Free Dark Magic by B. V. Larson

the first inkling of anger. If ever he felt he should slay Tomkin, if the Wee One had been judged and found wanting, then that was how it should be. Tomkin would, at that very moment, be executed.
    Deservedly so.
    That was the voice of the axe, he told himself, startled. It had been a long while indeed since he had heard its thoughts directly. Could it be that in a place like this, its voice grew stronger?
    He shook his head and became aware that Telyn was standing close to him, silently watching him. Had he muttered any of his thoughts aloud? He wasn’t sure.
    “All right,” he said at last. “Show me what you have found.”
    She produced in her hand a tiny light. It was not a candle, or a lantern, nor even an ember from the fire. Instead, it was a glowing thing that gave off a cold yellow-green light, like that of a firefly that never faded to dimness, but instead simply kept on glowing steadily. Brand did not ask her about this light. He knew that Myrrdin and Gudrin had taught her many small tricks of magic. It was best not to ask, because he knew the axe would not like the answer. If the axe imagined she posed some danger, it might become harder to think. He focused on following her and watching for any sign of something worse.
    It was not a long trip. They came to a clearing. So far as Brand knew, this was only the second clearing he had ever seen in the Deepwood, the first having been the spot where he had found Twrog’s body.
    He was surprised to see that the moon rode overhead. The forest had been so dense, so made up of thick bushy pines, that they had blocked out all sign of the sky. When on the trail, looking up you could see a thin river of stars, but even this vanished sometimes when the trees leaned forward, arching over the trail itself, greedy to close it off forever from the sky. In this clearing, however, it was as if a light shown upon the spot.
    In the center of the clearing was a ring of mushrooms. Each mushroom had a stalk as thick as man’s arm and a cap as big as a buckler. They were as black as midnight, a black that swallowed light, and yet each one glowed, encircled with a radiating an eldritch nimbus. Brand had seen glowing growths before, usually in caves, but he had never seen such a powerful green-white luminescence as this. His axe moved at the very sight of the place, and squirmed upon his back. It had been agitated ever since they left the trail, begging to be freed of his pack. He controlled his thoughts and his desire to grasp the handle with an effort of will.
    He took several steps further into the clearing. In a way, this spot of relatively open ground was a welcome one. At least there weren’t branches clawing at his clothing with every step and the smell of it was less close, dank and dark.
    But then he noticed the body in the middle of the mushroom circle.
    It was a child, he could see that right away. And it wasn’t one of the Wee Folk. The manlings were different in outline, thinner of limb and sharper of feature. This was clearly a boy and he was clearly dead.
    He stepped closer and closer still. He paused at the edge of the ring of black mushrooms, each coming up to the height of his knee. In their strange, sickly radiance, he saw the boy’s face. The face was slack and the mouth hung open. The sad eyes stared up at the moon.
    Brand noticed his breathing had taken on deeper puffs. In fact, he was almost gasping in air. He could hear something, and he realized it must be Telyn, but he could not form whatever she said into words in his mind. Resisting the axe, he lifted a single foot to step into the ring. He would take the boy’s body from this foul place and bury it properly.
    “Ah-ah!” said a voice.
    Brand put his foot down without crossing the ring.
    “That would not be wise,” said the voice. He had the direction now. There was something, on the far side of the ring, something there that was squat and low and thickly built. Brand was reminded by its outline of one