Sir William III of Revain, Knight of the Burning Blossom, bravely came to the Cave of Yearning in search of that treasure which all men seek, and he had found it.

Awakened from the sweetest of dreams, William opened his eyes with a sleepy, but pleasant flutter. Despite his aged years, and the experience of many battles, he did not feel the slightest stir of aching in his muscles and joints. Instead, his bare body was met by the softest of silk, and the most comfortable of blankets. The blanket was of red fur with a white striped pattern. He knew not the name of whatever animal it must have come from, but the touch was smooth, and more gentle than the brush of a loving mother's kiss to the head of her beloved child.

As his awareness grew, William made out his surroundings. He rested upon a round bed fit not just for a king, but an emperor. Five or more could sleep here on this wonderful place of rest. Beyond where he lay, he could see the rocky walls of the cave itself. He expected them to be rough, coarse, and in stark contrast to the exotic silks and fur. They were not what he expected. Rather, they were ornate, as though purposefully chiseled into patterns that did not seem possible. Not only that, the walls were not gray, or dark, but clear as spring water.

Then, the walls shifted in color. He glanced around and saw glowing crystals; some red, some blue, but it was not as simple as that, as they too transformed their hues. When he looked back to the walls, he found himself transported. It was as if he were no longer in a cave, but a house of elegant marble, pleasurable silks, and sensuous scents that comforted his senses.

William turned his head to the sound of creaking, and found a door opening. In came three women. The first had hair of midnight, and eyes like the deepest ocean. Her lips were red, and curved slightly upward in a way that made her gaze come alight with passionate delight. He knew this gaze. Knew her face. Her name was on his lips, but the second woman came to his side.

This woman had hair of the fairest kind, long, smooth, and bright like the rising dawn. Her skin was pale as freshly fallen snow, and the blush on her cheeks enchanting. Those eyes, like emeralds they shined, treasures of their own, staring back into his with a glimmer of her warm smile. She was an angel, or a goddess perhaps, William thought.

And then those thoughts were broken, by the loveliest of songs. So came the third, with her cinnamon curls, and comely, wholesome grace. She radiated the hearth, and the warmth of home, brimming with innocence and her voice carried softly like the steady murmur of a stream in a summer-lit glade.

He knew them. Their names, and their faces. The sounds of their voices, and the memories of the past. Three he had known. Three he had lost. William knew sadness in the heaviness of his breast, but that sorrow soon lifted with each note of that heavenly tune.

"Rest, dearest William." She with the midnight hair spoke. With an effortless hand she slid the dark silk that barely covered her form down the smooth flesh of her shoulder.

Just looking at her sent profound pangs of desire shivering through William's entire body. He stirred, and pulled her into bed, bringing her laughing, giddily, into his arms for a kiss.

"And what about me?" Emerald eyes stared into his, not with envy, or jealousy, but paired with a pleasant, and playful pout.

Her laughter filled the air melodically as he drew her in too, embracing with a hearty kiss. "I could never forget you," he said, "Never, in all my life."

The third woman continued to sing, smiling joyfully, and sharing meaningful looks with William as the time passed, and passed, ceaselessly. She sang of joy and good tidings. She sang of tragedies and fallen loves. Most of all she sang of eternity.

Not at all, and not once during her singing did William ever glance to the bedside mirror to see what there was to see. Not his growing beard, or his faded, paling flesh. Nor could he see the devious shine of malevolent eyes behind the purity of most pleasing masks.

"I have come for the treasure which all men seek," William said, with endless pleasure on his lips.

"And I have found it." The true William croaked, beyond the mirror, with a lilt of despair.

I awake to the pain of your absence in my bed, that cold and empty space beside me that should be warm to the touch with you. Moonlight spills in from the open window, the sill is white with snowfall and bright beneath its silver rays. I hear the fluttering of wings and my heart surges with joy. But you do not come, just a nightjar searching for milk to suckle. It knows... I breath to myself before it takes flight and disappears into the night once more.

My hand reaches down beneath the coverlet and traces the curve of my belly, the swelling sign of the love that we had once shared. I feel our child press against my skin, reaching out to me, reaching out to grasp the golden ring that you had set upon my finger. I know he shall be strong and quick and clever like you, though thinking of who he shall be makes me weep, for I also know my father shall take him away from me even after I have already lost you.

I am discarded by him. I am discarded by you. My sorrow is only eclipsed by my hatred.

My consciousness climbs out from the languid pit of despair I have wallowed in since you tore our world apart. Why should I linger here after all that has been done to me? Why should I accept the fate laid out to me? I am the heir of Níðuðr the cruel and I shall not be subject to another man. I make my decision, it shall be tonight. Tonight I shall claim the dowry my father has laid out for my husband to be.

I rise from the bed and stretch the last of my sleep away. I do not pick up the mourning rags hanging from the back of the chair by dressing table. Like a sleepwalker still in a dream I walk naked to the door and pull it open. Dark tresses sway against my milk white body, I feel our child kick inside of me, he already knows that I am about to do.

The hallway outside is dark and empty. My father's guests and servants all sleep. His guards keep their wary watches outside to study the sky with fear, watching for you, they will not see me stir from my bed. Silently I pace the shadowed stone halls, searching for the place where my father stores the treasure you made him. It is hidden in the farthest reaches of his palace, well away from the rest of his gold, for he cannot bear to look upon and my mother could not bear to part from them. I know the way already. I go there to look upon the things you made. Sometimes I go there to speak my brothers.

The stone floor is like ice and my bare feet grow chilled against it, but I do not stop. Through the half closed doors I hear the snores of the suitors come to claim me as their damaged prize. I let them sleep on, blissfully unaware of me, the ghost that stalks King Níðuðr's halls tonight. It gets colder and colder as I leave the last of the warm hearths behind until I finally stand before it, the mean stone cell where my brothers sleep amongst gold.

The door is not locked, all except my suitors know the secret of the treasure, and who would dare steal treasure with secrets such as these? No man would want such cursed things in his home. But I am no man, and they are my kin. They lie there, my brothers, in a chest of oak and iron. I kneel before them and lift the lid, feeling our child stir once more as my thighs press against my abdomen. I reach into the chest and draw them out one by one, my brothers and all the precious things that you made for us, made for me.

I pick up your goblets first. Silver set wide shallow bowls I had once seen my father and mother drink wine as red as blood from. Neither was regular or perfect in their design, but instead their contours followed a natural, almost organic, flow. Their stands were splays of silver struts that grasped around the cup, you had them bound together with silver wire, before having spread open again to form feet. Metacarpals and metatarsals cradling craniums, all used in your savage and beautiful craft. My brothers bones made beautiful.

Next I take out your necklace. I stare at them as they stare back at me. Golden chains linking four sapphire blue globes. Your art and magic turning my brothers' eyes to crystal stone. My mother had wept when you had told her what she had been wearing. I do not weep now as I take your gift and drip their sightless, tear-less, eyes around my pale neck.

Then there is brooch that you made for me. I am silent while I consider it, conglomeration of gilded ivory plucked from the mouths of princes. These teeth would never play with cheek and jaw and tongue to form tender loving words ever again. They would hold their silence forevermore - I do not mind, even silent they are my family still. I go to pin the brooch to my clothes before I realise I wear none. I drive the pin through the flesh of my breast instead and let my blood tickle down onto the other relics I have gathered against my skin.

He reaches out for them. Your son reaches out for them.

My brothers. My dowry.

His uncles. His inheritance.

But there is one last thing at the bottom of the chest. One last treasure you had created for us. The magic golden sword you had used as your lure to draw my brothers to your smithy on your lonely prison isle where you had suffered so long, tendons cut and bound to earth. I draw the sword from its sheath, feel the weight in my hand, touch one edge of its shining blade to a finger and watch as the blood wells up. This is your twisted Weregild. Blood for gold and gold for blood, shed in its own creation.

I shall make one more visit tonight.

I gather them up, the remnants of my family that you left me. The goblets I cradled against my side, the necklace I draped around my throat, the broach that pierced my breast still, and the sword, the sword I clutch in my fist. I take your final gift with me under my skin, hidden inside my womb.

Back out through the door, I retrace my steps in the pre-dawn dark. I know the door I seek now. My father's door, Níðuðr's door. I know that this will be your final revenge upon him, it shall completes your ruin of our family, but I do not care - I will not let him take my brothers and my son away from me.

Dripping in your gaudy treasures I push open the door his chamber and approach his sleeping form. I raise the sword above my head and bring it down into his belly. The bed fills with his blood. I have killed my King, killed my father. I crawl into the bed and lie next to him among the butchered and brutalised remains of our kin. This is the craft that you and I have worked together. This and the son I carry within me. Viðga I shall call him.

When I finally sleep again, I dream that you are there with me. You have finally come, your wings of beaten bronze holding you aloft at the tower window, your eyes like fire gazing into my soul. Mighty smith, maker and breaker of all things. I call out your name:

"Völundr!"

And then I awake.

“There is no way we can enter the castle with that bloody mermaid guarding the entrance.” Trevor slammed his mug on the table, some ale splashed out and would undoubtedly add some stains to the already stained wooden table. “Getting that audience with the sorceress will be impossible.”

“If we want to rid you of that curse we must. And if I can convince her to part with one of her rings…”

“I know, it will be a great wedding ring for lady Catheryn, one that will impress her father.” Trevor rubbed the green mark on his hand, that damned Blood Viper and its poison. They had to get to that sorceress. “What do you suggest?”

Mikhal gazed into his mug. “There is a story in which sailors put wax in their ears so they wouldn’t hear the mermaid’s song, but that would leave us unable to talk to the door. Maybe the Pendant of Moiros could work.”

“What is that?”

Mikhal looked up. “Long ago a warrior named Moiros set out to travel to a city ruled by a seductress, to avenge his brother who had fallen victim to her. His father, a skilled alchemist, created a pendant that would protect his heart. It is said the wearer of this pendant will not be seduced by any form of magic. That should include the song of the mermaids.”

“Should.”

An apologetic look appeared. “I have not tested it for myself nor have I heard a story where the pendant was used against mermaids, but the few stories I do know all say the wearer was protected against magical seduction. And mermaids have magic in their voice. Even the Stone Man was unable to resist them.”

“Yes, I know the story,” Trevor interrupted him. “The Pendant of Moiros then. Do you know where it is?”

Mikhal shook his head.

“Great,” Trevor grumbled and he drank from his ale.

“You found a magical artefact before,” Mikhal reminded him. “You found the lost Dagger of G’Narv. I’m certain we can find it.”
“It took me two years to locate that damned thing! I don’t have that long! Six months before I start to weaken and after another six months of agony, death will probably feel like it hadn’t come soon enough.”

They had helped the sorceress Meria bring a young sea dragon back to the sea, but when they had brought it close to a sanctuary for the water dragons, one of the Blood Vipers - a kind of magical sea snake - had sensed Trevor’s hostility towards dragons and had attacked. Meria had told them about a spirit sorceress who could cure the curse, but now they were unable to get into her castle.

“This time I am at your disposal,” Mikhal said, “and with that comes both knowledge of myths and legends, and connections. I have a friend, a nobleman, who in turn is well connected, has an interest in magical artefacts, and spends a lot of time in the library of Arnheim. We will find the location of the Pendant and also investigate other ways to get past the mermaid.”

Trevor nodded once and with that the deal was made. The first thing Mikhal did was send a message to his friend in Arnheim requesting information about the whereabouts of the Pendant. Then they went onto the city once more, talking to local healers and scholars to learn more about mermaids and any protection against their song. They had methods to not hear the mermaid, but since the mermaid would continue to sing as long as the door remained locked, it wouldn’t help. No-one had heard of any other way to silence the mermaid except for killing her.

“I doubt the sorceress will want to listen to us if we kill her,” Mikhal sighed.

“I’m sure people have tried that too,” Trevor added. “A sorceress would not leave one of her main defences unprotected.” He glanced to Mikhal. “What now?”

“I have one more thing I want to try.” Mikhal caught Trevor’s questioning glance. “Rumours. I will talk with the people and see what we can learn from them. You can get supplies for the journey and we meet back at the inn.”

They parted ways and after Trevor had gotten the supplies he went to the inn and ordered an ale. It wasn’t long before Mikhal joined Trevor at his table.

“And?”

“Unfortunately nothing much. The mermaid was brought here by the sorceress, but the stories about how the mermaid ended up with her vary. Either the sorceress defeated her and this is her punishment…”

“You expect me to believe the mermaid won’t allow anyone near the sorceress if she is being held captive?”

“An addition to that legend is that the mermaid is under a spell to do the sorceress’s bidding.”

Trevor huffed.

“Another local legend is that the sorceress saved the mermaid and that she came here as a way to show her gratitude.”

“She would agree to live eternally in a moat just to say: ‘thanks for saving me’?”

“One person suggested there could be love involved.”

Trevor rolled his eyes. “That’s not helpful.”

“Unfortunately not. If there was a single legend we could work with it. If it’s her punishment we could reason with her, if she’s under a spell we could try to break it.”

“If it’s out of gratitude or love we’re screwed.”

Mikhal nodded. “We’ll travel to Arnheim tomorrow. It’s the best place to learn about ways to deal with mermaids and get more information about the Pendant.”

---

The next day they left as soon as the sun was up. It took them three days to travel to Arnheim and once they were there they went to the house of lord Artmer. A servant opened the door for them and when he recognised Mikhal he allowed them to enter, promising to get the young master for them. They were brought to a guest room, decorated in a way to show of wealth for the visitors.

It didn’t take Lemitsa long to join them in the guest room and after greeting Mikhal he was introduced to Trevor.

“I did not find any ways one can get past mermaids while hearing everything and not killing them, but I know where the Pendant of Moiros is,” Lemitsa said.

“That was quick.”

“It will not be an easy task to obtain it. It is in the possession of lady Trialcia.”

“I would have rather heard it was guarded by a horde of dragons,” Mikhal muttered.

“And where is this lady Trialcia now?” Trevor asked.

Lemitsa explained she was travelling, she would visit her father’s farms and then head to the port to cross the sea. If they wanted the pendant they had to reach her before she boarded the ship. But then Lemitsa brought up the payment, he doubted there was anything two commoners could offer that could make her part with her trinket.

Trevor crossed his arms in front of his chest. “I will slit her throat and take it if I have to.”

“Now that is an interesting idea,” Lemitsa said, a sly smile appearing on his face. “I will give you her travel plan.”

“We’re not going to kill her!” Mikhal interjected.

Lemitsa turned to face Trevor directly. “Maybe you should travel alone.”

“You courted her,” Mikhal reminded him.

“There is a reason I am no longer with her.” Lemitsa stated coldly. “I will provide you with the information you need, her travel plan, her entourage, do with the information as you see fit. Trade with her, steal it from her, kill her. Do whatever you please, but you will not tell anyone I assisted in any way.”

“Deal,” Trevor said, holding out his hand. They shook on it and Lemitsa promised to have everything within the next hour. For the time being they were guests at his home and could clean up, eat, rest.

Once Lemitsa provided the details they needed, Trevor and Mikhal set out to find lady Trialcia, get the Pendant, and then go to the sorceress for the cure for Trevor and a ring for Mikhal.

---

They travelled on horseback, determined to get the pendant. Nobility took their time travelling, Trevor was certain they would catch up with her. How they would get the pendant was undecided, but they would. If Mikhal would not be able to sweettalk her into giving it up, he would use force.

The travel itself was without troubles, they made good time and even were aided in their search by a thief, who had heard the lady would make a stop at a village and offered to show them the way.

When they found the village they made camp at a crossing, the thief who had brought them this far told them he couldn’t go into the village as he was wanted for theft, which came as no surprise.

The next day Mikhal and Trevor went into the village and managed to talk with lady Trialcia. Not only did she decline to part with the pendant, she managed to turn the villagers against them and then left. Trevor was about to draw his blade when their thief friend appeared on a roof.

"Did you miss me?" he cheerfully asked.

"It's the thief!" exclaimed one.

"What is that idiot doing now?" Trevor hissed.

"Helping us," replied Mikhal, who took Trevor by the arm and walked away from the crowd who were about to turn against them, but now had their attention on their companion. “Quick, Trialcia has left.”

They didn’t see if the thief had managed to escape, but they would check up on him later. The route they took was suitable for horses, but not for carriages. The shortcut allowed them to get ahead of the carriage and they waited for the lady to stop.

“You are in my way,” Trialcia said as she leaned out of the window.

“We need that pendant,” Trevor replied, his hand hovering close to his sword.

“Is this a robbery?”

“Of course not,” Mikhal quickly said. “You had not given us the opportunity, but we want to offer a trade.”

With a dismissive huff Trialcia wanted to retreat into the carriage.

“Please hear us out, my lady.”

“What can two commoners offer me?” she asked with disdain.

“You better not offer her my dagger,” Trevor whispered to him.

Mikhal nodded once while keeping his eyes on Trialcia. “Did you ever hear of the Tear of Nymphodia?”

“No…”

Mikhal began telling a grand tale about a queen whose baby daughter died after just three weeks. The tear that fell on the girl solidified, turned into pure gold, and brought her back to life. “It is said,” he concluded, showing a necklace with a translucent yellow oval on it, it brings good health and prosperity. I happen to know you are on your way to Rotswell. There is an infectious disease there, but this will protect you. A trade. My gold necklace for your silver one.”

“I can take it,” Trialcia mentioned, her lips curled into a sly smile.

“You can, but you will notice it will turn bloodred and have the opposite effect.”
Lady Trialcia thought about what she had heard and turned to her advisor. After a short conversation she looked at Mikhal. “Very well, bard. We will trade.” She gave the Pendant of Moiros to the advisor, who brought it to Mikhal. Mikhal gave him the necklace and took the pendant from him.

“May Donyar guide you on your journey, lady Trialcia,” Mikhal said with a bow.

Trialcia didn’t reply and gave an order to continue their journey.

When the carriage was out of sight, Trevor turned to Mikhal. “The Tear of Nymphodia?”

“I made that up. I got it from a dwarf, he said it was called amber, from that country where the people have feathers.”

“If she’ll find out…”

“Worries for later. Let’s go visit that sorceress now.”