One for the Morning Glory (12 page)

"Borrow no trouble, Highness," Sir John said, beside him. "I took the liberty of sending a messenger for something, and if you will not eat, then you can be our entertainment."

He handed Amatus an instrument case—his own nine-string palanquin, the Prince realized. He took it out, tuned it, found it satisfactory, and idly strummed a few chords.

"We have some time until the vampire arrives," Calliope said. "If I may request—"

"Yes?"

"Would you play 'Penna Pike'?"

The fire crackled and burst, and the candles in the room seemed to waver just as if a cold breeze had blown through. Everyone in the room—even, perhaps, the Twisted Man, just a little—seemed to hold breath.

They are wondering if I am not yet over Golias's death,
Amatus realized,
and much as they loved him too, they are hoping that I am, for we cannot mourn forever. And more than that, it is time.

He had stayed in touch, roughly, with what was happening to ballads, and so he knew about the new ending of "Penna Pike," which gave an account of his doings, and of Golias's death, although he privately thought it was not an adequate version, for it omitted the other Companions, and Calliope and Sir John. Well, perhaps he could improvise a verse that included each of them—he had always been good at such things.

He strummed, and the palanquin felt as if it had come alive in his hand. He began to sing, and for no reason he knew—songs are that way—"Penna Pike" took him. He added the verses it needed, changed a few things that had always annoyed him, and in all made it his.

It seemed, as he played, that he felt Golias standing at his shoulder, and that somewhere in the middle, he remembered the one time as a child he had lost his temper and shouted that he was never going to learn anything—only to find that the next day he spent copying, one thousand times,
Superabo ob conabor
—"I will conquer because I will try"—in perfect lettering, on parchment, before the Royal Alchemist would speak to him again. Somewhere inside, a door opened, a wound closed, a note rang true. When he had finished, he saw faces wet with tears.

"What you sang of me is too much," Sir John Slitgizzard protested.

"And of me, Highness," Calliope said. "I was little more than a passenger on that voyage."

Duke Wassant heaved a deep sigh and said, "I hope this afternoon may pay for it to some extent, but I know now I shall always regret not having gone along."

Amatus bowed his head slightly, as Golias had taught him, for "if you have made a good thing, it should be honored, even if you do not yourself feel worthy of the honor."

He played for a while longer, rather well, he thought, but not with the magic that had enlivened "Penna Pike." It was no matter; magic could come when it wanted to.

For right now, he was with his friends, safe and warm, and the plague could be ended soon enough. Amatus had been wracking his brain for people who had died in ways that might make a vampire, but he had no idea. He was only grateful it was not Golias, for that would have been unbearable.

The palanquin was long since put away in its case, the fire banked, and the candles extinguished, and the sliver of moon that had pursued the sun through the day was about to set over the roofs in front of them as they sat in Calliope's bedroom, the doors open to the winter chill, waiting for the vampire. Beside the doors stood Sir John Slitgizzard and the Twisted Man, each with garden trellises laced with garlic, ready to bar the vampire's way back out. Calliope, wearing a garland of dried garlic blossoms, lay in her bed, seemingly asleep, for they wanted nothing to seem unusual until the vampire was well inside.

Grim and silent as death itself, Duke Wassant stood by with a hooded lantern, a supply of rosewood stakes, and a sharp ax.

And crouched in a little alcove, ready to step between the vampire and the bed, Amatus waited with stake and mallet.

The moment the way back out was barred, the Twisted Man and Sir John Slitgizzard would seize the vampire and wrestle it down. Then Amatus would stake it, and the Duke would strike its head off, and after they burned the rest of the corpse in the fireplace, they would fill the mouth with garlic, and bury the head at the nearest crossroads. It was the way vampires had been disposed of in the Kingdom since anyone could remember, and children had learned the procedure just as they learned what words were said at weddings, how to carry on their parents' trade, and not to allow anyone too young to drink of the Wine of the Gods.

As Amatus sat on his heels, his back against the wall, he kept turning over the last conversation they had had with Calliope. Just before putting out the candles, she had refused their requests, again, that she tell them who the vampire was.

"I will say this, for I have been down that road. It is repulsive and disgusting to the vampire itself—in some ways that is the very worst of it. It will long for release—"

"Can we not at least say he or she?" Duke Wassant had demanded.

Calliope shook her head, and the red silk of her hair flashed in the candlelight, but the swirl of color was as out of place as real red silk would have been at a funeral. "There will be a moment of deep shock when you see who it is. You must rehearse in your own minds that you will nevertheless do what needs to be done. You may trust me absolutely that no life remains in this vampire—it is absolutely undead—and that it is in the deepest pain and longs only to be properly released. It may well thank you at the moment you stake it, and bless you with the last bloody foam from its mouth."

"Are we lost, then, if we begin to talk to it? Does it have power to ensorcel us?" Sir John asked.

"Not according to the books, Sir John," Amatus had said. "They can fascinate the unwary in the way that a snake can fascinate a rabbit—which is to say, sometimes but not always, and it cannot possibly fascinate all of us at once. It might make one of us freeze for a moment, but it will not make any of us act on its behalf."

"Just the same," Calliope said, "and knowing you probably won't take this advice, I would suggest that we not talk to it. Even if it sincerely begs for the mercy of a killing, the urge to continue undead may overcome it and it may try some trick for which we are not prepared."

Now Amatus sat, shifting his weight now and then between his attached right and detached left foot, and wondered. He knew he had had more than enough clues, for he had run through the list of people it might be many times, and the name had seemed to hang upon his tongue without his being able to speak it. This must mean that he knew but would not let himself know.

There was no one he hoped it was and there were many he hoped it was not.

Vampires, according to the old books, could be made in many ways. Suicide sometimes would do it, or a father's curse, if the stars were wrong, the motive evil, and the person already bent that way. Sometimes it might be something as simple as an improper burial. Occasionally a thoroughly evil person, rotten to the bone, desiring only to live forever and not caring who was harmed, might actually wish to become one, and this was almost always enough in and of itself.

And there was the long list at the back of the book: things that had been known, now and again, to make a vampire: thwarted lust and longing for vengeance; murder in the course of incest; dying in childbirth in the Temple of the Dead; an all-consuming passion for one who had died, leading to pining to death in close proximity to the grave; seduction by promises of pleasure followed by debauch and murder; an unconsummatable love affair with a ghost; many other things, some so odd that it was hard to imagine they could ever happen twice.

For the many-thousandth time Amatus ran over the list. At least it could not be his father, or Cedric, or Roderick, for all of them waited one floor below, with a reserve force of guards. If they did not catch and destroy the vampire, they would at least see who it was.

Something dark and flapping shot across the moon, at first like a bird. Vampires had no wings—how they flew was only one of the many open questions about them—but they were partial to flowing clothing, which hid the distortions in their bodies. It moved across again, and now he could see it was a human figure, standing upright, clutching a cape or cloak about itself.

Another swing across the moon—it was much larger now—and then it was visible. It did not flap or fly, nor did it appear to walk on air; it stood upright and moved, wrapped in its dark cloth, straight in at the window, growing larger and larger. The Twisted Man and Sir John stepped to the side and picked up their trellises.

The last moments before it lighted were the worst, for now he could see the bare, horny feet protruding from the heavy cloak, and how they were twisted into terrible claws. The single hand that stuck from the cloak was much too big, twice the size of the creature's face, and like the claw of some poisoned and distorted sea creature.

There was no sound as it came in through the window; the cloak fluttered but did not flap. There was the whiff of an old, wet tomb, and the vampire swept in to stand in the puddle of moonlight.

Sir John and the Twisted Man brought the garlic-laced trellises together behind the vampire with a sharp, silent motion. At the blotting of the moonlight, it whirled, but now it was too late: a single step showed it could not approach the trellises.

With a squeak and a clank, the Duke unhooded the lantern. The light was all but blinding, after so long in the deep moonlight.

"So," the wrapped figure said. "At last. This." The voice was cold and wet and barely a whisper.

Sir John and the Twisted Man jumped as one, jerking the figure's arms outward, forcing it backwards, seizing an ankle each, as it beat and struggled against them. Calliope rolled off her bed and backed away as they approached, then lunged forward, holding her garlic necklace out, so that the vampire could go no farther. Duke Wassant had closed in from another side, and they managed to force it down upon its back on the bed.

The fight seemed to go out of the monster all at once, and now it was pinned upon the bed, legs held by the Twisted Man and an arm each by the Duke and Sir John. Its swaddled head fell back, as if resigning itself to what must follow.

Gingerly, Slitgizzard snatched back the heavy hood it wore.

It was Mortis.

There was no question that she was a vampire, now, and quietly, in the back of his mind, Amatus realized how evident it had been in the last week or so. His feet seemed to pick themselves up and move him slowly toward her, the stake and mallet clutched in his hand. Calliope moved around beside him, took the stake, and set it upon the center of Mortis's chest. One quick, hard stroke would do it.

Her eyes had always been dark, but something had lived in them, and now they were empty.

He raised the mallet.

"How?" he asked.

"The scream you thought an ill omen was my dying of grief, Highness." He had never heard real warmth in her voice, but there had been something there—perhaps merely interest?—and now that was gone as well. The lamp flared and flickered, and the shadows of their clouds of breath danced wildly on the wall.

"Grief for Golias?"

"Grief."

He drew a long, deep breath.

The Twisted Man spoke. "Finish it."

Amatus raised the mallet. "I am sorry."

The vampire spoke. "If I could drink your apologies, I would drain you drier still. Either finish me or release me to feed. The choice is yours."

"I would heal you if I could."

"I am dead. Your touch works only on those who have not died yet. Either put my blood on your hands or put your blood in my mouth."

With a single, clean stroke, straight from the shoulder and swung with all his force, Amatus drove the stake through her and the mattress below, affixing her to the bed.

Her mouth opened wide in a dreadful shriek. Her tongue, long and black, flew out and was pierced and impaled by her fangs as her mouth snapped closed. The stench in the room was what one might expect from the piercing of a rotted, bloated corpse pulled from the river.

Most horrible of all, perhaps, was that for one instant, as her body returned to its proper form, her hand came up and reached for the stake, almost caressing it, as if trying to gently pluck it from herself, and her other hand reached for Amatus, as if wishing to hold his hand.

He reached for it without thinking, and Calliope slapped his hand away. Shock and pain made him look up, straight into the girl's eyes—and they were wide with fear. "You mustn't. Your hand is wounded. She could draw blood and continue . . ."

Mortis expired. There was no expression of peace, as the old ballads mentioned; there was hatred, bitterness, and above all self-pity.

Something stirred in Amatus; the world was different from what it had ever been before.

For a long time none of the others spoke a word. "Highness," Calliope said.

"What is it?" Amatus asked. He had expected some part of him to come back, and he certainly felt different physically, but as he looked up and down his body he could see nothing—and yet it was different.

Calliope stepped close to him, resting her hand lightly on his arm, and leaned forward to whisper in his ear. "Your eye, Highness. You have your eye back."

Amatus looked up and around the room; time enough to look in a mirror later and see what he looked like—he had a feeling the effect was even more strange than the foot that seemed to walk of its own accord beside him wherever he went. For right now there was only the astonishment of discovering that the world had depth and a sort of reality to it that he had not seen in the time he could remember. "I . . . you all look so different," he said, looking around the room. "And so beautiful."

And then—perhaps from his own grief, or from the beauty of it all—he found that he did indeed have his left eye, for he could feel tears welling in both eyes and the force of blinking them back made the room dark.

The Twisted Man walked quickly to Mortis and put a cloth over her face. "Highness, you
must
go now—all of you must go—and send the King and the Prime Minister up to me."

His voice—in which fear or even concern had never been heard—was so urgent that they all obeyed at once, and in a short time found themselves on the street. "Stay as guests of the castle tonight," Amatus urged his friends. "We will sit in the tower room, with a bright fire."

To his great relief they all agreed. Of Amatus, it remains only to say that they spent the night gathered around the fire in conversations in which laughter and tears flowed freely, and went to bed late, all of them, and got up late for breakfast together. The next day Amatus healed Calliope's remaining servants, and they all helped Calliope to get her house back into order.

But Cedric, in his
Chronicle
, tells us of other things, which he swears Amatus never learned of. That may be true, for it is in Cedric's will also that his books be sealed unread for a century after his death, and Amatus tended to be careful and systematic about carrying out such wishes. So as to whether Amatus himself ever knew of what happened next, there is no one who can tell us.

When Cedric and Boniface came into the chamber, the Twisted Man had moved the lantern around better to illuminate Mortis's face, but left the covering over it. From the garments and from the blue skin they knew who it was, and they had both sighed, for fearsome as Mortis had been, she had been a superb Royal Witch, and they could not be sure how Amatus would take the loss of another Companion so soon after Golias.

The Twisted Man spoke. "I saw her begin to shift and change under the light before, and covered her face to stop that before he could see. What I show you now must remain between us forever."

In any other circumstance, Boniface would have objected, at least implicitly, to such an assertion of power over the royal person, but this time it seemed only in keeping. Cedric turned to the lamp and adjusted the oil valve a crack, so that the lamp was as bright as it could be, and drawing a candle from his pocket, he lighted it, and used it to light the candles in their sconces around the room.

The Twisted Man drew the cloth back, and said, "Now watch, Majesty and my lord."

Mortis's face was still beautiful, and in the bright light one could now see a sneer of contempt had settled onto it, except for a softness around the glittering reptile eyes.

But as they watched, the scales of her skin faded into it as if they had never been. The blue lightened to white, and then turned a soft pink. And the fangs which had been long and yellow as an old dog's when she was undead, now white and even pretty as they had been before, receded gently. Her features continued to change, the cheekbones coming down and sinking in, the chin broadening—

And the King cried out in deep horror and anguish; a moment later, Cedric gave a low, ill moan beside him.

The dead woman on the bed was now the very image of Boniface's Queen, who had died bearing Amatus.

"What can this mean?" Boniface whispered as he groped for a chair.

"As you have always thought might be the case, a story has come into the Kingdom, as they have so often before, and we are in the middle of it," the Twisted Man said. "I myself have seen . . . more than one story, shall I say, if you will permit me to leave it at that? And this may either be the sort of thing that has meaning in a story, or the sort of thing that is merely in a story. As for how she came into it—know this, Majesty. We came to be your son's Companions, and we traveled together, but we did not all come from the same places at the same time."