Spec the Halls - A Winterfest story

This story is a part of the Spec the Halls contest for speculative winter holiday-themed fiction, artwork, and poetry. You may find descriptions of and links to other entries at http://www.aswiebe.com/specthehalls.html

This story was previously published in "Delivered" Magazine Christmas Special, December 2005.

THE WINTER FESTIVAL.

Elissa sat snuggled in her fur on the wide window seat, head resting against the glass, hardly seeing the frenetic activity in the courtyard below. Burly workers dragged great branches of evergreen across the trampled snow, bunting was hung from every window, and the sound of hammering and good-natured shouting and laughter drifted up to the higher windows, but it meant little to her. She barely stirred at the tentative knock on the door, and only moved her head to glare at the intruder. “I told you I didn’t want to see you."
The fair-haired young man blushed under her emerald gaze, and hung his head. “I know you did," he said, “but it’s Winterfest. I thought you might forgive me…”
“Forgive you?” She swung her legs down off the windowseat. “You bedded someone else, Lem. It being Winterfest doesn’t make it all right. Get out of my chambers, before I call the guard." Her voice was flat calm, an unsettling contrast to the rage of the previous evening. Lem ran a finger over the bruise on his jaw as he considered his options.
“I’m going to Avenhelm next week, to relieve the garrison. I don’t want us to part like this."
“Well, maybe you should have thought of that before you went out and spent our marriage money on a Telesian whore? I know all the garrison boys do it, but I thought more of you, Lem."
He held out his hands in a gesture of supplication, which she totally ignored. “All I can say, and keep saying, is that I’m sorry. I was ale-sodden; I was a fool. I don’t want to lose you, not at Winterfest. Not any time. Elissa -”
“Get out!” She was looking around for something to throw now. “Get out, and take your pathetic excuses with you!”
He backed away hastily. “So you’re not going to the feast then?”
“Do you not want me there? So you can fumble with more women behind my back, make me look a fool? Oh, I’ll be at the feast, Lem. You just watch out for me as I dance."

The long tables in the Great Hall groaned under the lavish spread, and Elissa eyed the food with trepidation. Her appetite had not yet returned, although the sickness she had been feeling had faded a little. The Winter Feast was vast and intimidating. Throughout the year, every spare morsel of food was preserved, pickled or smoked in anticipation. Hogs and fowl were fattened, and for days now the castle huntsmen had been scouring the forest for any edible creatures unwise enough to stray from their holes at this time of year. The legions of cooks had been up before dawn, chopping, boiling and roasting, and now, as the sun went down, the months of preparation were over, and the feast was about to begin.
Elissa looked around at the green-garlanded hall, and thought back to the Winterfests of her childhood. They had always been held on the shore of the lake, with a great deerskin on hand in case the weather turned bad. Even when the famines had struck, the village had always managed to scrape together enough food to ensure everyone’s belly was filled. She thought about her mortal father and elven mother, dancing together in the flickering lantern light, and she smiled at the memory, before her present unhappiness flooded back, and she sighed.
“What are you thinking of, child?” Her friend Adele was already on her third glass of wine, before the king had even arrived. “Be happy! It is Winterfest, after all."
“I’m not really in the mood for Winterfest." Elissa knocked back her own wine in three large gulps, and looked around for more.
“You‘re going to let that swineherd Lem spoil the feast for you? I wouldn‘t; I‘d tell him where to put himself." She glared at him across the room, indignant on behalf of her mistreated friend. “I should go and have a word with him."
She half rose, and Elissa pulled her down again. “He’s not worth the trouble."
“You know what you should do, my dear? Stop bothering your pointed ears about it, and have a little fun yourself."
“Fun?”
“Fun of the sort he’s been having."
Elissa coloured. “I couldn’t do that! We are still engaged, I suppose…”
“So? If he treats your engagement like this, maybe you should too." She waved a leg of roast fowl for emphasis. “Take my advice, drink plenty tonight, because everyone else will be. And who knows what fun you could have?”
The tables were set around the edges of the hall, and a large rectangle had been kept clear in the middle for dancing. The women were on one side; the men on the other, and a raised stone dais at the end of the room was reserved for the Royal family. Elissa could see Lem from where he sat with his friends, heads bent close together in some private gossip. He looked up and caught her eye, and she swiftly looked away, flushing with rage as she heard a gale of laughter from the opposite table. She poured herself another generous helping of wine, as trumpets blared at the foot of the staircase, announcing the entrance of the king.

Elissa wasn’t the only one looking for solace in the bottom of a wine flagon that night. Lem was trying hard to get extremely inebriated, but his fiancée kept distracting him. Every time he looked at her, he felt sickened at the thought of what he had done. He could see her sitting on the opposite side of the room, watching the proceedings with a distracted air, and picking listlessly at her food.
“Maybe I should go and talk to her," he said to Alvar. His best friend sat beside him, tucking in with gusto. Wine, food, women; everything Alvar approached he did so with an enthusiasm that bordered on the gluttonous.
“I don’t think you should," he said, through a mouthful of bread. “I should think you’re the last person she wants to see. Adele tells me you’ve made her feel truly bad about herself, as if she’s not good enough to keep her man out of the arms of a Telesian whore. Which, to be honest, she’s not."
Lem bristled. “It’s not her fault," he said hastily. “I just wish there was something I could do to make it up to her."
Alvar chewed thoughtfully, a distant look in his eyes. “You really like this elf-girl, don’t you?”
“Of course."
“And you want her to like you again? Well, I may have an idea, but I don’t think you’re going to be very keen on it…”

The minstrels struck up a dancing tune, and there was a great clatter of booted feet as dozens of people simultaneously scrambled up to dance. Elissa sat isolated; Adele had been swept up by a younger son of some minor Lord, and although she had tugged at her to come join the dance, Elissa had declined. She was not sure she would be too steady on her feet with all that wine sloshing inside her. So she watched, light-headed, as the dancers twirled slowly past in a stately waltz, a blur of faces whirling past with sickening giddiness. She could not see Lem amongst the dancers, and cursing her eyes as she realised she was watching for him, turned once again to the wine jug. The stamp and shuffle of hundreds of booted feet was loud against the wooden floor, as the inhabitants of the castle flowed in harmony for this one night of the year. Of course, by the next day they would all be nursing muzzy heads and be back to the usual squabbling and infighting that characterised their lives. She leant back on her chair; feeling strangely detached from the whole scene, and gulped her wine.
“Are you not dancing, Elissa?”
Alvar’s face swam into focus above her. She shrugged. “I’m not in much of a dancing mood."
“Now that’s a real shame." He sat down beside her without waiting for an invitation. “Because I am in a dancing mood, and I find myself without a partner. I was hoping I could persuade you, even though you do look like you’re chewing a stingfly at the moment!”
“That bad?” She almost smiled. “So why would you want to dance with such a sour-faced hag then?”
He leant in a little closer. “I heard what happened between you and Lem…”
“Who hasn’t?”
“For all it’s worth, I think he was a fool. For sure, I’ve taken a few whores in my time, but I wasn’t betrothed to you. If I had been, well, I’d never have done it."
For the first time, her smile was warm and genuine. “That’s kind of you to say. You mentioned dancing -?” She shifted position on the bench, so her thigh was close against his, and he slipped an arm around her waist and helped her to her feet.
“If that’s your wish, lady…”
She smiled. Yes, let Lem see her dancing with Alvar. Maybe she’d dance just a little closer than she needed too, maybe smile a little more brightly…
She turned her most dazzling smile on him now, peeping up at him flirtatiously through her eyelashes. “Why, Alvar," she purred, “nothing would please me more." As he steered her firmly into the morass of dancers, she glanced over at Lem’s table, and flashed a triumphant smile.
The dance Alvar had led her into was a slow one, rising and falling like breathing. The music wafted down from the minstrel’s gallery above to the gently swaying mass of bodies below. He pulled her close and spun her slowly round, one hand on her shoulder; the other pressed firmly into the small of her back. Elissa, head on his shoulder, watched the faces of the other dancers spin slowly past her, eyes hunting for her fiancé, seeking recognition.
The music changed to a pulsing, sensual rhythm that she didn’t recognise. Alvar’s grip tightened against her waist, and she was startled to feel a growing pressure against her hip. Glancing down, she stifled a giggle at the sight of the bulge in his breeches. She looked up at him, and he grinned, shifting his hips against hers suggestively as the music changed again, becoming faster, drum-led, more urgent. The dancing mass spun, stamped, and spun again. The floor was really crowded now, and it was getting hard to breathe, the air thick with the scent of perfume and tightly packed bodies. Elissa felt a ripple of sickness in the pit of her stomach. She tried to force it down, but it came back in a rush, stronger this time. She felt very hot, and dizzy, and knew with horrifying certainty that if she stayed much longer in this heat and pressure, she would be sick. Desperately pushing herself away from Alvar, she tried to flee, but the press of bodies around her was thick and unyielding, and she was forced to fight her way through, scratching and kicking like a wild animal in a cage. Faces loomed at her, grotesquely distorted by the tears blurring her vision. Hands reached for her, but she shook them off and struggled on towards the fluttering torchlight at the fringes of the crowd.
Alvar caught up with her in the corridor outside. She was leaning against the wall, gasping for air, eyes closed. Some of the colour was beginning to return to her grey face. “Are you alright?” he asked. “Were you sick?”
She shook her head. “No, but I really felt I was going to be. It’s so hot in there, and I think it was all the spinning made me ill”
“It was all the wine!” he scoffed.
“It was probably all the wine," she conceded, with a tipsy smile. “I may stay out here for a while. I don’t feel like going back in yet."
Alvar regarded her critically for a moment. She was wearing a flimsy gown, low cut and sleeveless, and goose pimples were already appearing on her upper arms. “Well, you can’t stay out here. Look at you, you’re freezing!”
“I’m fine!” The rebellious streak flared up once again in Elissa. On the wall opposite hung a line of thick furs, left there by the guests, and she snatched one impulsively. “Come on!”
“Where are we -” but she was already away down the corridor, booted feet clattering against the flagstones. He shrugged, seizing a robe of his own, and followed her.

An icy wind whistled through the many arches and columns of the Courtyard, sending the snow swirling in flurries around Alvar’s boots. Lem’s girl had vanished, and he had the feeling she was playing some kind of game with him. Well, if that was the case, it made them equal, although out here under the cold light of the stars he was not sure his plan to help his friend was such a good idea after all. He caught sight of one of her boot prints, little bigger than a child’s, and he smiled. He had hunted all his life; this would be an entertaining chase.
The prints led in and out of the maze of statuary and snow laden bushes of the carefully set out gardens, and down towards the colonnade of the Long Walk. There was no sign of Elissa, and he marvelled at her elvish speed and artfulness. He knew she was not far ahead, he could hear her giggles, sometimes caught a glimpse of shadow as she darted around the next corner, but every time he thought he was catching up with her, she was gone again, weaving in and out of the pillars of the Long Walk in an infuriating dance that left him breathless and red-faced despite the chill of the night.
“Elissa!” His voice was muffled by the blanket of snow. “Elissa, I give up. You win, so let’s go back indoors, shall we?”
Her giggle sounded close to his ear as a cold hand came from behind and covered his eyes. “I haven’t won yet, Alvar."
“What?”
“You don’t know what game I’m playing."
Before he could reply, she swung him round and fixed her lips on his with an ardour that made his knees tremble. The passion of the elves was legendary, but it was the first time he had experienced it, and it was only with difficulty that he extracted himself from the embrace, remembering where he was and what he was supposed to be doing. Playing the predator was not natural to him, and now she had thrown him utterly off balance.
“What’s the matter?” she asked, sensing his discomfort.
“Nothing… I mean… Lem is my best friend….”
She had one of her hands curled around the back of his neck, and her lips brushed his as she murmured, “I know. I don’t care."
He came up for air, gasping. “Well, I do! This isn’t….
“Why did you follow me out here then, if not for this? What do you want?”
He saw her pointed ears twitch, as if at some sound. “Someone’s coming," she said softly. “It’s Lem."
He wondered how she could tell, but he wasn’t about to argue. “Listen," he whispered urgently. “I made Lem a promise, can you help me keep it?”

Lem was halfway across the courtyard when he heard the scream, high and fearful, and broke into a run, hoping that Alvar wasn’t going too far with his menacing. It would not do to have to fight him properly, nor to have anyone else involved. No, his heroic rescue of his girl would have to be carefully timed, and he slowed a little, drawing his sword for effect.
There was another cry, from the direction of the Long Walk, and he ran again. Under the lamplight, he could see two figures struggling. “Hey! What’s going on?” His ankle turned on a patch of loose snow, and he lost his footing and went down, floundering in the drifts. “Hey!” he cried again, not so threatening now, he realised regretfully. More…pathetic.
Eager hands reached down to help him up. Alvar’s hands, and the delicate fingers of Elissa, aiding him to his feet and dusting him down. Alvar was grinning openly at his discomfiture, and he remembered he had a part to play, and tried to act accordingly. He squared up to his friend. “What are you doing out here with my girl?”
Elissa giggled. He hoped she was laughing at him covered in snow, nothing more. “He," she pointed an accusing finger at Alvar, “he was trying to take advantage of me! I’m so glad you’re here; what are you going to do about it?”
He looked from her triumphant face to Alvar’s grinning one, and sank back to his knees in the snow as he realised he was being made a mockery of. “He told you, didn’t he?”
She nodded, and smiled unexpectedly. “Hardly chivalrous of you, to set up my own seduction. What if I hadn’t been able to resist his charms?”
Momentary doubt crossed his face. “But you did, didn’t you?” He turned to his friend. “Didn’t she?”
“Of course she did!” Alvar linked an arm through his. “Come on, we’re missing all the drink. Lets go inside and get you dry. Are you coming, Elissa?”
“Just a moment." She lingered behind to gather up Alvar’s fallen cloak in her arms, and ran her tongue across her pointed teeth, still savouring that kiss. With Lem away at Avenhelm Castle, it was going to be a very interesting Spring…

THE END.

(c) Joanne Hall 2005