Birds of every kind, from
sparrows to wrens to crows, starlings and swifts returned in huge flocks, and
were busy sorting out territories and new nests. Out of burrows and holes and caves, all the
animals who had laid low during the winter were stirring forth, sniffing out
old familiar ways and finding out what had changed while they slept.
Down under hill the elf and
bear were not idle. Thornbriar had
ordered an all-out spring cleaning, to turn up the last musty corners of the
old year, and had spent almost all morning busily scrubbing, sweeping, sorting,
and scraping. Bear assisted, mostly by
helping move the heavier furniture and by preparing strengthening snacks, a
talent in which he showed some skill and which he took every opportunity to
demonstrate, even when Thornbriar wasn't hungry. This never caused the bear any trouble,
because after the elf rejected it he cheerfully disposed of whatever tidbit he
had whipped up himself.
“You know, Bear,” the elf
said, as they paused for a little tea break.
“I don’t know what to do with half of the junk that’s laying around the
house. Besides everything I’ve accumulated
over the last hundred years, there’s stuff crammed around here that’s belonged
to my family that I’ve inherited, or just had dumped on me. I suppose I’ll just have to put some more of
it in the box room.”
The bear swallowed a huge
cup of tea in hasty interest. “The box
room?” he said curiously. “Where’s
that? I’ve never seen it.”
“I suppose not,” said
Thornbriar. “I’ve tried to forget it
myself. You know that big wardrobe in
the back passage? Well, behind that is a
door, and behind that door is a little room I use for storage.”
“Do you think we could go
look in it?” asked Bear. “It sounds
interesting. I love pawing through old
relics of the past.”
“You make it sound more
exciting than it is,” yawned the elf.
“But since I’ll probably have to put another box of junk in, I guess
you’ll get to have a peep. Well, let’s
get a move on and finish before I run down.
Otherwise I’ll never get going again.
Hand me that broom, will you, old fellow?”
The rest of the day was
spent with dust and cobwebs. By the time
the sun was starting to set every piece of wood glowed with polish and every
piece of brass glinted like a new penny.
The pair sat tired and dusty, but happy, next to a box filled with
things deemed as clutter but too good to throw out yet, like a cuckoo clock
that had somehow lost its cuckoo; a large pewter vase that Bear had dented
trying to swat a wasp, and a chess set lacking a few key pieces.
Thornbriar let out a happy
sigh. “Now all we have to do is stow
this away and we’re through. How do ham
and cheese sandwiches sound for supper?
I’m really too tired to try any cooking more elaborate.”
“That’d suit me down to the
ground,” said Bear. He grunted and got
up, then reached down for the box, hefting it with a rattle. “Well, the sooner we get going, the sooner we
eat. I’m still pretty curious about that
room.”
“Oh, very well,” said
Thornbriar, as he heaved himself out of his chair with a sigh. “Let’s get it over with. But I tell you not to get too excited.”
The elf reached over to a
lamp and with a particular twiddle of his fingers ignited a small, silvery
flame. The two made their way to the
long hall in the back, stopping in front of the looming, old oak wardrobe. It reached almost to the roof and was fully
five feet wide. Its doors were ornately
carved with woodland scenes in which deer, elves, and fauns cavorted underneath
a smiling sun.
Bear sat down the box of
junk and Thornbriar placed the lamp in a handy niche in the wall. “You take that end,” he said, pointing to the
left, “And I’ll take this. You push and
I’ll pull, and when the wardrobe is clear of the door, you give a holler.”
“All right,” said Bear,
setting his shoulder against the stout oak frame. “I’m ready.”
“On the count of three,”
said the elf. “One…Two…Three…Heave!”
The bear strained his
muscles and gave a mighty shove up and forward.
The elf took a step backward and suddenly yelped as the wardrobe came
down on his booted foot.
“Hurry, hurry, lift it up
again,” he said through gritted teeth.
The bear lifted again and
Thornbriar staggered back under the weight of the enormous piece of furniture.
“I see the door!” cried
Bear. “Get ready to set it down!”
“Right!” said Thornbriar,
hastily retracting his toes. The
wardrobe came down with a thump, rocking a little on its clawed feet. The elf leaned against it for a moment to
catch his breath, then walked around to where the bear was sniffing at the
dusty, cobwebbed door and its brass knob, green with disuse.
“Phew!” he snorted. “We’ll need a broom here.”
The elf went around the
corner, fetched the broom from the kitchen, and hastily brushed the door
down. Then he got a little stool, set it
next to the doorway, got on it, and reached high up to the sill. After a little groping he brought down a
dusty key, cut with elaborate teeth.
“Here we are,” he said,
hopping off the stool and putting the key in the lock. For a moment it resisted his efforts, then
with a dry “click-clank” the key turned.
“Come on,” said Thornbriar,
picking up the lamp. “Get that box and
let’s go in.”
Bear did as he was told and
followed close behind the elf, peering over his shoulder as he led the
way. It was a large room without any
windows, and boxes and parcels were piled up all around the walls and in aisles
along the floor. The air was dry and
musty and smelled of earth. There were
dark corners where the light of the lamp did not reach.
Bear set down his box on
what was apparently the newest stack close by the door. As he did so he noticed a pile of what seemed
to be paintings, covered by an oilcloth.
“What are these?” he asked,
going near and laying a paw lightly on them.
“Pictures of my relatives,”
said the elf. He brought the lamp closer
and twitched off the tarp. The first
painting in the stack showed an elderly dignified elf dressed in a complicated
combination of robes and armor, standing in front of a red curtained
window. In one hand he held a rolled-up
scroll.
“This is my
great-great-great-great-granduncle. He
rose to the highest position ever held by any Thornbriar. He was Lord High Protector of the Seal. And no cracks about what did he feed it,” he
added to the disappointed bear as the joke died on the bruin’s lips.
“Humph,” said Bear. “He seems a serious kind of fellow.”
“Oh, he was,” said
Thornbriar. “A pretty powerful
enchanter, too, I understand.”
For the next few minutes,
they flipped through the pictures, the elf explaining each to the fascinated
bear. Finally they came to the last one,
a double-portrait of Thornbriar’s parents.
The elf stood looking at it
for a long time. “I think I’ll hang this
one up again,” he said quietly. “Come
on, let’s take a last quick look around and then close it back up. I’m dying for a meal.”
The two poked and pried for
a while longer, Thornbriar explaining what was in some boxes and Bear peeking
in them if what he heard interested him.
Scattered around were pieces of furniture, dusty old armor, and other
odds and ends.
“Here, what’s this?” asked
Bear. He pulled out a strange little
iron chest from where it lay beneath a battered old chair, covered so thickly
with dust that it almost couldn’t be seen.
“Let me see,” said the elf,
bringing the lamp closer as the bear dusted the chest with one paw. “Oh, that’s only Great-Grand-Uncle’s iron
box.”
“Really?” said Bear, picking
it up and shaking it. “What’s in it?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said the
elf. “It’s been in the family for years
and years. I can’t say I remember it
ever being opened.” He looked at the
dusty piles around him and wrinkled his nose.
“Well, bring it along if it interests you. As for me, I’m ready to eat.”
The two left the room,
Thornbriar carrying both the lamp and his parents’ portrait, and Bear following
with the heavy old iron box underneath one paw.
Once outside the door, the elf re-locked it and put the key back where
he had found it on the dusty sill.
Heaving and groaning, they
moved the wardrobe back into place.
They retired to the kitchen,
where Thornbriar began to prepare their supper.
While he sliced bread, ham, and cheese for their sandwiches, Bear sat at
the opposite end of the kitchen table, wiping off the iron chest with a damp
dish cloth.
“Where’s the key?” he asked.
“There’s no key,” said
Thornbriar absentmindedly, as he sawed through the thick brown loaf of
bread. “Or if there was one, it was lost
long ago.”
“Well, what’s in it, then?”
said Bear crossly. “You might have told
me before I dragged it out.”
“I was thinking of other
things,” said the elf. “You were the one
who was so interested. And as for what’s
in it, I don’t know. As I said, I’ve
never heard of anyone opening it.”
“Never been opened!”
exclaimed Bear. “Why ever not?”
“I’m not really sure,” said
the elf, stacking slices of golden cheese on a plate. “I have a vague recollection of being told
not to mess with it or try to open it when I was a child. I suppose they thought I might break whatever
it is.”
The bear looked determinedly
at the box. “Well, I’m going to open it,
somehow or other. I have a good feel for
locks.”
“You’re welcome to try,”
said Thornbriar, getting up and bringing the smoky-smelling ham on a platter
over to the table. “But after supper,
okay?”
The bear set the mysterious
box aside, and the two hungry workers began to eat with relish. By the time the last crust had been devoured,
Thornbriar was yawning and heavy-eyed; so tired that he was almost unable to move.
“I’m going to hit the hay,”
he said sleepily. “I’ll just leave the
dishes for tomorrow, I guess. Unless
you’d like to do them?”
The bear looked at the
crumb-covered cutting board and the couple of dirty knives and felt slightly
guilty about his comparatively light duties that day. “Of course I will,” he said. “And then I might see if I can crack this
chest. You go on and get some rest, old
fellow. You’ve done a good day’s work.”
Thornbriar walked to his
bedroom in a drowsy daze. He barely
managed to get out of his dirty clothes, wash his face, and get into his
sleeping cap and nightshirt. He sighed
as he snuggled down into the cool, clean sheets and fell fast asleep.
Thornbriar was
dreaming. To the elves, dreams are more
like places within that they visit, and the elves are always aware that they
are there inside the dream.
Now Thornbriar was walking
down a long, long corridor, lined with doors on either side, doors of every
size and shape. He knew that somehow,
for some reason, he was looking for one particular door.
He passed dozens. Some he recognized. Here was the front door of his house; there
an arch of a ruined castle he had once visited; next a door in Dr. Gilpin’s
house. None of these, however, was the
one he wanted.
He came to a slow stop in
front of a rather plain door. It was in
two parts, upper and lower, cross-beamed, with two simple but graceful long
iron handles and matching hinges. He
stood staring at it a moment before he remembered which door it was. He reached out slowly and pulled the handle.
As he passed through the
door and into the room beyond, he had the strange feeling he was experiencing
things as two people; both the adult he now was and the child he had been. He was aware both of what he had known and
felt as a child and what he knew and felt now, so while the young Thornbriar
entered the room happy and carefree, the older Thornbriar felt a sudden pang as
he walked into his mother’s kitchen of many years past.
She was there, as she was so
often, among innumerable jars of spices and bins of ingredients; a happy,
red-cheeked elven lady with merry eyes like a cricket, dressed in one of her
dark green gowns, stirring batter in a large crockery bowl. The older Thornbriar walked up to her lagging
a little behind the younger Thornbriar, who ran ahead eagerly to stick a finger
into the mixing bowl.
“Hi, Mom,” that young one
said. “What are you making?”
“Buttercups, dearie, buttercups,” she said.
“Buttercups with a little lemon icing.”
While she handed him a dab to taste on the mixing spoon, the older
Thornbriar caught up. He tasted again
the batter, gone now for centuries, that his mother always made in spring.
It is the great sadness and
comfort for elves that all their past is remembered exactly, and there for
their dreams to access. Thornbriar
looked around wondering, why this room?
why tonight? when suddenly his eyes fell on the iron chest.
The younger Thornbriar was
trying to open it by sticking a fork into the keyhole. The chest was sitting where it always had
when he had been a child, wedged away on a lower shelf.
His mother turned from her
cooking and gave a little cry when she saw what he was doing. She rushed over and grabbed him up away from
the box.
“No, no, no, sweetie,” she
said. “You mustn’t mess with it, you
know that! Don’t ever try to open that
chest.”
“Why, Mommy?”
“There’s something very
nasty your Great-Grand-Uncle locked up inside, and we don’t ever, ever want it
to get out, you see? While it’s in
there, it’s safe.”
“But what is it?” asked the
little elf, round-eyed.
His mother heaved a deep sigh and sat him down on the tabletop. “Ah, Thorny, there are so many wicked things
in the world, and I really don’t like to tell you about them,” she said, as she
briskly straightened his clothes. “But
just to be sure you don’t mess with that, I will. Do you know what a necromancer is?”
“No, Mother.”
“Well, it’s a particularly
nasty type of wizard. A long time ago
there was a necromancer who made what’s in that box to help him do awful
things. Anyway, eventually he died, but
the thing didn’t, because it had never really been alive, you see? And it went around making mischief, and no
humans could kill it because it was so clever and quick. Finally, your Great-Grand-Uncle went and
caught it and locked it up safe.”
“Why didn’t he destroy it?”
“He meant to someday if he could find the right spell, but he never
did. The box has been passed down for
safe keeping for, oh, hundreds of years.
Someday I imagine you’ll take it for safekeeping.”
“Someday I’ll be a great wizard,” the young elf said eagerly. “I’ll do great magics and I’ll get rid of it,
once and for all!”
“Maybe, maybe,” said his mother.
“But now you go and play so I can finish baking. And mind, don’t open the box, child.” Suddenly she turned to where the older
Thornbriar was, staring disconcertingly straight at him. “Don’t open the box!” she repeated, walking
toward him. “Don’t! Don’t! Don’t”
Thornbriar turned to the door and fled out into the corridor.
In the kitchen Bear was still tinkering with the box. Several old skeleton keys had proved useless,
and now he was delicately probing with the tip of a claw.
“Easy, easy now,” he murmured to himself.
“Yes, that’s it, I think, just a little more pressure…” He held his
breath and listened intently. Suddenly,
with a little “snick” the lock clicked open, the lid springing slightly ajar.
“Aha!” said Bear triumphantly, putting his paws on the lid to lift it. Just as he did, Thornbriar, rumpled and
shock-headed from sleep, burst into the room, shouting, “Don’t! Don’t! Don’t!”
“What the--!” yelped Bear, startled, as he jumped in surprise away from the
table. As he did so, the chest fell from
his paws to the floor. With a tumble of
limbs and a jingle of bells, what was inside spilled out.
Thornbriar held his breath. Bear
reached down a slow paw and picked it up, holding it to the light to get a
better look.
“Is that all?” he asked. “It’s just
a doll?”
It was indeed a doll; a red and dark-green velvet harlequin, spangled with
black diamonds and brass bells. Its
hands and feet were china and on its head its hat curved into two pointed
horns. Its eyes were closed, but the
mouth was turned up in a malicious grin.
“Put it back,” said Thornbriar, edging around Bear carefully, staying as
far away from it as possible. “Please,
put it back in the box, if you can.”
“But why?” said the puzzled bear.
“What are you so afraid of? It’s
only a doll.”
“I’ll explain later, but just put it away first, all right? Quickly!” the elf pleaded.
The bear wrinkled his brow. “Well,
okay. I still don’t understand though.”
He stooped down for the box, but at that instant yelped in pain, dropping
the harlequin. Thornbriar cried
out. The doll somersaulted in midair,
landing on its feet. The two friends
gazed in fear as it stood there swaying from side to side, turning its painted
china face first to one, and then the other, its eyes now wide open and burning
green, slanting in sly cruelty as if considering its next move. From the painted nails of its ceramic hand,
blood dripped.
“It clawed me!” said the stunned bruin.
“It’s alive!”
Thornbriar snatched up the poker from the fireplace, whirled around, and
slammed the kitchen door shut. “Close
the window!” he yelled. “We can’t let it
get out!”
The harlequin turned, ran, and had almost reached the windowsill before the
bear had recovered his wits enough to react.
He slammed the shutter and latched the heavy iron bolt. The doll fumbled for a second with its tiny,
delicate fingers at the bolt, then turned with a venomous hiss on the bear, who
tumbled over backwards in surprise.
It leaped up on the counter next to the dish rack and snatched up the
kitchen knife. With a flick of its hands,
it flung the knife straight through the air at Thornbriar, who just managed to
parry it with the poker.
The dangerous doll took the opportunity, crouched, and sprang towards the
elf. Thornbriar dodged wildly out of the
way, but it was not him the harlequin had aimed for, but the doorway. In a twinkling it had worked the door open
and scuttled away into the darkened house.
“Are you all right?” asked Bear, having regained his breath and
balance. He walked over to the shaken
elf and peered past him into the shadows.
“Yes, I guess so,” said Thornbriar.
A sudden thought came to him.
“Corenth trane!” he snapped, and instantly there was a brief flicker of
scarlet flame around the edges of the window.
“There,” he said. “I’ve sealed the
house. Now he can’t get out.”
“Neither can we,” pointed out Bear.
“Brrr! What a nasty little thing!
What was it?”
“My mother said a necromancer made it,” said the elf, closing the door
again. He came over and picked up the
chest. “My Great-Grand-Uncle locked it
up. Hello! What’s this?”
He reached into the box and pulled out a folded piece of parchment. It crackled as he opened it.
“Hmm,” he said. “Listen to
this. ‘To whomever finds this note: Know
that I, Lord Erasmus Thornbriar, defeated the wicked Verile in magical combat. I undid many of his dark spells, but this
working I do not comprehend. Being
unable to unbind it, I place this Harlequin, which the said Verile used to
commit his crimes and in which his villainy yet lives, in this casket, until
some other can understand and unmake it.
Beware, for though it can neither move nor act when the sun is high, in
shadows and darkness it is as any imp or goblin. If, for some reason, someone has unknowingly
released it, I tell you, beware. Put it
back if it yet sleeps, for if it be loosed, none can tell what it would do.’”
“I wish,” said Bear, “That your Grand-Uncle had glued this to the outside.”
“Never mind that! We’ve got to catch that thing again and lock it up before
it does something terrible. This is what
we’ll do. We’ll search room to room and
lock them when we’re through.
“We need something to catch it in,” he said, turning towards the broom
closet. “Something like a net, or…Aha!
This tablecloth should do the trick!”
He handed it to Bear, then hefted the poker. “You take that cloth and get ready to throw
it over him, and I’ll drive him with the poker.” He picked up a lamp. “Well, I guess we’re ready,” he gulped. “Let’s go.”
Carefully, they opened the door and stuck the lamp through the crack into
the hall. They looked up and down, but
nothing indicated which room the harlequin might have entered.
“Okay,” said the elf. “We’ll try the
first door on the right.”
After locking the kitchen securely behind them, they entered the first
room. It was the formal dining room,
seldom used, with a long table, high-backed chairs, a china cabinet, and
sideboard. After a thorough search in
which Thornbriar even stood on the table to get a better look at the
wagon-wheel chandelier, they locked that room, too.
So it went, as they examined room after room, finding no sign of the
malicious doll until they came to the library.
While Bear was looking through the roll-top desk, he suddenly noticed
something.
“Say, Thornbriar, look at this! The
letter opener is gone. I’m sure it was
right here just this afternoon. And the
ink bottle is tipped over.”
“I’d day we can be pretty sure he was in here,” said the elf grimly. “And that he’s now armed.”
The bear snorted. “Big deal,” he
said. “I doubt if that little bitty
thing can hurt us much.”
“It did a pretty good job in the kitchen,” the elf pointed out.
“Yes, well, we were surprised. We
weren’t ready,” said Bear as he headed for the door to the back parlor. “Now that we have a plan, it’ll be no match
for us, you’ll see.”
He pushed the slightly ajar door open and began to stride out. Before he’d gone a step, a pile of heavy
leather-bound books fell from where they had been balanced on the other side of
the door, clonking him heavily on the head.
The big animal fell stunned to the floor.
Thornbriar leaped to his friend’s assistance, thrusting the lamp into the
darkened parlor. He caught a quick
glimpse of the harlequin, sharp letter opener in hand, as it quickly turned and
scuttled out of the door and into the hall.
Thornbriar sprinted over to the door and looked out. The doll had already disappeared. He locked it and went hastily back to Bear,
who had come to and was sitting up, rubbing his head.
“Ooooh,” he groaned. “What
happened?”
“You were just saying how powerless the harlequin would be against
us.” He helped Bear to his feet, feeling
the animal’s head. “That’s quite a lump
you’ve got there. Do you feel all
right?”
“Just a little shaken,” said the bear.
He put a paw up to his skull and wagged his head vigorously. “Aargh,” he growled. “Now it’s personal. Let’s get that thing and get it good.”
They went back out into the hall and continued the room to room search,
being even more cautious now. They found
more minor booby traps, including a curtain sash drawn across the way and
candle wax set where someone could easily slip on it, but they managed to avoid
them all.
Finally they stood in front of the last room. “He must be in there,” said the elf. “The sitting room.”
“All right,” said Bear. “Slow and
careful, and check the door first.”
The bear put a paw forward and clicked the door open, then jumped
back. Thornbriar took the poker and
jabbed its blunt tip near the knob, pushing the door all the way open. It creaked noisily until it hit the wall with
a bump. Slowly the two peered in.
The fire still burned low in the fireplace, casting a dim reddish
glow. The elf poked the lamp in, sending
the shadows flying eerily in every direction.
The two friends moved nervously just into the doorway.
Thornbriar pointed to the wood box, then to the fire. “I’ll lock the door so it can’t get out. You build up the fire so we can see better
what’s going on,” he whispered.
“Okay,” said Bear. While the elf
turned the key and pocketed it, the bruin galloped over to the kindling box,
checked around for any sight of mischief, then started piling logs on the fire.
The wood slowly caught, brightening the room. Bear turned to his friend and then
froze. Thornbriar was alertly scanning
the room all around, but behind him, precariously balanced on the door frame,
was the harlequin, the knife-like letter opener glinting red in its hand.
Before the bear could react, the evil doll leapt down with a thin, tearing
scream right onto the elf’s head.
Thornbriar yelled and dropped the lamp and poker. The harlequin wrapped its legs around his
neck, trying to choke him as it lifted the knife to strike. The elf violently shook his head from side to
side, trying to shake it off. Thornbriar
reached up to tear it away, but only got sliced fingers for the effort. The harlequin lurched back and forth, trying
to stab, but the elf’s movements kept him from landing a blow.
Bear seized the poker where it had fallen and stood swaying, trying to find
a safe time to land a blow, but finding none in the mad swirl as the elf and
harlequin jerked and jigged about the room.
“Get it off, get it off!” screeched Thornbriar.
“I’m trying, I’m trying,” yelled the bear.
At the moment, the elf’s feet jammed into a table, sending him sprawling
forward off balance. The bear jumped
back to avoid the crashing piece of furniture as the entwined combatants fell
to the floor.
Thornbriar’s skull landed with a crack on the thin carpet in front of the
fireplace. His vision blurred, then
crossed, then came into focus only to see the triumphant doll grinning over
him, knife held high to deliver a killing blow.
Thornbriar tried to rise but could not.
For a split second, the elf could see the knife descending, then the change
on the harlequin’s face just before the bear brought the poker around in a
mighty swing. There was a crack like a
bat hitting a ball, then a shriek as the jangling doll flew straight into the
fireplace.
Thornbriar managed to raise himself on his elbow. Through a haze of pain, he saw the harlequin
dancing in the flames like a frantic marionette as the ancient, dry cloth of
its body caught fire. To the elf’s
horror, the thing jerked its way past the firedogs, trying to escape the
flames.
Bear took a step forward, but before he could do anything, the elf had
snatched up the letter opener and hurled it like a dagger straight at the
smoldering doll. With a “thunk” it
struck the parti-colored velvet body, pinning it to a glowing log. The evil thing thrashed horribly, then with a
startling “whoosh” its entire body burst into flames.
The fearful friends could see for an instant under the doll’s clothes what
seemed to be the pitiful skeleton of a small child, before that too withered
and fell to ash.
The clock was chiming a quarter past three before everything had been put
back to rights. Bear patched the bump on
Thornbriar’s head with a cold compress and had him sit in an easy chair while
he straightened things up. The elf got
up only to sprinkle some silver powder and salt on the fireplace in case there
were any lingering bad influences from the doll’s demise. The bear brewed a nice cup of tea to settle
their nerves.
“What I don’t understand,” said the bruin, as he leaned back in his chair,
“Is why your ancestor didn’t just destroy the thing, way back when. It turned out to be pretty dangerous to save
it.”
The elf took a sip of his tea and stared at the fire. “I think I know why. He didn’t unmake it because he didn’t
understand it.”
Bear frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Do you remember his note? He said
he didn’t comprehend the spell. I’ve
known a few wizards in my time, and I know how their minds work. He didn’t care if the harlequin was good or
evil once he had captured it and stopped it from doing things. To him it was a puzzle to be solved. By burning it up, we just cut the Gordian
Knot, as it were.”
He sighed.
“Perhaps if I had become the great enchanter I had hoped to be, I might
have been able to peacefully dissolve it.
As it was, it was just horrible.”
“Well, I say good riddance,” humphed Bear.
“What good would it do to know how the spell worked anyway? Only bad could have come of that thing, it
seems to me. I, for one, am glad it’s
gone.”
The big animal yawned and stretched, muscles rippling under his fur. “Well, all this excitement has exhausted
me. I’m off to bed.”
He got up and started for the door.
He stopped in the doorway when he noticed that the elf hadn’t moved.
“Are you going to go to bed?”
“Not just yet,” answered Thornbriar.
Bear turned anxiously to his friend.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes, I’ll be fine,” said the elf gently.
“You go on to bed.”
“Well, all right,” said Bear uncertainly.
“Good night.”
The elf spent the rest of the night watching the flames as they slowly
consumed the logs. When the first ray of
morning sunlight hit the windows, he fell into a deep, peaceful sleep,
untroubled by dreams.
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