The War of the Flowers

by Tad Williams

  As she launched into a highly technical explanation of their encounter with the corpse-thing and their arrival in Larkspur territory, using words like "outflow" and "trajectory" and "proximate entry shift" that didn't seem like they belonged in a "magical-trip-to-Fairyland" kind of situation, Theo could not help noticing that his tiny guide's demeanor had changed. She was all business now — perhaps even trying a little too hard, flinging technical terms around like a roadwork foreman explaining to a company VP why his crew had accidentally put a jackhammer through a power cable.

  "Yes, well." Tansy dismissed the rest of the explanation with a flick of his long fingers. He looked at Theo again, not angrily, but certainly not with a great deal of human warmth either, as if Theo was a guest's dog rather than an actual guest. In fact, after all the trouble of getting him here, Tansy hadn't really spoken to him yet.

  Human wamth — that's the key, isn't it? Theo decided. He's not human. And I don't even think he likes humans very much. And if this purple-eyed fellow was one of the sympathetic ones, Theo had a sudden, chilling premonition of what it might be like to encounter some of the more unsympathetic of Tansy's folk.

  Well, so I'll never be Fairyland's Mr. Popular. "Why did you bring me here?" he asked.

  Tansy raised an eyebrow thin and white as a line of high-test cocaine. "Because I was the only one who could find you."

  Theo puzzled over this for a moment. "That doesn't really answer my question."

  "Wait until I finish with the sprite." The lord of the manor turned back to Applecore. "Is there anything else important you need to tell me?" "Bunches, I'm afraid." She lifted off the tabletop and hovered, looking a bit frayed. "First, that dead-bodies thing'll still be following him. If it found him there, it'll find him here."

  Tansy looked over the top of his spectacles. "I hope you're not suggesting I couldn't puzzle that out for myself." " 'Course not, Count Tansy. Right. Well, also, when we were leaving Larkspur's land, the lad here went into the creek. That's why I had to fly straight here and get Dolly and Teddy to bring him home."

  "The creek? You mean the Graywindle? It's strange that the nymph gave permission . . ." "She didn't, not exactly. Not at first." Applecore flew over and tugged Theo's left hand up so Tansy could see his wrist. "I had to let him be bound."

  The fairy lord shrugged. "The mortal's affair, not mine."

  "But it will affect how he travels, sir." Tansy shrugged again. "He may not. Finish your recitation." "Well, and when we bumped into Larkspur and his hunting party, I had to use my own charm because I used up all yours earlier, scuffling with that ugly thing. It wasn't much, just a small-and-secret thing, a Once-in-Thrice Misdirection I got through a friend's discount, but it was my last bit of protection. So I'm without defenses, sir, if you see what I mean."

  "I'll see you compensated, of course . . ." Tansy began. "Hang on a moment," Applecore said, then flushed — Theo could see it even from a few feet away. "Sorry for interrupting, sir. Sorry. I just realized, a moment ago you said, 'He may not.' What does that mean, if you don't mind my asking. May not what?"

  Tansy looked like he did mind her asking, at least a little, but couldn't be bothered to make a point of it. "May not travel. You see, things have changed."

  "How so?" Applecore moved a little closer to Theo, hovering almost protectively, he thought. "As I may or may not have explained to you, I did not want this mortal for myself, but because certain others wished me to summon him." Tansy turned and moved to a low chair, settling himself into it with remarkable grace. For the first time, Theo noticed that this important fairy had no wings — nor had any of Larkspur's hunting party had them, now that he thought of it. Hadn't Eamonn Dowd written something about the uppercrust fairies and their wings? "He was wanted at a conclave in the City," Tansy continued, "— a meeting of some of the most important leaders of both the Symbiotes and the Coextensives . . ."

  Applecore flew close to Theo's ear. "Those are the Creepers and the inbetweeners — the groups who are against the Chokeweeds," she whispered.

  Tansy frowned. He obviously had sharp hearing. "I must say I deplore those oversimplified names. It is the worst kind of common goblin-talk." He shook his snowy head in irritation. "Besides, we Coextensives are not "in-betweeners," a poor choice between two more dynamic parties. Rather, it is the other two parties who tend toward extremist positions, and we are the moderate and sensible majority on which society depends." In his strange way he seemed the most human Theo had yet seen him: a bit of color had even crept into the skin stretched over his pale cheekbones. "In any case, some of my fellow Coextensives felt it was important that this mortal be brought here . . ."

  "Theo Vilmos. I have a name. I'm not just 'this mortal.' " Another wave of the hand. ". . . That Master Vilmos be brought here, and although I am a busy person with many important projects, they convinced me to help. I was to bring him . . . you . . . here, and one of the young fellows of the Hollyhock household — a prominent Symbiote family, and good folk despite a certain political naïveté — was to come here and escort you to the conclave."

  "But what happened?" Applecore asked. "Have they canceled this meeting or some such?" Tansy shook his head. He sat silently for the space of a dozen or so heartbeats, then rose from the chair and walked over to a surface covered with wooden boxes whose shimmering screens were unlike those on any electronic device Theo had ever seen, as though they were not solid at all, but some kind of vertical liquid. Tansy moved his fingers slowly over one of the boxes and the screen rippled and glowed, then he closed the lid. Although he didn't much like Tansy, Theo had to admit these fairies were fascinating to watch. As with the folk in the hunting party, every gesture Tansy made, even the most apparently spontaneous, seemed like something choreographed and practiced. It's like they've been in some kind of Applied Gracefulness crash course since the second they were born.

  Finished with his first task, the tall fairy pulled open a drawer, then lifted out a silver box the size of a hardbound book and put it on the tabletop. Applecore buzzed over to examine it; after a moment's hesitation, Theo walked over to join her.

  "This was delivered yesterday," said Tansy. "The tommy-knocker who carried it was one of the workers from the mine on the far side of our estate. He did not recognize the fairy who gave it to him and bade him bring it here to me. In fact, the knocker said no one had ever seen this stranger within the bounds of the commune."

  The box was an ornate thing, the silver chased with designs of birds and tree branches. In the center of the lid was an emblem of a round flower with overlapping petals.

  "That's the Hollyhock crest, isn't it?" Applecore asked. Tansy nodded. "It is. But I don't think it was sent by the family of the young man who was coming for Master Vilmos. Look." Tansy lifted the box's lid, unleashing a waft of spicy smells that held a faint acridity underneath. Inside, nestling on white petals, was a small object the size of a child's fist, wrapped in red paper.

  "It's a heart," Tansy said. "Dried and stuffed with rue." He gave a short, sour laugh, but his face was turned away and Theo could not see his expression. "I rather think that means we shouldn't expect your escort, don't you? At least, not any more of him than this."

  —————

  "Good God, the way he said it — like he didn't care!" Theo sat on the edge of the bed. His legs were still trembling. "Like it meant nothing." Applecore was perched on top of the screen that looked like part of an air conditioner, vibrating gently. "They're not like us normal folk, those Flowers," she said, then looked up. "What am I saying? You're not like us normal folk, either."

  It was almost as hard for Theo to accept the casual way Tansy had dismissed him as it was to have found out that one of the few people in this whole mad world who seemed to have a vested interest in his safety was dead before Theo had even had a chance to meet him. "This all just sucks. What am I supposed to do now?"

  "Don't know. He'll talk to you again this evening, he said. Don't push him, Theo, that's my advice
. They're a mad shower, the Flower-folk. You can't hurry them after anything."

  "But what about me? I didn't want to come here. What am I supposed to do now?" He stood up and began to pace. "What about sending me back? Can you do that?"

  She shook her head. "Can't." "Can't? Or won't?" His voice was rising, even though a part of him was ashamed to realize he was shouting at a woman the size of a saltshaker. "Doesn't anyone here care that I've just been . . . snatched out of my normal life, without anyone asking me? Just kidnapped, for Christ's sake!"

  Dolly stuck her huge, blunt head in through the door. "You're hurting my ears, Pinkie. Sit down and talk nice." He sat down, clenching his teeth. He might be angry, but he was not stupid enough to argue with a couple of thousand pounds of bone and gristle that, according to Applecore, could run faster uphill than most mortals could sprint downhill.

  The little fairy came over and lit on the blanket beside him. "I'm sorry for how things have turned out, but don't go confusing the facts. I didn't kidnap you, I opened a door without explaining it because Tall-Dark-andCrumbly was going to suck the marrow out of your bones, probably without even taking off the meat first. I didn't fetch that thing down on you, either — it was coming on its own. And when you went through that door, fella, I didn't drag you."

  He stared at her for a moment then let his face sink into his hands. "You're right. I'm sorry. It's just . . ." He sat up. "Look, just . . . talk to me. Maybe we can figure something out. Why can't you send me back to my home? If I stay here, won't that thing find me? That . . . zombie?"

  "You're better off here, to tell you the truth. Tansy's got defenses. Besides, it's not that easy, just sending you back — it takes a lot of power, especially when you don't want anyone to notice. Even without the Clover Effect, getting someone through to the other world, it's like . . . like building some big, complicated ship. Takes a long time, a lot of work."

  "But you did it once already."

  "Because he arranged it. I don't think I could do it by myself, even if I had a trip left — I'm not a scientist like Count Tansy." "If he's a scientist, it must be the Dr. Mengele kind. The kind that thinks of people as lab rats." He thought for a moment. "You said before that he couldn't go, and that's why he sent you. Why?"

  "That's the Clover Effect, named after some experimenting Flower-fella. It's been so ever since we lost the king and queen of Faerie. We used to be able to go back and forth whenever we wanted, although there were some places that were easier for it than others. Now we can only go through to your world and come back here once apiece." She sat down on the comforter and combed her reddish hair out of her eyes with her tiny fingers. "That's our exemption, we call it, that one trip. Works coming from your side, too. Unless you're pure spirit like that thing that tried to kill you, that is — they can go pretty much wherever they want and then get their meat from wherever they end up, but the rest of us can't. So you need someone like Tansy or his friends to get you back home."

  "So I just have to sit around here and hope that your boss has enough magical oomph to keep that monstrosity away from me until he decides what to do with me."

  "More or less. Sorry."

  Theo slumped back against the headboard of the bed. "So what are you doing working for someone like this Tansy guy?"

  "I grew up here on the commune." "Why is it a commune, anyway? A commune's where everybody's equal or something. Seems to me like the whatever you call 'em, the Flowers are in charge here like everywhere else."

  "It's just a name from something back in the old days. The Daisy family used to be radicals, back during the First Unusual Era. They like tradition no matter what, so they kept the name."

  "So you live here?" "Not really. I live in the City now, but my family mostly are still here. We Apples have the freeholding of an orchard and everyone who's at home works in it — even Pip and Seed, my two closest brothers, and they always said they were going to run away because they hated it."

  "Your family owns an orchard?"

  "Not the land, but like I said, we've got the freehold on the trees. Ten acres' worth," she said proudly. "A thousand trees and more."

  "Oh." He nodded. "What kind of trees?" She rolled her eyes. "My name's Applecore. My da's name is Applewood. Ma's called Applebough. I got brothers and sisters named 'Pip, 'Seed, 'Skin, 'Blossom, to mention a few. One of 'em's even called Applebutter. So what kind of trees do you think they are?"

  "Oh. Yeah, I get it."

  "Quick as a hummingbird's hind end, aren't you?" He scowled. "I thought I told you to give me a break. How did someone so little get to be so damn snippy? Is it some fairy-thing? Did your mama dip you in the Nasty River when you were a baby or something?"

  She laughed. "One to you, boyo."

  "You didn't finish explaining why you're working for Tansy." "Ah. Well, his cousin Zenion Daisy is the lord of the manor here on the commune, at least as far as being the one with the seat in Parliament — he's the one who grants our freehold. But they're a tricksy lot, these Daisies, still sort of freethinkers by Flower standards, and they all share in running the place or doing whatever else interests them — Zenion's sister Dyspurnia actually makes most of the decisions. Tansy's had me help him out before, mostly gathering herbs or other things — he's mad keen on science but he's no herbwife. And I've run a few errands for him in the City, found books he was looking for, obscure charms, like that. I've had trouble finding much other work in the City, though, so when he asked me if I'd do this — well, the pay was good."

  "But . . . but why didn't he send someone . . . someone . . ." "Bigger?" She scowled. "Don't pretend, you, I know what you were going to say. Goes to show what you know — that's why he sent me. The smaller the person going through, the less disruption, so the less power it takes to send 'em. I'll bet it still turned all the lights off here when I went, but."

  Theo sighed. "So on top of everything else, sending me back is going to take some huge amount of power or something?"

  "It's not easy," she said. "That's why they call it 'science.' " "Then I'm just totally screwed." A wave of misery washed through him. They said you never appreciated your hometown until you moved away. How about your entire world?

  Applecore looked at him for a long moment. "Tell you what," she said. "I'll go talk with him — with Tansy. He's really not a bad fella by Flower standards."

  Theo gave her a bleak look. "Yeah, probably hardly ever beats the servants to death or anything." "Just quit feelin' so sorry for yourself. Stay here and I'll be back in a bit." She rose from the bed and hung in the air for a moment, looking as though she wanted to say something more, but instead she turned and shot out the door in a fizz of swift-beating wings.

  Bored and depressed, Theo got up and began pacing the narrow confines of the room, letting his hand trail along the hangings on the wall, which caressed his skin more like a liquid than like fabric. He stopped in front of the object that looked something like a clock and examined the strange glyphs arranged around the edges of its triangular face. It sure looks like a clock radio, he thought. I could listen to some music while I'm waiting. That would be interesting, wouldn't it? Listening to music invented on an entirely different world?

  He touched one of the small silvered bumps on the surface of the wood, but if it was a button, it didn't do anything obvious. He pressed another, then dropped the object onto the bed in surprise when a voice whispered out of it, asking what sounded like a question in a language he did not understand. The thing bounced a couple of times until it reached the end of its cylindrical cord. The whispering voice said nothing else.

  He waited a couple of minutes just to be sure, then picked up the clock radio or whatever it was in his hands and tried another button. At first he thought that this hadn't done anything either, until he realized that the wood was growing smolderingly hot beneath his fingers. He yelped and dropped it onto the bed again. A wisp of smoke rose from where it lay, so he jerked it up off the bed and held it by the cord.

 
"Shit! What do I do?" he said to himself, out loud — always a bad sign. Old Tansy'll love me if I burn down the family manor. The thing was growing hotter — he could feel it on his exposed skin even with it dangling a foot away. In a growing panic, he shoved the bed a little bit away from the wall with his legs so he could try to reach the outlet while keeping the clock safely away from anything flammable. It was a tight fit, and the clock thing swung toward him as he bent, rummaging awkwardly behind the bed, and bumped against his head. It felt like the time he'd picked up one of Cat's curling irons without noticing it was plugged in and he let out a shriek of pain.

  He finally got a grip on the cord down near what looked like an outlet, a rectangle of pale wood set directly into the stone of the wall. He yanked, but the cord did not come loose. The clock swung near his head again and frizzed a lock of his hair into a crisp curl. He braced his hip against the bed and yanked again, as hard as he could. The cord came away with a loud pop! and a flash of greeny-blue flame. For a moment he could see a round circle of teal fire still flickering on the outlet plate, then even the hole was gone, leaving nothing behind but smooth wood.

  He looked at the cord dangling in his hand. The ivory-smooth knob at the end where it had connected to the outlet was as featureless as if it had just been sawn off the tip of an elephant's tusk.

  The clock, or whatever hellish device it might be, was already cool.

  ————— Theo stuck his head out into the corridor. Applecore had been gone at least an hour and he was getting crazy with restlessness. Tansy's lab or whatever they'd call it here was down that way, but Theo had no intention of dropping in on him and reinforcing the fairy's dislike of mortals by blundering in at an inopportune moment. He'd just go for a stroll in the other direction. It wasn't like he was a prisoner or anything, was it?

  Was it? He stood in the corridor, wondering why it seemed longer than it had when he had looked down it before. How big could this place be, anyway? Was it the main manor house for the Sunny Days Commune or whatever Applecore had called it — Theo could only remember it had sounded like some kind of organic dairy — or was it a separate building? Well, finding a window could tell him something, and getting outside into the air would tell him even more.