Chapter 2

Into the Mist

-Part the Second-

He clasped his hands behind his back. Unease once more stirred within his heart, but Al hid it beneath a smile as the guard swung open the gates to Gerod’s Great Hall. The boy stepped inside, and the doors crashed shut behind him with a thunderous clang.

The cavern seemed darker than it had been under Ferlo’s rule. Only a few splinters of beechwood torches cast faint flickers of light, each mounted on a stalagnate surrounding the dais where the council bench stood. At the far end, upon the Master’s seat — whose back sprouted iron poppies like flowers from fertile soil, with stems and leaves twisting along the armrests — sat Gerod. A nightingale perched upon one of the iron vines, pecking at its wing, whilst Gerod gently stroked the bird’s neck.

“Master Gerod!” Al gave a slight bow as he reached the dais.

Only then did Gerod, a bold smile playing on his lips, turn his gaze upon the elf. He was not yet old; his black eyes gleamed with a fiery, almost youthful fervour. Al couldn’t help but compare the gnomish Master to Nol, and the thought of how utterly unlike each other they were nearly amused him. Nol was like a glacier, cold and unmoving. Gerod, by contrast, was all fire, his heart’s impetuousness poorly veiled and barely contained.

“The Willow Bard,” said Gerod, not taking his eyes off Al. He gestured towards a seat at the bench. “I once even had a liking for your songs.”

Al stepped onto the dais and, standing beside the bench, reached once more beneath his cloak to draw forth the parchment bearing the Council’s seal. Handing it to Gerod, he began to speak:

“In the name of–”

Yet Gerod cut him off at once, casting the document onto a side table hewn from a thick stalagmite.

“Enough! Spare me your formalities and that scrap of parchment. I know well enough why you’ve come, and I shall not waste time on such trifles. Sit yourself down! I’ve seen Ferlo speak with you as an equal, and you used words then far different from the stiff language of a Council envoy. So speak likewise with me, if you’ve anything worth saying!”

The nightingale trilled briefly, flapped its wings, and took flight. Al’s gaze followed it as it darted through the window and was swallowed by the black depths of the night. A faint, nigh imperceptible smile flickered on the elf's lips as he lowered himself slowly onto the seat by the bench. The chair’s armrests stretched outward like bare beech branches. Al rested his hands upon them comfortably, waiting in silence for Gerod to speak further.

The gnomish Master clapped his hands, summoning a servant who appeared from nowhere, clad in a stone-grey tunic trimmed with orange braid.

“Bring blackberry wine,” commanded Gerod. The servant bowed briskly and vanished as swiftly as he had come. Gerod’s eyes turned back to Al.

“Well then, woodland poet? You did not come to speak with me but with Ferlo. As for me” — he laughed, his eyes gleaming like glowing coals — “Nol would have sent no more than a bird, carrying a scolding letter fit for a wayward child. That’s what he willed Ferlo to do, didn’t he? Rein me in. But that shall not be. I will not yield the Fortress. Perhaps I did rebel against Ferlo and your Council, but the Stone Sages stood by me, and it is I who am now Master. What say you to that?”

Al raised his brows. As he had easily foreseen, Gerod was toying with his presence as though he were a worthless plaything. Whatever he said would soon enough be cast out alongside him through the great gates of the grotto. He might well have considered his duty as envoy fulfilled, rising to offer his farewell bow even now — were it not for that bard’s curiosity, stubborn as ivy, which bound him to the beechwood chair until he was driven from it.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“The Fortress is subject not only to the Council,” he said, casting a brief glance at the servant who had just returned with a jug of wine and was now pouring it into earthen cups, “but through the High Druid, also to the Masters of the Trees. By claiming the Fortress for your own, you stand not only against the Council but against the law of the Trees.”

“The Fortress,” Gerod snorted, “was wrought by gnomes. On gnomish lands, and by gnomish hands alone shall it be ruled. The law of the Trees... You repeat Nol’s words as though they were your own songs. Oh aye, you speak well, I grant you that — I’ve heard as much before. But...”

He fell silent, lifting his cup and gazing into the deep navy surface of the wine as though it were a mirror. After a moment, he continued, more softly, a faint smile curling his lips as he fixed Al once more with his gaze:

“But tell me, willow whelp — do you even know what lies within that Fortress?”

The question caught Al off guard more than he would have expected, and ere he could conceal his surprise, it must have flashed across his face, for Gerod laughed aloud.

“You’ve not the faintest inkling,” he said, swirling his cup so that the wine trembled and shimmered. He took a slow, deliberate sip before adding, “What lies within is enough to grind your law of the Trees to dust.”

Al offered no reply. He chose instead to weather the silence, awaiting Gerod’s next words. For a fleeting moment, he wandered through the labyrinth of his own thoughts, hoping in vain for an answer to the Master’s question. Yet none came — visions never heeded summons; that much he had long understood. All he had was the memory of the birder's words from the market, but they were vague and worthless, too insubstantial to lead him anywhere. “Some ancient secret. A key to great power and vast riches.”

He hardly knew himself why the Fortress had begun to pique his interest, and inwardly he laughed at his own curiosity. He had no fondness for riddles or ancient tales cloaked in the dust of centuries. He certainly had no intention of composing songs about it, and politics concerned him only insofar as was absolutely necessary.

As they sat in silence, the darkness at the far end of the hall suddenly stirred, rustling like branches in a midnight wood. Ignoring Gerod’s unwavering gaze, Al frowned, straining to discern the source of the unexpected movement and sound.

Then, from the shadows where the rustling had emerged, light flickered into being. A figure, wholly cloaked in folds of hood and mantle, knelt beside an open hearth, coaxing a fledgling fire. At first frail and hesitant, the flames grew bolder with each passing moment, their amber tongues stretching skyward with newfound courage.

Al's gaze fastened upon the quivering tongues of flame, golden-yellow like the petals of a rudbeckia. The longer he stared, the more they seemed to swell and stretch before his eyes, till at last they appeared to consume the cloaked figure entirely. The being began to hover half a yard above the ground, glowing like a firefly within a lantern. Al’s heart thudded wildly in response to the vision, and he barely caught Gerod's quiet words:

"Tell me, bard... if something precious, something your soul has always craved, suddenly fell into your hands — would you not sacrifice all to keep it?"

He no longer smiled; his eyes gleamed strangely now, touched with a flicker of fear.

He's afraid of me, Al realised, still somewhat dazed by his vision. His gaze shifted back to Gerod. Of course... he feared me once before, back when I was just a child. The memory of their first meeting flashed through his mind. The Master of Stone, afraid of a bard's visions.

Or of what I might glimpse within them.

"I don't know," he answered truthfully. He silently cursed that honesty as he slowly steadied himself once more.

Gerod let out a laugh, as though relieved.

"What sort of bard are you, knowing so little of so much? Your elven trees must be growing ever feebler if they bear none better than you."

Al arched a brow, smiling slightly.

"The better ones bow to the Masters of the Trees, not to mere rebels."

Thunder flashed in Gerod’s eyes.

"Were you not a envoy... nor a bard—"

But I am a envoy. And a bard. And you fear me, despite it all, Al thought, suddenly quite pleased with himself.

"Be gone," Gerod spat after a pause. "I’ve already sent a nightingale to Nol. It’ll reach the Twisted Oaks far sooner than you'll cross back over the borders of the Gnomish Wood and poke your nose past ring of the beechwood braid. But if you still fancy delivering word in person, and if you’ve yet to grasp it, then hear me now as a envoy — my answer is no , with all that comes with it."

Al idly swirled the wine within his goblet, delaying for a brief moment ere setting it down. Rising smoothly, he offered Gerod a shallow bow.

"As you will, Master Gerod."

As he departed, he cast one last glance over his left shoulder — but the hooded figure did not turn.