The Beast of Noor

by Janet Lee Carey

  “The beast broke through. The queen flew after. And we watched the Shriker’s attack. He had his teeth in Enoch’s side, for the man had garbled the spell, left out the word that would have cast the Shriker down into the underworld. Enocheryl would have died that night if the queen had not saved him.”

  “How was that?” asked Hanna.

  Shree blew this way and that, a quiet hissing sound coming from her hair and gown. “The Shriker’s teeth were in him when she enspelled Enocheryl, and there was much blood and much blood.

  “This we know from before and this we tell you now. The Sylth Queen gave Enocheryl the gift of magic in his fourteenth year, hoping he would kill the Shriker. But he disappointed her. On Othlore he did not wait for his learning season. Instead he stole the power spell. This new piece you gave us. This was why his power failed. A stolen spell is never rightly wielded.

  “For the eryl’s failure to kill the Shriker, Queen Shaleedyn caught him in the oak. The Sylth Queen’s punishments are swift as a night storm.”

  “But you said she saved his life.”

  “By the laws of the Old Magic, the queen can punish wrongdoing by turning a lyn or eryl into a four-legged creature, or one with wings or fins, she can cover them in stone or wood, but never can she take a life.”

  Hanna wrapped her cape about her, suddenly cold. The queen had imprisoned Enoch not for kicking his dog to death, but for miscasting a summoning spell that brought the Shriker back into the world. “The Shriker comes again each time there’s another dark moon,” said Hanna.

  “We said a stolen spell is never rightly wielded. The spell Enocheryl cast renews itself when the moon is swallowed by the dark. And once the beast is free, he hunts as any beast will do.”

  Eyes closed, Hanna gripped her knees and rocked back and forth. She wanted to spit the story out and be rid of it. It was dark inside her head, and it was her own night she was making.

  “Where have you gone, Hannalyn?”

  Hanna opened her eyes. “It’s a terrible story.”

  The deya tipped her golden head. “It is not a story, only part of one. It is not yet finished.”

  “I still don’t see how it can help me find Miles.”

  “Essha, Hannalyn.”

  WISE ROOT

  Deyas know by root and whispering wind where travelers go and where they’ve been.

  —THE WAY BETWEEN WORLDS

  HANNA RETURNED HOME LATE FROM HER DAY’S SEARCH, then sat at the corner table in her room paging through The Way Between Worlds. There was little in the book to help her understand Shree’s words. How would knowing Enoch’s tale help her find Miles? She went through the story again and again in her mind as her cup of thool cooled beside the book. Both Enoch and Miles were shepherds’ sons, and both wanted to learn the ways of magic from the meers on Othlore. Had Miles wanted to go to Othlore to learn a magic spell to break the Shriker’s curse, as Enoch had? He’d never told her that.

  There was more to Enoch’s tale—the dog he kicked to death and the stolen spell. Miles had never stolen a spell, had he?

  She searched the pages of the Falconer’s book and found nothing more on Enoch. Shree’s tale was hers to think on, and she’d have to solve it on her own.

  Hanna bent over the pages. There had to be a way back into Attenlore. She turned to the Enness map, laid the Attenlore map atop, and shuddered. The shadow realm had grown. How could it have? She blinked at the dark drawing. Uthor Vale had broadened, spilling over like black oil from a bucket. The Falconer must have changed the map before he died. Hanna looked closer. The meadow near the south rim of the vale was darkened. The same flowered field where Wild Esper had left her, she was sure. For there was the three-spired Oak King standing near the stream. Even under the chalk shadow she could see the place where the queen’s unicorn was slain. She quickly turned the page, heart pounding, eyes stinging.

  On page 352 she found at last an opening spell. A small thing, but she’d use anything she could to help her open the way to Attenlore. She practiced the spell silently, knowing better than to say the words aloud here in her room.

  The next day she stopped while searching in the wood with Gurty to say the spell.

  “Open as you have before,

  Let the traveler through the door.

  From this opening begin,

  The only way out

  Is in.”

  Gurty cackled. “Charms, is it now?” she said. “And what will you be doing next?”

  Hanna blushed and walked on.

  “You’ll not find a way by charms alone,” said Gurty.

  “Why not?”

  “Wouldn’t the Falconer have said the verse himself if that were all that was needed?”

  Hanna thought on this and knew the old woman was right. The Falconer would have used any powers at hand to rescue Miles. They crossed into the meadow and passed a rotting cedar stump with a young tree growing up from the middle.

  A cool breeze played over the poppies and wild lavender that grew here and there in bright patches. It was a beautiful place, but in her mind she saw the meadow in Attenlore. It was darkened over now if the Falconer’s map was right. She thought of the border of the shadow realm, a border she must cross, and bit the inside of her cheek.

  “Where have you put your mind, girl?” asked Gurty.

  “With Miles.”

  “Ah, and that’s where it should be.” Gurty’s face took on a thoughtful look under her gray, blowing hair. She paused, reached into her pocket, and pulled out a small blue root. “I have no real power,” she admitted. “And I’ve been more a burden than a help to you.”

  “That’s not true,” said Hanna, but she felt a pang of guilt, for she’d been thinking just that most of the day, and she’d said the same to the Falconer. “What have you got there?”

  “Wise root. It’s from the azure tree—the tallest and oldest trees in Noor.” She pressed it into Hanna’s hand. “If you should stumble into Uthor Vale, a place a-crawl with devilish trolls, shadow wraiths, and skullen snakes,” she said, waving her hands about, “this root will come in handy.” Gurty brushed the dry moss from her skirt. She squinted at the pale sun, which hung like a white disk now behind the heavy clouds.

  “When would I need the root?” asked Hanna.

  “Well now, how would I know that?” huffed Gurty. “But when you do, crush it and spit on it to make a paste for wounds.”

  “Why don’t you keep it with you? It’s light to carry, and you know how to use it, and … you’re coming with me, aren’t you, Gurty?”

  The old woman cocked her head. “I don’t know which way the fire’s leaning yet,” she said. “And anywise, those who cause the curse must break it, and the breaking’s in the blood.”

  “But I didn’t cause the curse,” she said. “It was Rory Sheen did that. And I didn’t ask to be born a Sheen, or to be a dreamwalker, or to have mismatched eyes, or …” She gulped in a breath. No one outside the family knew that she dreamwalked. She hadn’t meant to say it aloud, not any of it, but now that the words were out, she let the thought behind them pour out too, as the last bit of water will roll down in droplets when the pitcher’s nearly empty. “Gurty,” she whispered. “It wasn’t my witch eyes that made him call me, was it?”

  “Your witch eyes, maybe, and you’re a Sheen. Both might be reasons for the Shriker’s call. But there’s more here for the seeing.”

  Hanna stepped back, not sure she wanted to hear what the “more” was.

  “I’ve spent years in these woods,” said Gurty. “Searching for one thing and finding another. Look.” She reached up to the giant cedar by the trail, tugged a branch down between them, and gave a knowing nod.

  “What am I to see?”

  “Why, what’s there, of course.” She wiggled the branch so the green needles wavered.

  “A branch,” said Hanna. “With smaller branches growing from it, all covered in flat green needles. But how does this answer the question about my eyes?”
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  “Use them for looking.”

  Hanna touched a twig, counted fourteen smaller twigs, all sprouting thick, flat needles. Looking closer at the one near Gurty’s hand, she noted every flat needle was made of tiny leaves growing from the stem like branches from a trunk. Each one was like a little tree the size of her fingertip. She drew back a bit and saw each twig was like a tree as well; most were the length of her middle finger. The slender branches were the same, and the branch itself, which Gurty held down. From small to large, the tree shape repeated over and over.

  Hanna rubbed the bumpy cedar frond between her fingers, letting the new thought grow inside her. She’d lived near Shalem Wood all her life and never noticed this. “Is what you’re showing me how parts of trees are like the whole of them?”

  Gurty smiled. “Aye, there’s a pattern. Your eyes work fine, I’d say.”

  “But I wasn’t asking how my eyes worked or if they worked, but what my eyes have to do with being called, or whether—”

  “Who else has the Shriker attacked?”

  Hanna started. The question had nothing to do with trees or leaves or the color of her eyes.

  “Tell me whom you know of,” said Gurty. Her voice was rough and soothing at the same time, like a gurgling stream.

  Hanna thought on the victims she knew for certain. There was the midwife and her man, then Polly Downs. The Falconer’s terrow, Furleon. And there was the queen’s unicorn.

  Hanna told her all the names she’d thought of.

  Gurty wiggled the branch. “And where’s the pattern?”

  “There is none,” said Hanna.

  The old woman let go the cedar branch, and it bounced above them in the dusky woods. Gurty sent a green-eyed look Hanna’s way. “You’re a Sheen by blood, so he may have called you anywise. But you have a loyal heart, and kind. Think on the others. Wasn’t your midwife loyal to your mother to come up mountain on a stormy night? And her husband, so love-struck that he went after the beast all by his lonesome? Wasn’t Polly loyal to Tarn? And Furleon to the wind woman? And didn’t the Sylth Queen tell us Neurreal always came whenever she called her?” Gurty nodded to herself. “I’ve a mind to say it’s love and loyalty the Shriker can’t abide.”

  The branch above was still now, and it was Hanna trembling. She was loyal to Miles and to the Falconer, and she always would be. But Gurty had said another thing. Love.

  “Who loves me?” she whispered.

  “Girl,” said Gurty, “if you don’t know that …” She turned abruptly and walked into the woodland shadows. Hanna, with hands in her pockets and questions settling on her heart, followed after.

  AFTWAN’S GIFT

  “Your master has betrayed you. And through his betrayal man’s best friend becomes his worst enemy.”

  —THE LEGEND OF THE SHRIKER

  THAT NIGHT HANNA SWEPT THE KITCHEN FLOOR AS Mother tucked young Tymm in bed and Da read by the fire. As she whisked the crumbs into a pile, she wondered over Gurty’s words. Was there a pattern here? Did the beast call those who were loving and loyal? If that was true, as it seemed to be, Enoch’s story didn’t fit the pattern.

  It was Enoch who first brought the monster back to Shalem Wood fifty years ago, Shree had told her that, and it wasn’t over love or loyalty, but through a summoning spell.

  Hanna dumped the crumbs into the trash. The beast would want to hunt Enoch down—take revenge on a dog killer like his own master, Rory Sheen. Aye, she could understand that well enough. Some he hunted, others he called. Miles had told her that. So he’d hunted Enoch, and others like Polly, like herself, he called.

  Heading down the hall, she fetched the knapsack from her room. Why call those who were loyal? She stopped in her doorway, suddenly remembering the argument she’d had with Miles the day Granda told the Shriker’s tale in the cave. Miles had insisted Rory’s dog was a loyal hound to begin with. But that was before the Darro cursed the dog.

  Back in the kitchen Hanna filled a bag with dried mushrooms and stuffed it in the rucksack. Would the monster try to summon her again at the next full moon? She couldn’t let her fear of him get in the way. It was Miles needed saving now. And if the monster called her, she’d be all the closer to finding her lost brother.

  Miles’s room was dark. No rushlight there. Still, she knew where he kept his weapons. Hanna took the hunting knife down from the high shelf and hid it in her rucksack.

  At dawn Hanna stopped halfway up mountain to catch her breath and eyed the rose-colored clouds before pressing on. Her heart lifted at the sight of the broad-winged falcon flying beneath the cloud spray. “Aetwan,” she called, waving at him. He spiraled slowly downward and perched on a pine branch.

  “You’ve come back to me,” cried Hanna.

  Aetwan cocked his head and opened his beak. A small, triangular object fell to the ground by Hanna’s feet. She stooped to pick it up and turned the triangle over so the glassy side winked in the sunlight.

  “A mirror,” said Hanna.

  “A troll glass,” corrected Aetwan.

  Hanna looked up. “What does it do?”

  “Trolls can’t look at their own likeness.”

  “Oh,” said Hanna. “What happens if they do?”

  Aetwan squawked, or laughed—Hanna couldn’t tell which. “You’ll see.”

  “You’re coming with me to find Miles, aren’t you?” She gazed up at him. Waiting. Hopeful.

  Aetwan’s neck feathers puffed out. “Can’t,” he squawked.

  “Why not? It’s your home, after all.” No one had ever told her this, but the animals and birds from Oth spoke, as Aetwan could, so she’d guessed he wasn’t hatched in Noor. The falcon still hadn’t answered her challenge. “I have to go and keep on searching for Miles,” she said. “And there’s not much time—”

  “Till the full moon,” interrupted Aetwan.

  “Only three days,” Hanna went on. “Gurty’s old and slow, and she said she may not come at all, depending on which way the fire is leaning.”

  “You are not alone,” said Aetwan.

  It was what the Falconer had said, but if Aetwan left her to cross into Oth without his company … “If you leave me, Aetwan, I’ll be very much alone.”

  “Look around,” screeched Aetwan. It was a command as only he could give it, and she obeyed instantly, looking left and right, behind her and before her, and lastly up and down. But she saw no help at hand. “What do you mean?”

  Aetwan flapped his wings impatiently. “Remember,” he said.

  He took off again, flying awkwardly at first, then gaining grace as he gained speed.

  “Come back,” called Hanna. She watched his pumping wings as he ascended at a sharp angle, his body growing smaller and smaller until he disappeared behind the clouds. “You’re always leaving,” she whispered, “all of you.” She was staring at the clouds as if they’d swallowed not only Aetwan, but Miles, the Falconer, and Granda—taken from her everyone she’d ever truly loved. “And what have you given back?” she asked them.

  Up the path in the sunlit maple grove Hanna stopped and peered through the trees. “Be vigilant and look for the signs,” the Falconer had said. “These signs are not seen with the eye alone. The seeker must look with the eye of the heart.” How was she to do that? Did it mean to both see and feel? She stepped under the blowing branches and took the path that breezed before her, where the leaves were trembling.

  “Such woods as these would make a stranger sleep.

  But you they will awake.

  Such winds as these would chill an enemy.

  But friend, they will warm thee.”

  “Who speaks?” asked Hanna. Her skirts rustled as if a tender hand were brushing against them, yet she could see no one. There was a stirring all about her, and the maple trees gave up their foliage to it. The breeze danced with red leaves and brown and yellow.

  “In such hours as these a world is born.”

  Hanna suddenly knew the voice, and she looked about for the wind woma
n.

  “Wild Esper,” she called, turning round and round. “Where are you?”

  “Where you are,” Esper breezed.

  “But I can’t see you.”

  “See me.”

  Hundreds of leaves swirled before Hanna’s feet. In a rush of colors they lifted like a great wheel before her. Light shone from the center of the turning, as if the sun were caught in the hub of the wheel. Hanna shaded her eyes against the brightness. From the center of the wheel she heard the wind woman chanting the entrance charm she’d read in the Falconer’s book.

  “Open as you have before,

  Let the traveler through the door.

  From this opening begin,

  The only way out

  Is in.”

  Hanna felt herself being sucked toward the wheel, but she dug her feet into the soft forest floor. She didn’t want to go back to Attenlore without Gurty or Aetwan to accompany her. But the swirling passage, which had been as massive as the miller’s grinding wheel, was closing, just as the tunnel had closed around Miles long ago in the deeps. She knew she must go now, and go alone, or not at all. Hanna gripped the bowstring across her chest. She wasn’t feeling brave just now, but she loved Miles, and for that she stepped into the whirl.

  Her feet went out from under her as she was sucked inside. She spun helpless, with hundreds of swirling leaves around her. Blue sky, red leaves, brown earth, evergreens, swirled into a central glow until earth and sky and head and foot were all the same. The burning at the center filled her. Heat spread over her tumbling body. She let out a scream, then fell suddenly facedown into something soft and damp and very cold.

  THE DARK LANDS

  —THE BOOK OF EOWEY

  After the eruption of Mount Eenadd the people turned against eOwey and made sacrifices to the mountain.

  AT THE EDGE OF THE FROZEN MARSH MILES STOOD BLOODY and victorious over the slain gullmuth. The monster lay beneath his paws, its broken neck twisted, its dead black eye staring upward.