Eaglethorpe Buxton and the Sorceress (5 page)

We reached Hysteria’s side and I turned to
smile at my lovely companion, but she was frowning.

“What’s the matter?” I asked.

“Your plan seems fraught with unnecessary
problems,” she replied.

“How so?”

“If the apothecaries of the area are wont to
sell drams of ‘living death’, won’t someone suggest that perhaps I
have been given ‘living death’ when I appear to die of unknown
causes.”

“Living death is pretty secret,” said I.

“How secret?”

“Really secret.”

“But not so secret that just anyone can
purchase if from an apothecary?”

“No, not so secret as that.”

“What if, when I die, they decide to burn my
body instead of placing it in the family crypt?”

“Why would they do that?”

“To save space.”

“You are a member of the family, are you
not?”

“Yes, but I’m just a girl, and I’m young. I
haven’t had a chance to do anything grand or impressive that would
warrant entombing me in a place of honor. Our family has had that
crypt for at least a dozen generations and there have been a lot of
us. It’s getting pretty full.”

“But you are Lord Capillaries’ only
daughter.”

“I am the only child of his current wife,
true. But my mother is his fourth wife and I am his sixteenth
daughter.”

“I see.”

“Now that I think about it,” she continued.
“I don’t think that I would want to wake up in that crypt anyway.
It’s got to be pretty rank in there, and there is always the
possibility of zombie attacks.”

“Yes, I forgot about zombies.”

“The only people who can afford to forget
about zombies are those people with no brains.”

“That is true,” I agreed. “I suppose we
could plan to have your body sequestered somewhere else.”

“And here’s another thing,” she said. “What
if your message doesn’t get to my beloved in time? Suppose he hears
about me dying before he finds out about your plan. He might do
something rash—like hurt himself.”

“He wouldn’t do that would he?”

“He might. He’s very passionate.”

“He’s passionate enough to kill
himself?”

“Oh yes. He thinks about it all the
time.”

“So what do you propose?” I asked.

“Why don’t we climb on your horse and you
just give me a ride to Oordport, where I can meet beautiful, sweet
Henri and live together with him there.”

“Well, it is not nearly so poetical a plan
as mine,” said I. “But I will do it.”

The three of us rode down the road to
Oordport: myself, the lovely Megara Fennec, and my valiant steed
Hysteria, which is to say my horse. Night had fallen, and while one
could caution that it is a very good idea not to set out from one
city to another in the dead of night, but to take a room at an inn
and start instead the next day, I have seldom been one to follow a
good idea. It was a day and a half ride from Antriador to Oordport
and I wanted to make it there and back within three days. My play
was no doubt in difficulty without a lead actress, though she did
have an understudy, and I wanted to put things right, and maybe
even settle with Myolaena Maetar before Ellwood Cyrene returned
from Auksavl in five days.

“So what gave you the idea to act in my
play?” I asked the lovely young woman who was pressed up against my
back. “Other than hearing that my actress had been turned into a
tree, I mean.”

“I read a review of The Ideal Magic in the
local broadsheet.”

“Really? What did it say?”

“Well…”

“Come on girl, and tell me. We writers are a
thick-skinned lot.”

“It said that your play was made of big
words on small matters.”

“What a most excellent review,” said I.

“It is a terrible review.”

“No, it is a wonderful review. Big words on
small matters. Why, that is exactly how I write.”

We rode all through the night. Hysteria
having been well fed and watered the previous day was more than
happy to clop along at a leisurely pace. After a while our
conversation lagged however and I dozed off in my saddle. You might
wonder that this is possible—falling asleep and sleeping while
riding. I do it all the time. In fact, it is probably my single
best equestrian skill, which is to say thing I can do on a horse.
Unknown to me at the time was that Miss Fennec had dozed off as
well. While no doubt far less skilled than me at horsemanship, she
was pressed against me so tightly and had her arms wrapped around
me so well, that she didn’t fall off either. Neither of us even
knew we were asleep until we were awakened by a shout.

“Stop knave, and prepare to meet your
maker!”

Now might be a good time to mention that
while I purchased Hysteria, for thirteen crowns silver, as a
warhorse, she has a number of deficiencies that make her inadequate
to the task. Oh, don’t misunderstand me, she is a very fine animal,
in good health, and she has almost never failed to carry anything
that I asked of her. Warhorses though need to be of quite stern
stuff. Hysteria was never comfortable with the sound of sword on
sword, or sword on shield, or sword on body, or shield on body, or
shield on shield. In fact, she’s not too fond of the shhtink sound
that a sword makes as it comes out of a scabbard. It was just this
sound which accompanied the shout of “stop knave, and prepare to
meet your maker,” and it was no doubt this sound that caused her to
rear up and toss Megara and myself to the ground. I was not unduly
bothered by this, not only because I had been thrown by Hysteria on
a number of occasions, but also because I landed on Megara and she
was quite nicely padded. She on the other hand had more than a
lung-full of air knocked from her by my weight suddenly landing on
her. I jumped to my feet and drew my own sword.

“Identify yourself or die,” said I, striking
an intimidating pose.

“I am Cleveland Normandy and I am here to
put an end to your days of steeling young women.”

“-‘s hearts,” said I.

“What?”

“-‘s hearts. You are going to put an end to
my days of steeling young women’s hearts. That’s what you meant to
say.”

“No it isn’t,” said he. “I am here to put an
end to your days of steeling young women’s bodies.”

“I’ve never… almost never stolen a body in
my entire life. Seven, eight times at the most. And why would you
care anyway?”

“I care because I am Cleveland Normandy, and
I am Megara Capillarie’s true love.”

“No you aren’t,” said Megara, having
successfully refilled her lungs with air and climbed back to her
feet. She tossed back her hair and struck a pose. “You are my
father’s one true love.”

“What?” Cleveland and I both said at the
same time.

“He is the one my father has betrothed me
to, but I don’t love him, don’t want him, can’t stand him, and
don’t want to look at him.”

“She sounds pretty emphatic,” said I.

“I don’t know what that means,” said he.

“It means that she has strongly expressed
her desire with great emphasis or…”

“I don’t care what it means.” He jumped to
within sword-reach of me. “You are standing in the way of true
love.”

“I don’t think we have the same definition
of ‘love’, or of ‘true’, and probably not of ‘way’,” said I. “I
guess we’re okay with ‘standing’. I guess it all really hinges on
what your definition of ‘is’ is.”

My clever wordplay was apparently too much
for Cleveland Normandy, for rather than replying with rhetoric, he
replied with his sword, thrusting directly at me. Fortunately I am
even quicker with my sword than I am with my tongue. Of course with
a tongue, speed is not so important as wit. And now that I think
about it, with a sword, speed is not so important as swordsmanship.
So tongues and swords are quite a bit alike. I parried his blow and
swung my sword up, intending to take of his head, but I was wide of
the mark and took off only part of his right ear. He squealed like
a little girl and turning, ran away.

The bit with Cleveland Normandy and our
swordfight was the only real adventure on the way to Oordport, with
the exception that when we got there and found Miss Capillarie’s
true love, he was enjoying the company of a young woman named
Roxanne. I personally didn’t think this Roxanne was anything to
write home about, but I suppose there is something to the old
saying ‘a decent looking girl in the hand is worth a beautiful one
in a faraway city’. I didn’t stick around to find out how things
worked out with Megara and beautiful, sweet Henri, instead leaving
just as she was beating him about the head and shoulders. I noted
that Roxanne had wisely made a hasty retreat, no doubt unable to
match Megara either in beauty or in fisticuffs.

I left Oordport, which is a lovely city only
about a third the size of Antriador and is chiefly in the business
of sheep, forthwith. That is, I left forthwith. Not that the sheep
were forthwith, which doesn’t even make any sense, now that I think
about it, so never mind. I stopped just outside the city wall at a
little meadow to let Hysteria, who was still a bit upset, eat some
clover and take a drink of water. I intended to ride her much
harder on the way back than I had on the way there. While she was
thus engaged, I took a pleasant nap beneath a tree. When I was well
rested, having dreamed only manly dreams, and so was my noble
steed, which is to say Hysteria, I set off once again.

I made good time, especially considering
that most of the trip was taken in darkness. Lyrria is one of the
few lands where a trip in darkness is easily made. The roads are
paved with nice smooth stones and the wild beasts and robbers have
for the most part been chased away. I arrived at the gate of
Antriador less than twenty four hours later, and reached the
playhouse just as the audience was filing in to their seats.

Mr. Burbage, a fine gentleman despite having
been in his youth an actor, stood outside the playhouse door
watching as the crowd filed in. If anything, there were more people
here to see my work than there were on opening night and that gave
me a warm feeling deep inside as I thought of my ten percent of
gross ticket receipts.

“Mr. Burbage,” I said, as I tossed a coin to
a stable boy to have Hysteria taken care of. “I heard about what
happened to our lead actress. Have you put the understudy on in her
place?”

Burbage rolled his eyes. “You know she’s not
right for the part. She’s too dark and too tall.”

“What matters that?” I cried. “She knows the
words! The words are the important part! The show must go on!”

“My dear Buxton,” said he. “Fret not. The
show will go on. The show has gone on for more than a week since I
saw you last. Fear not. I have hired an actress for the lead role,
and she is perfect if I do say so myself.”

“I hope you are right,” said I.

“I am right. I believe that I am right, and
more importantly the audiences believe that I am right. Attendance
has been up every day since the unfortunate tree incident. That
didn’t hurt either. You know there really is no such thing as bad
publicity.”

“You know better than me,” said I. “And that
is something I almost never say.”

I took the side door entrance into the
theater and found a comfortable seat in the upper gallery so that I
could watch it along with the throngs of my many fans. I didn’t
have long to wait for the lights to dim and the curtain to rise
revealing the stage decorated to resemble the streets of the great
city of Illustria. The actors playing the parts of street venders
wandered around on stage, among the citizens, singing their lines.
Then came the first bit of excitement: Penny the thief cuts the
purse of the apple vendor and leaves the stage. Then the new
actress playing the lead part stepped on stage. She was tall and
striking and moved just as a sorceress should move. She sauntered
across the stage and delivered her lines.

“It’s a lovely day in Illustria, the jewel
of Aerithtraine, nay the very jewel of all Celestria. The people
are happy. The kingdom is prosperous. The king sits well upon his
throne.”

Next, the actress playing Luna came onto the
stage to deliver her soliloquy, wherein she spills her heart so the
audience can feel her loneliness. The sorceress then casts a spell
of love upon her and she leaves, giving the sorceress a chance for
to give her own speech, setting up the plot of the play.

“There you see magic. But it is a small
thing for me. I am Myolaena Maetar, the court magician—sorceress,
thaumatageur, prestidigitator, diviner, seer, mystic-- I am
spellcaster, mage, conjurer, and necromancer. I am all that.

“I am she who keeps the kingdom running
well. I am she who keeps King Justin on his throne. I bring
prosperity and fair weather. I am all that.

“I can read minds! I can shape creations of
matter and energy. I can brew potions of love or hate or death. I
can let you fly through the air, or stew in your own juices. I can
summon up the wise men of all the ages, or the most horrifying
monsters. I am all that… and a bag of chips.

“I should be openly acknowledged as the
mighty ruler I am. I should be Queen. But though I am not, I have
cast my spells and laid my plots. I am like the spider in the
center of a vast web. And I will devour my prey, after my own
fashion.”

It was only as she delivered the final line
“And I will devour my prey, after my own fashion,” that I realized
whom I was watching. The actress playing Myolaena Maetar was none
other than Myolaena Maetar herself.