* * *
Prince Loefrig soaked in his bath and entertained third thoughts to go with the second thoughts he had had for some time now about Droughtsea’s plan for the palace coup. Using monsters seemed so repulsive. Old Fwin didn’t really deserve that, even if he had gone a bit soft since his marriage.
“But how else can Your Highness hope to achieve your destiny?” the Duke had argued. “The army is his, and always has been. Nothing less than presenting your assumption of the throne to them as a fait accompli will save you from being deposed before you’ve had a chance to mend the mess your brother has made of this realm.”
The man was right, of course. Even in this idiocy about freeing slaves, the army would support Loefwin, who had commanded it in its conquest of the Six. Everyone remembered the conquest. What no one remembered was the part Loefrig and Loefric, poor Loefric, had played, which was the greater, the more important part. While His Current Majesty had been living it up in the rape and pillage department, Loefrig had been learning the administration of the country from their father, whose health had been slipping even then. And Fric, poor Fric, had already sacrificed himself, had already played the greatest part of all in the coming of the new social order, and had vanished into self-imposed exile.
But Loefwin, when he came home with the bride Loefrig had been too busy being the real power behind the throne to acquire, and Fric was past caring about, forgot their part in his victories, forgot them entirely. He was intent only on making over the seven nations into one that would run his way.
So maybe monsters weren’t too extreme. Still, Loefrig wished they didn’t have to enter the palace through his bath. Despite the Duke’s promise that there wouldn’t be many, Loefrig didn’t want any monsters or hidebehinds either, for that matter, crawling into the castle through his bath. But it couldn’t be helped. Loefwin had insisted the castle be built without a cellar or dungeon, and the doors couldn’t be opened without at once alerting the guards, who would take Loefwin’s side. At least the guards could not obtain reinforcements—the Tape, Droughtsea’s Bintnarangian pet who had so brightened Daisy’s days and lent an air of sanctity and efficiency to what government Loefwin managed to do, would see to the castle’s outer security. It was not really that bad a plan.
And there was a brighter side to the entire affair, besides being crowned Emperor and seeing Daisy crowned Empress. Droughtsea had promised that while no harm would come to Daisy’s mother and sister, they would be taken by the monsters far, far away, where Loefrig would never have to listen to Belburga’s frog jokes again. And surely, once he was Emperor, he could have the Duke build him a new bath. Smiling a faintly green smile at the thought, he rang for a slave to dry and oil him.
* * *
“I am much too well-bred to intrude in the affairs of others, ordinarily,” Anastasia assured them. “But in this case, with Docho the mercenary and the Anarchy of Miragenia both occurring within such close proximity to charges of mine, I feel I must share my own experiences of that man and that country with you.”
Carole was not reluctant to hear the swan’s story. It couldn’t possibly be any worse than the rest of the day. “Go ahead,” she said. “Tell us how you got your curse. Maybe I’ll get one myself. The Mother knows they seem to be fashionable these days.”
“It is not, strictly speaking, a curse,” the swan informed her with great dignity. “It is more accurately a hereditary protective spell. You see, the women in my family have always been the most beautiful, most desirable women in any realm anywhere. For that reason, Kings of the Nonarable Lands have always chosen their Queens from among my mother’s people. With such great beauty, we are of course the objects of the lusts and dishonorable intentions of many men.
“My great-great-great-great grandmother, Athractisha by name, was no less lovely than the rest of us, and very wise and learned, and also rather impatient with the foibles of men. They were always asking her if they didn’t know her from somewhere, which of course, they did, since she was queen at the time.
“Since the King was often away on business, and the Queen found her admirers sometimes alarmingly aggressive when her husband was gone, she devised a potion which could transform her into a swan. As a swan she would not only cease to be bothered by the lecherous, but could also escape them at will.
“It came to pass that the King was away at battle for her sake—one of the most ardent barons had gotten out of hand and His Majesty was undertaking the correction of the man’s manners, forcibly. The Queen awaited, pregnant with anticipation for her lord’s safe return and also pregnant with child.
“But the unruly baron was a treacherous fellow, and instead of staying with his armies in the field, he divided his forces, leaving half to hold the King at bay and half to besiege the castle.”
“Clever fellow,” Jack said, rubbing his hands together and leaning forward with shining eyes.
“A cad,” Anastasia said, tossing her head disdainfully. “He threatened to set flame to the village beyond the castle walls and murder the peasants unless my poor relative would deliver herself into his wicked clutches. It happened that the kingdom was very short on peasants that year, what with previous wars and a famine and several bad bouts with a fatal influenza. Besides, the Queen was far too kind to allow her subjects to suffer. But she was also far too fastidious to allow herself to be ravished by her overzealous suitor—and there was the child to think of too. So she decided to try out her potion. She turned herself into a swan and flew from the top of the keep to her husband’s side.
“Unfortunately, the enemy archers took it upon themselves to use her for target practice and she sustained mortal wounds which caused her to deliver her daughter prematurely and die—beautifully, of course—at her lord’s feet. As she breathed her last, she regained the form of the lovely lady she had been and he recognized her and in his grief won the battle and went home and slew his enemy and had all the archers in both armies put to death. The ability of our army to raise bowmen has suffered accordingly from that day, to the best of my knowledge, to this.”
“Did she pass on the potion to the girl?” Carole asked. “Because if you have some of it, I could get Granny Brown to analyze it and—”
“Of course she would not have passed it on, you silly girl. Did I not just say that she was dead? The child grew up and married outside the royal family and had many children, but only two girls. One lived happily ever after and the other, Gwendolyn the Gorgeous, encountered more or less the same situation as her grandmother. When under pressure from potential despoilers, Gwendolyn too turned into a swan, but did so spontaneously, without the help of the potion. Unlike her grandmother, she remained unharmed and married her true love while she was still in swan form. As soon as they were married, and she safely under his wing, so to speak, she reverted to her rightful self and they lived happily ever after.”
“And the same thing happened to you?” Carole asked, lying down beside the pool. “All except the happily ever after part, I mean. I guess we just haven’t gotten that far.”
“Not quite the same thing,” Anastasia replied. “In my generation, the spell seems to be more eager and actually rather presumptuously possessive. It did not wait until actual danger was upon us before effecting the transformation. One minute we were combing our hair and the next, you might say—zip—we were flying. Not that I was in an entirely rational state at the time of the transformation, you understand.
“My father had seen to it that the seven of us were in a state of distraction from worry, so far had he built up in our minds the bestiality and loathsomeness of the most persistent of my suitors. I was frantic that I would have to marry this so-unsuitable person, and my sisters, who were all younger, were terrified lest I refuse him and he choose one of them instead. My father, now that I think of it, seems to have been primarily concerned that he not be called upon to produce dowries for seven daughters he would as soon have at home bringing his slippers and playing backgammon with him.
“He seems to have forgotten about the spell, or perhaps he never knew of it. He was not of the old line of Kings, you understand, and knew little of our mother’s history. Indeed, I had known as little as he until shortly after my sixteenth birthday, when Mother told me all and gasped her last, victim to a fatal, romantic, and non-wasting disease.
“Father kept putting the fear of this fellow into my heart, and I in turn transmitted it to my sisters, along with the lore our mother had imparted to me. When my suitor finally entered our gates, we stood watching from the battlements. He was wearing armor, which was not a bad idea, considering my father’s state of mind at the time, and when he raised his visor, we girls were all so overwrought that we could stand it no longer: most maidens would have swooned under similar circumstances. We flew.”
“All of you?” Jack asked.”
“We always did everything together,” Anastasia said. “But now, you will ask, and this is where that nefarious mercenary steals into the picture, why did not the seven princesses wait until the undesirable prince had gone and return to their father and their natural forms? Because, I will answer, among the troops the Prince brought with him was Docho the Bintnarangian.”
The swan paused and said with emphasis on each word, “He is not what he appears to be. He followed us, though we flew and he was on horseback. You may figure that one out for yourselves, but whatever master he claims to serve now, you may believe me that magic is no more against his principles than war. While we slept, he cast a net around us, and compelled us by some other warlock’s wiles to transport him across the sands to the Anarchy of Miragenia, where all are merchants and magicians and any magic may be had for a price. There he sold us to a broker, who in turn sold us, with the spell that compelled us to remain beasts of burden, to a wizard who later lost us in a wager to the Brown Enchanter. Had I but known that Bronwyn’s spell came from Miragenia, I would have insisted that she give up her quest.”
“Why?” Jack asked. “Just because you had a bad experience with them. . .”
“I do not care to argue the point,” the swan said loftily, “but I can assure you that in any dealings between a Miragenian merchant and a second party, it is the Miragenian merchant who will profit.”
* * *
Between his worry about Bronwyn and the Duke and the flavor of the gruel or rather the lack of it, Jack could hardly eat a thing at supper. He wasn’t alone. Carole picked up a spoonful of gruel, looked at it, and dribbled it back down into the bowl. Neither of them participated in the conversation around them, which mostly centered on the hunting party the Imperial Game Wardens had arranged for the Emperor the next morning.
Jack was almost relieved to be able to return to his room, although he didn’t feel like sleeping. If only there was something he could do besides wait. If only there was even something enticing to snack upon while waiting.
Of course, there was one thing a gypsy could always do inside the house of wealthy people, which was to find some way to avail himself of some of their wealth.
Since Duke Docho had lied to him about the location of the treasure room, Jack decided now would be a good time to find where it was located. Also, he would investigate other places in the castle where he knew riches were to be found. All of those golden plates from which Loefwin’s court ate its ghastly food would bring a nice price in Argonia. If he could sneak into the room of the nobles who had stumbled drunkenly to bed, he might be able to relieve them of some of their gem-studded clothing as well, although he thought he should not actually take anything tonight. No, that would not do, for where would he hide his loot? He had no idea how long he and Carole would be compelled to wait in this gloomy place for the return of Bronwyn. But a man could learn things while he was waiting.
When curfew had blown and the normal noise of the castle stilled, Jack stepped into the corridor. From each side of the long hall, the flames of torches saluted each other, their shadows standing guard behind them. What were these Frostingdungians, anyway? Babies who were afraid of the dark and had to have lights burning in the halls all night? Well, why not? With its beasts visible and invisible, Frostingdung was an excellent place to encourage such fears. Certainly the lights would make it easier for visiting gypsies to scout around, though they would make hiding difficult, if he had need to hide. He was not such a fool as to imagine the people within the castle were all or even mostly friendly towards him and his friends. Not at all. As a matter of fact—he ducked quickly back inside the room and picked up Bronwyn’s shield before ducking out again—the buckler would be a reassuring item to have at hand. Surely it would protect him as it did Bronwyn, and even if it did not, it would make an excellent platter should he be able to pilfer a half-edible snack while auditing the kitchen.
He walked unmolested down the corridor, a vague sense of unease, of wrongness, causing him to keep the shield firmly in front of him. Perhaps the novelty of doing his reconnaissance in the full light of the torches accounted for his nervousness, but at any rate, he thought he would first make for the kitchen, and then if anyone should surprise him, he would have a good excuse to be abroad.
The kitchen was beyond the great hall, in back of it. Unlike the corridors, the great hall was lit with only three torches and one candle in its death throes. But the light was sufficient for Jack to see that he was to be foiled before he started. The place was inhabited.
* * *
Carole woke all at once, fully alert and listening. Her chest was tight with alarm and she felt as if her hair stood straight up, like antennae on some bug or the whiskers on a cat, quivering to pick up a hint of the danger that had awakened her.
For it was danger, she was sure of that. She’d heard a smothered scream in her sleep, and had dreamed it was a fox. But when her eyes flew open and she lay tense and waiting upon her bed, no trace of the scream lingered in her mind or in the air. She tried to will herself to relax.
But she felt too tightly tuned, as if she’d snap apart if she just lay there absorbing the tension. She jumped out of bed, hugging herself and dancing on the cold stone floor a little as she fumbled for her tunic. That was when she heard the second sound, a soft scraping, a faint susurration.
She ran to the door and pulled it open and looked down the corridor. A wisp of something rounded the corner at the end of the brightly lit hall, several doors down from her room. The wisp disappeared in the direction of Anastasia’s fountain. The other turn led to the great hall, and now she definitely heard noises from there too. She didn’t really want to investigate, but she didn’t want to be murdered in her bed either. She thought she’d better wake Jack. That way at least there’d be two of them to get into trouble. It felt funny out here, weird. Maybe weird feelings weren’t supposed to bother witches, but she was still a girl. And besides, anybody would be scared. Even Dad. Even Mama.
So she set her shoulders and walked in the direction of Jack’s room, which was straight ahead and to the left. She thought she’d much rather have Bronwyn along, with her sword and shield and big, sheltering lump of a body, but Jack would have to do.
She took two more steps. They didn’t take her as far as she expected. In fact, she wasn’t moving at all. It was as if someone had grabbed the tail of her gown and was pulling her back. She took two more steps and stayed in the same place. I must be dreaming, she thought. All right then, I’ll dream my way back to bed. Effortlessly, she turned and reentered her room, which was, after the brightness in the hall, suddenly alive with darkness. Her bed was tucked impossibly far back in the shadows, and seemed to be waiting for her, a baited trap. Whatever was in the halls was no dream, she was sure now. Law against magic or no law against magic, that hallway was under a spell.
She opened the door again and stepped out, this time trying to go the other way. Ten paces without leaving the threshold of her room annoyed and frustrated her sufficiently to cause her to jump around and try to run in the direction of Jack’s room again. No luck. She felt like screaming, but the sc
ream stuck in her throat and she swore softly instead, using a wicked blasphemy for which Mama would have washed her mouth out.
She stood shivering, not entirely with cold, and tried to think what to do. She hated being herded back to that bed, to the Mother only knew what slimy, creepy, reaching things that might be waiting to kill her in terrible ways like gouging out her eyes and dismembering her or… stop that, she told herself. You’re just making it worse. But repulsive creatures wreaking painful and messy mutilations on her helpless body kept flashing before her eyes and she could not talk herself into going back to that room and getting into that shadow-shrouded bed. But on the other hand, one could hardly stay here all night. She tried to cry out again, not a curse or a scream, just a rather strangled call. “Jack? Jack? Ca—can you hear me?” There was no answer.
Vaguely she remembered Daisy telling Rusty when the four of them had first arrived that they would have the wing pretty much to themselves, since only two other guests would be staying there. Rusty’s room was between Carole’s and Jack’s. Odd that Rusty hadn’t heard the commotion and come out to investigate herself. Carole hadn’t especially wanted to awaken her, since grownups tended to pooh-pooh the kind of feelings Carole had now, but recalling the toothy look on Rusty’s face as she’d stared down into the hole full of hidebehinds, Carole decided that for an adult, the lady might not make a bad ally after all. But calling Rusty’s name produced no better results than calling Jack’s.
Well, maybe her calling had fooled whatever was restraining Carole into thinking she’d given up. She charged towards Jack’s room again, and again swore roundly as she stayed within the frame of her own door.
The Unicorn Creed Page 17
