Music and Misadventure by Charlotte E. English

Author:Charlotte E. English [English, Charlotte E.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: urban fantasy, contemporary fantasy, humorous fantasy
Publisher: Charlotte E. English
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

12

It wasn’t.

‘Addie?’ I called, playing snatches from her song from time to time in hopes that one or the other sound would penetrate the forest gloaming.

No answer came, and she did not appear. I trudged through tangled thickets of conifer trees, their trunks wound about with ivy so dark green in hue it was almost black. Pools of water hid beneath the carpeting brambles, the one wetting my feet and the other scratching my ankles and legs, and progress was slow. How had Addie managed to disappear so thoroughly with such terrain to hamper her?

Magickal faerie creature. Right.

At last I heard a faint whinny, and another, and I adjusted my steps accordingly.

But it was not Addie that had called. It was another unicorn.

Another two minutes’ trudging brought me to the edge of a shadowy glade. There the trees grew more sparsely, and grass rather than bramble and vine covered the ground. In the centre was a serene pool, its glassy surface darkened.

Around the edges of that pool stood a whole herd of unicorns. I counted at least twelve, including Adeline.

She was making enthusiastic friends with a great, golden-palomino stallion.

Very enthusiastic friends.

‘Oh,’ I said.

I turned away my eyes, and sidled up to the pool, for a glimmer of something had caught my eye.

There, submerged at the bottom of the clear waters, was the most exquisite lyre. Smaller than most, its arched, curving frame looked made from moonlight itself: the moonsilver was aptly named. It appeared unstrung, but what had Mother said about it? Strung with enchanted waters from the king’s own pools.

Was this one of those pools?

Either way, what was it doing here, instead of up on the hilltop with the rest of the lost king’s personal effects?

My feet being soaked anyway, I shrugged and began to wade into the water.

‘Stop.’ My mother’s voice split the clearing like a whiplash, and I stopped on reflex.

‘What—’

‘Remember what happened when you tried to take the pipes off the bier?’ Mother and Jay had made it as far as the glade, but they remained on the edge of it, well away from the unicorn herd and the pool. Both looked disquieted.

‘Yes, but this has nothing of the same appearance. Look at it. All lop-sided as though someone just chucked it in there.’

‘They probably did. And what would encourage a person to hurl a Great Treasure to the bottom of a pool, do you suppose?’

‘Nothing good. Even so—’

‘Never mind even so. Leave it alone.’

I felt a flash of irritation. ‘Mother. You’ve dragged us all the way out here in order to find this damned lyre and the man who once played it. No? Well, we’ve found one of them. There it is, right there! And now you want me to just walk away?’

‘Yes. We’ve found it; excellent. And that’s enough.’

‘We can’t just leave it here. The Yllanfalen will want it back.’

‘You think they don’t know exactly where it is?’

I frowned. ‘They said it was missing.’

‘Yep. All of them, over and over, using almost the same words.

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