Gossamyr swung around. Ulrich’s arm barred her from approaching the rear of the carriage. “The only troubled one I can see is you, my lady! How dare you? She is not yours to own or display or to destroy!”
“Gossamyr,” Ulrich cautioned.
“Your name is Gossamyr?” The lady’s fox teeth parted and her tongue ran along them. “Unusual. Not a French name. Will you turn about for me?”
“I will not move another footstep until you release this poor creature!”
The clomps of heavy hooves rounded behind Gossamyr and Ulrich. The caravan leader marched his horse warningly close. Sword drawn and eyes keen to her, with a flick of his weapon he bid her turn.
“We thank you for revealing your prize, my lady.” Ulrich tugged Gossamyr’s shoulder. “Best we leave you to your path.”
“You cannot own this faery,” Gossamyr hissed, “nor treat it as a beast!”
“I cannot see,” the woman directed the man on the horse. “Her cape must be lifted.”
Caught up in Ulrich’s arms, Gossamyr struggled against his firm grip. She swung out her staff, clipping the shoulder armor of one of the men. Forced backward by a line of drawn swords, she held her staff to the ready.
“Let us pass, my lady,” Ulrich called. “It is the moonlight; she is so troubled.”
“Indeed.”
Gossamyr clenched her teeth. Ulrich tugged her backward, away from the carriage. She followed, but held a hard eye to any who would challenge her. Indeed, she knew it foolish to have reacted so, but in that moment her heart had led her.
The armored men, forming a shield before the carriage and cart stood with weapons aimed for Gossamyr’s retreat. Ulrich turned and, dragging her along by the clutched ends of the cloak, began to jog across the grasses.
“Release me!” She kicked at him and managed to free herself.
He landed her body, a foot to her shoulder and bent over her face. “Cease!” he hissed. “You wish to lose your head?”
Twenty paces away the caravan began to move.
“She has no right,” Gossamyr growled. Unmoving, she found she had no desire to leap up and run attack upon the carriage. For much as she wanted to believe she could win any challenge, the threat of so many mortal weapons becalmed her bravado. “The fée are not animals. Did you see her? She was close to death. Her wings…oh…”
“Stand up.” With Ulrich’s offer, Gossamyr clasped his hand and stood. “I know naught what you are about, my lady. But I can wager a guess.”
She lifted a defiant chin. In the darkness it was difficult to determine whether he jested or spoke a challenge.
“We shall be off, without further mention—”
She jerked from his touch.
Beneath the wool cloak, she felt the hem of her pourpoint fall away from her waist. “Oh!” She clutched the fabric, hearing the dried leaves crumble.
“You are falling apart at the seams,” he said. “Tough bit of luck.”
Blight! Her father had not been jesting when he’d said the Disenchantment takes quickly.
Apprehensions brewing, Gossamyr eyed the caravan that wobbled off down the road. Oh, but she had looked upon Disenchantment. Pale and shivering and in chains. Let it not be so cruel to her!
A testing bend of knee determined her leathers still held. The tough material should hold. But who knew what the Disenchantment could do? Had Shinn known she would literally lose the clothing from her body?
Gossamyr jerked as Ulrich moved aside the cloak to look her over. The sweeping movement of the wool ripped the back of her pourpoint. Quickly, she pressed a hand to her chest.
A low whistle punctuated his astonishment. Ulrich tugged the cloak tightly over her groping arms and secured the perimeter with a scanning eye, though the night could not allow him distance. “You need proper attire, fair lady. Most urgently.”
“There may be a seamstress in the next village.”
“You heard the knight; Armagnacs have entered Aparjon. We will do well to pass around the city.”
“But—”
“You are too quick to fight, my lady. I will not risk my neck standing aside you as we enter an embattled city.”
He removed the saddlebag from his shoulder and carefully placed it across the mule’s flanks. “We must make haste. I would let you ride behind me.”
“Behind you?” She had never shared a mount with anyone. Why, there was barely room on the beast for Ulrich’s long limbs and overstuffed saddlebag and the crossbow. “Impossible.”
“You are a bit of a spoiled one, eh?”
“What?”
He turned, one arm propped at his waist, the other hand tapping impatiently upon Fancy’s back. “I said, you are spoiled.”
“You think I’ve gone bad? Do I…do I smell?” She attempted to scent her immediate air but only smelled the coolness of the night and a faint tang, which she attributed to Fancy.
“Spoiled, as in rotten. Everyone jumps to your whim. The princess demands her pleasures. Whatever you should ask is given.”
“What be wrong with that?” She stabbed her staff into the ground.
They both looked to the ground to spy the clump of dry hornbeam fluttering out from beneath the cloak. Flakes of the enchanted, disarrayed and damaged.
“What is it I have heard about Faery finery and coin?” Ulrich pressed a wondering finger to his chin. Glee sparkled in his eyes, Gossamyr sensed, for it was dark save for the carriage lanterns bobbing down the road. Private as it should have been, he enjoyed her humiliation immensely. “It disperses to dust once introduced to the mortal realm.” He toed the flakes of her decimated pourpoint. They disintegrated to a glitter of dust.
Gossamyr nodded. “Very well. Be there another village close?”
“Pray there is. Now mount behind me. I promise I shall not attempt to befriend you along the way.”
“Splendid.”
“Though I wager it shall be difficult to ignore a naked rider clinging to my waist.”
“I am not naked.”
“Steal not my hope, my lady.”
The sky thinned and receded. A flutter of his wings proved ponderous. Never before had he felt as though the world might…slip away. That his footsteps would not take hold on a path simply not there. ’Twas as if he were falling through the roots.
Images from the fetch proved Gossamyr had successfully arrived in the Otherside.
