The Hob's Bargain(54)

"Why are you lying at my feet?" I asked sharply - a result of sitting up too fast and hitting my head on a low beam. "How did you find me?"

"The little folk told me where you'd be. I've tried to catch you at night the last couple of days, but you were gone. So I decided to try before it got dark." The hob stretched, taking up even more space. His eyes glowed a little in the dark.

"I've been patrolling," I said in answer to his implied question. Little folk? What little folk? Fully awake, I was too intimidated by his presence, made even larger and darker in the confines of the attic, to ask him about little folk.

"I'm afraid I told the big man - Koret?  -  that I would be borrowing you from him for tonight. I promised to see what I could do about the earthens, and I need you to do it."

"Earthens?" I asked, slipping out of my blankets and rolling them into a tight bundle. Yesterday's clothes (which I had slept in) would just have to do. I wasn't changing with the hob looking on.

"The creatures that attacked your village were earthens. They're the earth spirit's minions, pretty harmless as such things go. Your folk were lucky the spirit is weak yet, or you'd have been facing something much nastier."

"Earth spirit?" I asked.

"I think," said Caefawn, "it might be better if I talk as we go. Koret explained it is important that no one find you here. If we continue to talk, the chances of someone discovering your sleeping place are greatly increased."

By the time we were outside the village proper, night had fallen. The moon was still in a brighter phase, but it was cloudy, so at intervals we were floundering (well, I was floundering) in darkness. I wondered why he'd picked me to go adventuring with instead of Kith or someone else more competent. Of course, there was the bargain between us.

"Where are we going? " I spoke softly because we weren't far from the village yet, having stopped just past the temple grounds.

"I was hoping that you would have a better idea than I," responded Caefawn.

I thought for a while, then said, carefully, "How would I know where we're going, when I don't even know why?"

"Form a picture in your mind of this half of the valley."

I frowned at him, but he didn't see because he'd closed his eyes. I could feel him gathering magic.

"Do it, Aren. Please."

I tried, but it was like trying to decide what the roof of a building looks like from the inside. I'd never considered the valley as a whole unit, just bits and pieces, one connected to the other.

"Mmm. Perhaps try one place at a time."

I started with the place I knew best, my parents' house. I thought of it as it had been when Quilliar had been there. Ma's roses in full bloom.

"Move on." The hob's voice was dark as a moonless night, slipping into my vision without intruding. His magic cloaked me as warmly as a blanket in winter, and as comforting. The tension I'd felt in his presence dissolved and my vision shifted until I saw the house as it was now: deserted and sad, the roses withering from lack of care.

"This isn't it. Try somewhere else," said the hob.

I tried my cottage next. The thatching was thick and snug; bits of brown poked out of bare dirt near one wall where I'd planted starts from Ma's flowers. There were a couple of slats broken on the pasture fence near the barn. A rabbit moved cautiously through the doorway.

"That's it," said the hob, and his hands came down on my shoulders.

A swooping feeling lifted me, like going over a high jump on a horse, but stronger. It was as if the whole valley were laid out before me. I could see the raiders as they went about their business, the patrollers who skulked in the shadows, an owl swooping upon an unsuspecting mouse.

"What am I looking for?" I asked again, but as I spoke, I found it.

An old snag marked the corner of Lyntle's fields near the easternmost fields. The earth beneath the snag glowed as if there were a hidden campfire sending red and yellow flames to light the night. The rye, planted earlier this spring, grew over the top of the place, but it was stunted and off-color.

"I found it," I said.

"I see it," answered the hob. His arms dropped away. As soon as he released me, so did the vision.

Dizzy from the abrupt change, I swayed; he steadied me.

I stepped away from him. "Now tell me about this earth spirit and what we need to do to stop it."

Caefawn grinned at my peremptory tone. "Patience is not one of your virtues, is it? Very well." He spread his hands wide in open imitation of Wandel beginning a story. He had been spying on the village. "Elemental spirits are the guardians of the world. They preserve the order. The mountain is an elemental, too - although less powerful than the earth spirit. The river has a spirit, too. I saw her myself a few weeks ago. When I lived here before, the valley belonged to an earth spirit more powerful than the mountain or river because of the villagers' celebrations and sacrifices. As far as I know, the bloodmage's meddling sent them all to sleep, and they are slowly awakening."

Was the hob one of the mountain spirit's minions, as the earthens belonged to the earth spirit? "So the earth spirit who guards this valley is awake and angry. Do you know why?"

The hob shrugged, leaning one shoulder against a tree trunk. Shadows covered his upper body. "Because your people farm the land and forget to ask permission and give thanks. The spirit, unlike the water guardian, who is fickle and mischievous, is a formal creature at heart."