He did not dream. In the morning, when the lady woke him,
they went on through the forest. They made good time that
day, and the next day, and the day after the next. Patches of
blue shone through the grey sky. The trees became thinner
and shorter. Soon the trees themselves were replaced by shrubs
and bushes. Then there was only grass, endless swaying grass. Inside his skull, he could hear a howl rising out of nightmare
memory, clawing up at a bloody moon. I cannot see. Are you there?
“Where are we going?” “Now!” he shouted and lunged forward.
They were on a steep stone bluff that overlooked a raging
river that twisted and churned its way through the grassland.
Massive boulders tumbled through the turbulent water,
carried away by the rushing current. The lady narrowed her
eyes. “To a safe place. To those who have gone before us, and
those who will come after.” The scarred blade took the serpent’s head off with its crooked
fangs inches from the lady’s forearm. She had stepped back,
just as he had told her, trusting beyond all else, and her feet
found nothing but empty air.
She slid from the horse’s back and stroked the hound’s head.
“We should rest here. I want to watch the water.”
He looked up the slope. Danger buzzed in the back of his
skull. “As you say.”
The lady made the smallest of nods. The howl faded. His
fingers curled around the hilt of his sword. A quick strike. A
path, and a mountain beneath the bright noonday sun.
Steel fingers closed around her wrist. Muscles screamed in his
shoulder and back as he pulled her onto solid ground. Below,
the river kept churning into white foam.
The lady stood there suddenly, close, much too close. Slowly,
painfully slowly, she raised her hands to the great looming
helm. He did not move.
The lady walked to the edge of the bluff and looked down
at the river. He followed, slowly at first, and then quickly as
the hound barked a warning and he realized what form the
danger took. The lady pulled the helm from his head and held it, arms
trembling beneath the weight.
The serpent made a sound somewhere in between a hiss and
a laugh when it emerged from its burrow in the soft soil. His
hands were steel fists around the neck of an invisible enemy.
The air inside his helmet was stifling, choking, unbearable. He was weeping, and not only because he could feel the
breeze upon his face.
Then the lady saw the serpent and flinched back to the very
edge of the bluff. Her eyes were wide as they flashed a glance
at the foaming river below. Her gaze rose and met his through
the vision slit of his helmet and in that single moment he knew
this lady who had found him wandering in the woods was an
eternity that was not bound in scarred steel. “No,” she replied. Her hair gleamed in the sun, gleamed in
his memory. “This is our time. This will always be our time.”
“Do not be afraid,” he said. “When I say to, step back.”
“Back?”
“I will not let you fall,” he said. “I promise you.”
The serpent hissed again. Venom dripped from its fangs.
“Can it be?” she whispered. “Do you remember me?”
“I should not have gone,” he said. “I am sorry.”
V. The late morning sun shines down from a deep blue sky
onto the swaying gold-green grassland. A horse races at full
gallop across the plain. On its back is a knight, his head bare
and his armor whole. Beside the horse runs a lady, her long
hair streaming out behind her. Her feet leave no mark on the
grass. Beside the lady lopes a great hound. This is the green
spring of the world. This is knowledge and laughter and clear
joy, and the reflection of sunlight on far-off snow.
David Ferranti is a senior concentrating in Biology.
33