I made it to Bryniau right quick but wasn’t sure I made it to the right place. It wasn’t like any town I had seen before. Sure, I knew it was a crossroads town where a road to the sea met the road I was on from the Dalelands. I can read a map.
Bryniau should have had a few inns and taverns for traders and other travelers, stables for their horses. Maybe a small market for the farms I had passed. But there were a bunch more buildings, lined along the main road. Weird houses. Most came to my chin. Even the two story ones, those I could reach up and touch the roof, even keeping to all fours. I didn’t think I’d grown. Nope, not unless the road got bigger, too. Not that a sudden growth spurt was the strangest thing that had ever happened to me. Not with Dad being who he was.
Byrniau was also missing something common in trade towns. People. There was no one out and about. Just, if it hadn’t been so clean, idda thought everyone was gone.
Looky there. Maybe I was wrong. Well, a little wrong. There were a few regular-size places down by the crossroad itself. And someone lazing on a bench, under a sign that said “Over The Hill Inn”.
I trotted down to the inn. The man - at least, it looked male; sometimes it was hard to tell with elves - was quite lovely, with his long, blonde hair and sharp features. I always had a thing for pointy noses. Although that was fairly far down the list of things I have a thing for.
He was dressed almost entirely in black - black boots, black trousers, black shirt, black duster. There was even a black, broad-brimmed, flat-topped hat lying next to him on the bench. His only color was a shiny, emerald green waistcoat. He must be roasting, lying in the Sun with all those clothes on. I was perfectly comfortable in my bandeau.
“Bout ye!” I called out as I came up to him. He cracked an eye open. Idda thought he’d have heard my hooves clicking on the cobbles well before. Maybe he was a deep napper.
He didn’t say anything back. Rude.
“Good morn, kind sir,” I tried. Maybe he was one of those highbred elves that only talk grand. I could do that. I‘d been to the Summer Court with Dad. If you didn’t talk grand to Queen Mab, who knows what she would do to you.
The man straightened up with a sigh.
“By Lolth’s eight hairy legs, what are you?” Not so grand, then. Not even polite. I dinna take offense. I had people be much more rude to me.
“Have ye not seen a half-elk before?” I tapped my antlers.
“Can’t say I have,” he answered. “Well, par for the course around here.”
“Hmmph! I’ll have ye know I’m well above par. Maybe I’ll prove it to you, sometime.” I gave my long, emerald hair a toss and my matching tail a swish.
“Goody for you. Now skip along and let me get back to my nap.” He settled back into a slump. Some elves just aren’t any fun. That was fine; it took all kinds. I knew that. I had had all kings.
“Just, I’m Hlyssa, daughter of Pan, the elder fae!” He’d be impressed by Dad, even he wasn’t into me.
The elf opened one eye and sighed. “You’re not going to let me alone, are you? Can’t say I blame you. Nothing much to do here in this bustling metropolis.
“Name’s Gwendorian Oriende. What brings a fae to fair Bryniau?”
“Dad sent me a raven. And I’m half-fae.” I was as proud of my mortal side as my fae, almost. It grounded me. Full fae are so flighty. I tapped my antlers again. “My mother was an elk cow.”
That seemed to finally interest him. Gwendorian sat up and gave me a good look-see. “So, Pan’s fae magic sired a half elf and half elk cow?”
How wrong he was.
“Dinna let that idea get ye too hopeful. My bottom half is elk bull, not cow.” I reared up so that he could see for himself. “Sure, maybe you’d be hopeful, at that. And my top is an auloniad, a nymph. It’s easier to let people think I’m some sort of elf-taur, but have you ever seen an elf with a rack like this? I mean my antlers, but those, too.” A couple of opportunities for him, there. But his eyes were already up on my antlers. He dinna look like he wanted one part or the other. Bryniau was getting more boring by the minute.
“Uh, so you came here because an elder fae sent you a bird?” Maybe Dad did impress him.
“Sure, that’s how he talks to me. I mean, I do wish he’d stop by himself every once in a while. Claims he’s busy. Probably shagging something, Idda bet. This time, he just told me to hie over here. I was hunting down in the Dalelands, so it dinna take long.”
“You get a message to go to a strange town, no other explanation, and you just do it?”
“Dad’s of the Summer Court. I’m kinda bound to serve him. And serving him comes with a boon.”
I reached out my right hand into…somewhere else. I don’t rightly know where. Idda guess it’d be somewhere in fae-land. I do know that Gwendorian wouldn’t be able to see my hand well. It was still there but kind of shimmery. When I pulled it back, a fancy, recurve longbow came with it.
“Nice, innit.” I winked at the elf. “Now, watch this.”
I pulled back on the string. An arrow appeared, already nocked, straight as anything. When I loosed it, it flew down the road to hit the town sign right in the middle.
“Keep that up, you’ll get the sheriff on your tail,” Gwendorian said. “He’s already made it clear to me that he doesn’t want any shenanigans.”
“Sheriff? So there are others here? This all isn’t your own private desmesne?”
“Oh, Bryniau isn’t as empty as it looks right now. In fact, it’s fairly close to overcrowded. Halflings coming out of the woodwork. It’s just that they’ve mostly decided they are nocturnal. Something to do with the kobolds that used to mine silver out of the hills.”
“Halflings I know love to be out in the Sun. Hard to get them outside after dark. That’s bizarre.”
“Says the half-elk. Oh, a few make the effort. This town is usually busy with travelers. The halflings have a few services that can accommodate us bigger people.” Gwendorian pointed to some buildings clustered around the crossroads.
“Well, maybe not all of us,” he said, looking up at my antlers again. I dinna doubt that. Taverns that could fit a seven and a half-foot tall half-elk with a three foot rack were rare. Big cities would have a few. And, sure, they were fairly common near centaur lands.
“You’re the first outsider in the three days I’ve been here. Not that the halflings seem to rue the loss of coin. They seem to resent anything that gets them up during the day. Even my landlady will be napping right now, though she’ll wake in time to get my dinner. It is like they would not even bother if the people using the roads did not pester them about it.”
“You came here to see what was going on?” He had heard why I was here. Why was he?
“Oh, I did not know that anything was unusual about the town before I arrived. I’m here to look for my sister. Two months ago, she was here investigating some abandoned kobold mines. You skirted the edge of the Trollbeck Mountains on the road up from the Dalelands. There used to be nice veins of silver in them that a clan of kobolds mined. Bryniau was the closest town to the mines. The organization my sister and I work for had had some reports that the mines were not as depleted as thought. That the kobolds had abandoned them for some other reason. She was here to determine that reason, if it existed.
“As I said, she arrived here two months ago. She reported that she had arrived. That was the last the organization heard from her. They sent me to find her and to complete her mission. They would be satisfied with the latter. My priority is the former.”
“Your idea of looking for her is napping in the Sun? Not even with a good beer.”
“This is my third day here. I have not found any evidence that she was ever here. None of her possessions. No record of her horse in the stable. If any of the residents remember her, they are not saying.
“I am under instructions not to try the mines by myself. My organization said they would send backup. I am waiting for it to arrive.”
I rubbed my temples. I knew where this was going. It was already starting to give me a headache.
“This mysterious organization of yours - it treats with the Summer Court, dinna it? Or be owed a favor by my Dad or Queen Mab?”
“Not that I know of. There are several high-ranking mages in its ranks. Who knows what they might have gotten involved with at one point or another.”
“Sure, I’m guessing that I’m your backup. How’s that sound to you, agra?” I gave him my most sultry wink.
“It sounds like I’m going to go inside and pull us both a large ale.”
Den of the Red Wolf 