Silver Rose

Nymphs

Tara had to admit that the nymphs were strong. They’d carried all four of them while swimming through the stream. On the way, Tara explained her pledge to the princess who seemed ready to believe anything including the fact that her nanny was a fairy who could change her appearance. When Tara finished, the princess merely sighed, nodded, and smiled weakly. Before anything else could be said, she noticed the water was no longer spraying them and Tara saw that the nymphs had stopped.

The water nymphs took them to a rather large grove of trees. The trees were tall and large. Although there wasn’t any bothersome underbrush, the ground was hard and the air very cold. Tara wondered why she actually trusted nymphs with the task of finding shelter. All nymphs paid attention to were the best places to frolic and waste time. Mara told her the man was breaking into a fever and she feared it was going to be bad. She needed some herbs and plants Tara’d never heard of. Of course, Tara didn’t take much notice of plants in the first place. But she did notice that they were soaking wet and the morning breeze was deathly chilling.

“This is not a shelter,” Mara said. “It’s a bunch of trees!”

“This is ridiculous,” Tara agreed. “We never should have followed a nymph’s notions of a human’s well being. Nymph’s know nothing of—“

One of the trees was growing a rather large branch right in the middle of the trunk. The branch was growing longer and wider with the second. It stopped in front of Tara’s face. Then two green eyes opened on branch. Tara took a step back.

“Nymphs know nothing of what?!” The branches lips said.

Tara watched as the branch took on the shape of a woman’s head. It looked like a woodcarving. Tara bit her tongue. It was a dryad, a tree nymph.
“I’m sorry, Asha,” Lorelei came forward. “I have brought you some very rude fairies.”

“Indeed,” Asha, the tree nymph, said. “I hope you haven’t come to ask for anything after insulting my woods.”

Her woods? Tara could slap herself. This wasn’t just a dryad it was a hamadryad. Whereas the dryads could live in any tree they chose, hamadryads were tied to a specific tree. This was thought to be special in the tree nymph world and the hamadryads were the leaders. Thus, the trees of the woods they lived in belonged to the hamadryads because they commanded the tree spirits. And Tara had mistakenly insulted one. How were they going to get help now?

“May we talk to the other hamadryads of the grove?” Tara asked meekly. They were still nymphs after all and there could be reasoning with the others who were not directly insulted. All she needed was some wine and music.

“No!” Asha said. Then more calmly she added, “I’m the only hamadryad left here.”

Tara bit her tongue again. She shouldn’t have assumed there’d be more than one.

“What happened to the others?” Marina asked.

Tara could kick herself for not warning the child to keep her mouth closed. She just insulted the nymph even more. She looked over at Mara. The Fauye’s eyes told her that even she knew that story.

Asha looked over at Marina as if considering whether she was stupid on purpose or not.

“Your people,” Asha finally said, “have chopped them down. We, hamadryads, only live as long as the tree we inhabit does. When the tree is killed, so are we.”

Marina stared at Asha for a long time.
"How would we know if a… a…”

“Hamadryad,” Asha said for her.

“Yes,” Marina said, “if a hamadryad were living in a tree?”

“You only have to ask the tree.”

Marina nodded as if it made sense, but Tara doubted that she really understood.

“I’m sorry we cut your friends down,” Marina said. Tara and Mara exchanged shocked glances. Apologizing to a nymph?! “And I’m sorry you were insulted. Your woods are very nice.”

Tara pressed her lips together. This wasn’t going to work. Nymphs were dumb, but not dumb enough to fall for that.

“Thank you,” Asha said.

They were complete idiots.

“Tell me, Lorelei,” Asha said. “Why have you come here? It’s almost Winter. You know we must sleep.”

“I bring these fairies and humans to you, because they helped us be rid of terrible monsters that might have attracted worse things to my stream.”

“Monsters?” Asha repeated.

“Yes,” Lorelei said. “Like the kind we haven’t seen since the Dark Sorcerer and the fighting days of Galcon and Hathora.”

“Oh my…” said Asha. “What were they like?”

“Terrible. They were—“

Mara cleared her throat. Tara rolled her eyes.

“We’re not here for gossip,” Tara said. “We just need shelter for the man. He’s very ill.”

“What do you know about King Galcon and Queen Hathora?” Marina asked.

Tara wanted to shake her. She kept getting them off the subject.

“What do you know of them, human maiden?” Asha asked.

“They’re my ancestors,” Marina said.

“We’re not—“ Tara tried to break in, but Marina spoke over her. Just like a princess to a servant.

“I am Marina DeLaney.”

Asha and Lorelei looked at each other.

“And I’d love to know any information you might have about my many greats grandfather,” Marina finished.

Tara half smiled. The girl did know how to persuade people to her side.

“Is she really a DeLaney?” Asha asked.

“Yes, but—“ Tara began.

“Why didn’t you tell us this before?” Lorelei asked. “We wouldn’t have tried to drown you if we knew you were a descendant of Galcon’s!”

“A friend of Galcon’s is always a friend of ours,” Asha said, smiling.

They were so dumb. Who befriends people solely on the basis of them being related to someone who’s been dead for hundreds of years? Apparently, nymphs did.

Asha stepped out of the tree. Instead of being the brown, rough, bark of a tree, now she was green from head to toe. Her skin was a light green like celery; her lips and eyes were darker. She wore an olive green dress that stopped above her feet. Her dark spinach green hair branched out around her head like the limbs of a tree.

That was one fascinating thing about nymphs: they always looked like whatever they were representing. With the two different nymphs standing side by side, it was all the more apparent. Asha held her arms away from her body, while her legs touched. She stood rigidly and her movements were stiff. Lorelei, on the other hand, was sleek. She looked like she’d just come out of the water after a swim. Her motions were fluid and graceful.

There was one other nymph. Mountains nymphs, or oreads, but Tara had never seen one. It was said by some that oreads were orange, but others said they were silver. Some said it depended on the mountain they came from. But they were supposed to be very tall, almost giant like, and solid as rock like an ogre. Stories said that they were hermits, so she wasn’t likely to ever see one. Besides, there was also supposed to be very few of them. Why that was, she didn’t know. Mountains couldn’t be chopped down like trees. Nor could they be dammed up, like a river.

Tara snapped back to the matters at hand just as Marina and Lorelei were finishing telling Asha what they needed and why. Asha nodded.

“I know of a place,” she said. She walked deeper into the woods and they all followed her.

All they passed were trees and Tara wondered if dryads inhabited any of them, or if Asha was truly all alone. Asha led them to a pile of boulders. There was a space big enough for a grown man between the largest boulders. Asha pointed to this space.

“Years ago, satyrs and fauns lived in here. They have long been gone.”

Tara didn’t want to go inside some dark cave. Just because the fauns and satyrs no longer lived there didn’t mean something wasn’t there. She was about to ask if there was another place, when the naiads that’d been carrying Zander walked straight into the cave.
Which meant they all had to go in. And they did. The cave was narrow for a couple feet then widened out to a nice sized room. There were four small shelves in a row on one side and three large ledges on the other. At the back of the cave was. Dusty bowls and jars sat on bookshelves that were carved into the rock on either side of the fireplace. Toppled and broken chairs and stools lay about the cave, but a table stood intact in the middle.

“The fauns slept on the large beds and the satyrs on the smaller ones,” Asha said pointing to the three ledges and four shelves.

“What are fauns and saytires?” Marina asked.

“Satyrs are half men and half goat,” Asha said. “Fauns are half men and half deer. They are both men from the waist up… animal down.” She looked around the room. Tara thought her eyes looked wet, but that couldn’t be. Nymphs didn’t cry. They were always joyful.
“Don’t lay him there,” Asha said to the naiads who were settling the man on the middle ledge. “Put him here.” She placed a stiff hand on the ledge closest to the fireplace. “Dimmple always nursed sick animals on his bed. If he were here he’d insist the man stay on his.”

The naiads scooped the man up and lay him on “Dimmple’s bed”. They stepped away not looking the least bit tired. That was something else interesting. The naiads looked so frail, so weak, but they had the strength of a giant. They’re water she reminded herself. A drop may seem insignificant, but a deluge was monstrous.

Asha’s fingered the man’s hair, stroked his cheek. Tara shouldn’t have given the nymphs so much credit. They were still purely sensual creatures. Couldn’t she leave him alone? He was ill after all. Tara bit her tongue and walked over to Mara was standing in front of the fireplace.

“I don’t like this hole in the ground,” Tara whispered to her. “Those creatures could still be living here. Who’s to say they won’t come back in a few hours?”

“They won’t,” said Lorelei, suddenly beside them. “They left many years ago and never returned.”

Tara still thought they might come back. So they’ve been traipsing the countryside for a few years, maybe they’re ready to settle back down this very day.

“I don’t think it’s so bad,” Mara said.

“But it’s cold,” Tara protested.

“There’s a fireplace,” she replied.

“Do you really think stone beds will be comfortable?”

“They used to put grass and flowers on top of the beds to make them soft,” Asha said still standing next to the man.

“What about food?”

“We can bring fish,” Lorelei said.

“And don’t forget, some of us can use our magic,” said Mara.

“We just can’t stay here!” Tara said out of good arguments.

“Then where are we supposed to go?” Marina said quietly.

Tara started to answer, then stopped. She wanted to say Ambremose, but Mara would have nothing to do with that idea. Besides, they could drag an ailing man the thousands of miles to Fauye land.

“I’m tired,” Marina said. She wasn’t snotty or whiny like usual. She just stated it as a fact. “I know Zander is. He’s been in the palace dungeons for the past few weeks. I don’t believe he got much rest. Maybe you—whatever you are—can keep searching for another place. But we humans can’t. We’re exhausted and we’re staying here. You can leave if you must.”
She sat on the middle ledge with a look that dared anyone to try to make her budge.

“Then it’s settled,” Mara said, walking over the man. “We’re staying until the man is well enough to travel. Then we can decide what to do next.”

“But they might—“ Tara began.

“Tara, if you’re so worried about people returning, then maybe you keep watch and warn us when they do,” Mara said.

Tara stared at her mouth open wide. When did she get to be so bossy?

“Outside of the cave.” Mara added.

Tara pressed her lips together.
“Then maybe I will!”

She marched to the slit of the cave opening. Turning back she saw Mara, Lorelei, Asha, and the other naiads hovering around the man’s bed discussing fever, and herbs and plants. Marina lay on her stomach on the middle ledge listening to them. Tara crossed her arms over her stomach. This was all wrong. They’d see. She turned and stalked out into the chilling wind.