Forty-Five: The Curious Thing About Dryads

  “Got it, let’s be off,” Slade said, at long last picking up his knife.

  “We need to take care,” Freydis said. “We think there are Wastemoor soldiers about.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “Because we found this. Just before this beast here charged.” She held out the black and red sea serpent scarf. “Caiside says it’s the gear of a Wastemoor guard.”

  “Indeed it is, or was,” Slade said. “Thanks for recovering it. It’s mine.” He took it from her and wrapped it around his neck.

  “Yours?” she said. “Why are you wearing something like that?”

  “Well, it’s handsome, isn’t it?” he said. “And it’s well-made. I had to trade an entire cask of port for it. Now, I would not wear it out in the open back in Wastemoor, if that’s what you mean. But far away, the way I am now, why not? I have to hand it to them, it’s beautiful.” He tugged a corner of it.

  “So there are no soldiers from Wastemoor around?” Freydis asked.

  “Not that I have seen,” Slade answered. “And I would hope there are not. And I’m sure they would make themselves known if they were. They won’t be dropping scarves like a flirting princess, I’ll tell you that.”

  We now began backing away, in earnest, from the land narwhal which was still struck in the tree and trying to pull its horn out. It was dark now, which I hoped would also help us get away from it.

  “You just happened to come across us when that land narwhal was charging?” I asked Slade.

  “Indeed. I’ve been trying to catch up to you for days, now. Fortunate timing, eh? I knew you would be up here somewhere, but I didn’t think I’d run across you yet. I learned down in town that you journeyed up. You haven’t covered as much ground as I thought you might have, by now.”

  There we went again with the comment on our progress. I felt like half the people we were meeting had to criticize our adventuring skills. The Dwarves, Highview, and now Slade; all of them surprised at how long we were taking, and how we’d been kidnapped by korreds, et cetera.

  “We’ve had several setbacks,” I said.

  We told him of our delays with the korreds and Arranden Waters, and the spelepike, and the troll, and the dryad. Slade seemed genuinely supportive though all of them:

  “Ah, I wouldn’t feel ashamed about the korreds, you know,” he said. “They’re small, but when they put their mind to it, they can all come together for a purpose. I had a run-in with them back in my amber-gathering days. A very clean bunch of people, though, aren’t they?”

  And:

  “Well, that’s quite noble of you, helping that apparition of that Waters ancestor find peace, and move along. No one else could have done it. And it must be the same family as Miranda, no? What a small world it is.”

  And:

  “Dryads, yes, hard to avoid them around here. These highland woods certainly are the areas they’ll favor. And this one was alone, of course? Single?”

  “She was,” I said.

  “Isn’t that odd? Odd how that’s always the case?”

  “Well, I don’t believe dryads are the marrying sort.”

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  “Certainly, not marrying. But they bewitch people, don’t they? Quite easily? That’s what they always get up to, yes?”

  “That’s what they’re known for, certainly. From what I have always heard.”

  “But yet,” Slade said, “there’s always some solitary dryad lurking in the woods to latch on to someone. Right? Even though they are supposedly so good at the latching? Have you ever pondered that?”

  “Well,” I said, but he was already drawing in a breath to sing:

  So you’re wending through the woods

  – perhaps you’re out to trade some goods –

  and then you find you’re drawn to a partic’lar tree.

  And before you can prepare,

  some dryad’s tossing back her hair,

  and then you’re hooked; you find you never can go free.

  This girl just traps you like a fish

  and there is no way to resist.

  She’s got powers, magic, pull; you’re in her thrall.

  But shouldn’t we all wonder –

  as we see the spell your under –

  why this stunning dame was there alone at all?

  Slade sang a chorus, then:

  If their target men are easily bewitched,

  why are dryads never found already hitched?

  If their powers are consistently infernal,

  why are tree sprites never caught out contubernal?

  She catches any wretch who stumbles past;

  he’s stuck to her, he’s helpless and bound fast;

  but you never hear of dryads who are paired up.

  They’re all lonesome, solo, blue,

  and on a quest to capture you

  even though a bunch already have been snared up.

  I mean –

  Do they eat them? Is that it?

  Do they find some guy who’ll fit

  into their cauldrons, and just turn him into stew?

  You hear tales of ocean sirens

  – the very dryads of their environs –

  and sailors tell us that’s exactly what they do.

  But dryads? I’ve not heard that they are eating

  all these hapless wand’ring men that they keep meeting.

  Do the men just run away? Just get sobered-up one day?

  And escape the shack, or crawl out of the cave?

  Because if not, these dryads should

  be happy; blissful in their wood,

  with no reason to ensnare some other knave.

  If their targets are so easily enraptured

  you wouldn’t think that they would need so many captured.

  If their powers are consistently infernal

  why are tree sprites never caught out contubernal?

  Needless to say, Uncle Slade did the family proud, with his singing, even though it was my father and I who were the professional musicians.

  “Well,” Freydis noted, “you mention how the dryads target men, and so on, but in our case it was Caiside and I who got into trouble with her.”

  “Same point, though,” Slade said. “You have to wonder why she was single when you came across her. Always seems to be that way. Just one of this world’s mysteries.”

  .

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