Stay with the Dryad

Mist rises slowly up from the damp ground, filling the air with a coppery tinge. A broad stretch of branch and leaf above you shields you from a swiftly mounting wash of rain. In the deep wood before you rumbles a crackle and crunch above the torrent, as some large, onrushing creature presses through breaking bracken. "Shineeeeeeeeeeeeys!" a green-skinned, warty goblin screeches through filthy teeth as his red-rimmed eyes catch sight of your armour and shield. "Shineeeeeeys for Glubdrang!"
He stumbles and leaps nearer to you, launching to attack, and you notice that he favors his left side, which seems to have been recently injured. Without a breath for thought, the goblin lurches toward you with a tight swing of his short ax, grumbling, "two normal, two normal," as each swing is parried by your swift sword. You realize that this goblin will not be dissuaded to fight, and reluctantly swing your sword into a slashing cut, calling, "four silver," as the blow lands upon the goblin's shoulder, and he falls unto the ground before you. Oddly, he instantly disintergrates into the mulch of the earthen floor, leaving behind a glint of two coppers. You stand still for a moment, pondering.
Thin branches of the tree stirr gently and in the dimness a kind face reappears among the leaves. Softly smiling, the dryad tips her head to one side and seems to bite her lower lip. Although you see no motion, a dusky voice sounds just within your ear.
"I see you have stayed," she sighs, lifting a single eyebrow, "Is there something you wish of me?" A thought flickers through your mind, and silently the dryad shakes her head, leaning now against a branch. "With that, I cannot help you," you hear, tasting a brush of sadness within the words. The dryad disappears in mist and green, "Yet this I can do:" you hear, "Solve my riddle, and I can give you a magic key which may help you in a time of need." A few leaves part, and you see a silvery, glowing, strangely-shaped key extended from slender, knotted thread, just beyond your reach.
An arm of shocking white appears alongside the trunk of the tree, brackish fingers sweeping out toward you, followed by a smooth, unmoving face of dark, tilted eyes and raised eyebrows.
A sing-song whisper echoes through your mind,
"I am the begining of eternity, the end of time and space.
"I am the begining of every end, and the end of every place.
"What am I?"
The dryad covers her small dark mouth with three sprouting fingers, and her eyes wrinkle as a light giggle scents the air. She stretches upward, stepping lighly back, merging into the tree trunk; her smiling eyes glimmer as they disappear.
What will you do?

Medieval and Fantasy Links