Work Text:
When Pali realised that she and Fitzroy had tripped together, alone, into the fairy lands, something in her relaxed.
Here’s the trick! Here’s the trap! something within her cried.
Pali knew the story well - had heard it among her people and had heard it since from others.
Someone was enticed into following some god or fairy or other magic creature into another realm. And when they returned to their own world, they found that decades - or centuries - had passed.
Pali had known that she was caught by Fitzroy - by his look, his laugh, his rich voice - as much as Sardeet had been caught by the Blue Wind. And here was the magical other world she had followed him into.
Pali refused to succumb, refused to be ravished -
(She wondered, then, what would happen to Damian and Jullanar. Fitzroy had seemed fond of them. If he were a god, he might split his form, and send a part of himself back to them to live out that life. She wondered what he had told them happened to her. She wondered how much time had passed already.)
She would find her feet once she was returned to the world, however much time had passed.
And perhaps this story was not for her. She had seen already how Fitzroy attracted adventure and excitement.
(He attracted serendipity, luck. If this story was for him and not for her - he did love Jullanar and Damian; he would be saddened were they to grow and age beyond his reach. Perhaps they, together, would be lucky, and time would slow rather than speed.)
Her hand was on the hilt of her great-grandmother’s sword as she followed Fitzroy through the towering grass and flowers. Fitzroy was bright with the joy of exploration, calling out to those who came to meet them. Fitzroy was as charming to the fairies as he was to every other person he met.
Pali stood at Fitzroy’s shoulder as he negotiated passage for them, glaring at any fairies who tried to come too close, to reach clinging hands for Fitzroy, to kiss him, to offer food. She had listened to Jullanar’s stories of the Good Neighbors, and if Pali would follow Fitzroy tripping into fairyland, so too would she drag him out of it with her.
Pali saw the sly smiles turn on them when Fitzroy was not watching, as he promised a show and a song for passage at dawn.
These Good Neighbors insisted on throwing a feast. They said that they would be poor hosts if they did not offer food, and that Fitzroy’s promised song and show would be the perfect entertainment.
Pali spoke with Fitzroy before the feast. They emerged ready for it together, draped in veils, their two swords peace-tied, the weight awkward.
The feasting hall was a grand thing, a long room carved from a single massive fallen tree, wider around than any tree Pali had ever seen, except for those she could glimpse peering out through the windows. The tables seemed to almost grow again out of the floor, carved of the same reddish wood.
The food was mouthwatering, roasts and stews and pies and jellies. Sometimes Pali thought she had seen a dish from her homeland, but when she looked closer, it never was.
Pali faced Fitzroy on the stage and saluted. Fitzroy began the show, his voice deep and rich and strong, and she struck. Fitzroy would never be the greatest swordsman, but without the pressure of a fight, he had only to remember the moves Damian and Pali had drilled him on, and with the song, he was able to make that a dance.
The sound of leather-sheathed steel against leather-sheathed steel punctuated his song like the beat of an unfamiliar drum. Pali knew that she should not, but she settled into the rhythm with Fitzroy. This was a show, a performance they were putting on together. There was no need to trip Fitzroy up, and indeed that would only be counter to their purpose.
Their bright veils snapped and flared around them as they moved.
The fairy party, beyond the confines of the stage, seemed more a suggestion of a hazy fever dream than any reality as Pali sunk into the show, feeling the burning of her muscles, the sweat that had begun to gather, the wet smell of the forest, the reverberating shock of sword against sword, and Fitzroy’s voice somehow still cutting strong through it all, even though he had to be as out of breath as she was.
And then it was over, as they had agreed, Fitzroy panting on his knees as he looked up at her with bright and wild eyes, his sword discarded to the side, the leather-covered tip of her own sword under his chin, tilting his head up slightly. The dawn sun shone in through the open windows to cast even his dark features in gold.
Pali thought of the daze Sardeet had described, and she let the tip of her sword fall as she stepped back.
Fitzroy grinned up at her.
“You are magnificent,” he said in the bare few seconds they were given for applause. “We should get married.”
Pali couldn’t stand back, couldn’t back away as their fairy hosts whirled in. They were presented with sweet fairy wine to drink, and good fairy bread to eat, and cool cloths to wipe their foreheads, and hands, hands, hands everywhere. She bullied her way in to grab hold of Fitzroy before their gracious hosts could separate them.
The fairies tried to make much of the fact that Pali and Fitzroy had neither eaten nor slept, but together Pali and Fitzroy were firm that they had been promised passage at dawn, and they would much prefer that than to outstay their welcome.
Pali and Fitzroy stepped through the stone circle hand in hand, and there was Jullanar, tending the fire, as dawn spread rosy pink and lavender across the sky.
She looked unchanged, still wearing the same clothes, her hair slightly frizzy in a halo around her head, even in the braid that Pali had taught her to keep it out of her face while she fought.
“There you two are!” Jullanar called when she noticed them, giving them both a smile. “What did you get up to while you were gone?”