Aldric Fenn's Arc

Chapter 3 of 3

Aldric told the girl to sit, but she swayed on the bench instead. Her hands shook. Her eyes drifted from the tablet to nothing. He had planned to teach at once. Now he saw the truth. She had walked far from that abandoned schoolhouse with nothing in her stomach. A starving mind could not hold his craft. First he had to feed her. He pushed himself up. His knees cracked like green wood. The larder held only a crust and a shriveled root. Not enough. He needed a real meal, and quickly. The old inn stood within walking reach, warm and stocked. But he had no coin, and his cracked hands could not carry a full pot back before the bark stiffened them. "Sprite," he rasped. The little creature dropped from a rafter and landed on the table. His acorn cap tipped forward over one green eye. "Still here, bark man. Still owed a story." He crossed his thin arms. "You want another favor? Favors cost." "The girl faints," Aldric said. "I cannot teach a body this weak. Fetch food from the inn. Bread, broth, whatever they'll spare." The sprite eyed the girl. She had slumped against the wall. Even his grin faded. "Innkeepers don't hand meals to a leaf like me." "Then bargain," Aldric said. "You know how. Trade a story for a pot of stew." He gripped the shelf and reached down the glass bottle of faerie tears. It glowed faint in his palm. Little was left. He measured one drop with his eyes, then let a single tear fall onto the girl's cracked lips. Her breathing steadied. "That buys her an hour. Use it." The sprite snatched a small carving from the shelf, a willow shaped from dark ironwood, its leaves painted green and gold. "Trade this too. Innkeeper likes pretty things." He didn't wait for an answer. He darted through the gap under the door. Aldric waited. He counted the girl's breaths to stay awake himself. His own thoughts kept slipping. A word for stew left him and did not return. He did not chase it. The door rattled. The sprite squeezed back through, dragging a covered clay pot nearly his own size. Steam leaked from the lid. "Barley and mutton," he panted. "Told the innkeeper a tale of a drowned king. He wept. Kept the willow too." Aldric ladled broth into a bowl. He held it to the girl's mouth. She swallowed, then drank on her own. Color returned to her face. She ate the barley with both hands. When the bowl was empty she looked up, clear-eyed now, and steady. "Now," she said, "you were going to teach me." Aldric set down the bowl. The bottle on the shelf held one drop less. His days were fewer than the tears. But the vessel was fed and awake, and he could pour into her at last.