“And I’ll have the blessing of the birds,” Viviane added.
“Blessin’ of the flock. That’s what we call it. You bet you will. Plus smart advice, an’ a pal that’s not too goody-goody to do a little spyin’ for you. An’ this an’ that.”
“I want you,” Viviane said. “How much?”
“You got one of them new quarters on you? A shiny one?”
Viviane fumbled her change from a pocket of her jeans and prodded it with a forefinger. “Here we go.” Picking up the coin, she polished it on her shirt. “Oregon, two thousand and five. How’s that?”
“Perfect.” Nevermore hopped a bit nearer and held out one claw. “Fork it over.”
Viviane did.
“Okay. I just accepted your retainer, see? You get my services. I gotta take this to my bank, but I’ll be back before you miss me.” Transferring the quarter from claw to beak, Nevermore spread black wings of surprising size and flapped away.
“Gone!” A sigh escaped the small woman. “What a relief!”
“Will he come back?”
“Oh, yes. He will find you eventually. They fly awfully high, and they can see for a thousand years from up there. He has a great many contacts, too. The overworld, you know. You did not ask my advice.”
Viviane nodded. “I suppose I should have. Are you older than I am?”
“That is neither here nor there. I know how old you are, Viviane, but not how old I am. Yes, you should have. Had you done so, I would have warned you that although he is honest by his own lights—or…Or I think he may be. I mean…”
“You mean you’re not sure.” Viviane was getting impatient.
“That although Nevermore is honest by his own lights, his lights are black as his feathers. Shall we go? I will explain what you have to do on the way.”
“THIS is the spot.” The small woman fluttered above Viviane’s head. “It’s got to be, or at least I certainly hope it is. See the oaks? Stand in the circle.”
“In the fairy ring? All the mushrooms?”
“Is that what you call them? We use them for markers sometimes, in the woods. We like woods.”
Viviane nodded. “I’d heard that.”
“Now when you appear in this boy’s bedroom, you may frighten him. I hope you won’t, but you might. He’ll see a shimmer on his floor, like a pool of water there. You’ll come up through the water—you won’t get wet—and it will drain away. Don’t watch it. Watch him. If he starts—”
“I know what to do.” Viviane stepped into the ring.
“Taking his hand will be the signal. Don’t do it till he consents. You may raise your arms now. Or keep them at your sides. As you wish.”
Viviane raised them.
It seemed a typical boy’s bedroom, dimly illuminated by a night-light. A periodic table was taped to a wall, beside a picture of a president now obsolete by several terms. The small boy kneeling on his bed was dark, with black hair and shining eyes that seemed to see through her.
“Hello!” She smiled. “Don’t be afraid. I’m not going to hurt you. Or anybody.”
“There was water on my floor,” the boy said, “and you came out of it like—like—”
“A swimmer in a movie,” Viviane suggested.
“A fish jumping,” the boy said. And then, “I’m not afraid. If I were afraid, I’d yell for Miriam.”
Viviane smiled again; she had a charming smile. “That’s good. Who’s Miriam?”
“The sitter. She’s watching TV.”
“Do you like TV?” A thought had occurred to Viviane.
The boy shook his head.
“Then let me explain things another way. We’re going to do introductions, but different introductions. First I’m going to tell you my name, and then I’m going to tell you your name.”
“Like a game,” the boy said.
“Sort of like that, but it’s not a game. My name will be my name for real, and your name will be your new name, and your name for a long, long time. I’m Viviane.”
To himself the boy said, “Viviane the water lady.”
“And you’re Myrddin. It’s what your new teachers will call you.”
“I’ll get new teachers?”
Viviane nodded. “I think you’ll like them. Do you like the teachers you have now?”
“New teachers are always interesting.” Myrddin’s expression was unreadable; his eyes were brighter than ever, perhaps with excitement.
“They will be, but the things they teach you will be more interesting than they are. Have you ever wanted to be an animal?”
Myrddin only stared at her.
“A wolf, or—or a hawk.” He looked like a fledgling hawk, she thought. A hawk too young to fly. But soon…
As if he read her thought, he said, “I’d be able to fly?”
“Yes,” Viviane said, “and do lots of other wonderful things.” The small woman could fly. Did she like it?
“Why are you giving me this?”
Here it was. In spite of all she could do, Viviane sighed. “Because you’re the person who can stop a lot of bad things from happening. You’ve got a telescope on your dresser.”
His eyes darted toward it, and returned as swiftly to her.
“Without you, there won’t be any. Not ever. People will still look at the stars, but they won’t know what they are. Nobody will work out that chart of the elements. Not ever. Most kids will die of diphtheria and smallpox, now and always. People—”
“When will I start?”
“Now,” Viviane said. “Give me your hand, Myrddin.”
He offered it, she took it, and they sank until night had gone and broad daylight shone though the oaks, bathing the fairy ring in a soft green-gold radiance. The small woman landed before Myrddin, half his height.
Viviane gestured. “He’s in his pajamas. No iron, okay?”
“I know.” To Myrddin, the small woman said, “That is why we had to have Viviane fetch you—why we could not come ourselves, Myrddin, though we—would have liked to. Give me your hand? You must, or nothing else will work.”
He did, and the two of them walked away, fading out before they would have been lost among the shadows of the trees.
Hearing the fluttering of gauzy wings, Viviane turned around.
“There you are!” the small woman exclaimed. “We need you. Will you come? I know you must be anxious to get home, but—but you must. You just have to. Really.”
Viviane looked at her watch, then squinted up at the sun. “Okay, if you’ll tell me something first. Two things.”
“I…Sometimes I get mixed up.”
“I’ve noticed. Will you try? You’ve got to be honest if you want me to bail you out.”
The small woman looked stricken. “I—well…”
“You’re always honest and truthful. Except when you’re not. I’m trying to be helpful here.”
“Well—yes.”
“I’m the same way, but I want your promise. Swear you’ll answer these, and you won’t hide the truth.”
“I will,” Vivien promised, “if I can. But I may not be able to. I fib when I have no idea, mostly.”
“Don’t fib this time. If you can’t answer, say so.”
The small woman laid her hand on her heart. “Only the truth!”
She really needs me, Viviane thought. Great! Aloud she said, “First the time. I got thrown from my horse, and she was gone when I woke up, so I was out awhile. After that, I walked to these woods. That took a while. I had to hunt for a spring, and that took a while, too.”
“I understand.” The small woman smiled brightly.
“I talked with you and we went here, and I talked with that nice boy—”
“I am so glad you like him!”
“And we came back here. Et cetera, right? Well, my watch says its still one twenty-seven, so it’s stopped. Only the sun doesn’t seem to have moved either. All that stuff had to take a couple hours. Maybe more.”
“You wonder about that. N
aturally you would. We can, well, do things with time, Viviane. It’s an invariable for you. I know that.”
“Only not for you.”
Vivien shook her head.
“You put butter in the watch.” Viviane sighed. “Or else you never beat Time. When we’re through here, will you take me to the Griffin and the Mock Turtle? I always wanted to see them.”
Viviane was cheered immensely by the small woman’s puzzled look. “I will be happy to show you griffins,” she said, “once we are through with Myrddin. Mock turtles…? I really…Perhaps I can find some.”
“Don’t worry about the Mock Turtle,” Viviane told her. “We’ll get to him later. Here’s my second question. Exactly why do you need me this time? The first time was because there was iron in Myrddin’s room. But now you’ve got him, don’t you?”
Vivien nodded. “We do. This is, um, quite different. He is, you know. Older.”
Slowly Viviane nodded. “Okay.”
“More—ah—mature than you are, actually. And we—he objected…To continuing his studies, you know. And there’s still ever so much for him to learn.”
“He wants to drop out.”
“I—suppose so. It sounds…He—ah…”
“What?” Viviane set her jaw. “Tell me, or you get no more help from me.”
“Wants to go looking for you.” The gauzy wings drooped. “He cannot possibly find you, you see. He must learn much more before he can, ah…”
“Can what?”
“Search the past for people. For you. So we—it was my idea, Viviane. If you hate me for it, well, you do. We told him that if he studied, the time would come when he would see more and more of you. And—oh, I am so sorry! I never should have. And I will not tell. Not now! He must tell you himself. I…I like him, and I know you did, too. You said so. I would be…Stealing from him. I could never face myself again. Never!”
“If I go with you, he’ll tell me?”
Mutely, the small woman nodded.
“You’ll bring me back here after? Soon?”
“Yes! I promise!”
Together, they walked into the wood.
Things changed. There is no other way to say it. The trees Viviane had known all her life thinned out, and soon were no more. Strange new trees replaced them, kind trees for the most part, but secretive. The sky was a shade darker, the sun larger but not quite so bright. The air—motionless, windless air that seemed to await something new and strange—held a delicious chill. “Is this fairyland?” she asked.
At once the small woman shot ahead, turned long enough for a brief smile, and vanished among the trees.
A man’s voice shouted, “Viviane?”
“I’m here,” she said, and was at once assailed by doubts. Was she? Really? “Are you calling me?”
He ran lightly and silently, but not so silently that she caught no whisper of his coming. Then he was there, dark, hawk-nosed, and scarcely taller than she was. He dropped to his knees before her. “Oh, my lady! My dear, dearest, beloved lady of the lake. How I’ve longed for this moment!”
She crouched, bringing her face to the level of his bowed one. “You…They can do things with time. She said that. Are you Myrddin?”
He nodded. Slowly, gently, he took her hand between soft, long-fingered, brown hands that might have been a pianist’s. “I am. I’m Myrddin, my lady, your lover and your slave. Your slave no matter what may befall, and no matter what you or I may do or say.”
“I don’t want to have a slave, Myrddin.” Would he be angry? “I want a friend. A good and faithful friend.”
He looked up and smiled, perfect white teeth flashing. “Your slave and your friend, my lady. Faithful always.”
Viviane reached toward him, and he toward her, and without her willing it in the least—or not willing it, either—they were in each other’s arms.
They kissed, and kissed again, and though neither knew much about it, each kiss was sweeter than the last.
Until at length they sat side by side, she with her sun-brown arm about his waist and her head on his shoulder. He with a more muscular arm around her shoulders and his cheek brushing her hair.
“They promised I would see you again someday,” he told her. “If I learned everything. If I studied till I passed every test, I’d see you again.”
She squeezed his hand.
“I came to doubt them. Gwelliant I caught and shook till she greatly feared me. Show her to me, I said. Show her to me once, and I’ll believe you.”
Viviane lifted her head from his shoulder until she could see his face.
It was the face of one who is angry in a dream. “She said she would, and left. Soon she returned. You were coming, and your name was Viviane.”
“It is,” Viviane whispered.
“A lake arose from my floor. You must remember that. The shimmering water rose, and soon you rose from the water.” He sighed. “To me you will always be the lady of the lake.”
“I saw you on your bed,” she told him, “a little brown hawk, too young to fly. You’re bigger now, but a brown hawk just the same. You’ll always be that, my brown hawk, small but fierce.”
He chuckled, then grew serious. “Even when my beard is white, Viviane?”
“Yes. Even when your beard’s white. Even when we’re both old.”
“You don’t know. I see you don’t. It’s when you’re to be mine. When my beard is white.”
“Really?” She stared at him. “Is that what they told you?”
He shook his head. “It’s what I found out for myself, and it’s true. One of the things I’ve learned is to look with clear eyes on what’s past and what’s to come. I’ve combed the years for a time when we’ll be together, not for hours but for a time so long that a tree might grow from a cutting. Far in the past, that time existed. When it begins my beard will be white.”
For seconds that seemed long, Viviane tried to grasp what he had told her—to truly understand and accept it; but even when she knew she had to speak, she still could believe it true. Haltingly, only because she knew she must say something, she said, “You’re going to live a very long time. That’s what it sounds like.”
“Yes!” His arm hugged her, the hard, firm grip of a man who clings to something precious. “But I haven’t told you everything. The rest isn’t the crowning part. The crowning part is that once we’ve saved the future world, we’ll be together for many, many years. For decades, it may be.”
They kissed again.
“You should know this, too, Viviane. Once you and I are together at last, I’ll grow younger as the years creep by. Younger and younger, till at last we’re the same age.”
“Really? You didn’t just dream it?”
“No,” he said, “but if I had, it would yet be true. My dreams are no longer the idle fancies of a night. They haven’t been for a long while. I’ll grow younger, and you older. At last we’ll meet. After that, I’ll grow younger still. It’s hard to speak of this.”
“Then don’t,” she said. “Let’s be happy now. I am.”
“So am I. But you must know. When I’m a child again, you’re to return me to my mother. It will be arranged by them—by Gwelliant and the rest. My mother will never know I’ve been away. I’ll grow up then, like any other child. And you’ll call out to me once more.”
Somehow, Viviane felt sure it was the truth. “Yes, I know I will.”
He shook himself, shivering as if chilled. “We’ll win in the end. That’s what I’ve seen, and it’s what matters. In this too-short day, we have till moonrise. Let’s make the most of it.”
THIS was not the stand of pine and oak that Daisy had called a drawing-in wood. Nor was it the strange expectant forest in which she had been so happy. Its towering oaks were familiar, but older than any she had ever seen. And though their upper leaves were bathed in sunshine, the black loam she trod lay in a twilight no sunshine could reach.
“Anywhere in here,” the small woman told her. “You may build it anywh
ere you like. I am no builder myself—”
“Neither am I,” Viviane said.
The small woman ignored her. “But if I were doing it, I would try to build it close to the building materials.” The gauzy wings fluttered nervously. “I mean, I could not fly carrying an armload of sticks, and I would try to save steps.”
“I don’t see any sticks.”
“There must be some around somewhere, you know. All these trees? There are bound to be sticks. Just build it, and now I have to go.”
“Wait!” Viviane reached for her but missed.
“It need not be big.” Vivien rose into the air and out of reach. “Have I said that? I feel sure I have.” She vanished among the leaves, her voice floating back: “Two rooms. One big room.” Very faintly: “You know.”
“Oh, my gosh,” Viviane said to no one and nothing. Then louder and with increased feeling, “Ohmygosh!”
A raven dropped from the top of one of the surrounding trees to land with a considerable flapping upon a nearby branch. “You ring for me, honey?”
Viviane took a deep breath and found she was smiling—a wan smile, or at least it felt wan. “I,” she said fervently, “am very, very glad to see you, Nevermore.”
“You got a bit of company there.” Nevermore cocked his head, regarding her through one bright eye. “You need a nest?”
“A little house,” Viviane explained. “A shack, a shed, a hut.”
“Same thing.”
“The idea is to make this kid Arthur think Myrddin’s been living there. Vivien—the other one, the fairy—is going to bring furniture and stuff. My job’s to build the house. The nest? Only I don’t have anything to work with, and I wouldn’t know how if I did.”
“Got it.” Nevermore spread his wings. “Right up my alley.”
“You mean you’ll help?” It seemed too good to be true.
“I mean I’m gonna take care of it, honey. First we got to do the Blessin’ of the Flock. Stay right there.”
Wizards: Magical Tales from the Masters of Modern Fantasy Page 39
