondered how anyone could survive fifty years with the weight of the pinnacle above them.  The jailer only spent time here when he worked and he seemed a bit made, “Is it much farther, Jailer?”

“Not much to the door.  Who can say if it will open?  That door has been shut tight for. . .”

“Over fifty years.”

“Long before I started” The jailer shoved his key into the lock and struggled for a few moments.  They heard a metallic click and mumbled curses, “That’s the key, it’s broken off in the lock,” said the man.

“What now?” asked the Shogun.

“I push it in?” asked the big galoeer.

“Do so,” said the Shogun, Rising Tide.

*   *   *

They had found the girl cowering in the corner, blinded by their torches.  It seemed obvious to the Shogun and when it was explained, the Jailer, that this child, no more than twenty, could not be the seventy-year-old assassin, Kitsuniko. 

The Scholar advised, and then produced a written pardon and parole, absolving the former Kitsuniko of her former now fifty-year-old deeds.  It seemed stupid to the Shogun, but for some reason the Scholar thought this might molify the great sorceror and assassin Kitsuniko.  Being a man of action, Rising Tide, the Shogun, signed and had this pardon proclaimed throughout the pinnical.  Why borrow trouble?

The two elders, the Scholar and the Herb Witch, had even taken care of the poor waif, wisking her off to their den, the Shogun hoped, never to be seen again.  All was well, all was back to normal. 

*   *   *

Behind the Herb Witch’s shop and the Scholar’s library there was their home.  It was dimly lit now and the two elders fussed over the disoriented girl.  “You need to eat, I know this all is strange to you.  Rest, be refreshed,” said the old woman.

Are you my mother?  Are you in need? Kitsuniko thought.  All this is strange, this of the old woman, this speech.  I do not know it and yet I understand.

Now the old man spoke, “We apologize for the long delay.  It is not right that you were in that hole for so long.  We do beg your pardon.

The hole, Kitsuniko looked at the old man, he meant well, but his words confused her.  When he said hole did he mean the world?  And what was this place?  So bright, and with these others.  “Are you my mother?  Are you in need?” Kitsuniko directed her question to the old woman, the words came with difficulty.

The old man was confused to silence by her mumblings, but the old woman heard and reshaped the words into something intelligible.  “Am I your mother?”  The old woman smiled and look to the old man.  The Herb Witch smiled at Kitsuniko, “No, I am not your mother, but we,” and she made a motion that included the Scholar, “We are all blood.”

There was silence, comfortingly like her world.  Quiet like the old world, this one was messier, confusing, but she knew from her ritual that there was a wider world that she wasn’t allowed, but one day she would.  It was today.

The old woman and the old man got to their feet and stood, hand pressing hand, “Daylight and dark.  The day begins, the day ends, the words must be said, the ritual must be performed, that I might know my purpose, that I am ready at need.” The words were different, but the ritual was the same, the movings and steppings, Kitsuniko flowed with her blood, two she could not remember but seemed to know or be known by. ”Body remembers what the mind has forgotten,” In the semi-darkness Kitsuniko moves, fighting shadows with shadow knives.  In the half light nothing is unreal.

It was dark in the scrub tree grove that slowed Iamerge’s headlong plunge.  This, this of death is not for me.  I’ve died a dozen times and never felt the bite.

There was a breeze that ruffled the woody firs, Iamerge turned and looked.  The Wanderer, tumbling as it went, fled away like he had.  The darkness all around him felt oppressive despite the moon wind.  He stopped to look up at a sky full of stars.  Why should I flee what may never touch me?

In the night the chanting of the monks came to him out of darkness, “. . .God, who searches minds and hearts, bring to an end the violence of the wicked and make the righteous secure. My shield is God Most High, who saves the upright in heart. God is a righteous judge, a God who expresses his wrath every day.  .  .”

Was this destruction and death the expression of an angry God?  And where?  Where, out in all that dark, is a god.  I see a little light, glittering points of beauty, but where is God?

” . . . He who is pregnant with evil and conceives trouble gives birth to disillusionment.  He who digs a hole and scoops it out falls into the pit he has made.^”   Iamerge chuckled to himself.  He sat among the needles and litter.  I wonder if a pit might not be preferable to death, a safe place.  I should dig a hidee-hole. 

The chanting rose, recapturing Iamerge’s notice, “I will give thanks to the LORD because of his righteousness and will sing praise to the name of the LORD Most High.”

Iamerge sat breathlessly.  The silence made him fidget and he would have rose and walked back to the fire if he’d been sure of the way. 

Then low and slow the monks began again, building quickly, “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens.” Iamerge turned to the sound.  He could see nothing of the firelight.  He clambered to his feet, feeling as he began to walk to the sound.  “From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise because of your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger. . .”

He shuffled forward, waving his hands before him in the blackness.  A root seemed to grab his foot and he pitched headlong into a low bushy tree.  He stumbled and tried to catch himself, but tangled in the branches he went down hard.  Iamerge struck his head and saw stars of a sort.  He rolled over, stunned, and saw above him the stars of the sky.

*  *  *

Conal lay in pain. His legs ached from well below where he knew they now ended, from phantom feet all the way into his belly.  He wept, but not for the pain, he wept for joy at the sound of the monks chanting their prayers to the LORD. 

He gazed at the beauty of the heavens through the blur of his tears.  The brothers began again, “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”  My lord too, now.  

“You have set your glory above the heavens.” Above even those stars? I wish I could sing like the brothers. “From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise because of your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger.”

I’m ready to die, I could go now and happily.  What use could I be, that the LORD wants me? ”When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?” 

In the dimness of the firelight, Conal seemed to hear a still small voice, or he simply knew in his soul, “You will live and you will serve me well.  I have loved you, Conal, from everlasting.”

The brothers sang, “You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor.  You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet:  all flocks and herds, and the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas.”

Then I will serve you all my days.  Conal’s spirit sang with his brothers, “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!

*  *  *

Iamerge’s mind whirled in chaos and fear, It was stupid to run out into the night.  What was I thinking?  Weren’t their corpses he’d seen, men who had fallen to those beasts?  Why did he fear to see that man die with him sitting helpless beside?  What was so hard about that?

Iamerge looked up and saw a shadow blocking the stars.  He cringed, fearing the beast-men.  The Stranger only, He thought, around its rim was the dim light of the three stars of Tir na Nua, but the Stranger kept most of that light sending only a little back out to be seen.

Iamerge got to his feet with care now.  His senses were alive.  Realistically, it was unlikely that those things would return.  Then too, he was not far from the men.  Conal’s death had un-nerved him and then stumbling in the dark had brought panic.  He was fine and would be fine. Soon enough he would see his way clear. 

Iamerge felt something on his forehead, he made to brush it away and his fingers came away wet.  He was bleeding.  “There now, I’ll not escape this foolishness without embarrassment,”  He said in the night.

In the dimness he felt something at his feet.  He reached down and his probing fingers found a long branch, like a staff.  He grasped it and used it to return to standing.  Iamerge’s head ached abominably, but the rough wood in his hands was a comfort.  He felt less vulnerable.  Now nothing left but to find my way back.  then I’ll add myself to the wounded souls around the fire, he thought.

Again he heard the monks chanting, “I will praise you, O LORD, with all my heart; I will tell of all your wonders.”  It was a matter of minutes fumbling in the dark and he saw the glow of the fire before him and the blue light of Spark lightening the horizon,

“I will be glad and rejoice in you; I will sing praise to your name, O Most High. . .” the brothers sang as Bright, the blue star, rose.

The night was dark save for one star.  I breathed and felt much pain.  My voice echo in the hollow earth when I cried out.  I had fallen into a sidhe and there I lay atop a mound of broken timbers and sod.

There was no flying out of this, nor could I climb up the walls as if it were a well.  Panic gripped me, I confess, my breath came too quickly and as sod was still drifting down I breathed so much I began to cough.  I struggled to my hands and knees.  The fight to breath focused me.  I was not dead, nor even that injured.  I was in the home of my friend, the girl who had laughed, Jella.

At first this was small comfort.  I was in darkness and knowing that none of my folk would ever find me here brought rising panic again.  I tried to remember the place in my dream, it had been lit in the middle and around the perimeter. In truth it wasn’t that large.  I walked down off the pile I had ridden to the floor and promptly tripped over something hard and sprawled on stone flagging covered with more of the result of my descent.

I rose again, walking like a blind man, arms waving, I headed off in what I thought a straight line toward the wall of the place.  Eventually I must find it, surely.  Before I did, I found a wall of stone.  I followed it to a quick turning and felt along one side to the back.  Reaching, I found a screen richly carved with images my fingers could not puzzle out, but I followed it to stone again.  Now I hurried, trusting this was a back wall and was rewarded with slamming my knee into something hard.  I fell into more hard edged items and then the stone floor.  In agony I clutched my knee.

Light was gone from my world.  I was lost.  Lost in a big room, not much more, but it was frighteningly strange for a boy who had always lived with not much more than some leather between himself and the sky.  I felt stiffled in the dusty hole.  I cried out for the only friend who I thought could help, “Jella!” Echoes died quickly and silence mocked me, “Jella, where are you? I need you now.”

I felt my way back to the wall and was too wounded in spirit and frightened by the dark to try to find my way.  I leaned back against the wall and stared, marvelling that eyes opened or closed it made no difference.  “Jella!” I closed my eyes.

The sun was rising where she was.  I saw it color the clouds before it mounted into the sky.  There were herd deer everywhere.  The north deer all have antlers and they are all colored alike, I could not tell which was male and which female, I was in a sea of tawny, antlered, steam breathed herd deer.  There were snorts and a bellow and the creatures shied from where I was.

“What does any of this have to do with the Deer Riders?” asked the youngest clearly growing impatient even with his grandfather’s plunge into darkness.

“Oh that’s fine. Don’t you care what happened to me?”

The eldest coughed, “well grandfather, it seems you survived.”

“Well enough, but let me ask you.  What does this tent have to do with me?”

All three boys looked confused, still, the youngest was bold enough to venture an opinion, “It’s where you live?”

“True, and couldn’t you learn something about me by where I live?”

” I guess. . .”

“Well, you are learning about the Deer Riders.  Show some respect.”

“I fell into darkness, but I woke in a golden glowing cloud, in flames, on coals of fire, but I was not burned.  The central hearth, where I sat, lit the hall with dancing gold, but it seemed the inhabitants were as bright.  They whirled and leaped to the sound of pipe and drum, their faces were strange to me, their clothes, stranger, full of embroidery and darting, piping and checking and. . . Well I’d never seen the like.

There were gilded partitions and polished copper shields behind oil lamp sconces.  The stonework even seemed to glow from the fires and too, perhaps, from the folk.  I was too startled by it all to move out of the flames.  I sat there like one of the logs that burned underneath me until I realized that there was a girl staring at me and laughing.

That I had not yet died screaming in flames had made me sure that I dreamed if not sure of anything else.  Now I wondered, for here was someone in my vision who saw me.  I moved toward her and she motioned to me as she rose and walked back into a darkened passageway.  I glanced at the bright folk around me in their colors and embroidery.  Now I saw tables laden with a feast and many more folk sitting in compartments watching the dancers and making merry. 

The watchers looked through me, the dancers whirled around and even through me it seemed, and there in the shadows a little girl still laughed at me.  I noticed her again and followed her. “You can see me. . .”

She spoke, but I couldn’t understand her words.  She cocked her head and smiled brightly.  She laughed again as I shook my head.  She motioned to herself, “Jella” she said and then motioned to me.  I told her my name and she spoke it so strangely that I laughed too.  She motioned me to follow and went deeper into the shadows.

She pulled a loose stone from the wall.  It was marked with a carving of a spiral and a creature that I thought might be an otter.  She pulled a little lamp and a bottle of oil from the niche.  She smiled and waited for my full attention. Then she showed me that there was a wick in the bottom of the lamp, she drew it out and set it as it should be to function, looking again for my understanding.

I nodded, “I know what a lamp is.”  She smiled and chuckled, shrugging she unstopped the bottle, filled the lamp, and taking the wick out of its holder she dunked it in the oil and then placed it back in its correct position.  She wiped away the excess oil, closed off the oil reservoir, and then looked at me again.  She showed me a necklace she had around her neck.  It was exotic and decorative, but she took it off and showed me that the pendant held a flint and steel.  She prepared some tinder fluff and placed it where it could catch the wick afire but not the oil reservoir.  A few practiced strikes and the lamp glowed to life.

She set the little lamp on a flat stone that protruded above the hidden niche and reaching in the nook drew out another lamp and oil bottle.  She showed me these and then placed them and the flint and steel necklace back in the niche and stopped it all up with the carved stone.

She watched me until she knew she had my attention and my eyes were locked with hers.  “You will need these when next you come,” I heard her say in my head though my ears heard something else.  This is what I took from what she said though her words did not say that, being gibberish to me. 

She took up her lamp and led me down the narrow sloping passage, “Souterrain,” she said.  She laughed again to see my confusion.  There was a great booming behind us.  She held the lamp between us and her eyes held mine, “They are closing the outer doors for Samhain.  Feel the breeze?”

And so I did or thought I did.  I saw the breeze catch her fine golden hair and set it aflutter around her face.  A breeze was coming from the darkness ahead, cool and rich with strange scents.  The passage was narrow with stores crowding our way both left and right.  We walked a long way it seemed to me.  I recall her humming a song as we went, we descended a long slope and then again I felt that our way turned again upward, particularly toward the end.

I say end and there was one.  Steeper and steeper our way bent.  Then the light of the small lamp struck a wall.  On closer inspection, the layers of the stone wall were set back as they rose, a steep stairway leading to a starry sky. 

I looked once more at the girl.  Her eyes looked golden in the lamp’s flame light and her smile sparkled.  I thought to myself how lovely she was and how strange.  “This will be your way Dream-walker. . .” she said and I knew without knowing her words. “. . .next time you come.  The stars will lead you home.” At that moment the lamp guttered out and I was left in darkness, or very nearly so.  From above, starlight shone and I followed it up and out.