Where the Path Leads-Chapter 20

Chapter 20: Coming Clean

Hurrying again to keep up with Oderic, Emily followed him to a nearby evergreen tree where he walked easily under the low branches and, reaching up, pulled out twigs and dry leaves caught there. He told her to do the same, only for her it was necessary to lift the boughs up to find the dead branches underneath.

            “Anything that snaps when you break it, like this,” he said, snapping a twig easily. It seemed simple, but many of the twigs she picked kept bending instead of snapping. They were still too green. She had to search longer for the drier ones. After they were done with that, they went to the river bank, Emily keeping a wary eye out for the berg folk but also watching Oderic as he came to the old willow tree overhanging the river. Taking some of the dead branches, he peeled off the dried inner part, then crumbled and rolled it in his small brown hands, first twisting it together and then pulling it apart. Crumbly pieces of bark fell out, but what remained looked like a fluffy bundle of threads.

            “Good tinder,” he said, holding the bundle up for her inspection.  “Now, we’ll combine it with our kindling.” He nodded in the direction of their pile of sticks and leaves. 

            “We need an open, dry spot. Not here on this moss.” They moved away from where the dog lay and Oderic began arranging the smallest sticks they had collected into a small tepee around the fluffy ball of tinder, propping sticks against one another with some spaces in between. Next, he took some slightly larger sticks and also placed them in a circle around the tepee, interweaving among these the dried grasses and dead leaves. It seemed very artistic to her, but what he did next was truly amazing. 

            From his woven basket–what wasn’t in there?–he took out a stone that she later learned was flint and the sharp knife he’d used to shave the hair from around Gabriel’s wound. Getting close to the fluffy tinder ball at the very heart of the arrangement, he scraped the knife with a rapid downward motion across the stone. Sparks flew. The first few sparks landing on the bundle of tinder glowed briefly, then died into blackness. Oderic muttered under his breath and continued scraping. Finally, one or two sparks glowed brighter than the rest. He blew gently onto them as they continued to glow, eventually producing, to her great joy, a tiny flame as well as a lot of smoke. The fire was slow getting started and several times threatened to go out, but Oderic tended it patiently, blowing when the flame lagged, adding more tinder or kindling to encourage it as it started burning.

            “While I watch this, why don’t you go collect some water to boil,” he said.

            “In what?”

            He shook his head, she guessed at her unpreparedness, his long white hair under the red hat brushing his shoulders. Rummaging around again in his indispensable basket, he brought out a small cup with no handle, carved out of something harder and smoother than wood and intricately engraved with what looked like decorative knots, lines intertwined to make elaborate designs.  Even though the lip of the cup was worn smooth and the sides were slightly discolored, she admired the workmanship which made it amazingly beautiful, especially for something so small.

            “Oh, you like my cup?”

            “Very much?  Where did you get it?”

            “Where else but from the source? The stag who grew the horn.”

             While they waited for the water to boil so the needle could be cleaned, he told her the story of how he had come upon two great bucks fighting over territory, their horns so entangled that they were locked together. “I just sawed their antlers apart.  It doesn’t hurt them,” he added quickly, when she looked horrified. “Just feels like cutting a fingernail.  Good I did too. They were half starved when I found them.

            “I carry the cup with me to take a nip now and then, throughout the night.” He smiled mischievously. “Can’t resist that raspberry mead.”

            “Throughout the night?” 

            “Of course. Gnomes are nocturnal. We never stay up during the day.  I’m only doing it now to help you and Gabriel. I should really be sleeping.”

            When the bone needle was sterilized, he deftly guided the flax thread through the eye of the needle. It was her job to hold the sides of the wound together so Oderic could stitch it closed, and it took everything she had not to turn away, sickened from looking at the wound, but Gabriel for his part never moved. The poppy milk anesthetic must have done its job to keep the stitches from hurting. When it was done, Oderic sat back and wiped sweat from his lined face.

            “That was a bigger job than I thought,” he sighed. “I’m starved, how about you?”

            Emily didn’t want to say that she had been starving for the last few days, that she’d all but forgotten what it felt like to have something in her stomach. But her face must have given her away.

            “Come on, then. Let’s see what we can dig up.” He still sounded energetic. She didn’t know he meant to literally dig something up. He led her back to the river, to a place where it branched off into a small rivulet that came to an uncertain end. Water had backed up and in the marshy ground they dug up some of the cattails that grew there, first using a stick, then digging deeper with their hands. The roots which they were to eat had to be washed off well. Oderic also found some wild mushrooms growing in a moist shady spot, though as he picked them Emily kept imagining she heard faint laughter and was glad when they left the river and returned to the fire. On the way back he pointed out dark purple clusters of wild grapes hanging from vines that clung to some of the smaller trees. As she picked them, Emily wondered why she hadn’t noticed them before.

            Gabriel was awake when they returned and although still lying down, he had raised his head to greet them.

            “I think Gabriel Ratchet is hungry too,” Oderic observed. The black dog followed their movement with his yellow eyes as they tucked their cattail roots into the embers of the small fire to cook. The mushrooms Oderic cooked over the open fire, blowing on the flame to bring it up enough to simmer them in their own juices. Just the sight of their juice made her mouth water.

            While they waited, they ate the grapes, which were tasty though tart.  Oderic didn’t seem to mind. He popped them into his mouth, offering some in his toughened brown hand to Gabriel, but the dog was uninterested.

            “I know it’s not meat. It’s gnome fare,” he said to Gabriel.  “We don’t partake of meat,” he explained to her. 

            Gabriel finally ate some of the mushrooms and even a little of the cattail roots which, when they were cooked and peeled, tasted like sweet potatoes. Even without meat, the meal was delicious, but then she supposed everything tasted good when you were as starving as she was.

            After they were finished, Oderic took out a small flask and poured his stag horn cup full of a red, bubbly liquid. “Raspberry mead. Tops off a meal nicely,” he said, offering her the cup first.

            The sweet ale was a rare treat and as she sipped it, feeling its warmth all the way down, Emily was overcome by a surge of gratitude toward this wizened little gnome, but the thought of telling him how she felt made her suddenly shy. Instead, she just agreed, nodding vigorously. “Delicious!”

            He beamed. “It’s one of my best batches from last year,” and took a long drink himself, pouring another cupful and passing it back to her. After a while, the mead gave her a pleasant, relaxed feeling as they sat quietly by the fire. The late afternoon sun slanted across the river, glinting gold off the ripples caused by the evening breeze. Gabriel, who had turned from his side onto his stomach, laid his massive head on his front paws, and even though he rested, part of him still seemed alert, maybe because his short ears pricked up now and then at something she couldn’t even hear. Oderic sat weaving the wide, flat cattail leaves into a mat for her to lie on. Emily gathered her knees up under her chin, watching his deft brown hands, reminded of Sophia’s skillful hands. 

            Then she began telling him her story. 

            She told him everything, more than she had intended. It just seemed to come spilling out. She even told him that her home wasn’t really with Sophia, that she had wandered there by accident. She told him about the trouble she and Sophia were in. He was quiet throughout the telling and for some time after she had finished. She worried he didn’t believe her or thought she was crazy.

            Finally he said, “You’re not like any mortal woman I’ve ever met before, that’s for sure. I’ve never heard anyone suggest we needn’t obey our masters, nor that we don’t need protection.” He whistled softly under his breath. “No wonder the Seneschal was anxious to have you gone.

            “Now we gnomes tend to be more solitary, independent creatures, but still we respect our King and Queen, and,” he cleared his throat and looked at her thoughtfully, “our young women do not go running about by themselves.”

            She shrugged. “I’m not alone now. I’m with you . . . and Gabriel,” she thought to add, looking at the enormous dog.

            “Good thing, too, because it’s plain you need help.”

            “Do you know how to get to the abyss?”

             He had taken out a long pipe which he gripped between his teeth and with his short fingers took a pinch of something from a pouch, then tamped it into the bowl of the pipe with a stubby fingertip. 

            She waited impatiently for him to answer.

            “It’s been a long time,” he said thoughtfully, “since I was there, and only once.  But we gnomes never forget directions.”