Straying From the Path

You are sure?

Yes!

You cannot save him. You will stand watching, his fate in your hands, and you will do nothing. Is that what you wished to hear?

Elsa cried, because Falla spoke truth, always. Falla, Falla, I can’t do this anymore.

Hush, dear friend. I’m sorry, I’m sorry.

Once more, Elsa felt her soft muzzle against her hands, and Falla’s dark eyes gazed at her.

The first time she put on Falla’s skin, it was still wet with flesh and blood.

One day, the King needed a prophecy, and the Wizard worked his most powerful spell. But the spell failed, the prophecy did not come. It was a black day, as the Wizard stormed out of his workroom and the King despaired of overcoming his troubles. Folk everywhere wondered how the great Wizard could have failed.

Spying, the librarian’s daughter discovered the truth. She first went to the stables, to see Falla, but the Wizard’s familiar wasn’t in her stall. With a pounding heart, she went next to the Wizard’s tower, which was empty, because the Wizard was in the great hall, arguing with the King. By the front door to the tower, she found stairs leading down to the cellar.

There, the Wizard had sacrificed his familiar to raise power for the spell. The girl found the horse dead, her belly sliced open, her guts spilled over the floor, a slick mass of intestines and organs that made no pattern and offered no portents. She had been a noble animal, and the girl cried at the injustice of it. In her grief, a power took her. With the Wizard’s own sacrificial dagger, lying abandoned on the stone floor, she skinned the horse. She took the bloody skin to the great hall where the King pleaded with the Wizard to try again and the Wizard insisted such a prophecy was impossible. Wearing the skin wrapped tight around her, she delivered the prophecy that the King sought. “Betrayal! This is a Wizard who will slay his dearest servant for power. This is a Wizard who will covet his King’s throne!”

The Wizard denied it, the King disbelieved it, and the librarian pleaded for his daughter’s life, which the Wizard threatened to take. The King granted the librarian’s request, because while he did not understand the magic, he could see the girl was helpless in its grip. As she fainted, her father carried her home from the great hall. They both cried a bit, and he helped her run away, into exile. A year later, the King died of a mysterious creeping illness, and the Wizard took the reins of power before chaos could disrupt the kingdom.

The next morning, she awoke, naked and tangled in the legs and neck of Falla’s coat, a fringe of white mane tickling her nose. Conrad still slept nearby. She lay still and watched him until he stirred.

When he opened his eyes, looked at her, and smiled, her heart beat faster.

He could be a friend, she thought to Falla. My only other friend beside you.

Do not fall in love. Your fate won’t allow it.

I know, Falla. I know.

Elsa and Conrad sat and faced each other, Elsa wearing the mare’s skin, Conrad wrapped in the wool blanket.

“Well?” he said.

She lowered her gaze. “I didn’t dream. Your future isn’t for me to know.”

He gave his fox-sly smile, a joyless expression. “You’re lying. You cried in your sleep. Thrashed like you were having nightmares. You must have dreamed something terrible.”

Tears pricked her eyes. Sometimes, as with the princess and her marriage, she dreamed paths as clear as plate glass windows. Other times, like last night, the dreams were murky, little more than emotions and terror, which Elsa had to express. Conveying them meant reliving them.

“Tell me,” he said. “I’m not afraid.”

She quelled her own fear and spoke softly. “I dreamed of betrayal.”

He considered that, his expression falling to a frown. “Am I the betrayer or the betrayed? Whose betrayal?”

“Mine,” said Elsa.

After a long moment watching her, he pursed his lips and nodded, content to live with the enigma of prophecy. “Then I should leave, I suppose. If we are not near each other, we can’t betray each other.”

The princess’s cousin thought he could escape prophecy, too. Perhaps Conrad could actually succeed. She watched him dress, still wishing he was a famous rogue. Then perhaps

his own legend would save him from hers.

He straightened his cuffs, fastened the last straps on his boots, and took up his pack. “Well then, I’m off.”

So that was that. “Where are you going?”