Fireshaper's Doom (14 page)

“Sounds real exciting,” Big Billy muttered sarcastically. “So why you want to go see a bunch of painters?”

Behind him, David’s hands plucked nervously with the spring that held the screen door closed. “I told you, it’s the music. That’s the thing.”

His father’s face was like the red-lit sky before an evening storm. “I don’t like them folks,” he rumbled. “I just don’t like ’em. I don’t like you messin’ around with ’em, either; just want you to know that. Somebody’s gonna call the law on ’em yet, you’ll see. Somebody’ll run ’em off.”

“Pa—”

“You get into any trouble, don’t come crying to me.”

“When have I
ever
come crying to you?”

Big Billy’s face became dangerously still. “Watch your mouth, boy.”

“Physically impossible.”

“That’s it, mister. You’re staying here.”

Gravel crunched in the driveway, a car horn sounded.

“No, I’m not!” David said with deliberate control, matching his father glare for glare. “I know what I’m doing, and
you’re
not gonna stop me.”

And with that, he slammed the door behind him, leapt off the back porch, and sprinted across the dusty haze of backyard.

He was pounding on the car door even before Liz got it unlocked. “Quick, let’s boogie,” he gasped. “Pa and me just had one god-awful fight. Gotta get outta here before he comes out.”

Liz hesitated.

“Stand on it, Liz!”

She frowned and shifted into reverse, then gunned the engine. Gravel showered from the front wheels.

Liz glanced at David’s troubled expression. “That bad?”

David nodded grimly. “That bad. Didn’t want me to go without Little Billy. And I couldn’t give him a good reason why I shouldn’t take the little pest.”

Liz wrenched the EXP onto the Sullivan Cove road. Pebbles pattered against the floorboards.

“You could have told him we had a date.”

David’s mouth gaped foolishly. He stared at his freshly cleaned Reeboks. “Suppose I could,” he whispered, nodding. “I never thought of that.
That
he’d understand.”

Liz flashed him an appraising glance. “Yeah, that’s the trouble. You never think of things like that.”

“Liz, I—”

“Don’t say anything, Davy. Just think. Think for once before you talk.”

“Liz… Would…
would you
like
to make this a date?”

“Doesn’t matter what I’d like,” Liz replied glumly. “We can’t. Gotta pick up your number-one shadow. Gotta see Silverhand. Where the Sidhe are involved, people don’t count. Not with you, anyway.”

“Good God, girl! You know
that’s
not true.”

“Davy!
You…
oh, never mind!”

A heavy, awkward silence entered the car and rode with them for several miles. David spent the time stealing covert glances at Liz. She was taller than he’d remembered—almost as tall as he—and a tiny bit rounder in all the right places, though still slender as a willow staff. Her nose still tilted at the same impudent angle, though, and her green eyes still sparkled with the same unforgettable fire. She was wearing her hair shorter, too, and he wasn’t sure if he liked that or not. For the first time he noticed she had pierced ears.

Finally Liz took a long ragged breath and spoke again. Both her face and her voice had softened considerably.

“You’re right, David. I shouldn’t have said—what I said. I know what you went through last year, for your brother, for Uncle Dale. For me and Alec. That was the good side of David Sullivan. Davy the selfless hero, and I mean
that….
But sometimes I wish you could be like that all the time.”

David sighed and slumped down in the seat. “Sometimes I wish I could too.”

Chapter XII: In the Green Tent

(The Traders’ Camp)

The tent was square and made of green canvas, and maybe fourteen feet on a side. A brass pole supported the center, and anchored to it were four pie-shaped sections covered with nylon mesh through which a trickle of fragrant white smoke escaped. A bank of thick, stubby candles illuminated the space inside, erupting like stag horns from between two facing crescents of elaborately embroidered cushions. A red-and-gold rug of fabulous richness covered the floor from corner to corner. Woven tapestries glowed upon the walls, and beneath them low tables held bread and cheese and fruit—and a honey-golden wine as cold and clean-tasting as winter ice, but with a sparkling bite like fire.

Six people sat cross-legged on the silken cushions, sipping that wine: David and Liz and Alec; and facing them, Nuada and a man and woman of the Sidhe—Cormac and Regan. In spite of their prosaic dress—jeans, plaid shirts, and knee boots for the men, a long-sleeved white blouse and blue denim skirt for Regan—none of the older three looked remotely human.

The door flap rustled and a man entered, shorter than any there except David and Liz. Knotted muscles bulged under a layer of fat; his face was florid, his hair red as the candle fire before him. He cast a glance at Nuada, cocked a shaggy brow in inquiry. “Lords, is there anything else you’ll be needin’?”

The woman shook her head. “Not Lords,” Regan corrected softly. “Not in this World. Gods never, Lords no longer. Rarely even memories now.”

The man swallowed awkwardly. “Maybe not, Lady, but the Traders remember. Bridget, or Saint Bridget. Words don’t change what is.” He turned to leave.

“Oh, but they do,” the woman replied. “Ask about ‘God’ or ‘sin’ or ‘evil’ in three houses of men and see what answers come back to you.”

“As many as there be men alive,” the Trader said. “I’ll be right by the door if you need me.” He closed the flap behind him.

David took a bite of bread and cheese and looked at the man across from him: Nuada Airgetlam, called Silverhand. Warlord to Lugh the Many-Skilled himself. Once David’s unseen protector, now, possibly, his friend.

Candlelight flickered on Nuada’s features, setting the angles of nose and cheek and jaw in harsh relief—harsher still because of the assumed mortality that was like a pall stretched thin across eternal youth. He sipped from a pipe at intervals; a white clay pipe, filigreed with silver, and as long as his single forearm.

That
was disturbing: that single arm. To see such a man—such a perfect face and body—thus disfigured; the loose, flopping sleeve pinned carelessly to the shoulder like a sign of some dishonor.

Nuada followed David’s gaze.

“The arm is a thing of Faerie,” he said quietly in response to the unspoken question. “It cannot remain in this World for any great length of time; nor can I, for that matter, unless I wrap myself in the substance of the Lands of Men, which, as you see, I have done.”

“I was wondering about that,” David noted. “But I sure wouldn’t swap a Faery body for a mortal one.”

“Nor would I, if there were any choice,” Nuada replied, “for the change is indeed both a blessing and a curse. There is the wielding of Power to be considered, for instance: human bodies have little strength for it, which can certainly be an inconvenience. In order to perform more than the simplest enchantments we must once more put on the stuff of Tir-Nan-Og.”

David shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

“It is a thing difficult to explain to you who have but little Power and only one substance to wrap it in. But imagine if you can a thread of infinite fineness joining my form in this World with the very stuff of Tir-Nan-Og of which my true body is a part. Think of it as the link between body and place that memory provides—though it is more physical than that. As long as the linkage exists, we may draw on the full Power of our homeland and switch between the stuff of the two Worlds at will. Yet were we to draw on that Power while in man’s substance, it would almost surely destroy us.”

“And what happens if the thread is broken?” asked Alec.

Nuada’s face clouded. “If the Silver Thread be severed while we are in man’s flesh—which few things in all the Worlds can accomplish, or I would not be telling you, you may be sure—we would be doomed to roam the world as men, and to die the death of men at the ending.”

“And if you were in your
Faery
bodies?”

“We, would have to take up the substance of whatever World we were in, for our homeland would start to call us if we did not. It would be tolerable at first—a mere annoyance—but it would quickly grow worse, until we had either to return or go mad. The call of our World is like music, now: a tune playing in the back of our minds, but the longer we stay away, the louder the music becomes. And just as music played loudly enough can bring on deafness, so it is with the Call, except that the result is madness.”

“That doesn’t sound too good,” Liz interrupted. “But you said something about advantages too.”

“That should be obvious,” Nuada replied. “The primary one is simply comfort, for the reason I have just stated: to resist the madness prolonged separation from our land engenders. While we wear man’s flesh, the Call of home is weaker, no more than a fond memory of a pleasant song once heard. And as for the
other
advantage, watch and find out.”

And with, that, Nuada casually reached into one of his high boots and drew out a narrow-bladed knife. The naked steel sparked in the candlelight as he touched the blade to his fingertip.

“Iron!” David cried. “You’re touching iron!”

Nuada nodded almost smugly. “We could not hope to avoid it in this World; man’s flesh can wield what Faery flesh denies me. But in this form it can also wound me beyond any power to heal. When I lost my arm to a blade of iron in the Battle of Mag Tuired, even Dian Cecht could not grow me another. For that I must die and be reborn again. Send my spirit into a womb at the moment of quickening.”

“
But…
with immortality, couldn’t you do that?” Liz asked tentatively.

Nuada shook his head. “The joy of continuous living is greater to me than the shadow of pain in the arm.”

“In other words,” said Alec, “you’re afraid you’ll miss something.”

“Exactly,” Nuada replied. “But this is not why I asked you here.”

“I was wondering when you would get to that.” Cormac sighed restlessly. “Soon everyone will know our secret.”

Nuada looked up. “Not everyone, Cormac, only those who need to know. These three, at least, are owed an explanation, for we have met before. They have seen much of the arrogance of the Sidhe; let us now show them our hospitality.”

Cormac inclined his head a little less than graciously.

Nuada fixed him with a momentary stare, then turned back to the three friends.

“I see one question on every human face before me,” he said. “And the question that I see is, why do the Sidhe now seek to pass among them?”

“May I speak to this, Airgetlam?” Regan said. “It is a matter dear to me.”

“Yours may be the telling, Lady.”

The woman looked at David then. “You and your friends are no longer alone, David, in knowing of Tir-Nan-Og. The Traders, too, number those who remember us. We met them a scant few weeks ago, and a lady among them knew us. She was the mother of one of these folk. Fresh from Erenn, and she knew us for what we were as soon as she set eyes upon us. She promised to help us with our watching.”

David’s brow wrinkled thoughtfully. “But what do you hope to gain by that?”

Nuada set aside his pipe and took a taste of wine. “It is as Regan said: we are observing. For a very long time it has been my thought that the Sidhe have grown too much apart from men. Once we traveled freely between the Worlds, but as the years passed and men’s minds turned to other Powers, we found less and less reason to meet with them. But now, as well you know, the works of men encroach upon Faerie everywhere. I fear a confrontation may be inevitable unless something be done, and quickly. Yet there are things we dare not do. We could reveal ourselves to your leaders, for instance, but with the knowledge of Tir-Nan-Og would come the knowledge of the Powers of that land, and Power is a thing with which few mortals may be trusted. So I have come into the Lands of Men with two chosen members of my household. We will watch your people, learn what we can of the ways of men. Assess what manner of threat you may embody. And in a year I will return to Faerie and tell what I have learned to the High King.”

“Know thy enemy,” Alec muttered.

Nuada grimaced. “I do not deny it, but neither do I call mortal men my enemy—not yet. I hope that day will never come. Lugh hopes the same. Even the Mistress of Battles would not see blood spilled between the Worlds, and battle is her glory.”

“But,” Alec said, recalling the books David had lent him during the previous year, “isn’t that what your whole history consists of? One war after another?”

Nuada’s face clouded. He took another sip of wine. “Mortal and Immortal are not by nature foes, young McLean. More often, in fact, we have been friends, where there have been dealings between us at all. You have suffered no harm from our meetings, have you?”

“I’m not so sure about that,” David interrupted slowly.

Nuada snapped his head around. His eyes glittered with sudden warning.

“Would you have me strip them from your mind then, David Sullivan? I could do it. I could
make
you forget. Burn away the Sight, make you
normal
again. Say it, and it will be done.”