Glimriel's Quest

GLIMRIEL’S QUEST

by

Ian Elspeth Raines*

(*Bonnie S Egerton)

To Annee

August 9, 2012

chapter I

The Magician



The old man looked an improbable sight that night she saw him, as he stood upon the palisades above the ocean, rainwater streaming through his long, white hair to his shoulders and his many-colored robe flying in the wind. He looked an improbable sight the way childhood is improbable, the way anything is possible--anything--anything at all when you are small. Something in the air and in the old man’s demeanor spirited her back to her early days. She could imagine all the wishes, all the wonders, all the works of magic she had ever known as a child rolled into this one winsome man as he danced upon the cliffs. Balancing on the coattails of the wind, he moved lithely as a cat, all sinew and lean muscle, and not much bent for his age, Rain dripped from his hook of a nose. He wore a brimmed hat over that nose, but his eyes shone out just the same as darkling as well water under starlight. Jacq Felling knew him in some way, as if she’d always known him. She knew him in that way a person can know someone at first glance. He was a beginning. In him, she saw the beginning of all things, and she thought she glimpsed her own destiny that night, where she stood in the perimeter trees of the high forest, watching. Observing him was such an intense feeling that she couldn’t move but stood rooted to the spot where she remained frozen in place beside a hickory tree. The old man danced as unfettered as a child, knew the freedom of heart and mind and spirit that only children know. Sparks of electricity flew from his fingertips. She felt his gaze like a force to be reckoned with as it moved around the clearing, and she hid from view. The rain fell freely and she too yearned to be free. She raised her hands into the rain, caught it in her fingers, tasted the wine of it. Jacq didn’t know where this old man came from with his disheveled hair and pompous hat, but he made magic in the night. He was so old. He reminded her of some prophet of yore or some great and mighty wizard. He had seen more years than most people ever imagine. He had lived longer than princes or kings. His mien was as majestic as the mountains. And he danced. He weaved in and out of the wind like a spirit. Fairy green light flickered around him, lit the air like faerie fire. Light flared over the horizon. The rain came down like a benediction, and the old man’s fingers played through the air like a musician. The man’s coat swept mists along the soggy ground that billowed to his waist and trailed around his head.

Jacq held her arms to her, clutched the cotton material of her sleeves. The rain had seeped under her leather jerkin, and the shirt clung to her skin. The exposed sleeves left her clammy, overtaken by a chill, the kind that comes at the end of a rain when the wet sinks into a person’s bones. With a shudder, she realized the chill came from more than the cold, soggy breath of the night, as her vision of the old man shifted before her eyes to dawn as something more than a dance. The hem of his robe caught fire, a lick of flame reaching upward. He grabbed his hat from his head and slapped the fire out with it., then whirled around to face the forest Jacq shrank from view. He looked a hulking brute of a man for his age, etched against the cloud-swept sky. The lightning playing around him flew wild into jagged streaks that big the dark, and thunder cracked in the air. a rumble underfoot, and the cliffs shook. The ground boomed like cannonfire.

Jacq fell and plopped onto her backside, legs sprawled over the roots of the hickory. The skies opened and the rain poured down once more. She thought the old man saw her. He came toward her at an unsteady gait. Lightning cracked the air above his head, and he plunged headlong to the ground, to lie askew in the runneling mud. She thought him dead.

The wind offered itself as a comforting presence, when Jacq climbed to her feet, and tossed the leaves of the trees with a voice that echoed the voice of the sea. A little more distant, the call of a bull elk whistled in the dark. The brisk, air smelled of wet animal and a faint trace of scorched flesh as the shower died on the breeze. Jacq stared out at the old man’s body and held tight to the hickory tree for strength, as rainwater dripped through the forest canopy like second rain. The old man’s body remained motionless. It didn’t suddenly animate and rise to come lurching toward her, ghoulish and could as the grave. He lay still as silence. She should go to him, she thought, but a more intense part of her mind warned of danger. The destiny she throught she had glimpsed had brought her to this, and the wonder of it had so swiftly turned evil that childhood’s torment of nightmares came over her. Her clammy skin crawled, and a fist of horror grasped at her throat.

In its swaying bed, the ocean dipped. There came a rumbling deep in the sea, like thunder captured by the tides. Jacq watched the waves swell under moonlight. Starlight through the passing clouds washed a pall like sickness over her as the choppy sea rose. Her mouth slowly opened, and she breathed out horror. The sea was an entity, rising, rising up and up to peer over the cliffs and behold the old man. Then it dipped down into its bed again, and Jacq sank to the ground and shook like a beaten dog. She could hear herself weeping.

A night bird as black as death flew out of nowhere but darkness, a sinister sight that settled on the old man as Jacq looked the gauzy veils of mist clearing over the body. The bird tuggeed at the old man’s hair as if it were claiming material’s for a nest. Jacq made a hoarse sound in her throat. and struggled to her feet, breathing hard, fighting a veil of black blood before her eyes. The bird wasn’t real. She knew it, knew it with every fiber of her being. Some fould magic shaped it, and her world reeled around her, changing--changing.. She hated it with a pure, firey instinct. “Hey,” she shouted, waving her arms, and she ran. She shrieked as she ran, and the bird merely looked at her with moon-mad eyes, as she nearly threw herself on the old man’s body where the disdainful creature crouched. “Old man,” she yelled.

The bird flew at her with a sharp cry Its wings beat at her face. She struck at it with both fists. Its narrow bill lunged at here, gasped open and darted for her eyes. She lashed out in blind panic. A wing broke, and sorrow surged through her. Rage followed. The bird vanished as it had appeared. From nothing it came and to nothing it returned.

Jacq stood alone over the old man’s body like a lost animal, drained of any sense of reality. "Sorcery," she muttered on a quavering breath. "It's sorcery."