The Wizard (27 page)

"Mag is my name here, and here I was wife to Berthold the Black. My husband was headman of our village. The Aelf cast their spell on it. Our cows birthed fawns. Our gardens died in a night. Mist hid us always, and Griffmsford was accursed. An old man came. He was a demon. I know it now, but we did not know then. I was big with child when he came. "He said our Overcyns would not help us, and to lift the curse we must offer to the gods of the Aelf. Snari fed him. Berthold said we would not, that we must offer to our right Overcyns. He built an altar of stones and turf, with none but our little son to help. On it he offered our cow, and sang to the Overcyns of Skai, and Cli and Wer with him. "A turtle with two heads crawled out of the river and bit Deif and Grumma, strangers were on the road by night, and there were howlings at our windows. The old man said we must give seven wives to the gods of Aelfrice. Berthold would not hear of it. "The old man said I would never give birth until the gods of Aelfrice allowed it. Two days I labored with none but Berthold to attend me. Then I begged the Lady of Skai to take my life if only she would spare my child. I was able to bear him, and I named him Able because of it. "The old man came to our door. Grengarm, he said, demanded seven fair virgins. There were not seven fair virgins in Griffinsford, and soon he would demand fair woman whether virgins or not, and children too, whom he would eat. I do not know that he told the truth, though I believed him. He told me he would take me to a place where Grengarm would not find me. I said I would go if I might take my children. "I might take Able, he said, but Berthold was perhaps too big, and he offered to show the place to me so that I might judge if it was a fit place for them. It was not far, and we would return long before either woke. May the Lady and every lady forgive me! I went, thinking Berthold would rock Able if he woke. "We went to the edge of the barley, and there the old man cautioned me that I must not be afraid but climb on his back. He went on all four like a beast as he said it. I mounted and he flew. I saw that he was a terrible lizard, that he had always been, and the kind face he showed was a mask. I believed him Grengarm, and believed he would eat me. "He carried me to this island and stripped me naked. Here I remain, so the seamen I tempt may feed Setr and the Khimairae. There are other women, stolen as I was. "We tempt seamen so the Khimairae will not eat us, but we hide when the old man walks out of the waves, and do not worship him as the Khimairae do. Groa carved an image of the Lady for us, but another came by night and broke it, leaving an image of herself by the pool, beautiful beyond women. "Groa can write. She has taught me to write as we write here, tracing letters in the sand. This vase I found in the wreck, with the paper and the rest. O Lady of the Overcyns, Lady of Skai, you spared my life. Grant that these writings of mine will come to the eyes of my sons."

"Years have passed. I am no longer beautiful, and soon the Khimairae will eat me. I have caught Setr's poison in a cup. I write with it, and with a feather of the great bird. When I have written to the end, I will put this scroll in the vase, and stop it, and drink. None will touch my poisoned flesh for fear."

I asked whether I might take her scroll to read to my brother. She said that nothing I took from this place would remain when I left it, and cast her scroll into the waves. After that we sat long on the beach, naked together, and talked of the lives we had led, what it was to live and what it was to die. "I was taken by the Aelf," I told her, "to be playmate to the queen, for the Aelf live on, but few children come to them and any child born to them is a queen or king, as if every Aelf of the clan were mother or father." "You were a king to me," she said, "and to your father and your brother also." "We played games in a garden wider than the world, and I sat at lessons with her, and talked of love and magic and a thousand other things, for she was very wise and her advisors wiser. At last they sent me into Mythgarthr. All memory of Disiri and her garden left me. Only now has it returned." "You loved them." I nodded. "Mother, you are wise. I knew I would not find Disiri here, for my love for her has not been lost. But those were lostas lost as your scroll." "Which is not lost. It remains on the Isle, where you found it." She took up the green glass tube that had held it as she spoke, and removed the stopper. "Do you want to see it again? It is in here." The tube was empty; and yet it seemed to me that there remained something at its bottom, some scrap, perhaps, of paper, a pebble or a shell. I tried to reach in, although it was large enough to admit only two fingers. My whole hand entered, and as it sought the bottom, my arm. I found myself drawn into a tunnel whose sides were green glass. At once I turned and began to run back the way I had come, troubled (until I caught and held her) by Eterne, whose weighty scabbard slapped my leg. Soon I found a pale door. I opened it, and had no more stepped through than I was followed by Lynnet and Mani. "I thought you would stay in there a while, Mama," Etela said. Lynnet only smiled and stroked her hair. Thiazi said, "None of you need tell me what you saw. Should you wish to, however, you will find me an attentive listener." None of us spoke. Toug said, "Everybody got to ask questions before you went in, or anyhow that was what it seemed like. Now I'd like to ask one and all of you have got to answer just this one question. There isn't one of you that doesn't owe me." Lynnet nodded and took his hand, at which Etela looked astonished. "Here it is. Did it work? Did you really find love you had lost in there?" I told him I had, that I had found a mother whom I had forgotten utterly. To myself I added that her bones lay on the Isle of Glas, and I would not rest until I had interred them and raised a monument, as I now have. "What about Etela's mother?" I nodded, and was about to explain; but Lynnet herself spoke: "I did, and saw women dead and men who fell when the Angrborn came to Goldenlawn. I celebrated the winter feast, and danced the May dance, and cut flowers in our garden." She turned to Thiazi who sat huge as a carven image in his chair. "Your folk destroy so much to gain so little." He nodded, but did not speak. "What about Mani?" Toug looked around for him. "I saw him come out." Etela pointed. "He went out the window." "That's too bad," Toug said. "I'd like to know if he found love he'd lost too." Thiazi's voice was as dull and distant as the beating of the monstrous drums outside. "If he had lost love, Squire, he found it there." I said, "Of course he had love to findand of course he found it. If he hadn't, he would be here telling us so. He left because he's not ready to talk about it." There was a frantic pounding at the door, and Thiazi roared, "Come in!" It was Pouk, and though he did not look around I saw his living eye rest on me. "Lord Thiazi, sir," he began, "is my old master Sir Able in here, sir? I thought I heard him." "He is your new master as well," Thiazi told him. "I give you to him now." Pouk pulled his forelock. "Thankee, sir, an' I hope it sticks." "I'm here, Pouk," I said. "What do you want?" "Nothin', sir. Only I got news you ought to know. That Schildstarr, sir. He's got th' crown, sir, an' says he's king. He's fixin' to go out in th' town, sir, wit' all his men an' Thrym an' his guards." Thiazi rose, "Then I must go with him." I nodded. "First, Pouk, you mustn't talk of His Majesty King Schildstarr as you just did. If you're disrespectful I may not be able to protect you." "Aye, aye, sir." "Second, you're to go to the stable at once and saddle Cloud, and bring her to the entrance as quick as you can." Pouk hesitated. "I ain't no hand fer horses, sir, an' that'n don't know me." "Do what she tells you," I said, "and all will be well." After that, I sent Toug to notify Svon and Beel, and armed myself. Of Schildstarr's parade through the town I will say little. We human beings were kept to the rearno doubt wisely. Garvaon, Svon, and I rode three abreast, with Beel and Idnn before us and Garvaon's men-at-arms and archers behind. The castle of Utgard might have been taken, for there was no one to guard it save Toug and Gylf and a few slaves. But there was no reason to fear it would be taken, though the crowding Frost Giants who cheered so wildly for their new king eyed us with hostility that was almost open. When I saw their faces, I knew we would have to go, and go soon. I told Beel when we returned to Utgard. He agreed, but reminded me that he would need the king's permission. A dark and silent figure waited outside the chamber Thiazi had assigned me. "They're in there. . . ." Recognizing her voice, I bowed. "Who is, Lady Lynnet?" "My daughter, another girl." For a moment it seemed to me that a frown of concentration crossed her face, that face which so seldom wore any expression. "The cat. And a man. They wanted me to . . ." "You would be welcome," I told her. "I know." It seemed that she would go; though I stood aside she remained where she was, her head erect, her hands at her sides, her lank black hair falling to her waist. "I will return south with you. Goldenlawn will be mine." "I hope so, My Lady." "Shall I have a husband then? Someone to help build?" "I'm sure you will have your choice among a score." "They are so eager, for a little land. . . . Five farms. Our meadows." I nodded. "There are many men who are hungry for land, though many have land already. Others hunger for love. If you marry again, My Lady, you would be well advised to marry a man whose desire is for you." She did not speak. "There are many women, My Lady, who feel that a man who greatly desires them can't be good enough for them. That they prove their mettle by winning one who could couple with a lady more beautiful or more accomplished, winning him with land or gold, or by trickery. I don't pretend to be wise, but another lady whose name may not be spoken told me once how foolish that is, and how much of her time and strength was spent striving against it." "You?" "No, My Lady. If I'd been speaking for myself, I would have spoken less boldly." She passed me without a nod or glance. I watched her erect back and slow, smooth steps until she vanished in the darkness at the end of the corridor. There are ghosts and worse in Utgard, as I knew very well; but no one was less apt to be affrighted than she, and it is possible that they (like us) thought her one of themselves. Two girls, Lynnet had said, a catMani, clearlyand a man. Little Etela would be one of the girls. The other seemed likely to be one of the slave women, somebody Toug had found to care for her. The man was presumably Toug himself, though I hoped for Garvaon. Shrugging, I opened the door and stepped in, and saw that I had been right in some regards and wrong in others. The second girl was Uri, and not in human form but clearly a woman of the Fire Aelf. The man was neither Toug nor Garvaon but a blind slave, muscular and nearly naked, with one arm supported by a sling. Etela said politely, "Hello, sir knight. "We came to see you. Only I was here the first." Uri rose and bowed, saying, "Lord." Mani coughed as cats do. "She is afraid I will slip ahead of her, as I easily could, dear owner. I won't. I want to talk to you alone, after these others have gone." The blind slave stroked Mani's back with a hand thick with muscle. "This is him?" "Yes," Mani said. "This is he, my owner, Sir Able of the High Heart." The slave knelt and bowed his head. "It means he wants something," Etela explained. "That's how they have to do." "We all want something," I told her, "and when I do I kneel in just the same way. What's his name?" "It's Vil, and he was my old master's just like me. Only now we're Toug's." I nodded. "Stand up, Vil." He rose. Etela said, "Can I still go first?" "Sure. It's your right, and I have another question." "Well, I got a bunch. You can be first if you want to." "No." I took off my helmet and laid it in the armoire in which I would hang my mail. "You were here first, as you said, and I came in last." The truth was that I hoped her questions would make my own unnecessary. "I don't know where to start." "In that case it probably doesn't matter." I unbuckled my sword belt, took my place on the hassock, the only seat of merely human size, and laid Eterne across my knees. "Aren't you going to put that away too?" I shook my head. "I'll hang it by my bed. Something may happen during the night, though I hope it won't." Uri murmured, "I have often watched over you, Lord." I remembered then that seamen lured to the Isle of Glas had fed the Khimairae; but I said nothing. "Is the new king going to hurt us? Mama and me?" I shook my head again. "I would not let you be hurt, but I doubt that he intends you any harm." "Toug doesn't want to be a knight. Not anymore." "I know." "Only I want him to be one, and he'd be a real good one, wouldn't he?" This was addressed to Uri, who said, "I think so too." "See? We're going to get married, Mama said, 'n we slept in the same bed already 'n everything." Uri said, "I don't believe so, Lord." "Yes, we did! We're going to do it again tonight, an' I'm all washed 'n everything. So he has to be a knight." I nodded. "Which he is." Etela's voice rose to a wail. "You said he wasn't!" "I said nothing of the kind. You said that he didn't want to be one, and I told you I knew it. When I was tending his wound, I did my best to keep him from saying what none of us wanted to hear. I may also have said he was a knight already, though no one calls him Sir Toug. I think I didand if I didn't, I might easily have done so." She tried to speak, but I silenced her. "If Duke Marder were hereI wish he washe'd tell you there's no magic in the sword with which he taps a knight's shoulders. Queen Disiri, who knighted me, might tell you anything, and she commands more magic than Lord Thiazi and Lord Beel combined. But no magic can make a knight. Not even the Overcyns can. A knight makes himself. That's the only way. Come closer." She did, and I put my arm around her. "Many people know what I told you. I learned it from a good and brave knight when I was a boy. Fewer know this, a thing I learned for myself in a far country." Mani asked, "Where there are talking cats?" I nodded. "Talking cats who draw a chariot. What I learned, Etela, is that a knight cannot unmake himself. A knight can be unmade. It's difficult and is seldom done, but it can be done." Etela said nothing; her eyes were bright with tears. "It cannot be done by the knight himself, however. If Toug ever ceases to be a knight, it will be because you've done it, I think. Though there are other ways." "I never would!" I told her very sincerely that I hoped she would not. "But he doesn't want to, an' what can I do?" "What you're doing. Be good, take care of your mother, and show Toug you love him." "Well, I want him to ride a white horse, with a sword" She sobbed. "An' one of those long spears an' a shield." "I hope we'll leave this castle tomorrow. I'm going to ask the new king's permission, and do all I can to set Lord Beel and his folk in motion. If we go, you'll see Toug on a horse with a sword. His arm can't bear a shield, but the shield Queen Idnn gave himthe one that you saved from the fight in the marketplacewill hang from his saddle." "Will you help?" I nodded. "All I can." "Mama's better." "I know. She may never be entirely well, Etela. You must do whatever you can to help, every day. You and Toug." "I'll try." "I know. You must get Toug to help you. After all, she's his as long as we're here. Is there anything else?" "No." Etela wiped her eyes with her ragged sleeve. "Only this girl is going to talk about me. She said so." "Then go," I told Etela. "See to your mother, and get Toug to help if you can." She would have remained, but I made her leave. As soon as the door had shut, Uri said, "You might marry her, Lord. Do you think Queen Disiri would object?" I returned to my seat. "Of course." "You know her less well than you believe." "Do I?" I shrugged. "Or you might wed the mother." I sighed. "When I refuse to consider that as well, will you suggest I wed them both? You may go." "I may go whenever I wish, Lord, but I will not go yet. If you do not want to see me, that is easily arranged." Vil, the male slave, grunted in surprise; I suppose he thought she might be threatening to blind me. "When you speak foolishness, Uri, I don't want to hear you. Should I quiz you about the diet of the Khimairae?" "That would be foolishness indeed, Lord. When I was a Khimaira I ate Khimaira food. Let us leave it so. You dined upon strange fare once, when you were sore wounded." "I yield. You told poor Etela you were going to talk to me about her. Did you tell her what you meant to say?" "No. Nor was I talking of her and her mother so much as of you, Lord. Would you not like a fair estate?" "To be got by marriage? No." I laid Eterne on the hassock and went to the window to stroke Mani. "A crown? That lout Schildstarr got himself a crown, and easily." "So that I might sit a golden chair and send other men to their deaths? No." Uri rose to stand beside me. "I speak for all the Fire Aelf, Lord. Not for myself alone. If you kill Kulili, we will serve you. Not just Baki or I, but all of us. If you wish King Arnthor's crown, we will help you get it." I shook my head. "I have to get these people and more to safety, Uri. I have to do a lot of other things too. In Aelfrice, all these things will take only a few minutes." "You want me to go back. In a year, Lord, you might be King of Celidon. In ten, Emperor of Mythgarthr." "Or dead." "You are dead!" Uri's eyes were yellow fireworks. "You know that and so do I." "But Vil doesn't," I pitched my voice as low as I dared, "or at least he didn't. Which reminds me, I'd planned to ask Etela why she feared him. Why does she, Vil? What made her start when she heard your name?" "She ain't feared, sir. Not really." "She is. Before His Majesty's parade, Lord Thiazi told us about the distribution of slaves. You went to Toug, like