The Feline Wizard (37 page)

“You could not easily have done aught but listen. Aye.”

Matt took a breath. “I thought you did a masterful job of being patient.”

“But was patience what she needed of me?” Stegoman asked. “Did she not wish some sign of passion from me, even if it were anger?”

Matt chose his words carefully. “She might have wanted that, but she would have been frightened and hurt if you had given it to her.”

“Then there was no way to do what was right for her,” Stegoman sighed. “Patience frustrated her, but anger would have frightened her.”

“Well, you could have given her a compliment or two when you realized she was trying to get a rise out of you.”

Stegoman was silent awhile, then said, “Perhaps. But would that not have seemed odd?”

“Oh, I don't think she would have minded.”

“Perhaps not.” Stegoman was silent awhile longer, then asked, “Was she angered only because I was not, or did I reveal myself to be something too strange, too frightening?”

“Maybe you did cut a bit close to the bone there. Certainly you were a bit guarded about your own background.”

“Guarded!” Stegoman snorted. “Has she given even that much indication of her own?”

“Well, no, but the frightening parts of your biography aren't exactly going to inspire her with a desire to trust you with the secrets of her own hurts.”

“Even though I have entrusted her with my own,” Stegoman said with a sardonic tone.

“Well, yeah, but you were using them to explain why she should stay away from you. Can't blame her if she decided to take you at your word, can you?”

“I do not blame her at all,” Stegoman returned, “neither for her coming nor for her going.”

Which was to say, of course, that he blamed her for both, for if all she were going to do was to cause him grief by firing off a few insults and flying out of his life, why should she have come into it in the first place?

Still, he thought the two dragons were making progress— if Dimetrolas came back for more.

He had to admit that having Stegoman at his beck and call was very handy, and knew that a female and a full nest would end all that. Nonetheless, he wished that his friend would indeed find a mate—he'd be much happier for it. But if this courtship were anything to go by, he couldn't understand how the species had survived this long—though maybe it wasn't as hopeless as it seemed to human eyes. Dragons, after all, were a naturally prickly breed.

The sidicus finally flew out of the forest into a broad plain that stretched as far as Balkis could see. She looked about but saw only tall grass as high as her knee—and one huge boulder, gilded by the setting sun with a grove of trees behind it.

The sidicus hovered near her, beating its wings furiously and demanding, “Why are you so slow when aid is in sight? Come, bring your swain and hurry!”

An angry denial came to her lips, but the sidicus was already darting away over the plain to perch on the rock.

She quickened her pace, mad with worry about Anthony; the unicorn matched it without effort. She touched Anthony's throat, felt the pulse, and felt somewhat reassured. She also felt a little uneasy, knowing that her leading a unicorn marked both herself and Anthony as virgins, and scolded herself— virginity did not of itself make one more vulnerable.

They came up to the rock, which proved to be about the
size of a dining table, though oval in shape. Looking down, she saw that its surface was hollowed in the shape of a mussel shell—like a clam's, only longer. There was clear water in it, about four inches deep.

“Now, pay attention!” the sidicus rapped out. “This boulder is of incredible medical virtue, for it cures Christians or would-be Christians of whatever ailments afflict them—even wounds made by lion's claws.”

Balkis stared at the depression in the boulder's surface, then tried not to let her skepticism show. “Why should it cure only Christians and folk who wish to become Christians?”

“
Rawk!
Have you no brains, girl? We are in the land of Prester John, the foremost Christian king of Asia! Who else should it cure—the pagan shamans whose people threaten him?” The bird tilted its head back and burst into song.

The music amazed Balkis, for its voice had thus far been only a grating and raucous noise. With even greater surprise, she recognized the notes for a hymn!

The sidicus finished its song and fixed her with a beady eye. “Surprised, are you? Well, witty lady, know that if I can imitate human speech, I can mimic any other sound as well, even the songs of the nightingale and the skylark! If I can manage that, why should I not be able to copy something so simple as one of your hymns?”

The song had acted as a summons, for two old men came from the grove—and with that much of a clue, Balkis was able to discern a cottage in the center of the trees, its walls faced with bark, its roof thatched with leaves, so thoroughly a part of its environment as to escape notice. A suspicion formed in her mind that perhaps the trees that made the little house were still alive and had grown as they did out of kindness to the hermits.

Certainly they seemed to be religious men, for the crowns of their heads were either shaven or bald with age and fringed with white hair, and their brown robes were belted with hempen cords. Each carried a staff, the top carved into a cross. As they came near, they inclined their heads in bows, smiling through their long white beards. The one who looked marginally older said, “Good evening, maiden. Is your companion ill?”

“Not ill, good sir, but wounded.” Balkis noticed that the unicorn seemed completely at ease with the two old men, and she drew her own conclusions. Oddly, it made her more comfortable with them, too.

“We can heal him, if you will,” said the other old man.

Balkis' heart leaped, and relief almost made her weak. “Oh, thank you, sirs! He was mauled by a lion, and I have been so terribly fearful for his life!”

“He will live, be sure,” the first said. “Is he a Christian?”

“He… he is, sir—a Christian of the Nestorian sect.”

“As are we,” said the first hermit.

“Most are, here in Prester John's land,” said the second. “I am Brother Athanius, and this is Brother Rianus. Does your friend wish the healing of the entire body?”

Balkis didn't stop to think and wasn't about to count Anthony's wounds. “Oh, yes, sirs, if you can! Heal him entirely, heal him all!”

“Why, we shall, then.” Brother Athanius went to the unicorn and took hold of Anthony under the arms. “Aid us in laying him within the mussel shell, maiden, for we are old men and no longer as strong as we once were.”

“Of course, holy brother!” Balkis hurried to the other side of the unicorn with Brother Rianus and took hold of Anthony's left leg while the monk grappled with the right. Together the three of them managed to wrestle Anthony off the unicorn's back and onto the surface of the huge boulder but not yet in the depression.

The unicorn snorted.

Balkis turned back to throw her arms around its neck. “Oh, thank you, beautiful one, for bearing my Anthony hither! I shall ever be grateful to you!”

The unicorn nuzzled her cheek, whickering low as though to reassure her, then turned away and trotted off into the trees.

“Go apart from us now, maiden,” Brother Rianus bade her. “We must take the clothes from his body, for he must go into the shell as bare as he was born.”

“I—I shall, sir, yes.” Balkis turned away as they began unbuttoning Anthony's jerkin—but with a strange sense of foreboding that made her pulse beat like twin drums in her ears.

“Why leave it to them?” the sidicus demanded. “After all, you should have done that months ago!”

“Be silent, bird!” Brother Athanius commanded. “This work will be hard enough for her without your carping.”

“Hard forsooth! It would be the greatest ease for her and, when he is mended, the greatest pleasure!”

“Be not obscene, feathered one!”

Balkis walked away toward the grove, but her anxiety churned so high that she couldn't keep from turning back to watch, frantically concerned that Anthony could not be healed.

Brother Athanius managed to pull the jerkin off one massive shoulder, then the other, as Brother Rianus was pulling off Anthony's boots, then skinning off his breeches. Balkis resolutely turned her eyes away, determined to trust the two monks.

“Aye, avert your gaze, maiden,” the sidicus jibed. “You will long to gaze back there again soon enough, and with good reason, too.”

Balkis blushed a light mauve. “Do not be absurd, sidicus.” But she couldn't help an anxious glance. Brother Athanius was pulling Anthony's shirt up over his chest. As he did, her hands tingled with the imagined feeling of pushing against Anthony's skin, and she felt a wave of dizziness—she hadn't realized he had such a powerful belly and chest, all muscle from the look, and a great deal of it, too. But the wounds across it wrung her heart.

“So, then, I am a bird absurd?” the sidicus mocked. “Or do you mean to say that a bird should be obscene and not absurd?”

“He should not be either, if he wishes not to be roasted
with herb dressing!” But from the heat in her face, Balkis knew she was blushing furiously.

Anthony's shoulders were too broad and seemed to be entirely of muscle. Brother Athanius managed to pull the tunic off first one arm, then off the other, and Balkis gasped, amazed at the size of Anthony's biceps. Finally he was naked from the waist up. A glance at Brother Rianus showed that Anthony was naked from the waist down, too, and she looked away, feeling her face grow hot again.

“Aye, avert your gaze!” the sidicus chided. “Wait until he is healed, then gaze your fill!”

“Be still, bird!” Brother Athanius pointed an admonishing finger. “I have endured your carping while it did little harm, but I will not have you mock this maiden's virtue!”

“Will not her virtue be its own reward, Brother? And it had better be, for it will be her only rawka squawk rawka craw!” The sidicus broke off, eyes wide with surprise at its sudden incomprehensibility.

“You may have your speech back when the lad is healed and dressed,” Brother Rianus informed it. “For now, it were best you perched elsewhere.”

“Or you may be dressed for dinner,” Balkis told it with a warning glare.

The sidicus fluffed its feathers in indignation, gave a last raucous cry of protest, and flew off to perch on the monks' rooftop.

“Do not let the sidicus upset you, maiden,” Brother Athanius told her. “It has a brazen tongue, true, but it has also a heart of gold.”

“It has indeed aided me thus far,” Balkis admitted, “but nonetheless, for this brief time I am relieved to be shut of that dirty bird”

Brother Rianus gave Balkis a slight understanding smile. “You need not watch, maiden. If his faith is strong, the stone shall cure him.”

Then he took Anthony's legs while Brother Athanius managed his shoulders.

Again Balkis could almost feel the long, thick muscles of Anthony's thighs; the sight aroused warmth within her again.
She fought a feeling of faintness and tried to look away, but anxiety for her companion kept her gaze on the monks and their patient.

“Lift, now,” Brother Athanius directed.

Together they heaved and dragged, lowering Anthony into the mussel-shaped depression and the water at its bottom. Balkis' heart began to hammer in her bosom again—from anxiety, she told herself. What would happen if this stone did not cure Anthony?

“Peace be within your breast,” Brother Rianus called in comforting tones. “If his faith is sincere, the water will increase and rise.”

Balkis fought to keep her face immobile, to keep the twist of skepticism from her mouth and the panic contained within her breast. How could the faith of an unconscious man affect the level of water? And how could more water rise in a bowl that had contained only four inches? All they were likely to do was to give Anthony a chill from lying naked on cold stone!

“Ah, there—it rises!” Brother Athanius said with satisfaction.

Balkis stared. Sure enough, the water level was rising, slowly put perceptibly. It was as high as Anthony's ribs, then as high as his chest, over his chest—she looked away, blushing and ashamed of her own anxiety.

If the monks noticed, they kept silent on the subject, but Brother Athanius reached down to pinch Anthony's nostrils shut with one hand while the other pressed down over Anthony's mouth a moment before the water rose to cover it, to cover his face, then his hair, and Balkis' heart clamored with a new fear.

“Be calm, maiden,” Brother Rianus called in reassurance. “He will not drown.”

It was hard to believe that, with Anthony's hair floating about his head like a halo and making him look like an angel, especially since he was so pale, but surely no angel had ever inspired such feelings in a woman.

Then his hair was floating no longer, the water was sinking below his head, and Brother Athanius released Anthony's nostrils. She heard his breath rasp in, saw the color return to
his cheeks, and felt the knot in her chest loosen, a knot that she hadn't realized was there until it was gone.

The water receded until it was halfway down Anthony's sides, then started to rise again. The mussel shell filled nearly to the brim, and Brother Athanius had to prevent Anthony's breathing again; then the water ebbed away. A third time it rose, then sank down to its original level. Balkis gasped in amazement, for the ugly wounds left by the lion's claws were gone, and not even the bruise from the blow of that huge paw remained on Anthony's face.