The Fae’s Army

”My protection, my intervention, these visits… They are costly. In order for me to take on the spirit of decay with what remains of my strengths, my little child must be kept in a deep sleep. For three days and three nights. I require you to make a draught strong enough…”

”Do you mean a sleeping draught?” Cedric asked.

Duessa nodded.

”That is… dangerous beyond reason,” Lorenzo objected immediately, standing up.

“You are physicians, are you not?” Duessa asked.

“She’s a nine-year-old girl!” Edgar reminded her.

She turned her head towards Edgar directly.

”I have considered your many limitations. But this is the shortest time required to overcome an enemy of Hauroth’s might. The knight will fight by my side. Your role has already been assigned.”

”So you were conspiring on this too?!” Edgar reproached Ignatius.

”I have only just been made aware of this plan…” Ignatius said.

”Lies! That's all we’ve heard from you!”

”Doubt me all you want!”

”Shhhhh…” Duessa’s annoyed hush echoed in the passing wind. “Your bickering annoys me. And you’ll wake up Agnes.”

All four men were silenced.

“There will be no more arguing among my army moving forward. You travel under my protection and that of the forest until you reach Eatonbury. Return her to the safety of her cloister. You’ll wait for my orders there.”

“Duessa,” Lorenzo said, turning his head to face her directly. “No.”

The others looked at him, as did the fae.

“Oh?” she asked, a sly smile drawing across her lovely face.

“We won’t do this,” Lorenzo declared.

Without taking her eyes off Lorenzo, Duessa slowly got up. She took a few slow steps towards him around the outer turn of their circle; her leaves and twigs rustling as she walked.

“Lorenzo…” she uttered. “The studious one.”

She draped an arm over his shoulder and leaned affectionately against him while Lorenzo froze in place.

“The other two are plague doctors by trade. Barely trained. One wise, if rusty…” she looked towards Cedric. “But he is the only believer among you. And that drunken one is… oh, how interesting. Domine, custodi milites. His trade before this was…the battlefield. But not as one merely sent to the slaughter. Not you. You were the strategist. You! Drunken Edgar?! How delightful!”

Ignatius looked up. Edgar lowered his head, without a denial.

“Did you know you had a brother in arms, Ignatius?” Duessa asked. Then she giggled and turned her attention back to Lorenzo.

“And then there’s you.”

Her fingers began to walk the length of his beak ever so playfully.

“University of Paris. A foreigner by birth. A Florentine. How did you end up here…? This is more than a vocation for you. It is priesthood.”

Lorenzo didn’t move. Neither did the others.

“Children can be wiser than their years, didn’t you know? I wasn’t sure about her choice at first…But I see it now.”

And with this, she laid the softest kiss on the left cheek of Lorenzo’s mask. From that very spot, a vine of roses sprang. Slowly, more roses began to form and bloom; enough to twist and entwine around his entire body, her own, and even the floor beneath the others until they tangled around every boot, every leg and every torso.

“That being said…” Duessa continued.

And, immediately, every sweet-smelling rose sprouted a handful of thorns that grew in size until they began to pierce thick leather and snake inside sleeve and armor until they broke skin. The vines that now spread out into the forest floor began to glow, their curious otherworldly green light flowed outward, pulsing from roots to ground to branches, until every leaf shimmered with the fae’s uncanny influence. It touched a stream and spread quickly to the river, rising to illuminate neighboring brooks and the waterfalls.

All the animals in the forest began to chirp, hoot, growl and bark. Their cries of excitement rose and spread across the glowing landscape.

“You are adequately prepared to do this,” she whispered lovingly to Lorenzo. “I believe in you.”

The men began to squirm in pain as the thorns pierced their skin. They pierced Duessa’s skin as well, even from her lovely crown, so that crimson blood began to spill over her skin, trickling down from her skull so her blood matched the dark color of the roses.

“I will have my little Agnes live as a normal, happy child, back in her mother’s arms. I failed to restore it once. That mistake won’t be repeated.”

The men were now grunting with pain as the thorns doubled in size.

“But I can’t do this with this corruption hanging in the air, you understand. So Hauroth will be defeated.”

“Agnes will die…” Lorenzo could barely speak through the agony.

“Agnes is already dead,” Duessa said.

Even through the pain, the revelation cut more deeply.

“My presence alone keeps her breathing,” Duessa explained. “But once Hauroth is defeated, she will be alive once more by her own grace, free from the bondage of the forest…”

She stopped for a moment, a single tear falling from her cheek.

“Though forever cherished.”

She wiped it away with her hand.

“Oh…” she said and then the thorns and roses began to slowly retract and retreat. “I just remembered. Agnes has not yet agreed to this. I didn’t get to ask her! How clumsy of me!… Well, then, I’ll explain it all after she’s rested. This journey has been tiresome for all of us.”

She watched the men bleed and pant in place as the vines and thorns receded back into the soft soil of the earth and all the little creatures went quiet, the green light dimmed, and the forest once again darkened so that only the soothing water of the stream reverberated.

“If she agrees, I will accept no refusal from you.”

Once the men were left heaving and breathless, Duessa picked her ale cup and simply walked away.

“Thank you for the ale.”

No mist, no wind. All four men simply watched as the fae sauntered away into the brush.

Bleeding, ale cup in hand, Duessa vanished into the darkness.