Ben was beside himself. “Look at whom I’m with, for God’s sake! Questor, Abernathy, Bunion, Parsnip, Fillip, and Sot!” He turned and beckoned to those behind him. But no one came forward. No one seemed quite sure that they should. Ben felt a hint of desperation creep into his voice as he faced Willow anew. “Why would they be with me if I’m not who I say I am? They know the truth of things!” He wheeled about once more, anger in his voice. “Damn it, Questor, say something to her!”
The wizard hesitated, seemed to consider the advisability of doing what Ben asked, then straightened. “Yes, he speaks the truth. He is the High Lord, Willow,” he said finally.
There were muttered hissings and murmurings of agreement from the others, including a few pleas of “Save us, great High Lord, mighty High Lord” from the G’home Gnomes, who were hiding now behind Questor’s robes.
Ben turned back. “Willow, come over here quickly! Please! Get away!”
But now Meeks had come forward several paces and he was smiling Ben’s most reassuring smile. “Willow, I love you,” he told her. “I love you and I want to protect you. Come here to me. What you see from the stranger is all illusion. He has no support from our friends; they are just false images. You can see the truth of things if you look. Do you see me? Am I anyone different from the one I always was? What you are hearing are lies! Remember the dream! You must pick up the reins of the bridle and bring the black unicorn to me to be safe from the dangers that threaten! These illusions pretending friendship are the dangers of your dream! Come to me now and be safe!”
Willow was looking first one way and then the other, confusion evident in her face. Behind her, the black unicorn stamped and snorted delicately, a bit of shadow caught in the sunlight, bound in place by ties no one else could see. Ben was frantic. He had to do something!
“Show me the rune stone!” Willow called out suddenly, head jerking from Ben to Meeks and back again. “Let me see the stone I gave you!”
Ben went cold. The rune stone, the milky-colored talisman that warned of danger when it threatened. “I don’t have it!” he called back helplessly. “I lost it when…”
“I have it right here!” Meeks announced in triumph, cutting him short. The wizard reached beneath his robes and brought forth the rune stone — or something that appeared to be the rune stone — glowing bright red. He held it up for inspection.
“Ben!” Willow asked softly, some of the hope coming back into her face. “Is it you?” Ben felt his stomach lurch as the girl started away from him.
“One moment!” Questor Thews called suddenly, and everyone turned. “You must have dropped this, High Lord,” he advised officiously, coming forward a step or two more, the G’home Gnomes shaken free momentarily from his robes. He held out the rune stone Willow had given Ben — at least, his magic made it seem like the stone — and let everyone have a good look. The stone glowed crimson.
Ben had never been more grateful to the wizard in his life. “Thank you, Questor,” he breathed quietly.
Willow had stopped again. Slowly, she backed away from them all, the indecision returned. There was fear now in her face as well. “I do not know which of you is Ben,” she told them quietly. “Perhaps neither of you.”
Her words lingered in the sudden stillness that followed. A frightening tension settled down across the sunlit meadow with its chessboard of frozen figures, each ready to move in a different direction, each poised to strike. Willow pressed back toward the black unicorn, eyes shifting from one set of playing pieces to another, waiting. Behind her, the unicorn had gone still.
I have to do something, Ben told himself once more and wondered frantically what it ought to be.
Then out of the woods strolled Edgewood Dirk. The cat might have been out for an afternoon walk, sauntering with an unconcerned air from the trees, picking its way delicately through the scrub grass and flowers, head and tail held high as it stepped, eyes looking neither right nor left. It paid no attention to any of them. It seemed almost to have stumbled onto things by accident. Dirk walked directly to the center of the clearing, stopped, glanced casually around at those assembled, and sat down.