Kirin was quite disoriented when the demon threw him out of the bed at dawn, enveloped him in a cloak and dragged him to the stables.
"Where are the others?" the bard asked.
"The prisoners said the army scattered into small groups going east. You and I will go southeast along the river. Elinor has already left to scout northeast with Owain."
He didn't look happy about it, and Kirin raised his eyebrows.
"You allowed that after they tried to kill each other yesterday?"
"I have no authority over her. It was her decision," Valerien replied tersely.
Kirin nodded and rubbed his eyes. Despite the early hour, the air outside felt hot and humid after the summer rain, so he took off the cloak and laid it across the saddle.
It was soft and dyed an unusually light shade of blue. He remembered seeing it among the pile of fabrics Valerien purchased on the market.
"That is not mine," he said.
"It is now," Valerien replied, then frowned at the fort walls.
The High Warlock stood there at the gate, blocking their way. Kirin braced for another confrontation between him and the demon, but the old man just handed him a strange-looking bow, a quiver full of arrows and a small but heavy purse.
"Owain left this for you, since you lost Windstring. This bow belonged to the prisoner named Taran. I hope his former master won't mind," the warlock said, inclining his head to Valerien.
Kirin swallowed nervously at that provocation, but the demon just said, "Not at all."
The warlock smiled pleasantly. "I will be here, gathering my witches, in case I am needed. Farewell, then."
As they rode downhill, Kirin felt like the bow was burning a hole into his shoulder. He hung it on the saddle next to the quiver and said somewhat sheepishly, "I am sorry about that. Do you want it?"
"Keep it."
"But maybe Taran would rather you have it."
"The dead don't want anything."
"Did you know him well?" Kirin asked hesitantly.
"He used to serve my family."
The image of the horribly disfigured short creatures rose in Kirin's mind, and he shuddered.
"What was he like before… before his face was destroyed?" he asked, hoping to replace it with a different picture.
The silence went on for so long that he thought he would get no answer.
"He had black curls, brown eyes and a round, cheerful face. He could command earth magic almost as well as a High Fae and was a much better gardener than he was an archer," Valerien finally replied.
"Your gardener ran away to join an army of traitors?"
"He didn't run away. He was free to choose his own path and joined the regular army long before he made the mistake of following his commander here."
Kirin frowned and asked, "You said he was almost as good as a High Fae. Is that what you are?"
"Yes."
"But he only had earth magic?"
"Low Fae are created out of a single element. Only High Fae have the skill and strength to combine two forces of nature into a new being."
The bard pondered that for a while, then concluded, "So your kind was made to rule and his to serve. That doesn't sound like he was free to choose his own path."
"No one has absolute freedom of choice, bard."
"Not even you?"
"If I did, I would not be riding on badly made human roads with a nosy human."
Kirin decided to ignore the irritable bastard and rode ahead, feeling miserable. The gods had to have a cruel sense of humour to bind him to a creature so convinced of his own superiority.
He looked into the pouch, hoping against hope that it contained some dried meat, but it was only filled with blunt arrowheads and other scraps of iron. While he thought about the possible uses for that strange gift, they passed the town gate unhindered.
He glanced over his shoulder, wondering if the back injury was slowing the demon down. As if to prove him wrong, Valerien caught up to him. Holding the reins in one hand, he offered Kirin the strange metal food container.
"I am not hungry", Kirin said.
His stomach disagreed and grumbled. Valerien grinned and took out a piece of honey cake.
"I am not a child or a pet that you have to feed."
The demon shrugged and bit into it himself.
"I hope you choke on it, your demonship," Kirin muttered.
"You are more difficult than a box of newly hatched whisps," Valerien complained.
He took the reins from Kirin's hands, then gave him the food. The bard was too ravenous to protest being led like a child on a pony, so he just took it as a peace offering.
"What are whisps?" he asked and put a piece of sticky deliciousness into his mouth.
"They look a bit like your dogs, but they hatch out of eggs and have wings. When they grow, the wings turn into two extra tails," Valerien explained.
"You just made that up."
"I did not. They are very good-natured and loyal to a fault, but they have no self-preservation instinct at all when they are young. If you don't keep an eye on them, they'll fly against a wall or into the wild, where they can't survive."
Kirin narrowed his eyes at him. The bastard was making fun of him again.
"Or they just prefer that to suffering your presence," he said and snatched the reins back.
Valerien just grinned and took back the empty container.
"When I first met you, you were carrying a lute instead of a bow into a dark forest. That was foolish, even for a bard."
"I didn't expect to find a demon there!"
"So you meant to enchant wolves, boars and outlaws with a song?"
"Climbing a tree and staying still would give me better chances than a bow in all those cases."
Valerien smiled. "Maybe you are surprisingly sensible at times. How did you lose your old bow?"
"It got burned," Kirin mumbled.
He wasn't eager to recount that humiliating episode.
"I see. It is never wise to win against a member of the royal family."
"How do you know that?" Kirin asked suspiciously.
"The guards at the gate yesterday accused you of using magic in the archery contest against their prince."
"Even if I had that kind of magic, I wouldn't need it to win against Mordred," the bard said scornfully.
"So he threw a tantrum and burned your bow?"
"He isn't that stupid. He bribed the chief priest to give this whole speech about how the gods demanded Windstring to be sacrificed in their honour."
"And if you had refused?"
"The king would have demanded that Owain take it from me as his champion. I didn't want to make things difficult for him, so I threw her into the Beltane Fires myself," Kirin admitted.
He braced himself for more ridicule, but Valerien just looked ahead. Eventually, he gestured at the weapon on Kirin's saddle.
"That is just a standard military bow, one of ten thousand identical copies. But Taran was just as hopelessly sentimental as you are, so he named it Taranbais. It means "thunder-strike" in the old Fae tongue. Use it well."