Brokedown Palace Read Free Page A

farther.”
    “You reject it?” said Miklós.
    “I do. I must. But that does not mean you should. I am old, master. I am from another age. Once I was stronger than the power of Faerie. Now, it is stronger than I. Perhaps someday I shall be the stronger again. I know that in Faerie, should you go and return, you will learn much. But I don’t know if this knowledge is good or ill. If you go, you must decide this yourself.”
    “‘Another age …’ Was it you who carried Fenarr? You, yourself? But I thought you had died!”
    Bölk made that sound which is called snorting in a horse or a
man. “Myself? Another? Who can say? The land has changed; I have changed; the world has changed. All things become what they were not, and I am no different. I remember Fenarr, if that is what you mean; but my memory differs from the legends, and I am not certain that the legends are not more accurate. But master, the choice is still before you.”
    As the horse finished speaking, Miklós suddenly knew that all thought of not going had left him. He straightened his back and said, “Come then, Bölk. Take me as far as you may, and I will learn what I learn.”
    “But what will you do with what you learn, master?”
    “Do?”
    “Pay no mind. Only climb onto my back. We have a hundred leagues of plains before we come to the foothills that bring us to the pass the River has carved, and from there we must find our way to the great waterfall that is its source. I think we should avoid the city, and doing so will add yet more time.”
    “We’re in no hurry, Bölk.”
    “Are we not, then, master?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Pay no mind.”
     
    THEY EMERGED FROM THE WANDERING FOREST LATE AT night, after riding to it for four days and through it for another three. They camped just beyond its border. The next morning, Miklós rose, stretched, turned, and gaped.
    The Mountains of Faerie stood before him, awesome and magnificent.
    Ten millions of years before, a battle had taken place. On one side had been billions of tons of rock, mostly granite, wishing to go east. On the other, billions more tons of rock, mostly limestone, sandstone, and shale, desiring to travel west. The battle lasted for
hundreds of thousands of years of pushing, withdrawing, looking for avenues of escape, and head-to-head duels of pure strength. In the end, the limestone had succeeded in passing beneath the granite.
    The victorious limestone, except for occasional patches, remained invisible. The granite could be seen for scores of miles. All conception of distance left Miklós as he viewed the closest peak. Its base was near enough that individual evergreens could be seen, yet trees at the top were merely a blur. The peaks farther back, and higher, gleamed white with snow in the early morning sun. Those still farther back showed faint white that the sun couldn’t reach because the Hand of Faerie loomed over them like a blanket, shaken, about to settle.
    “It’s beautiful,” he said at last.
    Bölk stood next to him, watching Miklós’s face instead of the mountains.
    After what seemed like hours, Miklós noticed the morning chill and hastened to don a plain gray cloak that he had purchased in a village on the other side of the forest, trading his ring for it and for other things Bölk had said he would need.
    “We must leave soon, master,” said Bölk.
    “I know,” said Miklós, almost to himself. “We’ll be traveling—how far can you bring me?”
    “To the base of the flats that come from Lake Fenarr and signal the beginning of the River of Faerie.”
    “How far is that?”
    “There is a path into the mountain before us that soon joins the Riverbed. We will reach the path a few hours after we start, and the base of the falls a few hours after that.”
    “So today is our last day together?”
    “It is, master.”
    Miklós said nothing, but stared at the mountain before him while laying a hand on Bölk’s neck.
    “You should eat, master,” said