The Eagle & the Nightingales: Bardic Voices, Book III Read Free Page B

no other such metal had—it was the true Elven-forged silver, silver that no mortal could duplicate, more valuable than gold.
    She opened herself cautiously, and “touched” it with a purely mental hand. She did know that bracelet; she wore its twin on her right wrist. The maker could be trusted, insofar as any Elf could be trusted. She relaxed, just a trifle.
    “In the name of friendship, then, I accept the gift and welcome the bearer,” she replied, holding out her hand. The Elf dropped the silver bracelet into her open palm without a word; the bracelet writhed in a strange, half-alive fashion and slipped across her palm and ringed itself onto her hand, then moved over her hand and onto her wrist, joining to the one already there. As it did so, she heard a strange, wild melody—but only in her mind. This was the music of Magic, true Magic, the magic that the Gypsies, the Elves, and some few—very few—of the Free Bards shared.
    If she had not already had this experience with the quasi-life of Elven silver more than once, she would probably have been petrified with fear—but that first bracelet had been set on her wrist when she was scarcely more than a child, and too inexperienced to be frightened. She had not known then that Elves could be as cruel as they were beautiful and that very few of them were worthy of trust by human standards.
    For a moment, a fleeting moment, she felt very tired, very much alone, and a little frightened.
    When she pulled her hand back to examine her wrist, she could not tell where the first bracelet began and the second ended—only that the circle of silver on her wrist was now twice as wide as it had been. She did not try to remove it; she knew from past experience that it would not come off unless she sang it off.
    The Elven lord dropped bonelessly and gracefully down on the other side of her fire, and caught her eyes in his amber gaze. “I come with a message, as well as a gift,” he said abruptly, with that lack of inflection that gave her no clue to his intentions. “The message is this: The High King of the mortals serves his people ill. The High King of those who dwell beneath the Hills would know the reason why, for when mortals are restless, the Hill-folk often suffer. If Nightingale can sing and learn, her friends would be grateful.”
    The chill spread to Nightingale’s heart, and she shivered involuntarily at this echo of Master Wren’s words.
    First Talaysen speaking for one king, now an Elven messenger speaking for another. This was so unreal that if someone had written it as a story-song she would have laughed at it as being too ridiculous to be believed. Why is this happening to me?
    “Is there no further word from my friend?” she asked, hoping for some kind of explanation.
    But the Elf shook his head, his hair rippling with the movement. “No further word, only the message. Have you an answer?”
    It wasn’t a wise thing to anger the Elves; while their magic was strongest in their Hills, they could still reach out of their strongholds from time to time with powerful effect. Songs had been made about those times, and few of them had happy endings.
    “I—I don’t know,” she said, finally, as silence grew between them, punctuated by the chirps of crickets. Firelight flickered on his face to be caught and held in those eyes. “I am not certain I can send him an answer. I am only one poor, limited mortal—”
    But the Elven lord smiled thinly. “You are more than you think, mortal. You have the gift of making friends in strange places. This is why the High King asks this question of you, why the runestones spelled out your name when he asked them why the mortals grew more troublesome with every passing month, and who could remedy the wrongness.”
    Nightingale grew colder still. The Elves lived outside time as humans knew it, and as a consequence had a greater insight into past and future than humans did. Elven runestones were the medium through which they