Laughing inwardly at the unwitting double meaning of Gaelinar's praise, Larson repeated the maneuver. Valvitnir crashed solidly against the Kensei's notched wooden blade. Momentarily, Larson's attention strayed to Silme who watched his practice with approval.
"Enough." Gaelinar followed the direction of Larson's stare. "Work will make a swordsman of you. For now your interests are elsewhere."
Smiling, Larson sheathed his sword. Drying sweat intensified the late morning chill as he strode to Silme and took her arm. Returning to the camp-fire, they found Brendor sorting a sack of rations.
The four travelers breakfasted together for the first time in more than a week. Glad for company, Brendor prattled in an unending, childish banter. More attentive to Silme's hand, Larson heard little of the conversation until the sorceress spoke. "Yes. Brendor's done well. He's learned the spell I promised to teach him."
The child beamed as Silme continued. "I recognize this land. The town of Manivoll lies a half day ahead. I have friends there who would gladly watch Brendor while we complete our quest."
Brendor's smile vanished, replaced by a grimace of horror. "Watch: you can't leave me! You just can't, I:" His eyes pleaded with Larson.
Gaelinar nodded in tacit agreement with Silme's plan. Unable to meet Brendor's eyes, Larson took a sudden, inordinate interest in his meal.
Brendor leaped to his feet. His unfinished apple tumbled to the dirt. "I won't go! I won't go! I won't:" When this tactic gained no sympathy, the child changed to another. " Allerum." He knelt beside Larson and seized the elf's arm with grubby fists. "Please, Al. Pleeease."
Larson closed his eyes as the image of another child took vivid form in his memory. Ti Sun's voice rang clear as reality. "Candy, Joe?" A small hand tugged at his fatigues.
Larson heard himself reply, his voice stiff with feigned offense. "You know my name, Ti Sun."
The child amended. "Candy, Al. Please, Al____________________
"
"All right. Okay." Larson thrust a hand into his pocket and retrieved a packet wrapped in crisp, clean paper. Ti Sun watched with a bright-eyed excitement which made Larson smile. Slowly, he peeled away the wrapper to reveal a piece of chocolate melted nearly to liquid.
"Thanks! Thanks!" The child accepted the offering and soon coated his Fingers and mouth with candy.
Gavin called from farther along the road. "Al, you coming?"
Larson turned. Light flashed through his thoughts like a warning. Suddenly, he realized he was caught in flashback as fully as a shallow sleeper knows when he is dreaming. Memory crowded him, solid as brick. Larson struggled against reexperiencing the catastrophe he could not bear a second time. He tried to force his mind from Ti Sun a dozen times with no success. Madness engulfed his conscious thought, pushing his mind back toward a village in Vietnam and the chocolate-stained child with the beatific smile.
Larson staggered. His hand cracked painfully against steel. Inadvertently, he seized Valvitnir's hilt, and another consciousness merged with his own. With Vidarr's aid, Larson escaped his flashback none the worse for his vision except for sweat-slicked palms and a shiver which wracked his entire body.
Brendor clung to Larson's shirt, his entreaties muffled by folds of cloth. Larson mentally communicated profuse gratitude to Vidarr, then turned his attention to the child at his chest. " Brendor, I like you very much."
The child tightened his grip.
"Enough so," Larson continued, "that I want to keep you as a son." The words sounded hollow to Larson's ears. Even nine months in Vietnam had not aged him enough to have a ten-year-old child. Al Larson was only twenty, but I can't know the age of this elf body in which Freyr placed me. According to fairy tales, elves are immortal. If that holds true, the point becomes assuredly moot. Larson forced his thoughts from this new distraction. "I won't have you killed because of my task. You stay in Manivoll, Brendor. I won't apologize for caring enough to keep you safe."
Brendor made no reply, but his mouth puckered to a scowl and he moved away with a tread sufficiently heavy to convey betrayal. Haunted by remembrances of a Vietnamese boy who became a casualty in the affairs of men, Larson paid the sorceress' apprentice no heed. He helped Silme and Gaelinar pack the horses, believing his decision a wise one.
The journey to the town of Manivoll convinced Larson of the soundness of his choice to side with Silme and Gaelinar. In an attempt to sway the lenient elf who had already proven himself a child's easy mark, Brendor became Larson's self-appointed servant. The boy volunteered to carry Larson's supplies on his own horse, dismounted to retrieve a cape pin the elf dropped, and offered to groom all the steeds at their next encampment. Larson supposed Brendor would have eaten, drunk, and pissed for him if given the opportunity. Since Gaelinar recognized the change in Larson's and Silme's relationship, he rode ahead on the pretext of scouting; but Brendor's constant presence made even simple exchanges of affection impossible. By the time the travelers reached the outskirts of Manivoll, Larson could scarcely wait to be free of the boy.
Brendor fell distressingly silent as they entered the town. Larson recalled the first time his mother had left him in the home of a strange babysitter. Then, he had clung to his mother, overwhelmed by the irrational fear she would never return. Sensing his discomfort, his mother had entrusted him with a necklace she wore every day. Though it was senseless to think she would abandon him and not her jewelry, the gesture consoled him. At the time, Larson had been considerably younger than Brendor; he knew a token far more valuable than a silver chain would be required to reassure the healer's nephew.
The moment Larson and his companions reached the town proper, peasants converged on Silme like groupies in the presence of a rock star. Disquieted by the gathering crowd, Larson, Gaelinar, and Brendor shied away from the sorceress' admirers. The Kensei explained in a whisper. "Years ago, Bramin sent a dragon after Silme. After a long and arduous battle, she defeated the wyrm near the town of Manivoll. Naturally, the citizenry was convinced she rescued them from the beast; and in all fairness, she probably did. Once Silme recovered from her confrontation, she hired me as bodyguard."
Larson nodded, only partially listening as he pondered a means to comfort Brendor. His only item of value was Valvitnir, but he could not hand the sword to the boy and still complete his quest. Gaelinar's katana and shoto were surely off limits; and Larson doubted Silme would surrender her dragonstaff to a novice magician, though she often left it in Gaelinar's care.
A tarp-covered wagon creaked past Larson and stopped before the throng which surrounded Silme. A man reined in the horse while a plump woman dragged a freckle-faced girl toward the sorceress who was already engaged in an inordinate number of simultaneous conversations. A gust of wind swirled a few dusty feathers from the wagon, and the woeful clucks of its live cargo gave Larson an idea. He placed an arm about Brendor's slumped shoulders and addressed the Kensei. "How many days of travel do we have left?"
Gaelinar kept his gaze on Silme, though she surely had nothing to fear from her reverent crowd of townsfolk. "A half day to the oracle and the same back to the river. Then one more day to the Valleys of Darkness and the Helspring."
"And another to return to Manivoll for Brendor," Larson finished. "How much food do we have?"
Gaelinar scratched his leg through the layers of his wind-spread robes. "Four, maybe Five days."
"Good," said Larson with surprisingly effective finality. "Just enough to reach our goal and get us back to Brendor. We won't buy any rations here." He smiled at the child. Without supplies or a nearby town, Larson and his companions would be forced to return to Manivoll to secure food or go hungry.