Anthea wasn’t ready to rise. “What do you want?” she whispered.
The figure stood still a moment longer, then came to kneel beside her. He was unbelievably handsome, with large, slightly slanting eyes, a high forehead and long, straight nose, high cheekbones above gauntness, and a full, sensuous mouth. The lips curved in a courtly smile. “We have need of you.” His voice was rich and melodious, and his eyes drew her, compelling.
A thrill coursed through her; it was just like every folk tale she’d ever heard or read, and she didn’t doubt for a moment what he was. She rose slowly, as unable to resist as to think, while the Faerie lord’s gaze was on her.
He was taller than Anthea by a head or more. He gazed down into her eyes, smiling, and she felt herself being drawn into the huge, dark pools of his pupils ... .
Then he turned away, moving silently into the depths of the cave, depths that she had not realized were there, and it came to her that this was not a hill, but a barrow, a hollow hill that her people had long thought to be Neolithic burial sites, but older people had known for the dwelling places of the Faerie Folk. She followed the elfin lord, her heart hammering in her breast.
The door was set into the sides of the tunnel, and seemed as old as the rock around it, made of dark, rich oak, waxed to a gloss that seemed to let one look deeply into the grain. The Faerie lord turned the lock with a huge key and stepped aside to bow her in. Anthea followed, heart hammering in her breast; how could anyone come through that door, if the Faerie locked it behind him? Once she was through, she could never depart without his leave—but curiosity impelled her forward as much as his compulsion, and she could not even think of turning back.
Lock it he did, then stepped on past her, murmuring, “Come.”
She followed, marveling at the richness of the paneled walls through which she moved. An archway opened to her left, affording a brief glimpse of a drawing room elegantly appointed in an antique style, but the Faerie lord strode past it without a glance, and Anthea had to follow.
They came to the end of the hall, and another rich old door, partly open. The Faerie pushed on through it, and Anthea, following, stepped into a chamber so wide that the huge canopied bed in its center seemed small. The walls were hung with tapestries; between them, walnut panelling glowed. The floor was covered with an Oriental carpet, and the bed-hangings were satin and velvet.
The Faerie lord knelt beside the bed, taking the hand of a lady who seemed so exquisitely fragile that she seemed to float between the sheets. Her hair was long, and so light a blond that it seemed almost silver. Her face was delicate, fine-boned and high-cheeked, and her eyes were huge, her lips red and full. But those high cheeks were hollow, and her skin was very pale. One look at her made Anthea feel heavy and lumpen—but also made her feel healthy.
Magnificently healthy, when she saw the emaciated infant lying on its mother’s breast, eyes still closed, little mouth working at its fist. Its crying was so thin as to sound like the mewing of a tiny kitten. Anthea stepped forward, a wordless cry drawn from her, reaching out toward the baby—but she halted a few feet away, not daring to touch something so fragile.
The Faerie lady looked up at her, and once again Anthea felt herself drawn into huge, dark eyes. “I am height Lolorin,” the lady murmured in a low, husky voice, weak with strain, “and this is my lord, Qualin. Wilt thou nurse our child?”
Anthea looked up, eyes wide—and realized that the man, though he still knelt, was strung as tightly as a violin, seeming ready to leap, just barely held in check by Lolorin’s hand on his, his eyes burning as he gazed at his child. “I ... I cannot,”
Anthea protested feebly. “I ... I am not a mother, and have no milk to give.”
“That, we can amend,” the Faerie lord said, his voice deep and cavernous, and Anthea felt a thrill of alarm mixed with a dreadful yearning. “A small spell, and thy breasts will swell with milk.”
“But ... but I am a virgin ...”
“Thy breasts will take no heed,” Lolorin assured her, “and the milk will be good.”
But Anthea was in a quandary. The sight of the infant pulled at her, so deeply that pity and her longing to help it became an almost physical pain—but ... “I am young, and have tasted so little of life! I have suitors, I have barely begun to live ...”
The Faerie lord stirred. “ ‘Tis true. Name thy nurse’s fee, and thou shalt have it.”
“Oh, don’t speak of fees!” Anthea cried. “If the baby grows strong, that will be enough!”
Qualin’s eyes glowed, but Lolorin said, as though the words were dragged out of her, “She doth speak without thought. Consider well, mortal, for if thou dost consent, thou wilt be bound to us for a year and a day—’ twill be that long at least ere my babe can subsist on fare other than thine. And human milk is vital, for the aura of thy own kind hath enervated the folk of Faerie. We have weakened with age, and the decline of mortal folks’ belief in us. So tenuous hath our existence become that Faerie mothers’ milk hath grown too thin to sustain an infant long.”
“We would not ask this of thee,” said Qualin, “save that our child must have a human to nurse, and thou art the only woman who hath chanced to come within our purview; I lack the vitality to go abroad to sue. Yet thou hast come near our hollow hill, alone and at night—and thou art one of those born with the power of magic about thee.”
“I?” Anthea gasped.
“Indeed. Hast thou never felt it?”
“No, never!” But then Anthea remembered her contact with Sir Roderick, and his mention that she could only see him because of an inborn Talent, which might fade as she matured. Apparently it had not—or she had not grown up as much as she had thought.
“ ’Tis that quality of magic,” Qualin said, “that touch of the fey, no matter how minor, that doth enable thee to see and speak with us of the Faery world.”
“ ’Twill be long ere another so gifted haps to come within the aura of our powers,” Lolorin murmured. “It will, I doubt not, be too late for my babe. Wilt thou not give aid? For if thou dost not, surely he may die!”
“Oh, do not lay such a charge upon my soul!” Anthea buried her face in her hands, torn “I would not see your baby die—truly, I wish to save him—but I wish to save my own life, too! I wish to dance, and to speak with other girls. I wish to be have young men fall in love with me, and woo me, and court me; I wish to dance at balls and drive in the Park!”
“ ’Tis only a year,” Qualin protested. “Your life will still be there when thou dost return.”
“Nay,” said a deep voice from the doorway. “It will be vastly changed.”
Anthea spun about, and Qualin surged to his feet with an oath.
There, in glowing silver armor, stood a knight with a drawn sword in his right hand—and, tucked in the elbow of his left, a head!
But it was a living head, if a ghostly head can be said to live—and its lips moved as it spoke. “The lady is in my care, and I will not permit her to be harmed.” The head wore no helmet, and the rugged face was young and handsome, though it too glowed silver beneath a wavy mass of hair.
“Sir Roderick!” Anthea cried. “You have found your head!”
“Yes, Anthea—and I must thank you for bringing me to the battlefield on which I lost it.” Sir Roderick held his sword out before him, where it floated, point fixed on Qualin. Then he took the head in both hands and set it on his shoulders, giving a half turn as though to lock it in place. Qualin took the opportunity to lunge, but the sword parried easily and riposted, sending Qualin back on guard.
“How didst thou come here!” he spat.
“I followed my kinswoman,” the ghost answered. “Blood calls to blood, and I had but to answer that call. Your locks mean naught to me, for I am a ghost.” He smiled grimly, his eyes never leaving Qualin’s. “And know, Anthea, that you will pass far more than a single year here—
for though it may seem only twelve months to you, in the world outside, seven years will pass. Your friends will be matrons and young mothers; the gentlemen so smitten with you will be husbands burdened with the management of their estates. Your aunt will be seven years older, if she does not pine away for grief at your disappearance.”
“Aunt Trudy! Oh, I could never do that!” Anthea turned to Qualin. “Is this true?”
“It is,” he said reluctantly, eyes still on the ghost. “And who art thou, stranger, who comes thus to imperil mine heir?”
“Her ancestral ghost, who has known and cherished her since childhood. I do not wish your child any harm, but I will not see my own deprived of youth and the few carefree years of romance God grants to her. A vaunt, eldritch lord, and stand aside! This lady is not for you!”
“I shall not let her be torn from me!” Qualin ground out, and lunged forward.
“No,” Anthea screamed—but swords not of steel met with a fearful clash ...
And held. They stuck together as though they were magnets of opposite poles, and an eerie silver light played over both blades, melding them together. Qualin spat an oath and wrenched at his, but it would not budge. “What magic have you wrought, fell specter?”
“No enchantment of mine.” Sir Roderick, too, was wrenching at his blade. “Some other force comes. O glow upon our swords! You are a spirit of your own form!”
“Even so.” The voice was a thrumming in the air, a deep vibration within their skulls. “I am a spirit foreign to the land, but strong enough withal, especially on such a night as this. Give over, Faerie lord! Give over, ghost! For I shall hold thee bound till thou dost cry ‘Hold, enough!’”
“Never shall I bow so!” Qualin raged. “What hellspawn hath brought thee here?”
“A spawn of mortal folk, and not of Hell at all,” said a resonant voice behind Anthea. She spun about with a gasp, and saw a gentleman in breeches and Hessian boots, though his coat and neckcloth were gone and his shirt torn wide open, showing a manly, muscular chest. “Roman!” she cried, then blushed. “I mean, Mr. Crafter!”
“The same, Miss Gosling.” But Roman’s gaze was fixed on Qualin and the ghost. “I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure.”
“Wouldst thou speak as though in a drawing room, thou fool?” the Faerie lord snapped.
“Why not?” Roman said, with airy disregard of the circumstances. “We may as well be civilized, after all, since we cannot do one another harm. Anthea, would you do the honors?”
Anthea noticed the use of her Christian name alone, but knew it was no time to charge him with a breach of etiquette. “Mr. Roman Crafter, may you be pleased to make the acquaintance of Qualin, a lord of Faerie, and his lady, Lolorin, with their child. The knight is my old friend, Sir Roderick le Gos, late of Windhaven Manor.”
“Quite late, I should judge, from the cut of your armor.” Roman looked Sir Roderick up and down. “Still, it is becoming; you must give me the name of your tailor. I thank you for your kind intercession on behalf of Miss Anthea, Sir Roderick.”
“It is my pleasure,” the knight responded, “for I am privileged to think of her as my ward, though not in the eyes of the law—and you shall have to answer to me, Mr. Crafter, if you wish to know her better.”
“Why, Sir Roderick!” Anthea protested, blushing furiously.
“I gather he is the senior male of your house,” Roman inferred.
“If you are being so civil as to make introductions,” Qualin ground out, “might we know the name and style of this creature who has bound our swords?”
“My apologies,” Roman murmured. “He is a creature of the sea, and I made his acquaintance during a storm in the tropics. We got on famously, and he has chosen to accompany me for a brief space. In fact, it is through him that my cousin purchased my rise from powder monkey to midshipman, and thereby to ensign and, eventually, captain.”
“Yet he advanced by his own ability,” the spirit hummed. “Call me, as he does, merely ‘Erasmus.’ ”
“Saint Elmo’s Fire!” Anthea cried.
“Excellent, Miss Gosling,” Roman said, with surprised pleasure. “Not too many landlubbers know the term, or that ‘Elmo’ is the shortened form of ‘Erasmus.’ Yes, he has that name among the superstitious, though to tell you the truth, he has as little to do with saints as with demons—though I promise you, he can give living mortals quite a shock. Yet he seems to have taken a fancy to my inquisitive turn of mind.”
“And to your boldness and talent in dealing with spirits,” Erasmus hummed. “What say you, Roman? Shall I free these two banty roosters?”
“Banty roosters!” Sir Roderick choked.
“You will have to forgive my friend,” Roman apologized. “He has taken up many idioms that he learned from me in my youth—oh, very well, my early youth. But the question he asks is valid. Will you both sheathe your swords and try to deal in reason, if he releases you?”
“Well, I will attempt it,” Sir Roderick huffed.
“And I.” But Qualin’s eyes glittered dangerously. “Yet I warn thee, I will not permit the lady to be taken from us, if she doth choose to stay.”
Roman glared at him for a space, then said, “Fair enough. She is, after all, her own person. It is your decision, Anthea, and we will all abide by it. Agreed, gentlemen?”
Ghost and Faerie grumbled assent, and the glow drifted away from their swords to hover, a sphere of light, by Roman.
Anthea paled, and almost cried out in protest. Was she to be left without support in this? Though she did have to admit that she did not want to be compelled to a course of action she would not like, it would nonetheless be wonderful if someone else could only tell her what it was she wanted—and could be right.
“Please acquaint me with the nature of the contretemps,” Roman said. “Apparently the issue is the freedom of Miss Anthea Gosling. But why should there be any contention against it?”
“First tell me,” Qualin growled, “who you are, and how you came into my hill.”
“I am Roman Crafter, late of His Majesty’s Navy, and later of the United States of America.”
“What is that?”
“A country in the West, beyond the Isles and the ocean.”
“It cannot be.” Qualin’ s eyes burned. “Mortal eyes cannot see the Western Haven.”
“Quite right; the only ones we see are quite mortal, I assure you, and though they have their own population of elementals and spirits, none of them are of your race. As for myself, I had the bad fortune to be impressed into the British Navy, and the good fortune to meet Miss Anthea Gosling. When Erasmus told me that she had been spirited away by an a utter cad, I rode as quickly as I could to overtake them. I lost their track on the road, but Erasmus cast about and found them for me, and I arrived in time to spare her the worst of his attentions. Yet when I’d done with him, she had fled, and I was quite concerned for her further safety. Erasmus was good enough to seek you out again and unravel the spell that barred the entrance to this hill. I felt your presence and followed.”
Anthea stared. “But—the door ... the lock ...”
Roman frowned. “What door?”
“That huge old door in the hillside! He used a six-inch key to open it!”
Roman shook his head, gaze still on Qualin. “Only a bush, and a cave mouth.”
Anthea’s breath hissed in. “A glamour! It was an illusion that Qualin cast.” She looked up at the tall Faerie lord. “Did you think I would be more willing to help if I thought you lived in a rich house?”
“Aye, certes. If ’tis not so, thou art quite unlike all others of thy kind.” Qualin’s gaze stayed on Roman.
“Then,” Anthea breathed, “everything else I see is also a glamour. Take it away, please! You cannot expect me to dwell in the midst of a lie!”
“Thy kind ever have,” the Faerie lord snappe
d; but Lolorin murmured, “My lord, I prithee—let her see what is real.”
Qualin stood stock-still for a moment; then he shrugged, tossing his head. In the blink of an eye, the tapestries and carpet were gone, as were the rich wooden panels behind them. Damp rock walls showed in their place, webbed with niter where they merged into the cave’s roof. The four-poster bed was gone; Lolorin lay on a heap of old straw atop a rocky shelf, and her coverlet was several old furs sewn together, with patches of hair missing. Her gown was only linen, stained with age, and Qualin’s glorious raiment had faded to the dun colors of an old, threadbare tunic and hose.
“This is the truth thy kind so praise,” Lolorin said. “Why, I cannot tell—I had liefer live with glamour.”
“So would most of us.” Anthea felt her heart sink.
Even Roman looked somber, but he said, “You cannot expect a gentlewoman to live under such conditions!”
“Glamour will warm and comfort her,” Lorlorin protested.
“The lady is safe.” Qualin’ s tone was brittle.
“Be sure we shall not maltreat her; we have too great a need of her.”
“Need?” Roman turned to Anthea with a frown. “Would you acquaint us with the nature of that exigency, Miss Anthea? Surely you did not come into this hill of your own free will.”
“But I did, Mr. Crafter,” Anthea explained, “at least, into the cave that is the mouth of this tunnel. I sought to hide from Lord Delbert ... .” She shuddered at the thought of him.
“Do not fear,” Roman said quickly. “He is fled to the Continent, and will trouble you no further.” His eyes hardened. “I made quite sure of that.”
Anthea nearly asked what Roman could have done that would have made him so certain, but her courage failed her.
“I take it,” Roman went on, “that Lord Qualin then appeared, to entice you further in.”
“Why, yes,” Anthea admitted, “though I can scarcely blame him, since he did it to protect his own child.”
“Child?” Roman glanced sharply about the room. “Ah, yes!
The Crafters Book Two Page 17
