The rainbow knight, Eras, rode his horse into a ramshackle collection of huts that could hardly be called a town on his road north.

  The horse looked right and left happily, though she stayed centered in the street. She breathed a chill fog with each step, and every now and then she shook herself of the lightly falling snow. Eras gripped her mane for a moment to settle her and himself. Almost no one wandered in the street this close to dusk. The town had no gate or barriers between it and the elements. A handful of houses had lights from fires inside; most were chill dark. The center of town held empty stands with thick woolen blankets thrown over three stalls wares. It was a trusting place, or just so small that any theft could not have been enjoyed by the thief without notice.

  There was no inn, so Eras knocked at the door of a nearby home to beg a bed. This one had a light on. His first knock rang hollow, and no one came. BANG! He knocked again, once, louder than he wanted, his gauntleted fist an icy metal sledgehammer. The door flew open, outward toward him, and he caught it on his shoulder armour harmlessly but stepped back from the force. In the firelit outline of the doorway stood an old woman. She stood erect in the way of elders, straight everywhere but the shoulders which craned forward.

  She spoke fast, “Nothin’ fer strangers and the like uns, hun, especially none of them metal folk all creaky, wonky like, and noisy.” She went to shut the door, but Eras lifted his visor. His dark eyes burned in the firelight.

  “Please, good woman. I ask only rest for the night in your shed. Tomorrow, I leave behind all the trappings of towns and head for the mountain.”

  At the last phrase the woman’s eyes grew wide and showed themselves to be a stunning hazel, still sharp despite her age. “Cursed, ye right fool, fool. Cursed ‘tis and ye’ve no fat on yer bones to carry ye, know what I mean like? Cursed cold, cold n’ery goes away up there.” She reached up a bony hand and Eras instinctively leaned downward so she could reach him. She set her thumb gently on his high cheekbone just below the visor opening, then she pushed hard, and he pulled his head back.

  “Good woman, why…”

  “Oh shut it bone man, metal and bone’s all ye’ve got fer the cursed cold mount. Fool, fool, fool, foooooOOL.” She turned around into her home, leaving the door behind her open and she began to rifle around in a tall wardrobe in the corner.

  “Good…” He started to say,

  She turned her head back towards the door and shot him a glance sharper than even the roughest rogues he’d ever hunted. He snapped his mouth shut so fast his teeth hurt. She nodded and turned back to the wardrobe, raised her bony left hand and beckoned him into the house.

  Eras looked at his chestnut mare, who’d only been with him a short journey now, and considered letting her go. Instead he tied a small rope around the saddle and a post in front of the home, leaving the fate of his horse to a future version of himself. When he entered the room, for the home was simply one semi-large room, he took it all in at a glance. A cook pit and pot rested in one corner, a bed in another. What looked to be a reading chair sat in the third, and a wardrobe stood in the last from which the woman tossed out coats and furs and gloves and boots and every article of clothing one could imagine. The growing pile on the floor seemed impossible for the size of the wardrobe itself, yet still she rummaged and silenced any inquiries if he tried to speak.

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  She searched and muttered to herself. Then, all at once, she stopped. Silence drew itself across the room like a soft covering, and she turned to the rainbow knight holding in front of her a small, thin set of what looked to be men’s underclothes with full length legs and arms. The garment was all of one piece. She walked over to Eras holding it above her as if it were an offering to a deity, and Eras took it with a quizzical look.

  “Thank you?” His inflection betrayed him.

  The old woman snatched it away from him in a flash and muttered “ungratful, UNGRATful. Metal bone man, bone headed boy, ye know!”

  Eras stood utterly confused, but took off his helmet and held it under his left arm, the warmth of the cook pit fire restoring some life to his limbs. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, preparing to speak, but when he opened his eyes the underclothes were flying at him. He didn’t dodge in time and was struck straight in the nose. The cloth wrapped itself around his face, and immediately his whole head felt unnaturally warm, like a fresh fire was being kindled inches from his flesh. He sputtered, dropped his helmet with a calamity of clangs, and pulled the cloth away from his face. The heat stopped. He dropped the garment on the floor and pulled off one of his gloves to feel his face, to ensure there were no burns. All was fine, but he eyed the woman, who stood with her arms crossed and looked up at him and then back down at the cloth on the floor pointedly.

  “Oh, oh I am sorry!” He reached down to pick up the cloth and his bare hand felt the same uncanny warmth. He removed his hand, then looked at the woman who wore a wry grin and looked at the cloth then at him. He reached out and picked it up again, and let the cloth rest on his hand. It grew warm rapidly, but just as it seemed to reach a burning the temperature leveled out. He could no longer distinguish between where his hand ended and the cloth began. Neither heat nor cool existed. He lifted the cloth to his face and set it gently against his cheek, and first the warmth, then the steadying. It felt magnificent.

  “Yer horse.” The woman said, a smile wide on her face.

  Eras drew the cloth away from his face and scrunched his eyebrows as he looked at the old woman. He opened his mouth then closed it and looked back at the cloth. “This for my horse?”

  “Ay boyo, she’s a beauty, heavin’ and pullin’ and riding and whatnot. Take right good care of ‘er and no cursed cold’ll turn ‘er ta ice, ye know?”

  “What, what is this though? This material.”

  The old woman shrugged her bony shoulders, “Warm cursed. Maybe beats cold cursed. ‘Nother traveler left it.”

  Eras lit up, “What did he look like?”

  “How do I know? Wore a cloak and all close ‘round his face like? Was a big white storm back befo’, way back. Left it and left.” She shrugged again. “Ye can rest in the corner and think. Warm cursed cloth for yer horse. Sleep on it.” She nodded sharply, turned, walked over to her bed, got under the covers, and went straight to sleep without another word.

  Eras stood awkwardly, eyes darting from the cloth, to the woman, to the cloth, to the door, and to the corner. He slumped as a wave of exhaustion swept over him. He stepped, his boot heavy on the floor, and the woman stirred. He paused, then walked more gently to the door, ensured it was closed and locked, then sat in the corner with his back to the wall, let his head fall backward, and tried to sleep.

  #

  The sun rose slowly, drawing amber rays with pastel pink highlights on an indigo sky as the rainbow knight, sans his furs, walked slowly northward, his metal sabatons crunching snow crystals to dust beneath him, a pack on his back with his shield woven to it. His sword hung heavy at his side. He breathed in the deep, cold morning air, and breathed out through his helmet’s grate a fog of life smoke. Yet for all the chill around him, and the lightness now from his burdensome furs, he felt warm as a spring day in the southern plains, and he smiled at the mountain in the distance as he walked on.