Leaving Rondalo and the horses behind in the fastness of snow-clad peaks, Camille crossed fields of ice and barren rock and snow, rubble and scree and schist half-buried in the winter white, Scruff shifting about to keep his balance as Camille scrambled across the boulder-laden ’scape. On she went, the trek difficult, and she paused now and again to take a drink and offer water to Scruff as well.
It was nigh the noontide when she came to the barren, dark ruddy slopes. She paused briefly to feed Scruff a scatter of millet seeds and to take a meal of her own. Then on she went up the bleak sides, her staff aiding in the climb as she angled cross-slope for the ledge above the vertical rise, the ledge the Dragon’s doorstone.
As she gained in height, she looked back into the fastness she had left behind, yet she saw no sign of Rondalo among the jumble of rock. Still, she knew that he was there somewhere, lost in the background, her gaze unable to find either him or the horses.
On upward she went, the sun sliding down the sky, and though a shoulder of the slope stood in the way she knew she must be getting close. Of a sudden Scruff grabbed a lock of her hair and leapt down into the high vest pocket, the tiny sparrow chattering frantically and tugging on the tress.
With her heart thudding in her chest, “Ah, then, I was right. Peril indeed is nigh, eh, Scruff.”
Still the bird chattered, and still did Camille climb, yet when she rounded the turn to abruptly come to the broad ledge, Scruff fell silent.
Camille stepped thereon, and midmost yawned a black hole.
And it was vast.
Timorously, Camille moved toward the gape.
“WHO COMES?” boomed a great voice, echoing hollowly.
“Oh!” Camille blenched and cried out at the thunder of sound, her heart leaping into her throat.
“IS THAT YOU I TASTE, RONDALO, FAINT THOUGH IT IS? COME TO YOUR DEATH? COME TO MEET YOUR FATE?”
Again Camille flinched, yet she managed to say, “ ’Tis I, Camille, and though I did journey with Rondalo, instead I have come for your aid, O Raseri, your help to find my Alain.”
As Camille peered into the darkness, trying to see, the voice drew closer and boomed, “ALAIN? PRINCE OF THE SUMMERWOOD?”
“Oh, yes, and I am so glad you know of him, know of my beloved. He is lost, and I-”
“Camille, my love,” came a gentle response, and stepping forth from the darkness “Alain, Alain, oh my love.” Sobbing, Camille rushed forward, and he took her in his arms.
“Shhh, shhh,” he said. “I would not have you cry.”
“Oh, Alain, my sweet Alain, I have found you at last and I have been searching for so very long, and-”
Camille felt an insistent yanking on a lock of her hair, and she could hear Scruff chattering madly. And she looked down at her pocket where the tiny bird jerked and pulled at her tress.
And from the corner of Camille’s eye…
… from the corner of her eye…
… from the corner she saw…
… a great scaly foot with claws like sabers resting against the stone.
With a gasp, Camille drew back, and there before her ’twas not Alain, but instead “RRRRAAAWWW!”
The Dragon’s roar was deafening, and he was monstrous, looming upward some twenty feet or more, his gleaming, sinuous body stretching back into the blackness of his lair. Like the stone of the mountain itself, he was a dark ruddy color, splashes of ebon blackness glittering here and there. Vast leathery wings were folded along his sides. And as he slithered forward, emerging from his den, Camille stepped backward in terror, the vertical precipice of the ledge coming near.
“YOU, RONDALO’S CAT’S-PAW, COME TO GULL ME WHILE HE PLANS SOME HEINOUS ATTACK. TREACHEROUS MAIDEN, YOU WILL NOT LIVE TO SEE ME DESTROY HIM.”
Raseri drew in a deep breath, and Camille knew she would not survive the fire to come. Futilely, in a two-handed grip she thrust out the stave, as if it would ward the flames, and she shut her eyes and turned her head aside, death even then on its way.
A great blast of fire spewed forth, but it touched not Camille. She opened one eye to see the last of it gushing into the sky.
And then Raseri looked down at her and at the staff in her hands. “Lady Sorciere sent you here?”
Of a sudden, Scruff scrambled out from the pocket and to Camille’s shoulder.
“Yes, my lord Dragon,” said Camille, her voice tight and quavering with residual tension and dread, as well as with disbelief that she was yet alive, Camille herself feeling as if she would collapse at any moment, and she abruptly sat down on the stone. She put her head between her knees and said, her voice a bit muffled, “Indeed I was sent by the Lady of the Mere.-Oh, not specifically here, yet she did start me on my way. ’Twas Chemine, the Lady of the River who sent me to you, for only-”
“Chemine?” The Firedrake’s glittering, golden serpent eyes flew wide in surprise. “That cannot be. She would not do such, for I slew her mate on her wedding night, or so it is I recall.”
“Nevertheless, she is the one who sent me, with her son Rondalo as my guide, for you are the First of the Firsts, and perhaps only you can aid.”
Raseri peered down into the valley, and his forked tongue flicked out, and he hissed, “Are you certain this is not some trick? I see Rondalo now riding in haste this way.”
“Oh, no,” cried Camille, leaping to her feet, “he will break his sword-oath.”
“Scruff,” called Camille, holding open the vest pocket; the wee sparrow hopped in. Then swiftly she cast off her rucksack and bedroll and waterskin and then removed her cloak. She stood on the lip of the ledge and whirled the garment by its collar ’round and ’round o’erhead.
Finally Raseri said, “He’s stopped.”
Camille continued to whirl the cloak.
“He’s turned back.”
Arm weary, Camille lowered her cloak and saw in the distance, among the great boulders strewn along the valley floor, Rondalo riding away.
As Camille donned her cloak once more and Scruff scrambled back to his usual perch, Raseri said, “Well, now, if one of my sworn enemies has sent you to me for aid, and the other sworn enemy acted as your guide, then there is a tale here for the telling, and I would hear it all.”
Darkness had fallen, and Scruff was now asleep in the high vest pocket, and by the growing argent light of the waning gibbous moon half-risen, her tale now come to an end, Camille looked up at Raseri.
The Dragon sighed. “No, Camille, I know not where lies a place east of the sun and west of the moon.” Even as Camille started to weep, Raseri added, “Yet do not despair, for although I am indeed the First of the Firsts, there might be in Faery some who are even older than I.”
“Older? How can that be?”
“ ’Tis said they have been in the world since the very beginning of time.”
“Where can I find these eld ones?”
“I am not at all certain, but there is a river you may follow, and they might be found nigh. Yet it is perilous in the extreme to go along those banks and worse still to fall into its flow.”
Camille glanced at sleeping Scruff. “Peril from what? Monsters? Serpents from the seas in those waters?”
“Worse,” replied Raseri. “It is the River of Time, that which the Fey avoid; none whatsoever go nigh, for it is said that should one travel along the River of Time, then mortal he will become.”
“A river of time?”
“Aye, for all time flows in a stream out from Faery, to spread over the earthly demesne.” Raseri looked down at Camille, then gestured outward. “Where else would time issue forth but from out of this mystical place?”
“But I thought time touches not Faery.”
“In the main, ’tis true, for in Faery, time is confined to the river, perilous in the extreme; but in the mortal lands it spreads out over the whole of the world and becomes diffuse, attenuated, and is somewhat less dangerous. In Faery, all Fey avoid the river, going ’round rather than across, for we want not to suffer time’s ravages should we travel along its banks or fall into its flow. But in the world of mortals, the Fey on occasion do swim within time, for there it is weakened. Still, should we spend overlong in the world of men, we might turn mortal ourselves. Have you not heard the tales of Fey falling for the love of a mortal man or woman, and becoming mortal themselves? That’s because they overextend their stay in the earthly realm. To retain their immortality, Elves and other such oft vanish from the mortal lands and return to Faery, else mortal they would become. And though the River of Time does run through Faery, none I know travel thereon.”