The Tales of Two Seers

by R. Cooper

  The horns stopped.

  “It is too soon,” Cal said insolently, afraid of the silence and what this meant. “Please. You can’t take me yet. I should have a night. At least a night. It’s little to you but everything to me. Please, my lady.”

  Voice as silver as her light, the Queen replied, with far more patience than he likely deserved, “Callalily.”

  Whatever else she would have said was lost to her hiss of surprise and the outraged cries of her courtiers when a great wolf leapt forward and planted itself between the Queen and Cal.

  The wolf was black and gray, with spots of white in its raised, spiked fur, and paws bigger than any wolf’s that Cal had glimpsed before. It was not far in size from the bear. Its growl shook the oaks and silenced the members of the procession, who halted as they reached for weapons. The wolf’s teeth were white in the glow from the Faery Queen, huge and sharp and threatening.

  Cal went still as stone.

  The Queen raised her chin and narrowed her beautiful eyes.

  The wolf lowered its head as if preparing to leap into battle, and growled again in warning, before taking a step back that made it clear where it stood.

  Between Cal and anyone else.

  This was no ordinary wolf.

  “Raymond,” Cal murmured urgently, and darted a look back to his human, only to find his human gone. Of course. Large, beautiful Raymond, who had no fear of the Wildwood and who would not marry any other than Cal. Raymond’s clothes and his boots and his distant axe all that was left of him in that body. Cal turned back to the wolf braced for bloodshed, his challenger and protector, his knight in wolf’s clothing. “Raymond,” Cal said again, and crawled forward to dig his hand into the coarse fur at the wolf’s haunch.

  The great wolf did not snap at him, but also did not stand down.

  The Queen’s smile held a tinge of sadness. “I had looked forward to your long visit, Callalily, but I cannot fault your taste. He is exquisite, a truly magnificent beast. Foolish for love as well as stubborn, but I suppose no one else would do for you.”

  “He wants me,” Cal told her breathlessly, still marveling at it. The wolf turned to look at him, its growl fading and growing soft. Its eyes were piercing. “He’s mine and I did not know.” Cal’s fingers sank into fur so deep it had no end. “Raymond, you are mine. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Yes. I wonder that he did not act sooner, since the strength of his claim was enough to draw me here now.” The Queen tossed her head, her brown and gold hair falling like water around her shoulders. “I had hoped I would arrive in time for my son’s wedding, but it seems I was too late.”

  The wolf turned sharply toward her again.

  “Wedding?” Cal echoed faintly, then dug his fingers even deeper into black and gray fur to soothe and calm his beast. “He… stayed for me. Raymond-who-is-both-man-and-wolf. He saw my two worlds and he built a cottage between them, let me grow flowers there but did not tell me he made that home to wait for me. Raymond,” Cal raised his voice and used the name that had been offered to him freely. The wolf stiffened. “Did you wed me in your heart when you took me?” Cal demanded, growing softer with each word. “Was that your vow?” Cal should have been furious but found he was smiling again. “Was that to protect me, or you? Tsk. There is no Devil in you, woodsman. Only a wolf’s faithfulness.”

  Cal focused on his mother again as he got to his feet. “He will not like the Court. Not for seven years.”

  His mother’s grin was all teeth. “This cottage with flowers… I would like to see it. Midsummer is a good time of year.” The wind stirred. “Will your husband consent to be a man again, or do we parley over the head of a beast?”

  “I don’t think he trusts you not to vanish with me,” Cal revealed, not hiding his pleasure at saying it.

  Raymond huffed.

  The Queen deigned to lower her head to consider the wolf at her son’s feet. “It was your claim that brought me here, wolf-who-is-also-a-man. A claim strong enough to tell me my son is wanted as he should be wanted. That is what his father and I wished for him. I had hoped it would be with me in my realm, but Callalily has his own answer. Will you, now?”

  The fae in the Queen’s procession turned their heads away in disgust or discretion at the shifting, stretching meld of fur and flesh. Cal watched, fascinated. Raymond groaned, long and aching, and then stood as a man again, naked and drenched in silver.

  He clenched his hands and lifted his chin, and Cal darted in front of him before Raymond could say something brave and reckless. If this also shielded Raymond from covetous faery eyes, Cal could not feel sorry about it.

  “Mother,” Cal started, prepared to negotiate, but Raymond slipped an arm around his waist and spoke with his mouth above Cal’s ear.

  “Callalily of the Wildwood and Hillston is my mate,” Raymond said boldly, and nosed at Cal’s temple. “Even if you take him, this would be true.” His hand tightened at Cal’s waist, the only sign that he was still worried. Cal put a hand over his and Raymond pulled him closer. But he stopped his nuzzling to ask a question of the Queen. “Is that claim enough to keep him with me?”

  “Aye,” answered the Queen, while Cal’s heart stopped and cheers went up around them.

  Cal twisted around so he could take Raymond’s face in his hands and look at him. Raymond’s stare was as beautiful as ever. His voice was still a rumble.

  “Claim enough to keep you here, but not with me if you don’t wish it,” Raymond told him, a silly mortal creature, even with the magic in his bones.

  “I have wished it since you gave me your name,” Cal reminded him with an odd sort of patience. He supposed he could be patient now. Time was a gift and he would not squander it, but he could slow and allow himself to revel in Raymond’s devotion. He smiled giddily, which made Raymond frown with suspicion but Cal decided to be generous and ignore it. “I am your mate, you say, to steal my heart and keep it with you. Wolf-words from a wolf-man. Words you gave to my mother and not to me.”

  “Callalily,” Raymond said, wary now, blissfully wary of Cal, but not of priests or bears or queens.

  “Hmm.” Cal nodded, still giddy. “I will miss the years at my mother’s side. It gives me joy to see her. But I can speak with her now, and I have a boon to ask of her.”

  Raymond grimaced. “I told you I did not need a wife, or some—"

  “A husband.” Cal clucked his tongue and then put his palm to Raymond’s cheek. “You need a husband, and there are other ways to bind us, if the Church in all its holiness will not.”

  The worry eased from Raymond’s expression. “You are already that to me,” he explained calmly, if gruffly, though he should have explained it months ago. “I will only have the one. It is our way.”

  “You are going to have to tell me more about your ‘way,’ woodsman.” Cal patted Raymond’s cheek, then took his hand away to gesture behind him. “Since you have already met my father, come and meet my mother…. Perhaps get your clothes on first.”

  Raymond gave a start and glanced down as though he had forgotten his nakedness.

  Cal had not. “But do not get too attached to them,” he added in a whisper. “Your bed awaits me.”

  Raymond bared his teeth in a silent snarl. “Our bed.”

  Cal was alive and mortal and married. Married to a wolf, and happier than he could ever have been, even in the court of the Faery Queen.

  “Our bed,” he agreed softly, fervently, with all the passion of his stunted half-fae soul, before throwing himself into Raymond’s arms, where he would stay for so much longer than one night.

  Tales Before Bedtime

  THE CIGARETTE in the silver tray next to the typewriter had burned to the end and turned to cold ash. Matches as well as a lighter, equally silver and costly, rested, forgotten, beside them. The tumbler and bottle looked more recently touched, whiskey in the bottom of each, but not much. Jacob tasted none in his mouth, however, and unclenched his jaw in order to lick his lips. His
spit was metallic, unpleasant, so he swallowed the rest of the liquor in the glass before polishing off the last of the bottle.

  Fine whiskey shouldn’t burn, but it was fire down his throat and in his stomach. Jacob set the bottle down with less care than he would have if he had been drunk, then closed his eyes to catch his breath before he reopened them to consider the typewriter.

  He didn’t read the words on the page still in the machine, or any on the stack on the floor. He didn’t need to. Right now, they were fresh, and his vision was too full of another time and place. He rubbed at the corner of one eye, then turned his head to look out at a view of nighttime Paris.

  Rain fell in sheets down the glass, obscuring everything but distant lights. That was fitting, even for a reluctant and sober prophet.

  Jacob smiled for a fraction of a second before a shiver hit him, and then another. His fingertips were cold, and so were his toes, which was unusual enough to bring his attention back to himself. The delicate metal chair that matched the metal and glasswork table he used for a desk was frozen to the touch. He was also barefoot, and had sat down sometime after noon, apparently without stopping to button his shirt—or even to put one on over his undershirt.

  At least he had pants on. The real wonder was that Kaz hadn’t thrown a blanket over him or pulled him from the horrid work long enough to lead him to a hot bath.

  Rather fussy, that bird. Inclined to flutter over Jacob and not himself, until he’d develop a headache and shut himself up in a darkened bedroom and finally sleep in a way that even a golden peacock needed to do once in a while.

  The doorway leading into the flat was dark, meaning if Kaz was home, he was alone and not in the mood for guests. He rarely was, these days, not in the flat, though he would go out to parties after performances when he felt it prudent.

  Jacob flicked another glance to the blurry skyline visible through Kaz’s decadent wall of glass, then got to his feet. Several joints protested. He felt things more in the rain. Even thinking that reminded him of his grandfather, complaining every morning all through the winter, anticipating his winter complaints during the summer.

  Jacob surprised himself with a snort of laughter, then another at the idea of his grandfather taking a tour of Kazimir’s velvet-and-silks flat. His breath was visible, the tiniest huff of steam.

  The temperature alone should have earned Jacob a visit from his golden bird, all pouts and cups of tea with slender silver handles. That would have amused his grandfather, too, and perhaps made him despair, a little.

  Jacob might have played the part of a mistress, if he had bothered to dress or shave or make himself presentable. In other regrettably sober moments, Jacob had looked within himself for some sort of shame, but the truth was, this was the least shameful thing any human or being could ever know. If Jacob was kept, as fairies sometimes giggled, then so be it. He knew the truth of the arrangement.

  Kaz needed care far more than Jacob. If Kaz had made it through a performance but gone directly to the bedroom upon arriving home, then he wasn’t well.

  The human world took its toll on them all, the fairies and the elves and the lonely imp child, and the humans, too. Each day were more fears, a rising dread that sugar and champagne could not banish. Kazimir the Great saw it, felt it, threaded it into his golden voice to make audiences weep.

  Jacob stumbled forward on chilled, numb toes to the carpeted, comfortable warmth of the main room, leaving the single light on the balcony to burn. He found the path to the bar easily despite the near darkness, downed bourbon because it was the first bottle he curled his fingers around.

  Satisfied, if not any warmer, he made his way to the kitchen. Switching on the light revealed a tray with uneaten toast and an egg—his neglected breakfast. But his stomach made not a peep. Kazimir should have interrupted him to chide him about this and hadn’t. That was worrying.

  Jacob left the kitchen for the bedroom, pausing at the sight of Kazimir’s long, lovely body curled onto its side, Kaz’s face hidden under a pillow. Kaz had stripped off his evening clothes and left them in a puddle on the floor. His robe had slipped and twisted to bare his exquisite shoulders as well as his legs and a hint of his ass, and the glow of his skin was all the light Jacob needed.

  Beautiful did not do Kazimir justice. Kazimir could go without sleep and drink nothing but vodka or wine and look fresh as a daisy, although, these days, Kaz largely subsisted on sugary black tea and toast with honey. Jacob often teased Kaz about his nervous stomach, volunteered to peel grapes for him if Kaz should desire it, handfeed him apples and cheeses. Kaz usually batted him away then pulled him back, called him ridiculous, then suffered through a caramel or two to make Jacob happy.

  The humans who had once thought to own Kaz had likely convinced themselves that Kazimir did not feel hurt and so could not be hurt. His pain was rarely obvious. But his glow was fainter, and his breathing unsteady as if his dreams were restless.

  Jacob crept forward to pull a fur from the foot of the bed over Kazimir’s lower body. The peacock immediately curled into it, cooing from beneath his pillow before going silent once again. He should have been able to handle the cold better than Jacob, but this, Jacob wouldn’t tease him for. Jacob’s body was still back in the mud most of the time. He was used to the cold, and French rain, and not lifting his head because there was nothing to see but gray and the not-yet-dead.

  That Jacob had not died with them was absurd. The mouthy, troublemaking cocksucker was still around when others were not, because G-d had a funny sense of humor, or for no reason at all, or for a thousand other possibilities that had ceased to exist when Jacob had gone to a party at the behest of a friend and for the liquor, and found himself watching a shining, male Cleopatra dare a man to try to hurt him, with all the confidence of someone who had been hurt by much worse.

  Then that unearthly ibis had kissed Jacob and asked for his heart.

  Jacob’s heart was not pure or light. Neither was it a lion’s. It should have been safely buried in mud on reclaimed farmland. But Jacob had dragged it from the earth with his own two reckless hands at the suggestion of a sad beauty—at the demand of a sad beauty, because Jacob had grown up with Ivanhoe, and Arthurian tales, and Robin Hood, and it always betrayed him.

  Jacob had spent over a decade swimming in whiskey for a reason. He’d gone to war for the same reason—or maybe because he’d been the boy who loved Sir Walter Scott too much. He didn’t like to look to the past. Or to the future. Or any of the possible in-betweens. But he had no choice now. He had pledged himself to Kazimir the Great, a firebird, a muse despite himself, and the visions would not stop. Jacob wrangled them into stories both tragic and silly, and left them, imperfect, embarrassing, damp with tears and torn through with frustration, for Kaz to keep.

  Jacob was not as drunk as he would like to be. He never was, anymore, because alcohol held them back, the dreams and the pasts and the what-were-to-comes. Jacob was not a great writer. In his stories, he kept trying to capture what could not, or would not, be captured, but Kaz kept them all, regardless. If Jacob left them out for Kaz to find, Kaz would stow them away, perhaps into the overflowing satchel beneath this very bed.

  Jacob did not go back to hide the one he had finished today. He went into the bathroom to splash water on his less-than-impressive face and make himself suitable for Kaz’s bed, cleaner if not clean, before leaving his trousers on one of the rugs and reentering the bedroom.

  The rain was audible, but only just, like a conversation in another room. The curtains were drawn over the window to keep in the warmth or to leave the room dark.

  Jacob clucked his tongue before bending over to gently nudge one perfect, bony shoulder.

  “Under the covers, please, golden bird.”

  For long moments, there was nothing, then a sigh and one arm slipping over to Jacob’s side of the bed.

  Jacob tried another nudge. “I can’t join you in bed until you are in bed, lovely one.”

  “Flattery,�
�� Kazimir murmured dismissively in French from beneath his pillow. “Yasha, come here.” Then, with a heavier sigh, he pulled the pillow half into his arms and brought his legs up to try to hold the Jacob who wasn’t there in place.

  Jacob took the opportunity to tug the bedding down and then rearrange it over Kazimir’s body, replacing the fur throw when he was finished. The back of Kazimir’s neck and some fine blond hair was visible. Kazimir was at least fifty years old, perhaps older, but there was no sign of it anywhere on him. Not even dragons aged like that, as far as Jacob knew. Only fairies did, but Kaz was no fairy.

  Or maybe he was. What did Jacob know of beings, anyway? Even most of them didn’t seem to know.

  Sometimes he thought of the humans that fairies loved, and what it would be like to grow old next to someone who would not, not for a long time. He wondered if the fairies got tired of fragile bones and wrinkled skin, or loved them more dearly because they marked time they would not have together. Jacob worried over this question like a dog with a bone, and what it was that fairies and beings like Kaz saw when they looked at aging and weary, ordinary, imperfect humans like Jacob and decided they would have them.

  The question of souls was not one Jacob could ever answer. But he wondered all the same.

  He came around the bed slowly, putting his glasses on the nightstand. He shivered once he was beneath the covers, and stayed where he was so his shudders wouldn’t disturb Kaz.

  “Sang for you before I knew you,” Kazimir complained, voice thick with sleep. He was probably not awake. “Why do you stay away?”

  Jacob was almost tempted to peek beneath the pillow. “You’re dreaming, I think.” He reached out to pull that arm over his waist.

  A hand tightened on him, drawing him closer. “Am I?” Kaz wondered with no urgency, burrowing deeper beneath his pillow and yet coming near enough for Jacob to feel his breath on his shoulder. “If weres can wait, why can’t I?”

  “The obvious answer to that is that you are not a wolf, golden bird.” Jacob spoke softly. He wanted to wriggle his hands under Kaz’s body, but his fingers were still frozen, and he didn’t want to jolt Kaz into real wakefulness. Kaz was precious this way, even with his knees almost pressed to Jacob’s stomach.