Endsong

.two. ~ Callum

         This was his first time in the Mistwood. Though he imagined it was most of their first times, even Old Gerard, who was approaching his fiftieth nameday. It was said that Men didn’t travel into the realms of the Elves, for fear that the Elves would steal their hearts away or sour their souls to the land of the living. Mystical creatures with magics and sorceries. Callum had heard tales of the Elves ever since he was a babe. Some tales spoke of their valiantry, some of their terror. Most, he supposed, were fantastical tales from people who’d never met an Elf in their life. He was going on fourteen summers now, he ought to know better than to believe his wet nurse’s stories.
         Their caravan had been long on the road, over a fortnight before they’d come to the River Road. The Twinsriver had been more beautiful and daunting than he’d ever heard anyone describe it. Words had not done it justice. Rushing rapids flowed swiftly into calm, placid meanders. The forest around them had been thick and colorful, vibrant and earthy and that was even before they’d come to the Mistwood, said to be the most beautiful of forests in all of Isolace. Callum could see why. A thick canopy of green and grey nearly blocked out the sun, but the forest was alight with fireflies and june bugs. Every now and again, Callum thought he could catch the light of a willowisp through the thick bows, but when he turned his head to look, it was gone.
         Say what they would about the Elves, none could say they didn’t live in a world of beauty, Callum thought.
         Riding beside him was a creature far less known for his beauty. A man by the name of Elocea Ham. Never before had a surname befit a man more than that of Ham. Elocea was a stout man, rotund in nature, fat to the common tongue. He was the only among them who didn’t wear a suit of armor, instead just a breastplate that had to be stretched and refit on the daily. His horse labored twice that of any other man’s, simply trying to bear his weight. A balding head of hair was hidden beneath a cap of golden silk with a pom that sat atop his round head. His beard was beginning to look unkempt, falling out of the twin braids he kept it in and a flagon of wine was always at his side.
         Callum had been squire for Elocea Ham for little over a year now. He was of House Trent before that and still adorned the name with pride. But the Trent’s had financed Elocea Ham into his faux Lordship by rewarding him handsomely for the capture of a sworn enemy, Sir Ivan Othos, who it was said had raped and murdered a cousin of Lord Enoch Trent himself. His land, his riches, his squire -- all paid for by the Trents and their endless coffers and repositories. How a man like Elocea had ever caught a renowned Knight such as Ivan Othos was beyond Callum and never a question he would ask. Not from his place as squire to the man.
         He’d made a name for himself after that. Turning his initial riches into a business and increasing it tenfold, maybe even twenty. No one could say how deep Ham’s pockets went save for the man himself. He kept his own books and haggled his own coin.
         They rode with an assemblage of soldiers and sellswords, all paid for out of Elocea’s fine riches. Men more loyal to the coin than they were to the man who commanded them. But so long as Ham was paying, they would do as he said. Thus was Elocea’s way, Callum had come to figure out. Even Old Gerard, who rode just beside Callum and who had signed on to be Elocea’s one true bodyguard was paid handsomely. He’d told the man to his face one that were the coin to ever falter, so would his loyalty. To Callum’s shock, it seemed Elocea had enjoyed the man’s honesty and trusted him all the more.
         “They say the Mistwood is haunted,” a gaunt, dirty man named Kelvin was saying behind him. The words perked his ears, he’d always loved stories of ghosts and shadows.
         “Nonsense,” Old Gerard silenced him with a voice as gruff as gravel. “Elfish sorcery.”
         “It’s true!” Kelvin protested. “I met a trader from West of the Hamfells that said he come out here once. Said he was alone on the road when he caught sight of a naked lady bathing in the river. She bid him come bathe with her, she did. And when he climbed down off his horse and dipped his toes in the water, she tried to drown him, she did. He sat there under the water, struggling and gasping and then all of a sudden, she just weren’t there anymore. Vanished, into thin air.”
         It was a poor story, but Kelvin’s often were. Callum didn’t raise a peep to tell him as such, that wasn’t the place of a squire. But Old Gerard, he had something to say.
         “More like he got piss drunk and fell off his horse into the river,” he grumped.
         “Bollocks,” Kelvin grouched back. The road had made them irritable. Too long had they been traveling and now, so far from home, they were going to rely on the Elves’ hospitality to house them tonight. If they were turned away, it would be another night camped out under the canopy of the forest, a prospect which none of the men seemed fond of. Not when the Elven Kingdom of Leís was said to have the softest of silk beds and sweetest of honey meads. Where every citizen lived in the riches of their kingdom and ate fresh game and sweet cakes every night. No man had to live off jerky and porridge, the way their band of travelers had been living these past many days.
         Ahead of him, Elocea drank from his flagon until it was dry, lifting a hand to snap his fingers. It was a sign he had need of his squire and Callum spurred his horse forward, coming to ride beside the man. Knowing full well what he wanted, Callum began to unstring a spare flagon of wine from his own personage to hand across to the man, replacing it with an empty one. He would fill it again when they stopped from a barrel being toted around in the wagon. If they didn’t arrive at Leís soon, Callum feared they would run out of wine before then and all incur the wrath of their master.
         Elocea took a long drag on wine before he let it fall to his side, wiping the excess from his bear with his sleeve. Callum began to slow his horse, to ride behind his master when the man turned to look at him, as if realizing he was there for the first time in ages.
         “Do you fear the Elves, Callum?” he asked, voice a hearty thing to match his girth.
         After some thought, “A little, my lord,” he admitted.
         “Smart lad,” Elocea commented. “Spirits be damned,” he announced loudly, so his men could hear. “It is not spirits that haunt these woods, but Elven trickery. Mysticism.” He curled the word, drew it out with a sneer on his face.
         Behind them, Old Gerard nodded his agreement. “Hear, hear.”
         “I felt it as soon as we passed into the Mistwood,” Elocea continued, chest puffing as he boasted his position. “Their eyes are upon us. Their magic seeps into our clothes, can you feel it on your skin?” He shuddered atop his horse and Callum kept quiet. He hadn’t felt a thing. “No, I suppose you wouldn’t. I suppose only those with a penchant for the magical would know the difference.”
         There was a grumbling in the men behind them, knowing the insult for what it was, but Elocea seemed not to care. His gaze stayed forward, wine making his cheeks flush. He was quiet the rest of the way, as were the men who followed him. Midday turned to evening and evening rang close to dusk before finally, through the shrouded wood, they caught sight of high walls made of thick oak. Towers and stations sat atop the walls, lit dimly with lamplight. A massive, ornate gate stood along the River Road, the face of a great owl carved into its intricacies.
         There, beside the gate, Callum’s eyes widened at the sight of a procession of Elves who stood guarding their eternal kingdom. They were clad in white gold armor, light and breathy, atop layers of green satin. Vines of ivy had been filigreed upon their helms and sharp looking shortswords hung at their hips. There were six on each side of the gate and one Elf who stood flush in the center of the road. This Elf bore a helm with silver antlers and wore a red cloak, marking him different from the others. Mud colored hair, braided and decorated with beads cascaded down to his tailbone. A warrior, for certain. Callum guessed he was some sort of commander, or maybe even the king himself, as regal as he looked.
         As the band of men approached, Elocea slowed his horse and the others followed suit. The Elf in the center of the road seemed to study them for a moment, though if he was surprised to see their company, he didn’t show it. Suspicion turned his brow and Callum found himself suddenly nervous that they would be turned away at the gate, or worse. Killed. Eaten, maybe, if his wet nurses were to be believed.
         “You have reached the gates of Leís, Company of Men,” the elf spoke, a voice as smooth as warm silk and slight accent to his common tongue. “You will state your business of we shall ask you to turn around and go back the way you came.”
         Even Elocea seemed enthralled by the Elf’s demeanor for a moment, before he cleared his throat and regained his wits. “I am Lord Elocea Ham of Jaggenburg.” No man dared call him on the claim of Lordship, too nervous to flap their tongues. Callum behind him could not stop staring at the Elves. “As for my business, I have come to seek an audience with your King.”
         Cursory glances were exchanged among the dozen Elves to each side, but their leader at the center remained as impassive as he had been. “Long has it been since Men sought the audience of my King.”
         “Too long, one might say,” Elocea answered, jovial in his answer. “Would that the wisdom of the Elves be not lost among my kind, mayhap we would have a better state of affairs.” It was a far cry from the way Elocea had spoken about the Elves just hours prior. The skepticism in his voice was gone, the doubt in his mind vanished. His words were buttering and light. But would they be enough to win the trust of the Elf standing in front of them?
         “What business do you have of my King’s council?” the Elf demanded.
         Elocea smiled warmly. “Before I state my business, may I ask who it is I am speaking to? It is custom where I come from, you see.”
         A slight hesitation in the Elf before he answered with, “Ullindar Stormshield. Lord Commander. Now, your business, if you would, Lord Ham.”
         Callum’s master beamed at the title and nodded his head. “As you wish,” he told them and reached inside a sleeve towards a pocket he’d had sewn there. It was a movement too quick and suspicious for the Elves in front of them, who had their swords drawn quicker than Callum could blink.
         Elocea huffed and stammered, but was slow as he removed his hand from his sleeve. In it, a shiny, flat stone-like object, opalescent and black. He turned it in his hand, showing it’s bowed nature and one hardened face while the other was smooth to the touch. “‘Tis only proof,” Elocea said to ease the tensions still burning in the Elves’ muscles.
         “Of what?” Ullindar demanded.
         “That I’ve come to see your King about a dragon.”
         For in his hand laid a dragon scale.