‘You will travel by the Old Ways, the Secret Pathways which only the Elves and the animals know but which you also with your powers of Magic may now know. And you will not be alone as you journey for with you will be your companions of Silver Wood; Perryfoot the Fleet and the dog Sam, you, Brock and you, Warrigal.
‘And there will be a sixth traveller, known to you now as an Urkku but in fact one of the Eldron; the girl you met by the stream. She will be a friend of your own race and you will learn much from her, as you travel, of the ways of Man.
‘When you leave here you will journey to where she lives. She will be waiting, for Ashgaroth has touched her mind as she slept to prepare her for your coming. And so that she may know you for the one sent by him, you will give her a Ring.’
He stopped talking and there was silence for a long, long time as the three travellers continued to look at him, their minds racing furiously with all that they had heard. He sat in the windowseat, looking gently at them, framed by the light of the early moon, for the sun had now gone down. Nab wished that he could sit here for ever, listening to that voice, and remain secure in this little room. Somehow he was afraid to leave, for while he was in the room he retained some part of him as he had been before he entered; when he left, he would be in some way different. He felt as if before he had been safe; wrapped in a cocoon of ignorance, but that now the world was a different place and his role in it frightened him terribly: from being a mere bystander watching from the outside, he was now at the centre. He looked at Brock and Warrigal and found that they were looking at him and he wondered if their attitude towards him would change.
For the badger and the owl, in fact, the Elflord’s words as to the place of Nab amongst them had been no surprise, rather a confirma-tion of something which they had felt from the night he had arrived in the wood. What their minds were trying desperately to cope with was the wealth of knowledge which they had just been given and the incredible story behind it. Brock soon gave up, his mind submerged under it all, but for Warrigal it was like the completion of a puzzle as all the little fragments of stories and legends that he had picked up over the years finally came together as one.
The Elflord’s voice broke in upon their thoughts.
‘You will dine with me tonight, as my guests,’ he said, ‘and tomorrow before you leave I will present you with the Ring and the casket of the Faradawn. Come with me.’
He stood up and beckoned to them to follow him as he walked back across the little room and opened the door into the hall. As they emerged into the vastness of the huge chamber a wonderful sight met their eyes. Down the centre stretched a long mat woven with rushes of greens and browns and interlaced with fronds of fir, and on the mat, which stretched almost to the far end, was a vast selection of foods and drinks all arranged in little silver and copper dishes, each one carved with a different pattern and each illustrating a part of the story which they had just heard. The Lord Wychnor led them across to the head of the mat, where he sat down on a brilliantly coloured cushion and motioned to Nab to sit on his left with Warrigal and Brock on his right. When these four were sitting, the host of elves who had been standing alongside the mat also sat down and all turned towards Wychnor, who stood up, raised the silver chalice which was in front of him and turned to Nab looking deep into his eyes. Then he drank from the chalice and the elves all cheered and likewise raised their bowls and drank. When Brock leant forward to take a sip from his bowl, which he guessed he was supposed to, he saw with a thrill that around the outside of the bowl was carved a delicate picture of a badger moving backwards through a snow filled wood with a bundle nestled under his two forelegs. He looked excitedly at the other bowls around him and saw that they too represented different scenes from his life with Nab; a carving of the sett with him and Tara playing with Nab, the first Council Meeting, and others, all bringing back warm and satisfying memories. He looked across at Nab and then turned to Warrigal and they too were looking in wonder at their silver bowls, lost in thought. The boy raised his head and looked back at Brock and a tear oozed from his eye and trickled slowly down his cheek until it fell on the mat. Then the Elflord sat down, the cheering stopped and everyone began to eat and drink.
‘Do you like them?’ said Wychnor, pointing to the carvings and speaking to the three companions. ‘Our craftsmen were finishing them even as you were walking past them this afternoon to meet me. See, here is one of the three of you walking through Ellmondrill and here is another of you coming across the water with Reev. Ah, here is some music and the dancers. This will be a new dance, performed in honour of you all; even I have not seen it before.’
The great door at the end of the hall had opened and a stream of elves were dancing in, some carrying instruments from which came the sounds of music and others clad in costumes from which hundreds of little lights shimmered and sparkled in the orange twilight glow that shone from the patches of lichen on the walls. The owl, the badger and the boy watched in wonder as the musicians settled down around the outside walls and began to play and the dancers moved in time with the rhythms, echoing in their movements the memories and timeless images which the music evoked in their minds. Nab recognized little snatches of sound from the walk through the hall that afternoon when they had been practising and, as these more familiar sounds came to him, he once again felt the impulsive urge to dance. He watched the dancers as they moved around the hall and their costumes formed a dizzy whirlpool of colours in which he became lost, and then dimly, through the haze of sounds and lights, he felt himself get up from his cushion by the mat and dance across to join them. Once he was up and had given himself to the music his body seemed taken over; he seemed to fly through the air up to the rafters, which were festooned with evergreens, across to the far wall and then down to crouch on the floor in a tiny ball only to explode again into separate pieces each of which flew away to different parts of the hall.
Brock and Warrigal watched in amazement and the elves cheered and laughed and soon the cushions around the mat were vacant as the floor was filled with dancers, each joyously lost in his own world of movement. The badger and the owl sought out Nab and the three of them frolicked and spun and laughed and leapt until they could move no more and then when the moon was highest in the night sky the visitors returned weary and happy to their little room below, and the elves all retired to sleep. All except Wychnor, who went to his private room and sat alone staring out through the window at the moon shining on the clearing; and his mind was lost in the past.
The next morning the animals were woken by Reev as he came into their chamber, bringing, as he called it, their ‘travelling food’ on a large tray. The sun shone very brightly through the window and they knew what that brightness meant; snow had fallen in the night. They went over to look outside and could hardly recognize the clearing, covered as it was by a thick layer of white, making everything round and smooth and soft. The elf stayed with them as they ate, talking about last night; he had been one of the dancers but none of the animals had recognized him in his costume. Indeed, in the myriad of wonders that had so mesmerized them, they could remember very little, but when they thought back to their talk with Wychnor a little cold chill sent itself shuddering into their hearts at the recollection of his words. In the magic of last night they had been able to forget, but now, in the cold light of a new day, the things he had told them came flooding back in a rush so that they no longer felt hungry.
