Chapter 5 Stolen Magic

We returned to Coryfe. There was a good pile of wood ready for the fire, but the pieces were small - fallen wood, without any density – and we would burn through it in the time it took to cook the rabbit. If we had an axe to chop with, the trunk of the dead tree would have enough wood for a hundred fires, but, unfortunately, we did not have anything between us. Luckily, the weather was milder than my village. We would not feel the lack of fire overnight and our cloaks would provide sufficient warmth.

I cleared an area, and began building a little fire, using my fire striker to start it.

Rivyn returned to his log and angled to capture the moonlight across the pages of his book as he opened it. I saw his hair lift in a draft of magical energy.

"How can you read in such poor light?" I asked him.

"It's magic," he was distracted. "It's not written in ink. You wouldn't understand."

"What's so important about that book?" I prepared the rabbit to cook, skinning and gutting it.

"It has power. Every little bit counts." He looked at me. "I am trying to read," he reprimanded.

"Sorry," I grumbled, spitting the rabbit and propping it over the flames. I checked on the fairy man. He had helped himself to more scone, and seemed content to sit and eat, his wings pressed against an apple. He looked up at me and said something. "I'm sorry, I can't understand."

"He compliments the cook."

"Ah," I smiled at the small man. "I'll pass it along." If I ever made it back home. I watched the sun rise over the trees, and noted the direction thinking I could use my lode stone to direct our travels. "How far from where we were could we be now?"

"Unlimited," Rivyn didn't look up from his book.

"Unlimited as in..."

"We could be anywhere," he replied with complete indifference.

"Anywhere in the land?" I qualified.

"Anywhere in the world." He looked up at me. "Don't worry so much. We will continue into the forest, and sooner or later, we will work out where we are. If it is not somewhere useful, I'll collect some spell components and cast another portal."

"That's all very well for you to say," I pointed out. "I've been taken against my will to an unknown location by a man I met on the road. There are stories that begin this way, and they never end well."

He snorted. "Fool's tales designed to scare maidens and housewives into obedience."

"How is that so?" I rotated the rabbit. It was starting to smell good. Like the mage, I was hungry.

"Beware the Fae man who will steal you away," he laughed derisively. "What use has a Fae man for a mankind girl when he has Fae women? It is more likely to be the other way around. Is that rabbit done yet? I am hungry."

"If you like your meat raw, it is done."

"Throw me one of those scones, then," he ordered. "Preferably one that hasn't fairy tooth marks in it." He was fussy, I thought, for someone without his own supplies, but I threw him a scone. He caught it, easily, one handed, and took a bite as he turned the page. He frowned slightly as he read.

"You speak as if you know the Fae," I commented thinking that a parent would explain the origin of his pointed ears and teeth, and unusual beauty. Was he a stolen child, like from story? The result of a romantic dalliance between a Fae man and a mankind woman, taken back after birth to be raised by his Fae-parent? But then, if that were so, surely, he would not be so derisive of Fae men taking mankind women, and why would he be out of the Fae Forests and lands?

"And you speak as if you do not," he replied. "I'm trying to read."

We sat in silence broken only by Coryfe's movements, the crackle of flames and sizzle of roasting rabbit, and the occasional turn of a page. "So, what is more important than my changeling brother?" I asked him as I took the rabbit off the fire and divided it. "That justifies stealing me from the roadside?"

He put the book back into his bag. "Magic power. Mine was stolen from me. I need to reclaim it before the month's end, or it will be gone forever."