Stardust

“It’s me own fault—I should’ve been paying more attention to where we was goin’. Now you’ll never get your star, and I’ll never get my merchandise. One day some other poor bugger lost in the wood’ll find our skellingtons picked clean as whistles and that’ll be that.”

Tristran stared about him. In the gloom it seemed that the trees were crowding about more thickly, although he had seen nothing actually move. He wondered if the little man were being foolish, or imagining things.

Something stung his left hand. He slapped at it, expecting to see an insect. He looked down to see a pale yellow leaf. It fell to the ground with a rustle. On the back of his hand, a veining of red, wet blood welled up. The wood whispered about them.

“Is there anything we can do?” Tristran asked.

“Nothing I can think of. If only we knew where the true path was… even a serewood couldn’t destroy the true path. Just hide it from us, lure us off of it…” The little man shrugged, and sighed.

Tristran reached his hand up and rubbed his forehead. “I… I do know where the path is,” he said. He pointed. “It’s down that way.”

The little man’s bead-black eyes glittered. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, sir. Through that copse and up a little way to the right. That’s where the path is.”

“How do you know?” asked the man.

“I know” replied Tristran.

“Right. Come on!” And the little man took his burden and ran, slowly enough that Tristran, his leather bag swinging and banging against his legs, his heart pounding, his breath coming in gasps, was able to keep up.

“No! Not that way. Over to the left!” shouted Tristran. Branches and thorns ripped and tore at his clothes. They ran on in silence.

The trees seemed to have arranged themselves into a wall. Leaves fell around them in flurries, stinging and smarting when they touched Tristran’s skin, cutting and slicing at his clothes. He clambered up the hill, swiping at the leaves with his free hand, swatting at the twigs and branches with his bag.

The silence was broken by something wailing. It was the little hairy man. He had stopped dead where he stood, and, his head thrown back, had begun to howl at the sky.

“Buck up,” said Tristran. “We’re nearly there.” He grasped the little hairy man’s free hand in his own larger hand, and pulled him forward.

And then they were standing on the true path: a swath of green sward running through the grey wood. “Are we safe here?” asked Tristran, panting, and looking about apprehensively.

“We’re safe, as long as we stay on the path,” said the little hairy man, and he put down his burden, sat down on the grass of the path and stared at the trees about them.

The pale trees shook, although no wind blew, and it seemed to Tristran that they shook in anger.

His companion had begun to shudder, his hairy fingers raking and stroking the green grass. Then he looked up at Tristran. “I don’t suppose you have such a thing as a bottle of something spirituous upon you? Or perchance a pot of hot, sweet tea?”

“No,” said Tristran. “ ‘fraid not.”

The little man sniffed, and fumbled at the lock of his huge package. “Turn round,” he said to Tristran. “No peekin’.”

Tristran turned away.

There was a rummaging, scuffling noise. Then the sound of a lock clicking shut, and then, “You can turn around, if you like.” The little man was holding an enamel bottle. He was tugging, vainly, at the stopper.

“Um. Would you like me to help you with that?” Tristran hoped the little hairy man would not be offended by his request. He should not have worried; his companion thrust the bottle into his hands.

“Here go,” he said. “You’ve got the fingers for it.”

Tristran tugged and pulled out the stopper of the bottle. He could smell something intoxicating, like honey mixed with wood smoke and cloves. He passed the bottle back to the little man.

“It’s a crime to drink something as rare and good as this out of the bottle,” said the little hairy man. He untied the little wooden cup from his belt, and, trembling, poured a small amount of an amber-colored liquid into it. He sniffed it, then sipped it, then he smiled, with small, sharp teeth.

“Aaaahhhh. That’s better.”

He passed the cup to Tristran.

“Sip it slowly,” he said. “It’s worth a king’s ransom, this bottle. It cost me two large blue-white diamonds, a mechanical bluebird which sang, and a dragon’s scale.”

Tristran sipped the drink. It warmed him down to his toes and made him feel like his head was filled with tiny bubbles.

“Good, eh?”

Tristran nodded.

“Too good for the likes of you and me, I’m afraid. Still. It hits the spot in times of trouble, of which this is certainly one. Let’s get out of this wood,” said the little hairy man. “Which way, though… ?”

“That way,” said Tristran, pointing to their left.

The little man stoppered and pocketed the little bottle, shouldered his pack, and the two of them walked together down the green path through the grey wood.