The Knight

I froze. “What can you tell me about him?”

“Nothing!” (That was the male voice I had first heard.)

“Nothing at all, really.” (This was the female voice.) “You know much more about him than we do. A lot of you think him the Most High God.”

“Thus they know less. We ca

I said, “Bold Berthold says he’s master of the flying castle, and it’s in Skai.”

“Really?”

“We have never seen it.” The male speaker cleared his throat. “Besides, we wish not to talk about it. Here, Gylf! Here boy!”

“What do you want to do? Hide behind him?”

“If necessary, yes. Sit! Good boy!”

I said, “May I look around? I won’t hurt anyone.”

“Did I not say you could?”

She was tall, so slender she seemed like a collection of flexible sticks about the color of milk chocolate. He was a lot shorter, brown too, with an enormous nose and beady eyes; but at first I did not see him all because of the dog.

It was the biggest dog I ever saw, very dark brown with a white blaze on its big chest, and smiling. You know how dogs smile? It had soft ears that hung down, a head as big as a bull’s, I-can-take-care-of-myself eyes, and a mouth I could have put my whole head in.

“This is Gylf.” For a minute I thought the dog was talking, but it was the male voice coming from behind him.

The brown woman said, “He is a puppy really.”

“But he can—you know.”

“Would you like us to take care of the baby?”

“We will have time on our hands now, you know.” The owner of the male voice peeped cautiously around Gylf as he spoke. He was terribly ugly. “It is not as if we have never raised your children before.”

“I will do the work,” the brown woman said, “and he will take the credit.”

“The sun will be up any moment.”

I said, “You’ll feed him? And—and ... ?”

“Educate him,” the brown woman said firmly. “You shall see.”

“Only not soon. He will be in Aelfrice.”

“Well, so will he!”

I wish I could say why his saying that made me decide, but it did. Partly I was thinking that if I left Ossar in Gle

She did, cradling him in her arms and crooning to him.

Immediately both Aelf began backing away. Instead of sloping up, the riverbank was sloping down, and they went down that slope into a mist. “Have no fear brown woman called, “I will teach him all about you.”

“About Gylf,” the owner of the male voice said, “it happens all the time. After a storm someone finds such whelps.”

“As we did,” the brown woman added.

“But they are his.”

“We are to take care of them until he whistles.”

“Which we have ....”

They were gone and little Ossar with them, and the riverbank sloped up normally again.

I was looking at the dog, I suppose because there was nothing else left to look at. “Those were Bodachan, weren’t they? Earth Aelf?”

He seemed to nod, and I gri

He nodded again, this time unmistakably, and I said, “You’re a real smart dog, aren’t you?”

He nodded and smiled.

“Were you really the Valfather’s? I think that’s what they said.” He nodded the same way he had before.

“I see. Somebody’s trained you to nod when you hear a question. Is there any question that wouldn’t make you nod?”

As I expected, he nodded to that too. He also looked inquiringly at the lamb I had ski

“You’re right, I ought to cook that. I’ll give you some meat, and all the bones, okay?”

Of course he nodded.

In a few minutes more I had a whole leg-of-lamb roasting on a pointed stick. It was not until I smelled it that I found out how hungry I was. My mouth watered, and it seemed to me I had never smelled anything as good as it was going to be.

The dog came closer, lying down next to me. I said, “Gylf? Is that your name?”

He nodded as if he had understood every word.

“You’re a hunting dog, or that’s what it sounded like. What do you hunt?”

He nuzzled me as if to say you.

“What? Me? Really?”

He nodded.

“You’re putting me on!”

Eyeing the sizzling meat, he licked his lips. His tongue was Day-Glo pink in the firelight, and about as wide as my hand.

“I’ll give you some, but we’ll both have to wait before we eat any. It’ll be very hot.” I took it from the fire while I was talking to him; you can cook meat more if it needs it, but if you cook it too much, you ca

He nodded and licked my knee. Big as it was and rough as it was, his tongue was warm and friendly.

“When we’re through eating, we’ll go to Gle

I touched the meat, and licked my fingers, then waved it around on its stick to cool it. “Are you as hungry as I am?”

He nodded, and I noticed he was drooling quite a bit.

“You know, I’ve been wondering what killed that wolf. That was dumb of me, with the answer lying right next to me. It was you. You don’t have to nod, Gylf. I know it was.”

He nodded anyway.

“Then you left the lamb for me, instead of eating it yourself. Maybe the brown girl had something to do with it, but it was nice of you anyhow.” I tore the lower part of the lamb’s leg from the upper and gave it to him.

He held it down with his forepaws, the way dogs do, and tore it with teeth that would have surprised me in a lion’s mouth. Seeing them, I wondered why the wolf had not dropped the lamb and run. “Well, how is it?” I asked him.

And he grunted, “Good!”

Chapter 12. Old Man Toug

Gle

He looked scared and shook his head. He was quite a bit younger than I used to be, if you know what I mean.

“You know him, though.”

He nodded, although I could see he did not want to.

“Don’t gape at me. You’ve seen strangers before.”

“Not nobody big as you.”

“My name’s Sir Able,” I told him, “and you and me will get along much better of you use it. Say, yes, Sir Able.”

“Yes, Sir Able.”

“Thanks. I want you to find Ve for me. Tell him I’ll be at Toug’s house, and I’ve got to talk to him.”

Gylf sniffed the kid’s face, and he shook like Jell-O.

“Tell him I’m no enemy. I’m not going to hurt him, and neither is my dog here.” I let him go. “Now go find him and tell him what I told you.”

“I, um—uh ...” the kid said, then he managed to add something more that might have been, “Sir Able.”

“Out with it, if it’s important. If it isn’t, find Ve and tell him.”

The kid touched his chest with a grimy finger and bobbed his head.

“You are Ve.”

“Y-y-y ...”

I made him come with me, saying I wanted to talk to him and Ulfa together.

The house was right down the street. I rapped the door with my bow and grabbed the lather by the front of his dirty shirt when he answered it, shook him as I pushed him in, and ducked under the lintel. “Where’s your daughter?”

She must have heard me, because she looked in from one of the little rooms in back.