Mara played, and a silver light shone in her hair. For a moment, Sturm thought she was glowing, then gradually he noticed the same light spreading over his arms and shoulders, over Acorn's neck and the chestnut flanks of Luin behind them. White Solinari had broken through the thick mask of clouds, and the road behind him and before him was as clear and dazzling as midday.
"As I feared," Mara said, the song over and the clouds returning. "We've listed a bit to the south. We'll strike the river again if we keep on as we're going."
"How… how did you do that?" Sturm asked, turning Acorn forcefully from the trail that the stubborn little mare insisted on following.
"Gilean mode," Mara said quietly, "with the High Mode of Paladine placed in its silences. When you combine them, it's a song… of revealing. It dispels clouds and night, stills waters so you can look to the bottom of pond and river. In the hands of the great bards, it unmasks the dissembling heart."
She smiled at Sturm, who caught his breath at the depths of her hazel eyes.
"But I am no great bard," the elf concluded quietly. "With my music, we are lucky to see a momentary change in the weather."
Sturm blushed and nodded, yanking once more at Acorn's reins.
"Well, the clouds parted long enough," Mara said, pointing due east. "There's our direction. That way lies the Darkwoods."
"But where on the woods' edge can we find Dun Ringhill?" Sturm asked. "The stars don't tell us that. If only we had Jack Derry here!"
"Ah, but Jack is lost or upriver or… elsewhere," Mara said. "Leaving us alive if no wiser."
"He believed I could find the way," Sturm muttered disconsolately. "He trusted that I was my father's son, that I am more resourceful than I feel."
"My dear boy," Mara said with a crooked smile, "what in the name of the Seven makes you think that?"
"He told me," Sturm said, "that the acorn doesn't fall far from the tree. What else could that be but talk of fathers and sons?"
"Perhaps something a bit more… arboreal?" Mara asked. "Or a simple riddle that your thoughts of fathers have kept covered? After all, Jack couldn't give you directions to Dun Ringhill. Bandits have ears, after all, and would follow us like hounds."
Sturm nodded. It made sense. Jack was, after all, a man of concealments and riddles. Seated on the increasingly unruly mare, Sturm mined his knowledge of tree lore, of gardening, of the mythical ancient calendar of the dryads that supposedly followed a symbolism of trees. None of it helped. He felt as though he were back in the maze of Castle di Caela or in the thickest reaches of the Green Man's fog.
The mare wrenched once more, and he tugged furiously at her reins. "By the gods, Acorn!" he snapped. "If you don't-"
He paused at the sound of Mara's laughter.
"Now what?" he exclaimed, but the elf laughed even more.
"Let go of the reins, Sturm Brightblade," she said, recovering her breath.
"I beg your pardon?"
"Think about it, Sturm. Who among us knows the way to the village of Dun Ringhill?"
Slowly, reluctantly, Sturm opened his hand. The reins dropped limply over Acorn's withers, and sensing the new freedom, the little mare turned about and walked steadily east, then south, then east again. Mara resumed the music, this time singing the old song from Qualinost, adding to it equally ancient words.
"The sun,
of all our heavens,
"and leaves
spangled with fireflies,
"The leaves
they blaze into ash
"and birds
and wheel to the north
"The day grows dark,
but we
green fire upon
Ahead of them, green footprints sprouted and grew among the dingy ground cover. Acorn leaned forward, grazed softly on one of them, and began her slow progress on the new trail. Luin followed, browsing at the footprints, too, eating the trail behind them. At a farther distance, the high bushes tilted and switched, a sign that the spider Cyren followed, as always obscurely and furtively.
They hadn't traveled twenty yards before the music arose in front of them, too. A fluid, beautiful descant joined with Mara's singing, and Sturm closed his eyes and saw liquid silver passing like a magical stream before his inner vision.
So Vertumnus had joined in the music again. Sturm sat back in the saddle, resigning himself to Acorn's direction and the melody all around him. Though the Green Man's song invariably led to… challenges, it also led toward the Southern Darkwoods. And despite the challenge and the peril, that was the goal of his journey.
On they traveled, and even though the night was thick about them, Sturm's heart was much lighter. Jack Derry's riddle had been a little thing, not much compared to the mysteries that lay ahead. But solving one thing gave hope to solving another. The road ahead of him looked less daunting now, and as the lights of Dun Ringhill shone dimly before him, Sturm imagined the smithy, the sword re-forged, Vertumnus faced down and beaten on the first day of spring.
It all seemed possible, even likely. He felt the crisp exhilaration of adventure, of swords and riding and mystery and beautiful females. He sat back in the saddle, brushing against the sleeping Mara, who mumbled and tightened her grip about his waist. For a moment, the journey seemed something he was born to do.
He didn't notice the men until they rose like fog from the high grass, sudden and quick and quietly efficient. The man in the forefront, a brown, wizened little character, smiled and raised his hand.
"Good even, Sturm Brightblade!" he called out, his common speech fluent but thick with the accents of Lemish.
Good old Jack Derry, Sturm thought admiringly. As quick in travel as he is with the sword. "Ho, there!" he called out, dismounting from the horse. And then, more formally and Solamnically: "Whom have I the honor of addressing?"
"Captain Duir of the Dun Ringhill Militia, sir!" the weathered little man announced, standing at comical attention. "Assigned to protect the western approaches."
Sturm looked back in amusement at Mara, who was rubbing her eyes and straightening herself in the saddle.
Sturm stepped forward, removed his glove, and offered his hand in the traditional Solamnic gesture. Shyly, awkwardly, Captain Duir extended his own hand, and the two men exchanged greetings as equals.
Sturm nodded and smiled at the peasant soldier, who slowly smiled back, his blue eyes narrowed now with a new and strange amusement.
"Master Sturm Brightblade of Solamnia," the captain announced, his grip tightening on the young man's hand, "I arrest you as an invader, in the name of the Druidess Ragnell!"