Ed Greenwood: Swords of Eveningstar

“Cavanter buds,” Florin told her, pointing at a nearby bush, “from yonder shrub. Only pleasant to eat this time of year, when they’re green and swelling. Truly mouth-watering if you’ve butter to pan-fry them in.”

Narantha’s mouth was still watering. She watched Florin bite into a bud as if it was an olive or radish, and did the same. Chewy… unfamiliar… a bit like carrot in texture, but fried bread in taste. Nothing so spectacular as the brownfin, but… pleasant.

The forester had made his fish and buds vanish in a trice, and was at work on the rabbit, pulling it apart on another leaf. Thankfully, his knife had already made the head disappear, and it seemed to have cooked so thoroughly that it came apart like custard as he pulled on the legs. In moments another leaf was held out to her. “Bones in this,” Florin warned her. “Not to be eaten. Spit them onto this leaf; nowhere else.”

Narantha had eaten rabbit many times before, usually covered in the choicest simmered sauces prepared in the kitchens of many high houses and even the palace, but this-sauceless and too hot, stinging her fingers as she bit and gobbled-this overmatched all. The best food she’d ever eaten.

It was gone while she still ached for more, and she never noticed that the forester had slipped his portion onto her leaf as she gnawed-nor that she’d been moaning softly, in sheer pleasure.

Licking her fingers hungrily, Narantha sat back and stared at the greasy leaves. In all the feasts she’d eaten, as far back as she could remember, she’d never tasted anything so fine.

Florin was washing his hands-and his chin too, it seemed-in the stream. “Come,” he said gently. “We’ve a long way to travel before nightfall, to escape the beasts. Wash.”

Narantha blinked at him, her moment of bliss gone.

“Are you suggesting,” she asked icily, “I should go on my knees and lap up water like a dog?”

“Only a little. Drinking too much at once isn’t good. Use the sand to scour your mouth and hands.”

She made no move, but stared at him, eyes smoldering.

The forester calmly tossed handfuls of water onto the fire, dousing it amid puffs of smoke and loud hissings, until he could rake it apart and wet it down thoroughly. The largest twigs went into the water, thrust down into the submerged flank of the sandbar and buried there. The leaves they’d eaten from were served the same way.

Then Florin scooped up dry sand and cast it across the scattered ashes of the fire, rinsing his hands in the Dathyl once more. “Wash,” he told her firmly, sounding for all the world like one of her childhood nurses.

“And just who are you, man,” she told him back just as firmly, “to give orders to me?”

Florin gave her the same sort of “old wisdom looking at her with grave disappointment” look that her long-dead uncles had favored her with. “The scent of the fish and meat on you will come off on every branch or leaf you touch, leaving a clear trail even a half-witted wolf or owlbear-and there are no half-witted hunting beasts-can follow. You’ll lead them right to your own throat. To say nothing of the stinging flies and worse that’ll find it much sooner than that, and buzz around your eyes day and night through. Wash.”

Defeated, the fair flower of the Crownsilvers gave him a wordless snarl and went to the water, turning her back on him.

“Relieve yourself over there,” he added, pointing off into the trees. “No thorns or stinging leaves. Yes, yon bushes are thicker, but you’ll be burning or itching for days if you head that way.”

Narantha’s back stiffened, but she made no reply.

“If you wait to go later,” Florin added calmly, “remember this: what you leave behind is like shouting your whereabouts to the hunting beasts.”

Wordlessly Narantha went where he’d directed. “Use the big pale leaves, no others,” he added-and suspected, by the manner in which the tangled vines she’d vanished behind immediately danced and rustled, that she’d made an immediate and very rude gesture by way of reply.

He looked all around for signs of their stay, scraping the sands with the side of his boot to do away with the prints of boots, knees, and hands.

When the Lady Narantha emerged from the bushes, glaring at him mutely, Florin murmured, “Please follow me”-and walked into the stream.

Narantha looked incredulous. “What are you doing? ”

Standing knee-deep in the Dathyl, the forester replied, “Always do this when leaving a forest camp. Doing so makes it harder for the more intelligent monsters to track you from your cookfires to wherever you next sleep. Elsewise, they’ll soon be biting out your throat.”

The flower of the Crownsilvers looked down at the unfamiliar and overlarge boots on her feet, her lips drawn back in distaste. “It’s going to be cold and wet,” she snapped. “I hate being wet.”

“Best get it over with quickly, then,” Florin said briskly. “Always face what you mislike, do battle with it, and get it done: all the more time then for what you prefer, yes?”

Narantha glared at him. “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you? Humiliating me every chance you get, mocking my ignorance of forest ways, as much as telling me I’m utterly useless. I hate you. Gallant men of Cormyr — true men of Cormyr-never stoop to treat a lady so.”

Florin glanced up at the sky. “The day,” he told it conversationally, “does draw on. We have to cross an owlbear’s hunting ground to get out of this forest; it’d be a real pity for us both if night found us when we were just passing its lair.”

“ Stop spinning dire tales!” Narantha spat. “You’re lying! Just making things up, to try to scare me into obeying you! Well, I won’t, so there! There must be a bridge across this stream somewhere-or you can chop down a tree and make me one! Yes, sirrah! Hear now my command: fell a tree, right here, and-”

Florin strode up out of the water, gallantly cupped her elbow in his hand, and escorted her-straight into the Dathyl. When she started to struggle, seeing where he was heading, his gentle grip turned to iron, and he towed her into the water until she was stumbling, flailing, and almost immediately shrieking as her foot threatened to come out of her right boot, leaving it behind, deep underwater.

“Stamp down hard,” he commanded quietly, “or you’ll be out of those boots-and crawling for days through the forest. If the beasts let you live that long.”

He kept hold of her-which was a good thing, considering how many hidden holes and rocks she seemed to stumble over, unintentionally almost sitting down twice-and took her on a long and very wet stroll down the stream before climbing out onto some bare rocks, with a grimly dripping Narantha beside him.

Something seemed to shift, along the side of a tree ahead of them, and Florin called something soft in a liquid, shifting-sounds tongue Narantha had never heard before. She thought she heard the merest whisper of an answer before Florin dragged her back into the stream and walked on, around another bend.

This time she did fall, snatching her hand away from him and promptly losing her footing. She came up coughing, spitting, and very wet, and made no protest when he gently claimed her arm again. Her teeth were chattering by the time they stepped out of the Dathyl once more.

“What was that you said?” she asked, miserably, folding her arms across her breast to try to cover herself from him in the drenched ruin of her nightrobe. “And to whom?”

“A polite greeting, and assurance we meant no harm. To the one whose home we almost blundered into.”

Narantha waited, shivering, until it seemed clear the tall forester wasn’t going to say anything more. “I’ve never heard that speech before,” she blurted, finally. “What was it?”