The Feline Wizard

by Christopher Stasheff

  “I suppose we must thank him for that,” Balkis said grudgingly.

  “Of course.” The sidicus' tongue lolled out in an avian smile. “You never would have told it by yourselves. Birds are much more practical.”

  “Go hatch an egg,” Balkis muttered, then aloud she said, “Thank you I shall, then, for you have been a great help.”

  “Yes, thank you, good bird,” Anthony said, “and I thank you, reverend sirs.”

  “Go with our blessings,” Brother Ranius said, smiling, “and may love lead you.”

  * * *

  With Anthony's arm about Balkis, they walked in silence, stopping to gaze into one another's eyes now and then, smiling but still shy. After half an hour they overcame their shyness enough to stop and kiss again, then went on, talking in low tones of things they had never discussed in all the months they had journeyed together. All that day they drifted in a sweet dreamland, and though Balkis occasionally felt the touch of apprehension, wondering what would happen when evening came—though it sped her pulse, too—she was able to put it aside well enough to enjoy these first few blissful moments to the fullest.

  When the sun went down, they walked awhile in the moonlight, Anthony talking of his love for her and of her beauty, stopping frequently for kisses that inflamed her thoroughly. Finally, though, Balkis' head began to droop with weariness, and Anthony stopped. “We have come far enough for one day, my love. It is time to sleep,” he said.

  Apprehension clamored in her breast, surging up into her throat, but Balkis managed to only gaze up at him shyly and say, “Let us lie down, then.”

  The ritual of pitching camp had become so routine that they were able to go through it without thinking—which was good, for Anthony began to grow silly, making foolish remarks that soon had Balkis giggling and breathless—but when they had supped and she knelt by her bed of bracken, again overcome with shyness, Anthony said, “Sleep, now, and I shall watch, for that bath in the magical shell has made me so completely well that I feel no weariness, and doubt I could sleep.”

  Relief flooded her, though she could have wished for a better reason to keep him from sleep. “How long shall you watch?”

  Anthony shrugged. “I shall waken you when I tire. It shall be half the night at least, and perhaps all of it, since I shall have the sweetness of your sleeping face to gaze upon and fill me with strength.”

  She blushed, looking down. “May the night be calm for you, then.” She lay down, careful to arrange her cloak with all modesty—if he would gain strength by gazing, it should be only her face that he watched.

  “Sleep lie sweetly on your brow.” Anthony leaned over and kissed her forehead. “And on your eyes.” He kissed each closed lid. “And on your lips.” The last kiss was substantially longer than the others and guaranteed to keep him awake. When he lifted his head, Balkis smiled shyly up into his eyes, then deliberately closed her own and breathed out a long sigh of happiness. Anthony echoed it with a sigh of his own that perhaps held as much longing as contentment, then turned away to sit by the fire where he could watch both the night and her.

  Sleep would not come to Balkis, though, and all that lying still with her eyes closed merely made her acutely aware of the strange warmth and trembling within her. As the hours passed she began to wonder whether to feel relieved or disappointed at Anthony's self-control.

  Then she remembered that the unicorn hadn't hesitated to carry him, that he must be virgin, too, and wondered if he were as apprehensive as she. She even wondered if he knew what lovers did together, then remembered that he was a farm boy, after all, so had certainly seen animals couple, as had she herself in growing. Then she remembered the crudeness of the household in which he'd been reared, and a strange thought struck her, the possibility that he might not connect mating with love.

  If that were so, she would definitely have to do something about it. She was still wondering what when she finally fell asleep.

  Anthony woke her after the moon was down, woke her with a kiss on the forehead. Heavy-lidded and flushed with sleep, she smiled and said, “Is that all you can offer me, sir?”

  Smiling, he kissed her on the lips, a long and lingering caress that quickened the blood in her veins well enough. Then, though, he released her and sat back on his heels to say, “I have grown wearied at last, so I shall let you watch for the last hour or two of the night, if you wish.”

  Balkis realized that he was waiting for her to rise from the bed, even though she had made only the one this night. She rose with a sigh, went to sit by the fire, and gave him a smile that spoke more than her lips as she said, “Dream sweetly, love.”

  He pulled his cloak over his shoulders, smiling back and saying, “If my dreams have been as sweet as my musing, I may not wish to wake.”

  “Oh,” Balkis said, “I think I can see to that.” She gave him what she hoped was a look filled with promise. His eyes glowed in answer, but he forced his lids shut with firm resolution.

  She turned back to the fire with a sigh and fed it twigs. Really, she was going to have to do something about his excess of gallantry.

  She woke Anthony with a kiss, and the magical mood wove itself around them again as they ate breakfast. Then they drowned their fire and took to the road again, or rather, the path. The early sun cast a rosy glow over the landscape, the dew twinkled like stars all about them, and they both felt that they were walking on air as they strolled along, chatting of inconsequentialities—and stopping now and again for a kiss.

  Early in the afternoon the mountains that had been before them in the distance for so long were suddenly near, and they saw that the path led into a gorge a hundred yards wide at the bottom. As they came into it, they saw that the walls were high rugged cliffs. They looked about them, marveling at the wild beauty of the place—then heard shouts in a language that Balkis recognized again as akin to that of Maracanda, but so heavily accented that she couldn't really understand it. She did, however, comprehend one word. “Anthony! Someone is telling us to stop!”

  “There may be danger ahead, then.” Anthony looked all about him. “Where are these people who send kind warning, though?”

  “I see them not, either,” Balkis said.

  The voices shouted again, then began to chant with a heavy beat.

  “That has the sound of a war song,” Balkis said nervously. “Where are the singers?”

  “There!” Anthony pointed upward, staring in amazement.

  Balkis looked where he pointed and saw a dozen dragons— small ones, only twelve feet long—saddled and bridled and with people riding them as they flew. As they spiraled down toward the intruders, their war-songs grew more harsh. Anthony and Balkis stared, thunderstruck, as they came. Then three riders dropped spinning packages that spread open into nets, and Balkis jolted out of her reverie. “Run!”

  They ran hand in hand, stumbling and staggering over rough ground. Balkis followed the pressure of Anthony's grip, first left, then right, with a total lack of pattern; they were running toward the western wail, but so unpredictably that first one net, then three, fell to either side, but none caught them.

  A voice above called out a command, and two dragon-eers dove between the fugitives and the cliffs, then arrowed toward them.

  Balkis cried.

  “Fires scorch and waters drown!

  Fear that earth might drag you down!

  Air betray you, tumult-fed!”

  Anthony didn't even give her a chance to run dry; he called out,

  “Hurl you high above our heads!”

  The dragons cawed in fright as a wind rose out of the earth itself to hurl them high, tumbling; their riders shouted in terror. They didn't fall from their saddles, though, and Balkis suspected they were tied in. She ran on, letting Anthony direct their course, but glanced back over her shoulder and saw that the two dragons had dropped as suddenly as though they had been tossed, but managed to halt their fall by cupping their wings. Steadying, they didn't try to chase Anthony and Balk
is, but flew ahead toward the eastern cliff, then swooped upward and spiraled higher, regaining altitude.

  “Down!” Anthony cried and dove, pulling her with him. She fell, and scaly bodies shot by overhead. A rider shouted and a net fell but didn't have time to open; it struck Anthony between the shoulders as a solid lump.

  “My love! Are you hurt?” Balkis cried.

  Anthony flashed her a grin as he struggled to his feet, then managed to catch his breath and say, “I've taken worse knocks than that.”

  Balkis caught his hand again with a sob of relief, then saw the lumps of lead in the packed-up net. “It is weighted around the edges!”

  “Therefore it spreads when the warrior gives it a spin and lets it go,” Anthony said grimly. “Very clever—but so are we. Run! If we can find a cave in that stone wall, they cannot come at us!”

  Balkis ran, glancing back at the riders who had just attacked them—but saw that they were sailing onward toward the eastern cliff, just as the last two had. She thought they were going to strike directly into it, but at the last second they swooped upward, then spiraled aloft. She remembered Matthew Mantrell saying something about updrafts. “Anthony! We do not need a cave! If we can even come near to the wall, the riders cannot reach us. Their dragons are far better at gliding than at real flying, and need the air that blows upward along the cliffs to take them back into the sky!”

  “To the wall let us flee then!” Anthony said grimly, and kept up his broken-field running. Nets fell to the left and the right of them, they even had to bat aside the edges of one, but none caught them. They came closer and closer to the wall, and the riders must have known it meant safety for the couple, for they set up a hue and cry as they dove at their quarry.

  Then one flew directly overhead, only twenty feet up, his net already spinning. It fell open, fell far more quickly than most, fell on them and all around them, and they floundered in the midst of it with cries of despair. Anthony reached for his dagger to cut their way free, but the rider pulled sharply on a drawstring rope and the net closed about them, yanking them off their feet, swinging them high into the air. They cried out in fright and clung to one another, staring down at the ground that receded so quickly below them, spinning and swaying.

  “What spell can take us far from here?” Anthony cried.

  Balkis tried to remember—yes! There was a verse that she'd heard the Lord Wizard recite.

  “I know a bank where the wild thyme blows—”

  She broke off in fright as the net began to swing down. They had come to the top of the cliff, but there was only a hundred-foot shelf before it began to climb again, honeycombed with shelves on which the men had built a whole village complete with dragon-cotes, and they were sinking directly toward that village's square. She sang out louder and in a rush.

  “Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows—”

  Then the net struck rock with an impact that knocked the breath out of her. With wild hope she looked at Anthony, but saw that he was gasping for air, too, and despair and fear gripped her.

  Thunder shook the ledge. Looking up, Balkis saw a huge reptilian shape that blocked out the sun, stooping upon the twelve-foot dragons with a twenty-foot tongue of flame. The smaller dragons sheered away in terror, their riders screaming, and as the leviathan passed, Anthony saw a rider with no saddle or reins, only the dragon's great triangular plates to hold him on its shoulders.

  “What horror is this come upon us?” Anthony cried.

  “It is not horror, but a friend!” Balkis told him, almost weeping with relief. “I know that dragon! He is Stegoman, and the man who rides him is the Lord Wizard of Merovence, my teacher!”

  Stegoman completed his first pass and turned to rake the air again, but the dragoneers rallied, calling to one another and forming small groups to either side, surrounding the behemoth. One daring rider sailed overhead, dropping his net, but Mart's sword flashed, cutting half its ropes and batting the rest aside. It plummeted downward and tangled a rider below it.

  But the dragoneers were singing again, chanting their war-song as they swooped and darted at the huge dragon who had come to wreak havoc upon them. Balkis had heard their accent long enough so that the words began to make sense, and she realized they weren't boasting or trying to buck up their own spirits—they were giving directions to their mounts and compelling them to obey! The tyrants had not made friends with the dragons—they coerced them by magic! She understood what they were ordering and cried a warning—but too late, for the separate knots of riders suddenly swooped all together and attacked in a pack.

  Matt laid about him frantically, and Stegoman scythed his flame from back and forth, but a few dragoneers managed to duck in from his blind side and swords raked his ribs. Balkis bit her knuckles to keep from screaming as one dragoneer's sword caught Mart's blade and knocked it back against him, making him reel in his seat. She could see that Matt and Stegoman could hold the dragoneers off a goodly while, but in the end they would be borne down by sheer numbers.

  Anthony saw that, too. He worked frantically with his own dagger, sawing through ropes. “If you know a spell to help your friend, sing it! We must be free of this net and away where we can aid in our own defense!”

  Balkis tried to think of some verse that might disperse the horde of fliers that beset her friends, finally remembered something she had heard Idris sing, and began,

  “Blow, winds out of the north!

  Chill them to their bones!”

  Another roar split the air.

  Anthony froze, staring up. “What lyric brought you that?”

  Another full-sized dragon came tearing down from the sky, a reddish dragon a little shorter and considerably more slender than Stegoman, but with a lance of flame just as long. The dragons scattered with scandalized screams of rage, and for the first time Balkis heard them utter words.

  “It is Dimetrolas, bigger yet than when we cast her out!”

  “It is Dimetrolas, turned against her own kind!”

  “Even as we knew she one day would! Gather all! Slay the renegade!”

  “I am not a renegade but an outcast!” Dimetrolas roared. “If I turn against you now, it is because you cast me out of your tribe; I can fight without turning against my own, for you have made me no longer one of you!” Then her roaring turned inarticulate and her flame swept the air to guard Stego-man's back. Dragoneers howled as their mounts rolled aside from the flame.

  But the dragons were shotting the alarm, and more of their kind came bolting from the round doorways of every cote. Some circled down to the shelf to gather their riders, but most came with bare backs, flaring their rage against the rogue who sided with a stranger against her own clan. Soon the whole village was aloft and attacking from every side, only oldsters, children, and hatchlings still on the ground to watch the battle. Gradually the cloud of fliers separated into two wedges, one on each side, like the jaws of a forceps.

  “We must aid them!” Anthony cried.

  “We must indeed.” Though why the Lord Wizard was not himself using magic to fight off the fliers Balkis couldn't understand. Perhaps he feared killing them, for if you knocked a dragon unconscious at that height, both mount and rider would die in the fall. She had watched closely enough to identify the leader of the dragoneers, though—the one who rode the largest dragon and wore an emerald jerkin, where all others wore brown or grayish-green, and if they had tamed the flying dragons not by friendship or skill but by incantations, they offered a very serious weakness for her to exploit. She began to chant, adapting a verse Matt had taught her, and so worried not at all about rhyme.

  “How happy is the dragon taught

  To cease to serve another's will;

  What armor is his honest thought…”

  “Take it, Anthony!” She was chagrined not to remember the last line of the verse.

  “And simple flight his utmost skill!”

  Anthony replied.

  Balkis' voice rang with delight:
/>   “Dragons, be freed from servile bands,

  Of goad to rise, or fear to fall;—

  Lords of yourselves, though not of lands…”

  She floundered again, and Anthony came in on the instant:

  “And having nothing, yet have all!”

  A cry came echoing down, Mart's voice: “Wotton!”

  “What in Heaven have we wrought, indeed?” Anthony exclaimed, looking up.

  Every dragon who carried a rider roared with delight as he or she dove toward the village ledge, roars that resolved into, “Off my back, midge, ere I swat you!”

  The riders shrieked frantic verses, but nothing would regain them control. The dragons swooped within five feet of the ledge; a few riders were smart enough to leap off. The others howled with fright as the dragons looped the loop to make a second pass—fright that their spells did no good, that the dragons were completely out of their control, that their conquered mounts did exactly as they pleased. On the second pass most of them jumped, and the dragons flew away to attack Dimetrolas. The few diehards nearly did—die, that is, because their dragons simply turned their heads and blasted flame. None actually struck the riders, they missed by a foot or more, but the men and women took the hint, untied their saddle-ropes, and as the dragons dove toward the ledge, leaped to save their lives.

  They ran to gather weapons, but they were safe for the moment, for all the little dragons were concentrating their attack on the renegade—Dimetrolas.

  “Do you act in concert still?”

  Balkis cried, spreading her hands up toward the flock.

  “Remember each your mind and will!

  Render up your own opinion…

  “Anthony, a rhyme!” she shouted. Obligingly, he answered,

  “Of none other be a minion!”

  “Well sung!” Balkis said with a sigh of relief. “Give me now a second verse.”

  “Second… ?” Anthony spread his hands, at a loss how to begin.