The Story Continues….

As per my promise to the king_of_goblins.

Everything in the world of Fae had its own glamour, Fanny mused, and in this world that Jareth had created there was very little difference. But the rules bent here, and they played and twisted like sunlight bouncing off of a prism. She could feel things constantly shifting. It was a slight perception of things moving beneath her feet, and yet there was no real tangible sensation that could be measured by her five senses. It was by intuition that she sensed it.

She was lost in her reverie when a small elfin voice was heard beside her,”Lady,” came the timid voice, “are you daydreaming?” the Mickle a Muckle asked.

“Aye, I suppose you could say that,”Fanny arranged the dark cloak over her shoulder,”I guess you could say I am looking for clues to things and have no way to get my bearings,” She looked at the dimuntive creature and smiled, “outside of my meeting you, of course.”

“I thought we were supposed to be playing a game,” the Mickle smacked his lips on the last of the leaves that he had been munching on,” I told you that you couldn’t trust, Him“.

“We are, we are,” Fanny said, “I suppose it just takes a bit of getting used to.” Fanny knew that Jareth would not make the game easy for her because of any assumed rapport or mutual enjoyment that they shared. On the contrary. She fully expected Jareth to make it difficult for her if for no other reason than the sheer delight of watching her struggle with his riddles. She liked to imagine that he was hoping both that she could figure it out and yet fully expecting her to fail.

Overhead the sound of leathern wings and a great wooshing of air could be heard. A cry like a thousand trumpets echoed off of the sides of the mountains and a shadow was cast over the expanse of forest like a dark airborne monolith.

A bolt of lightning or ball of fire shattered a tree next to where Fanny and the mickle stood, sending tree bark, limbs and foilage flying in all directions. Fanny blinked and felt her breath catch in her throat. Her mickle companion let out a yelp and dove behind a large limestone boulder, rolling headlong into a bed of nettle. The small elfin creature did not react to the plant’s fiery touch at all.

Up in the sky a Fanny caught sight of an immense opalescent creature, it’s scales glowed in the suffused light like an abalone shell in the sunlight. Great wings that looked like transluscent leather carried it on the wind and again it let out a great cry that seemed to shake the very earth beneath them.

“An’na’l na?’rax, u:th va:s be’thud, dox’je:l ‘djenve!” Fanny gripped the rowan staff and struck it twice on the ground. Still the beast came and she repeated her spell. “An’na’l na?’rax, u:th va:s be’thud, dox’je:l ‘djenve!”

The dragon circled like a large bird of prey overhead, casting its shadow over the whole of the forest. A heat shimmer cast off of its wings and for one moment, Fanny thought that perhaps the great beast would wheel and turn back the way that it had come, but instead it came closer to the ground where she stood.

“”An’na’l na?’rax, u:th va:s be’thud, dox’—-”

“Save it, woman,” said the Dragon in a voice that resembled rasping metal against bone, “The Charm of Making does not work on me, not here.” He landed on the ground with a soft thud, “Interesting that you would try to use it. Why?”

Fanny Fae took one step backward from the opalescent beast, “I’faith, Lord Dragon, it was just instinct. If you need fire you strike a flint. If a dragon appears, then you just….”

“Use the charm, hmm?”

“Yes.” she said, “Wouldn’t you if our places had been reversed?”

“Had you not spoken the old tongue nearly so well, I would have blasted you where you stood, woman.,’ the great beast said, ignoring her question, “If I am not mistaken, only someone from the Fortunate Isle would still possess such a gift.”

Fanny looked at her feet for a moment then slowly raised her gaze to the reptilian orbs that scrutinized her, “I am grateful that you didn’t, my Lord,” Fanny then turned the question back to the dragon, “I would like to know, however, if I have caused you another offense?”

“Offense? Not to me. But I was sent forth by the Queen of this realm – and she is much displeased that you are here within her kingdom. Now that you have used the Charm of Making and have rendered it well enough, even the Queen cannot take precedent over that. What am I to do with you?” The dragon appeared as thoughtful as any such creature possibly could. He reached out with a wing that had three fingers at its end. The fingers seemingly of their own accord reached out and touched the Wytch on the chin, ” Do you have a name, O’ Woman of the Fortunate Isle?”

Flochsnaerd had been watching the exchange between the dragon and his new-found friend from behind the safety of a nearby rock.

“She..” the Mickle braved from behind his hiding place, his voice quivering, “She says her name is Fanny.”

The dragon slid his gaze from the woman whose chin he still held at the end of his wing, and regarded the Mickle-a Muckle as if he had been interrupted by an impertinent child, “I did not ask you.”

Fanny took one step toward the dragon, hoping to take the dragon’s attention away from the Mickle, “I am known as Fanny Fae,” she said.

“Fae, is it? Well, I thought I recognized Sidhe blood within you. Most interesting, most interesting indeed. But you are a long way from the Fortunate Isle, Lady, and I can only imagine what might have brought you here.”

Fanny smiled, “I am Fae, and it is for the pursuit of my own amusement that I come here, of course. I delight in adventure; both my own and in the stories of such from others.”

The dragon drew back and regarded her with what appeared to be an expression of surprise, “I have many stories of my own, Lady” he said, but you probably would rather hear those of a man who is only known by that name. The Storyteller knows all of the best stories.”

“Oh?” Fanny tried to appear startled by the dragon’s revelation, ” I am sure I would delight in your own stories, Great One, ” she said,”but is there such a creature in this land?”

The dragon nodded and leaned down toward the Wytch, “Yes, there is, and I think that I may know where to begin to look.”

As she mounted the back of the great beast and took the shaking hand of the Mickle that followed along, Fanny hoped that what she did not say, or what she would not allude that she knew would lead her closer to the answer to Jareth’s challenge. She was relieved that she had not relied on magic and therefore broken her agreement with the Goblin King, nor had she lied to either the Mickle a Muckle or the Dragon in order to obtain her objective. It was just sheer luck that she had tried to use the Charm of Making in order to make the dragon disappear and have it not work. That much of a breech was a technicality, but to the Fae and to the Goblins, everything was all about half truths and technicalities. Whether you won or lost depended a great deal upon whether or not you were able to turn either to your advantage.