“I thought you’d give me hope, or comfort, maybe, something to ease this pain. Maybe just a touch—if I could feel something, but I don’t. It’s all empty and dull, and you don’t love me. I’m sorry I came. Doesn’t seem to matter now.”
The man turned and left, his hand—the knuckles—white as he clenched the rifle. He did not look back ever again. He walked a long and twisted path through the woods, stomping his way through the underbrush, his face set in a cold frown, his dark eyes like a starless winter’s night.
“I’m here to kill you.” They were the first words he had spoken in hours. He was somewhat startled to hear his own voice, but not half so startled as the man he had addressed. Such a direct reply. It had been to the brusque and perhaps inadvisable question:
“What do ye want?”
It was his stock and trade to ask visitors what they wanted. He, after all, granted wishes, for a price. He was not used to such a straightforward answer. Too many people were too embarrassed to say what they meant at first. The men would hem and haw, the old ladies would beat about the bush, but this young man came right to the point.
“It’ll cost—” He had been about to say, as he always did once he understood the request, “It’ll cost ye.” But the young man didn’t give him a chance. The rifle exploded with fire and smoke, and the granter of wishes fell dead there at the crossroads.
The young man went his way. He would learn the cost, in time; as the years crept by, as the seasons passed, as he walked along the unending road, he would learn what it had cost him. He never went home again.
Tale Told 