Extraordinary (29 page)

The antlered man stooped before the queen, reaching for her, lifting her. She looked even more tiny and frail in his arms, and her limbs dangled. She couldn't have weighed very much, but still the antlered man staggered, making small adjustments until he could manage to hold her. Moving carefully, he straightened back to his full height, with the queen safely cradled in his arms, and turned.

It was then Phoebe saw that the antlered man wore a circlet on his head, formed of ivy and oak leaves entwined around—and growing from—the base of his antlers. The green wreath made a stark contrast with the tattered fur on his head. Yet it was part of him, alive and budding, even though beneath it the rest of him was withering and weakening.

For the first time Phoebe thought to wonder if there was a king as well as a queen. Mallory had not spoken of a king in her story, and there had been no hint of infidelity in the way she had spoken of the queen having been with Mayer Rothschild or her other lovers. She had also described the queen in such a way that had made Phoebe believe that the queen held sole power. Indeed, in her audience before the queen just now, Phoebe had seen no hint that this was not so.

But the antlered man held the queen not like a subject, but like a lover and a full partner, while for her part the queen rested trustfully, vulnerably, in the antlered man's arms. They were a pair, Phoebe knew suddenly and for sure; a deeply bonded pair, even if the rules of their union were something she didn't understand, even if, as in a game of chess, the king's power was limited next to the queen's. They were held together by a history and understanding and culture of which she knew nothing, but which was nonetheless palpable in the simple way in which, despite great weakness, their bodies were clinging together, dependent on each other. No—not dependent. Interdependent.

No sooner had Phoebe had this thought than the antlered man turned his head to meet her gaze. His eyes were slits in his animal face. There was no possibility of reading his thoughts, even though his eyes held Phoebe's for a long moment, steadily. She looked back at him just as steadily, with a curiosity that she made no attempt to hide.

Then, slowly, Phoebe ducked her head respectfully toward the antlered man. She made no decision to do this; she simply did it and it felt right. She was still trussed up in the willow bands like a big plucked bird being prepared for the rotisserie, with only Ryland's harsh, indifferent hands keeping her upright. But she felt compelled to acknowledge something that she could not put into words. She thought of her ancestor Mayer, seeing the queen all those hundreds of years ago, and being filled with awe. As she looked at the antlered man, Phoebe understood in her bones and blood some of the reason Mayer had joined the primal dance.

The least she could do was nod.

To her surprise, the king nodded back, inclining his head just as respectfully to Phoebe, though his expression remained unreadable. Then he turned and, bearing his wife—the only word Phoebe felt was remotely appropriate—he disappeared, leaving Phoebe alone in the clearing with Ryland.

“Come,” Ryland said. “You will spend the next hours at the glade. I'll bring you there.” He put out his arms as if he was going to lift her into them, just as the king had lifted the queen, but Phoebe jerked herself away, hopping backward, managing somehow to keep her balance, even with her heels on. “Don't touch me.” She had to keep hopping in order to stay upright. Hop. What was it Mallory had said about dignity? Hop. Glaring at Ryland and indicating the willow bands, she said, “The queen,” hop, “told you,” hop, “to make me,” hop, “comfortable.”

Hop.

The willow bands disappeared from around her arms and thighs so suddenly that Phoebe fell. She landed painfully on her left hipbone and then saw that Ryland had also fallen and was on the ground beside her. Writhing.

She stared at him in disbelief.

Between one moment and the next, Ryland had shrunk in on himself even more. The bones of his face were suddenly so sharp and prominent that they seemed as if they would slice through his skin. He was breathing hard too, as if he'd been running . . . no, as if he had asthma. Automatically, Phoebe groped in her dress pocket for her inhaler. Then, realizing how stupid that was, she jerked her hand away and kept watching as he breathed, or tried to.

It was strange to have him be the one gasping. Strange to watch his chest rise and fall unsteadily.

“You're dying,” said Phoebe quietly. The words came out of her with conviction and all the pieces came together in her mind as they should have earlier. “Not just you, Ryland. All of you. Weak and dying. All of you . . . faeries.”

Ryland turned away from Phoebe in one convulsive move and curled up on the ground with his face hidden. His back seemed to hump, as if his spine were shifting shape beneath his shirt and skin, and then the muscle followed along with the bones, distorting, transforming. Phoebe put one hand to her mouth and instinctively scooted a few inches away in the dirt.

It was as if another creature were inside Ryland, trying to break free.

Then she realized that if she was going to run, this was the time to do it. Phoebe got shakily to her feet. Could she find her way back through the dark maze of the rock tunnel? And then over the lake in that rowboat? She swiveled back to face the cavern opening, to run, but stopped in shock. She could not see it. Instead, the rocky plain on which they stood now seemed to stretch endlessly in every direction.

No escape.

At that moment she understood, with horror, that she was relieved. She could not run. She could not, because she had already made a decision.

In exchange for Phoebe's cooperation, the queen had promised Catherine's life. Phoebe believed the queen would keep her word. So, she would trade. She would trade herself for her mother.

She thought briefly, sourly, of all the stories in history about parents sacrificing for their children. Were there any in which the opposite happened? She could think of none. It might be that this was the kind of story nobody wanted to tell, and nobody wanted to hear ... however real it might be.

Phoebe sank back to a sitting position on the ground next to the writhing figure that was Ryland. She wrapped her arms around her knees, hugging them tightly, and watched him.

He had coiled completely in on himself, and he was still wheezing. Phoebe discovered that she was holding her inhaler tightly in one fist, though she had no memory of pulling it from her pocket. She supposed, with grim humor, that her inhaler had become like a baby's security blanket or teddy bear for her. She might as well hold it tight.

She listened with a professional ear and could tell that Ryland's breathing was settling into something that, if it was not normal, at least did not sound quite so desperate. Phoebe bit her lip. Then, sighing, she reached out very consciously and pressed her inhaler into what was now only partially a humanoid hand. She heard the creature whisper, in a voice deep and rough and utterly unlike Ryland's, “That won't help me.” Nonetheless, and weirdly, the elongated claws wrapped around the inhaler.

As his breathing settled more, the creature rolled back to face Phoebe.

He was both larger and smaller than the man he had been, because he was now clearly part feline. But only part. What Phoebe now saw was a human head on a lion's body. It was a monstrous, beautiful, and still pitifully skeletal lion's body, with a head and face that was entirely Ryland. A sphinx? But no, it had wings! Then, a moment later, Phoebe saw its tail, and it was not a lion's tail but the thick, muscular, and unmistakable tail of an entirely imaginary—or so she had thought—creature. A dragon.

That detail told her all. She recognized the creature from her reading: a manticore.

Phoebe flinched, but only a little. After all, that her ex-boyfriend should turn out to be a hellish creature of myth was neither the strangest nor the most devastating thing that had happened today.

The manticore's claws released the inhaler. He said, “I'll be better now, in this shape. Using magic to loosen your bonds was one thing too many. The illusion of being human became too much for me to maintain.”

That human speech would come from this creature of legend and nightmare seemed crazy. But again, it was no crazier than what had already happened.

“This is your true self?” asked Phoebe.

The manticore nodded.

“You look pretty sick.”

“I am dying,” said the manticore. “We are all dying, as you said a moment ago. The vast majority of us were too weak even to attend the queen's council and meet you. Some—many—have already died.”

Phoebe nodded. She hugged her knees. “I understand now,” she said. “It's because of Mayer Rothschild's bargain with the queen, right? She drew some sort of power from the earth to give Mayer the sons he wanted, and in exchange he promised an ‘ordinary' female descendent. Except there wasn't one. For hundreds of years, there wasn't one.”

The creature who had been Ryland simply folded his paws beneath him and tilted his human head to the side.

“So, in the meantime,” Phoebe said, “you've gotten weaker and weaker, waiting. And then, I guess, you decided it wasn't going to work, to wait and hope for that ordinary Rothschild girl. You decided to force the issue. You and Mallory.”

The manticore nodded. How strange. It had Ryland's features, more or less, but to Phoebe, it didn't look at all like him now. Although of course it was the other way around. The Ryland she had known was the unreal creature, the illusion.

She wondered what Mallory's true appearance was. Was she also a manticore?

“So now you have me,” said Phoebe. “I said those words out loud. I said I'm ordinary. I guess that was what you wanted, right?” She did not need the manticore's nod for confirmation, though he gave it.

“But you also have my mother for insurance, to force me to do what you want. Which is, I'm assuming”—and Phoebe discovered that she did, after all, have to draw in a little breath before she could pronounce the word—“to die.”

“At the ceremony,” said the manticore. “Tonight.”

“After which the balance—wasn't that what the queen called it? The balance will be restored and you will all return to health and happiness. Probably you'll have one of those big dancing parties like the one Mayer went to.”

“Yes,” said the manticore. His human eyelids flickered. He said, “I'm sorry, Phoebe.”

“Like hell you are,” said Phoebe.

A moment.

“I can feel two things at once,” said the manticore. “Sorry for you, but glad that we will be saved. I picked my people over you. Of course I did.”

“And your sister did too,” said Phoebe.

“In our place,” said the manticore, “would you not do exactly the same? Isn't that what your ancestor Mayer Rothschild did, all those years ago? He picked his family and his people, and left us to suffer and die.”

“He didn't know!” snapped Phoebe. “How could he have known?”

“Perhaps he did and perhaps he didn't,” said the manticore. “But what if he had known? Would he have chosen differently? Would he have made a different bargain? Would he have sacrificed his family and his people for us? Would you?”

“Probably not,” whispered Phoebe, after a minute or two.

“We had to force you,” said the manticore. “It was the only way.” He extended his front paw. For one ludicrous moment Phoebe thought he was offering to shake hands. But then she saw that he was holding the inhaler out to her. Its casing was cracked.

Phoebe took the inhaler and tucked it into her pocket.

Then she pulled her knees up to her chest once more and encircled them with her arms, and sat beside the manticore in silence.

“I'm not asking permission, Your Majesty. I'm telling you. I've already brought him into Faerie and I'll bring him to Phoebe. She needs someone with her while she waits today. Someone who loves her. The human boy, Benjamin, is all she has now. He's willing.”

“No! I forbid this.”

“With the greatest respect, Your Majesty, you haven't got the power to stop me.”

“It was not for this that we siphoned so much of our remaining power to you all these years.”

“I'm sorry. After tonight, when she is dead and our people are alive and healthy, you can punish me as you see fit.”

“You have betrayed us in so many ways, I have lost count. And now you carelessly reveal our realm to this boy.”

“Later, we can have him forget where he's been and what he's seen. After tonight I will submit again and forever to your rule, Your Majesty. But Phoebe will have her friend with her for her last hours. And if I have to suffer or die for this later, I will.”

“No.”

“She is my friend, Your Majesty. I have to do this for her. It's all I can do.”

“Phoebe must die, child.”

“I know. Believe me, I know.”

The manticore conducted Phoebe back to the pretty little garden that she had first seen ten hundred million years ago, when she peeked behind the door of Ryland's bedroom. This time, getting there involved only a ten-minute walk on a raised earthen bank across a cattail marsh. When Phoebe asked, with only a little sarcasm in her voice, why it was that previously they had needed to row across a lake and then thread through a cavernous maze to go between the two locations, the manticore shrugged his gaunt feline shoulders.

“Coming and going are two completely different things. Haven't you noticed that traveling back is always shorter than traveling out?”