Rahim had been little more than a boy, the first time he laid eyes upon a fairy. He’d been sitting beneath his favorite tree, an elm with ample shade not far from the home where his parents raised him. From early childhood to later youth, he had sat beneath it to read and write, until the day a deer with leaves and blossoms growing from its antlers stepped out from behind it, gazed at him for a moment, and began to walk deeper into the woods
Rahim had followed it, fool that he was, until a chorus of chittering laughter reached his ears. A crowd of fairies had crawled and slithered from the carpet of loam, grasped his clothes, and pulled him deeper into the darkness. A mortal! they had laughed. Come, come with us and serve, our lady has use for your long legs and strong back. Then one unlucky fairy had reached his hand, and found the cold iron rings on his fingers. Rahim had stumbled back onto the road in a daze, to find that night had fallen and he was very hungry.
He was not that foolish boy anymore. Against his own will, he was both a warrior and a king, with hundreds of subjects turning out to celebrate the birth of his first child. But as he watched Lady Eisendusk step into the town square like a shadow to join them, he felt suddenly very small and cold and hungry again.
Continue reading “Gracious Hosts (3/3)”
