Sprite

Neistah raced across the forest in front of a group of human hunters he had literally tripped over just a few miles away from Earl’s encampment. He hadn’t been expecting them, and obviously they hadn’t been expecting him, either, still wrapped in their sleeping bags in the middle of the morning. Their jumbled thoughts as they suddenly awoke told Neistah they were slackers, broken off from the main party of hunters days ago, with no intention of rejoining them until it was time to go home again.

Neistah’s abrupt arrival changed all that. With a yowl of surprise, the hunter Neistah had stepped on shot to his feet and promptly fell back down, hopelessly entangled in his sleeping bag. The hunter sleeping next to him had more presence of mind. He rolled out of the way and came to his knees, gun in hand. The others were quick to follow.

They stared at each other for several heartbeats before Neistah bolted. This was pure luck! He hadn’t thought to encounter any hunters so close to the changeling’s camp. Grinning madly, Neistah sprinted away, careful not to go too fast. He wanted the hunters to follow him. These didn’t seem to be the ones who were setting fires, however, but that did not matter. Hunters were hunters, and Neistah was Neistah. He led them on a merry chase.

The four young men who chased Neistah were careful to stay away from any water. Whenever Neistah tried to draw them back towards the river, they gave up the chase, and Neistah would have to double-back and draw their attention again. He was trying to steer them away from Earl’s place, where he had left Norah behind.

These hunters were young, as young as his changeling Sprites. It wouldn’t help them. They were as noisy as any of the hunters, crashing through the undergrowth without regard for the trail they were leaving, but they weren’t firing their guns. Neistah doubted it was in concern for his well-being, although if one of those iron bullets were to hit him, it would be of great concern to all of them. These boys did not want to draw the attention of their main group unless they actually managed to catch him.

Neistah grinned and stopped running. If they wanted to catch him so badly, he would grant their wish. His hands rested lightly on the hidden pockets where he kept silver knives. A little human blood would not matter here.

The four boys slowed uncertainly when they saw Neistah was no longer fleeing from them. One of them held a long knife—iron, Neistah noted with a frown.

“Are you one of them Sprites?” the boy called out nervously.

Neistah laughed, and stalked forward, his own sharp knives suddenly appearing in both hands. He had to move quickly, before the others decided to shoot regardless of who it brought. The boy with the knife would go first. He darted towards the boy, who fell back with a cry and dropped the knife. It was the same boy Neistah had tripped over. Neistah contemptuously kicked the iron knife away, wincing as his foot burned where it made contact. He pressed his own knife to the boy’s throat, holding him out in front of him as a shield against the hastily leveled firearms of the other three.

“Throw down your weapons or he dies,” Neistah said calmly.

One by one, the remaining hunters lowered their weapons.

“I said throw them away!” Neistah snapped. They really weren’t much more than boys. But for the lack of a mutation, they could have been one of ‘his’ sprites.

They looked to the middle boy, who nodded and threw his gun into the bushes. The other two followed suit. “Now what?” the boy asked.

“Now you all die.” Neistah flipped one of his knives over so that he held it by its silver tip, poised to throw. The second knife remained tightly against his captive’s throat.

A faint trill of laughter in the distance split the tense silence, and they all froze. Neistah listened with all his senses and groaned. He stayed both his hands.

Moments later, they all heard rustling in the brush and several young girls appeared out of the woods, flushed and talking animatedly to each other. They fell silent as they realized they were not alone.

“Get the guns! Get the guns!” One of the hunters screamed as he dove for the bushes.

Neistah pushed the one he had been holding away from him, and the boy fell sprawling into the middle of the group of girls, who screamed in reaction. Neistah paid no attention as he flew past to grab the boy who was scrabbling around for his gun. He threw the boy bodily out of the bushes and glared at the other two, who hadn’t yet moved.

’What are you doing here?’ Neistah sent without taking his eyes off the hunters. ‘I told you to stay in the village!’

‘You did not!’ Norah sent, swiveling around to glare indignantly at Neistah.

At least she hadn’t said it out loud. Neistah turned his attention back to the hunters.

The boy on the ground stared up fearfully at the mutant girls surrounding him, especially the one who had the same mutations as the Sprite. He surreptitiously edged backwards, closer to where his knife lay half-buried in the soft dirt.

With a cry of triumph, he lunged for it, brandishing it in front of him as he got to his feet. “Stay away,” he warned, as both Sprites started towards him from different directions. The girl hesitated, but the boy Sprite only grinned fiercely and locked stares with him.

After a moment, the boy’s face went slack and the heavy iron knife drooped in his hands.

’Take your girls out of here,’ Neistah silently directed Norah, moving to lock gazes with the hunter who had gone for the gun. He repeated what he had done with the first boy, and by the time he turned to the other two, they were quaking in fear.

Norah took the knife gently out of the frozen boy’s hands before he dropped it and pierced his foot. She brought it to Neistah, who waved her away. “You keep it,” he said aloud, adding silently, ‘Touching iron does not bother you?’

Norah wrinkled her brows. ‘Should it?’ she asked, handing off the long knife to Roselle, who watched Neistah with narrowed eyes, clearly about to express an opinion Neistah had no desire to hear. The other girl, Lou, and three others from Earl’s camp all stared at Neistah as if he was the one who had done something wrong.

’I said leave!’ he sent more forcefully to Norah. He couldn’t afford to be distracted now, not when he was setting compulsions in the minds of all four hunters.

‘No. What did you do to them?’

Neistah hissed in exasperation. ‘I’m making them forget they ever saw us,’ he sent. ‘Now, go away so you won’t undo everything I just did. Tell Earl it’s time to go.’

“What?” Norah, startled, slid into speech, earning herself a sharp look from Roselle.

Neistah raised his own voice so that Roselle, Lou and the handful of other young changeling girls who had foolishly accompanied Norah could hear also. “Go back to Earl. Tell him it’s time to go. The hunters have found us.”

The three girls from the hidden village immediately paled. Even Roselle was taken aback. “You mean the village has to move? Now? What about Will and the others?”

“They will find you,” Neistah said. “If the hunters don’t find you first. What ever made you decide to go for a stroll in the woods?”

Lou, the small blonde child who Will had once believed to be Datro’s Sprite, piped up, “We’re searching for Mack and the other lost changelings.”

Norah hadn’t realized that’s what Lou thought they were doing. She had only meant to go on a small adventure to prove to Roselle that she didn’t need to stay cooped up in the village when Will was away. She had to admit the thought of ‘Norah’s Sprites’ appealed to her, as well. But Lou’s idea wasn’t a bad one. “We will do that, honey,” she said softly. “But another time, when we have more practice. We don’t want to bring hunters down on us.”

Neistah herded the four hunters together. They all stared straight ahead unseeingly.

“What’s wrong with them?” Roselle asked.

Neistah ignored her. ‘Go. Now.’ He directed his thoughts at Norah, whose own thoughts were plain to read. She was afraid he would kill the hapless boys as soon as her back was turned. She was right. ‘They cannot rejoin their comrades,’ he sent in explanation.

‘Then don’t let them,’ Norah sent back in retaliation.

Their entire non-verbal conversation took less than a few seconds, but their body language gave them away to the sharp Roselle, who glanced between them as if she knew they were communicating silently. Neistah sighed. ‘I won’t kill them,’ he conceded. To all of them, he said, “Just go.”

“Come on.” Roselle took Norah’s arm. “We’d better do as he says. He’s a sprite—they do this all the time.”

Norah choked back a startled laugh. Neistah was certainly a sprite, in more ways than Roselle could imagine. She nodded, and left it up to Neistah’s discretion.

Already the four hunters were beginning to cast off Neistah’s compulsion. One boy tracked Norah’s movements with his eyes, although the rest of him stood unmoving where Neistah had left him. As soon as the girls were lost to sight—and Neistah was aware that at least one of his captives had taken note of the direction in which they had gone—Neistah caught them all one by one with his eyes again, strengthening the compulsion. He would not go back on his word to Norah. He would not be the instrument of these boys’ deaths, however . . .

Suddenly grinning in anticipation, he sent a silent command. Slowly they stripped off their jackets and shirts, shivering in the cool autumn air. Their shoes followed, until they stood before Neistah clad only in trousers, unfortunately ankle-length. Neistah strode forward with his silver knife and slashed the pants at the knees while the boys stood unflinching, held by his compulsion, before him. Now they looked like his Sprites. “Follow me,” he said, snapping his fingers. This game might prove interesting in its own right. The compulsion would hold as long as Neistah was there to ensure it; however, it would fade with time and distance. When that eventually happened, Neistah planned to be far away. Ironic that their own comrades would be the ones to stumble upon them and likely mistake them for Neistah’s Sprites. The outcome would be the same, only Neistah would not be the one to take their lives.

By that time, Earl would have moved the hidden village, which he’d been chomping to do for a while now, and Norah would get a taste of what it was like for human changelings in the forest. All in all, a good day’s work. Whistling under his breath, Neistah moved off, away from Norah and the girls, with his four new ‘Sprites’ trailing along behind.

X X X X X X X X

The girls made good time on the way back to the village. Roselle, as leader, found Earl and breathlessly explained that their location had been compromised and Neistah said they should leave. Earl didn’t question them; he gave a sharp whistle, a signal most of the other villagers knew, and in seconds the camp was stirring. The scouts who had remained behind to protect the village now helped to dismantle it, smoothing over any signs of human habitation.

Norah, who ran to her tree-house to retrieve her satchel and the few items she had, marveled at how quickly and quietly the villagers moved, packing their scant possessions and walking away from their homes without a backward glance. Abashed, she realized how very lucky she and her girl ‘Sprites’ had been as they tromped noisily through the woods. Thankfully, it had been Neistah who had found them, and not anybody worse. She might share Neistah’s bloodline, but none of his forest senses.

The entire village moved in staggered groups in a pre-determined direction. Earl had his escape route all planned out. Roselle and Lou accompanied Mattie, and Norah was assigned to another changeling woman, Mary, who moved through the woods with efficiency and without speaking. Norah couldn’t see anyone else from the village, and wondered briefly if Mary knew where she was going, but she caught Mary’s unspoken thoughts. This was how they moved for safety. No large groups, not like the hunters who traveled in packs for self-protection. Mary knew exactly where they were going.

By nightfall, they reached the edge of a small pond where the woods ran right down to the water. Norah dropped her satchel and ran to kneel by the still water, her heart soaring to be so near it. She felt Mary’s hand on her shoulder, as the older woman put a finger to her lips and motioned her to keep going. Disappointed, Norah shouldered her satchel and followed the woman, trying to read her thoughts again, but either the woman wasn’t thinking clearly, or the first time had been an accident.

Not far from the pond, Mary stopped and pointed to a rocky depression in the earth. “That’s your new home,” she said quietly. “You’ll have to clean it out, make it yours, but for tonight, it’s safe. Go on, go inside. Go to sleep. I have to find a place for me and my man still.”

Mary left Norah there, in the dark, with the dank smell of rotting leaves and a hole in the ground. Is this what they had to do each time they moved the village? She wrapped her arms around herself. This was nothing like Anais’ bright wood, even though there was a pond nearby. She missed the fair land, she missed Breyan. Clutching the blood-red stone Breyan had given her for remembrance, Norah crawled into the hole. It was bigger than it looked from the outside, but not by much. Her throat hurt, and she wanted to go home. The only problem was, she didn’t know where home was anymore. If only Neistah were here with her, she wouldn’t feel so alone. She curled into a ball, using her hair as a blanket, and tried not to breathe in the musty scent of the leaves.

Just before she fell asleep, Norah sensed thoughts that were not her own. Concentrating, she ‘listened,’ and realized Roselle was nearby. So was Lou. So were all of them! While she was feeling sorry for herself, the rest of Earl’s village had arrived in two’s and three’s, and established places for themselves, apart from each other, but still near. Comforted, Norah drifted off to sleep, too tired to wonder why she was able to ‘hear’ her friends so clearly.

In the morning, the real work of setting up the village began. People came together to help each other clear out natural-looking homes from the wilderness. There was a spring which trickled down to feed the nearby pond, which became their drinking source. Wild onions grew amid other plants, all native to the woods, but clearly encouraged to grow in this remote area. Earl had been cultivating this spot as an alternative village for quite some time. Norah wondered how many other potential village sites he had prepared—and how many they would realistically need in the coming months and years. It made her sad to think that they always needed to be on guard, ready to run at a moment’s notice.

Roselle anxiously asked, “You’re sure Will can find this place?” Mattie and Mary both assured her that he could, but as the days went on, Roselle grew more anxious.

Norah, too, was sick of waiting in the village. She had cleaned out her—and Neistah’s, as everyone assumed they were a couple—small cave, filling it with sweet-smelling herbs and lining it with blankets supplied by Mary, who really was very sympathetic. Norah visited the pond daily, but usually late at night after everyone was asleep, as even these changelings gave her strange looks when she slipped into the ice-cold pond. “Let’s go exploring,” she said to Roselle one day as they were gathering herbs to dry for the coming winter. “You, me, the rest of Norah’s Sprites. We won’t go far,” she added, grown prudent with the reality of their precarious situation. “Just a short walk.”

Roselle was all for it. “This time, we won’t make the same mistakes. If the boys can move silently through the woods, we can learn how to do it, too. I’ll call the girls!”

Norah still wore her shimmery gown rather than the bulky jacket and trousers she had brought from Datro or the woolens and leathers that the rest of the changelings tended to favor. For fugitives in the middle of the forest, the changelings were quite well-supplied, thanks to Neistah’s Sprites, who occasionally raided hunter camps or trade caravans, relieving them of their goods. It was only fair, since neither the hunters nor the traders would treat with them honestly. The result was that Earl’s village had a selection of fabrics, which Norah’s Sprites appropriated, making themselves gowns of earthy greens and pale yellows, edged with red when they could get it, in an approximation of Norah’s flowing faerie gown.

No cloth compared to Norah’s ethereal garment, which, for all its delicate beauty, proved immune to rips and tears from the unforgiving forest environment. However, the girls insisted on wearing their gowns as a symbol of ‘Norah’s Sprites.’ It made them more cautious in the forest, because they needed to make sure the material didn’t catch on errant branches. They became fleet of foot, and silent as well, as they explored the area around Earl’s new encampment in the weeks before winter. It took their minds off their men, who still had not returned.