"Is it fear that inspires them? Is it jealousy? Or is it something more sublime, some inner voice telling them that they and I are not of similar ilk? They do not know, of course, of my days with the Touel'alfar, but certainly it is evident to them, as it is to me, that they and I do not share the same perspective."
Elbryan slumped back in the chair, musing over his own words. He put the tips of his fingers together and shifted his hands in front of his face, allowing 'his gaze to drift from the mirror.
When he looked back, the specter of Uncle Mather remained, passively and patiently standing in the mirror's depths.
"Belli'mar Juraviel warned me that it would be like this," Elbryan went on. "And, in truth, it seems perfectly logical. The folk of the Wilderlands frontier necessarily huddle together. Their fear isolates them, and they often cannot distinguish friend from foe.
"So it is concerning me whenever I venture into the Howling Sheila. They do not understand me -- my ways and my knowledge, and most of all, my duty -- and thus they fear me. Yes, Uncle Mather, it must be fear, for what have I that the folk of Dundalis should envy? By their measures, I am poorer by far."
The young man chuckled and ran his hand through his light brown hair. "Their measures," he muttered again, and he couldn't help but feel sorry for the folk of Dundalis, of Weedy Meadow and End-o'-the-World, huddled ever in their cabins. It was true enough that they enjoyed some amenities Elbryan did not: soft bedding, solid water basins, stored food: But the ranger had two things far more valuable, by his way of thinking, two things that he would not trade for all the treasures of all the kingdoms of Corona.
"Freedom and duty, Uncle Mather," he said firmly. "I draw no lines of property, because those lines serve as barriers both ways. And, in the end, it is a sense of accomplishment, of purpose, and not the wealth attained by such accomplishment, that equates to fulfillment and happiness.
"And so I walk my watch. And so I accept the barbs and open chiding. I take faith in what I am doing, in my sense of purpose, for I, above all others, understand the consequence of failure."
But I am alone, the young man thought privately, not yet ready to admit the truth aloud. He sat back again for a long moment, then braced his hands on the arms of his chair, preparing to leave.
He felt a soft and subtle vibration. Music?
He knew it was music, though it seemed too soft, too much in the background for him to actually hear it. Rather, Elbryan felt it in his bones, a gentle, delicate sound, sweet as an elvish harp, melodic as Lady Dasslerond's voice.
He looked at the mirror, at the distant image, and sensed a calm there.
Elbryan went outside his cave immediately; expecting the music to be louder. It wasn't; it hovered on the edge of his perceptions, whatever way he turned. But it was there. Something was there.
And Uncle Mather wanted him to find it.
He had planned to go to Weedy Meadow that day, then move on with the setting sun to the west, a circuit of End-o'-the-World. Now he could not go, for this subtle music, though Elbryan sensed it was not threatening, was surely intriguing. Had the elves come to visit? Then another thought nagged at the young man, a notion that he had heard this song before, though he could not place it..
The ranger spent the better part of the morning searching out the direction of the quiet notes. He used all his training, all his tools, focusing his senses one at a time in each direction, on every plant and every animal, seeking some hint of the source. Finally, he came upon a set of tracks.
A single large horse, he decided, unshod and walking at an easy pace. There were indeed wild horses in the area, some perhaps that had escaped the tragedy at Dundalis, others that had run off from caravans, and still others whose roots in the region were older than those of the human settlers. They were not numerous, and surely skittish, though Elbryan had entertained the notion of breaking one.
He soon came to believe that this would not be his chance, though, for as he followed the clear trail, he came to the conclusion that he was following, too, the source of the music. Thus, Elbryan believed, the horse was obviously ridden.
That thought didn't slow the ranger; it only intrigued him even more. Someone had come into his domain, someone not of the villages, for if it was one of the villagers, then this horse would likely have been shod.
Elbryan skipped down one tree-covered hillside, into a narrow vale and to the edge of a rushing river. He crossed with some difficulty, but had no trouble regaining the trail on the other side, for the rider was making no effort to conceal his tracks. Elbryan closed steadily. Soon he could make out the actual notes of a wind instrument, he noted, and he searched his memory once again, for he was certain that he had heard that peculiar, haunting sound before. He remembered, then, the instrument, piped by a merchant on the occasion of Elbryan's tenth birthday, a curious thing, a leather bag and a series of pipes - - a bagpipe, it was appropriately named.
The ranger moved swiftly and silently over a series of rolling hills. Then he stopped, suddenly, as the music stopped. Elbryan peered out around a tree. There, standing higher on the hill amidst a tangled grove of birch and low brush, stood a tall man, much taller than Elbryan, even considering the ranger's deceivingly low perspective. He had black, bushy hair and a tight beard. He was naked, at least from the belly up, with a powerful upper body, muscles clearly defined, and an arched back. He held the pipes under one arm, down low, his song finished.
"Well, ranger, are ye liking the way I fill me chanter and drones?" he asked, a wide, white smile across his face.
Elbryan crouched lower, though he was obviously seen. He could hardly believe that this man had noted his approach or that this man knew his title!
"And it took ye long enough to find me," the man bellowed. "Not that ye would have had I not piped for yer tracking!"
"And who are you?" the ranger called.
"Bradwarden the Piper," the man answered proudly. "Bradwarden the Woodsman. Bradwarden the Pine Father. Bradwarden the Horse Tender. Bradwarden the ..."
He stopped as Elbryan came out from behind the tree, the ranger rightly sensing that this introduction could go on for some time. "I am called Nightbird," he said, though he figured that this man somehow already knew that.
The tall man nodded, smiling still. "Elbryan Wyndon," he added, and Elbryan nodded, then stared dumbfoundedly when he considered the implications of that long-lost name. To everyone in Dundalis with the exception of Belster O'Comely, Elbryan was known only by the name the elves had given to him.
"Might be that the animals telled me," Bradwarden remarked. "I'm smarter than I look, not to. doubt, and older than ye'd guess. Might be the animals, might be the plants." Bradwarden stopped and offered an exaggerated wink that Elbryan, still a fair distance down the hill, saw clearly. "Might be yer uncle."
The ranger rocked back on his heels, unable to find even the words to ask the obvious questions. He was wary, though not afraid, and he continued up the hill, testing every step before he shifted his weight, as if he expected the place to be trapped.
"Ye should've killed the three," the piper went on.
Elbryan shrugged, not understanding.
"Paulson and his cronies," the tall man went on. "Nothing but trouble. I'd been thinking o' killing them meself, when I seen an animal chewing off its leg in one o' their wicked catchers."
Elbryan started to respond that he had eliminated the cruel traps, but the words were stuck in his throat. As he came around the low brush, he noted the hind quarters of a horse, noted that the man was mounted: As he came around another step, he saw that that was not the case, that the man, and no mount, had been the source of the tracks.
For Elbryan, Nightbird, who had battled fomorian giants and goblins, who had lived with the elves, the sight of a centaur was not completely unsettling. It brought many questions, though, too many for poor Elbryan to begin to sort out. And it brought, too, a memory of a piping song while he and Pony had stood quiet on the slope outside of Dundalis, and he recalled, too, the stories of the Forest Ghost, half man and half horse, that he had enjoyed as a child.
"They be nothing but trouble," Bradwarden remarked distastefully. "And I'll kill them if one more scream of me animal friends reaches me ears!"
Elbryan didn't doubt the claim for a minute. There was something too matter-of-fact about the centaur's tone, something. dispassionate, removed from humanity. A shudder coursed the ranger's spine as he imagined what this powerful beast, easily eight hundred pounds and cunning enough to completely avoid the ranger for all these weeks, might do to Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk.
"Well, Elbryan the Nightbird, have ye an instrument to join with me pipes?"
"How do you know of me?" the ranger demanded.
"Now if we're both for asking questions, then we're neither to be getting any answers," Bradwarden scolded.
"Then you answer mine," the ranger demanded.
"But I already did," Bradwarden insisted. "Might be --"
"Might be that you are avoiding an answer," Elbryan interrupted.
"Ah, me little human laddie," Bradwarden said with that disarming smile, though it surely seemed condescending coming from so far on high, "Ye'd not be wanting me to give up me secrets, now would ye? What fun would ye have then?"
Elbryan relaxed and let down his guard. One of his friends had told Bradwarden of him, he figured, one of the elves, most likely Juraviel. Either that, Elbryan decided, or the centaur had eavesdropped when the young man was at Oracle, for Bradwarden knew of Uncle Mather, and of the "little cave." In any case, Elbryan felt in his heart that this was no enemy standing before him, and he thought it more than mere coincidence that this very day, for the first time since he had come to the region, he had hinted openly of his feelings of loneliness.
"I trampled me a deer this morning," the centaur said suddenly. "Come along for a meal then; I'll even let ye cook yer part!" With that, the centaur took up his pipes and started a rousing military march,. thundering away on powerful legs. Elbryan ran full out, constantly seeking out shortcuts in the thick underbrush, just to keep pace.
They were not alike, very different in so many ways. True to his words, Bradwarden allowed Elbryan to start a fire and cook his venison, while the centaur ate his portion, nearly a quarter of the deer, raw.
"I do hate killing the damn things," the centaur said, ending his sentence with a resounding belch. "So cute they be, and appealing to one of me body in more ways than ye'd know. But fruits and berries are naught but ticklings. I'm needing meat to fill me belly." He rubbed a hand across his stomach, at the point where his human torso connected with the equine bottom half. "And I've considerable belly to fill!"
Elbryan shook his head and smiled -- all the wider when Bradwarden belched again, a great, thunderous burp.
"You have been in the region all the while?" Elbryan asked. "And I never spotted you nor found any sign."
"Don't ye be too hard on yerself," the centaur replied. "I been in the region longer than yer father's father was alive. And what might ye spot? A hoofprint or me droppings? Ye'd think them both that of a horse, though if ye inspected the droppings a bit more, ye'd find that me diet's not quite the same as me horsie friends."
"And why would I look closer?" Elbryan asked, a sour expression on his face.
"Dirty business, that," Bradwarden agreed.
The ranger nodded, forgiving himself for missing the signs.
"Besides," Bradwarden went on, "I knew ye were coming, and ye didn't know I was here. Unfair advantage, I'd call it, so don't ye go chastising yerself."
"How did ye -- you know?"
"A little birdie telled me," the centaur replied. "Sweet little thing that says her name twice in a row."
Elbryan's face crinkled at the cryptic statement, but he just shook his head, thinking that it really wasn't that important. Even as he started to ask a question in a completely different direction, he remembered a certain friend who fit the description. "Tuntun," he stated more than asked.
"Aye, that's the one." Bradwarden laughed. "She warned me not to expect too much from ye."
"Indeed," the ranger said dryly.
"So I telled her that I'd be watching over ye," the centaur went on. "Though I've come to know that ye don't need much watching."
"Then you are elf-friend," Elbryan said, hoping to find some common ground.
"Elf-acquaintance, I'd be calling it," the centaur replied. "They're a good sort for the wine, and they respect the animals and the trees, but they're too much for giggling and too long on manners!" To accentuate his point, he let fly the loudest belch Elbryan had ever heard. "Never heared an elf's belly- thunder!"
Bradwarden laughed riotously, then hoisted a huge skin and poured an amber-colored liquid -- Elbryan recognized it as boggle -- into his mouth, a considerable amount splashing over his bearded face.
"Ye should've killed them," the centaur said suddenly, spraying more than a little wine with each word.
Elbryan, thinking Bradwarden to be referring to the elves, crinkled his brow incredulously.
"The three men, I mean," the centaur clarified. "Paulson, Cric, and . . . what's the third, then? Weasel?"
"Chipmunk."
The centaur snorted. "Idiot," he muttered. "Ye should've killed them, all three. No respect, I say, and nothing but trouble."
"Then why has Bradwarden tolerated them?" Elbryan asked. "They have been in the area for some time, I would guess, considering their lodgings, and obviously you knew of them."
The centaur nodded at the simple logic. "I been thinking of it," he admitted. "But they didn't give me an excuse. And," he paused and offered a sly wink, "don't ye fear, for I'm not overly fond o' human flesh."
"You have tasted it then?" Elbryan reasoned, not taking the bait.
Bradwarden belched again, and then he launched into a long speech about the ills of humankind. Elbryan merely smiled and let the centaur ramble on and on, considering the creature's words carefully so that he could discover many hints about Bradwarden. Elbryan suspected, and would come to confirm over the next few weeks, that he and the centaur were not so different in purpose.
He was a ranger, a guardian of the frontier humans and also of the forest and its creatures. Bradwarden's mission, it seemed, was not so different, except that the centaur was more concerned with the animals, particularly the wild horses; he even hinted that he had given many of the wild horses their freedom, since their human masters treated them badly. He hardly cared for the humans. He had seen the raid on Dundalis years before, he confirmed for Elbryan, though the worst he would admit of the tragedy was that it was "a pity."
Theirs became a tentative friendship, an offered smile and exchange of news whenever the pair happened to be in the same area. For Elbryan, knowing Bradwarden was a wonderful thing indeed. He found that when he next ventured to Oracle, his previous feelings of loneliness did not follow him into, the cave.