The Black Beast

by Nancy Springer

  “Good!” Wayte exclaimed, teacherlike.

  Frain began to warm to the fight. The guards were yelling, goading and cheering Wayte, thinking they would see revenge. But I knew by then that they were more likely to see friendship. Frain began to press his attack, and Wayte’s smile broadened with every stroke. He gave Frain a blow to the head that sent him spinning; the lad was down in the dirt and springing up again before I could shout. He was lithe and young, but Wayte, twenty years older, was breathing hard. Frain lunged at him and sent him circling backward around the clearing.

  “Time!” Wayte gasped.

  They breathed, then fought again. They were well heated now, battling furiously at close quarters, neither one gaining. But Wayte tired first. His footwork slowed, and he got off balance and fell heavily to one knee. He put up his wooden sword for defense, and Frain struck it so hard that it broke. I sighed in relief; the fight was won. Frain tossed away his own sword.

  “Hand to hand now?” he asked Wayte cheerfully.

  “Confound it, Frain, that’s enough!” I shouted in exasperation. “Don’t you do anything halfway?”

  The crowd of watchers gasped and opened before me. Frain bowed to me collectedly enough as I approached him. He was wearing a fine linen tunic that hung almost to his knees and a sort of useless blue capelet. The tunic was soiled with sweat and dirt, and the cape was torn. Blood was dripping down onto it from a welt on his head. “A pretty prince you look,” I growled.

  “He is a marvelous fighter, my lord,” Wayte said, getting to his feet.

  “And you are marvelously courteous,” Frain returned. “Certainly you owe me no great favor.… My lord, I have repaid your hospitality by ruining my borrowed finery. I pray you are not angry.”

  In fact, I had to smile at his diplomacy. “Are you two friends?” I asked.

  “I think so,” Frain said quietly, and Wayte nodded.

  “Then join hands for all to see.”

  They gripped hands before the gawking crowd, and then Frain buckled on a bronze sword and came with me. The sword was a fine piece of work, curiously wrought. I glanced at it as we walked silently side by side. “It is odd for a healer to be a warrior,” I said at last.

  He did not reply, but his face moved. I had reminded him of something he wanted to forget “I am sorry about Queen Mela, my lord,” he said in a moment. “I was no healer for her.”

  “There are some who cling to their ills,” I replied. I felt calm, almost dreamy, but he had started me crying again even so; I could feel the tears on my face. I let them run. Sorrow turns to poison if it is kept inside.

  It was a long way to the tower stronghold I wanted to show him. We went through the great hall and the audience hall and the council chamber and the passageway beyond to the narrow twisting stair, and so up. Few were allowed to come this way besides myself. I opened the heavily barred and bolted door. Every king has his treasure room, and I felt sure that Frain had seen gold before, but not such gold as mine. He stood thunderstruck. I watched with bittersweet pleasure, knowing that he, himself, was the price I had paid for all that was mine.

  “You must be a smith fit for the gods!” he exclaimed.

  “Look your fill,” I said.

  I knew every piece as he came to it, remembered the labor and the feel of the metal beneath my tools. A brooch in shape of a leaping panther with tiny gemstones for eyes and swirling muscles of combed gold. A mirror with inlaid birds on the back, their tails soaring into patterned curves. A sword with two dragons chasing each other around the hilt and a tiny rabbit crouching on the end. A cauldron with a kingly procession riding around, men and horses and maidens and well-bred hounds. There were far too many to name, but I knew them all. A pitcher with ducks floating across the lid and a hawk stooping on the handle. Belt buckles, drinking cups, scabbards and shields and greaves and helms and clasps. Many bore the lotus device, emblem of Melior and indeed of all the Vale. There were harness rings too splendid for any horse that I had ever seen. There were fine chains and jeweled necklaces that Mela had worn on occasions of state. There were useless things—toys, in fact, for the child we never had. Tiny, snorting steeds pulling a gold chariot with wheels that really turned. Hunters chasing a leaping stag. Metal soldiers. A silver top that never spun quite right.

  “It was the dream of my life,” I explained to Frain, “to make marvelous things, not for some loutish patron but for myself, to hold and cherish.… I think you can see I have treasures such as no other king in Vale can boast.”

  “Truly you do,” he agreed, touching and turning the objects with careful fingers.

  And the greatest treasure lost, I thought. “Choose a gift for yourself,” I said.

  He looked up, startled, questioning. Already he knew how precious those lifeless things were to me.

  Sometimes I had made frightening and beautiful creatures such as men seldom see. The dragon, each shimmering scale a single jewel. The flying serpent with head of a ram. The Luoni, the winged women who sit and stare down at travelers from high rocks, knowing they will have their chance at us after we die. The brown man of the Eidden wealds, with his shaggy goat’s head. Frain froze with a silver brooch in his hand: a winged unicorn caught in graceful flight, its shining horn raised. I knew it well, the delicate thing.

  “Is that for you?” I asked.

  “For Tirell, I think.”

  “Very well. Then what will you have for yourself? I am sorry I have no torques. I have never made them since I left Melior.”

  Frain shook his head dazedly. “You choose. Something small. I am not used to such splendor.”

  Something small, I thought, but very precious for my son who had come to me when I needed him most. There was healing in his every glance and word. “The serpent is the sign of the healer,” I mused aloud.

  “Maybe so,” Frain said, “but I don’t like snakes.”

  “No one does. That is why some men worship them.… Well, what sign would you like to wear then? What sort of creature are you?”

  “A pup,” said Frain bitterly.

  I raised my brows. “Did Wayte call you that?”

  “No, no! Wayte has been very kind. It is only that—I do not know what I am. What is the emblem of ignorance?”

  “I don’t know. But I wish people would remember that the dog is the emblem of honor and fidelity.” I sat down on a trunk. “Have you heard the legend of the dog-king of Vaire?”

  He shook his head, seating himself in willingness to hear. So I told the tale.

  “On the night in which Nolan of Vaire was born, his sister, the magical she-dog Vlonda, birthed two pups, and they were called Kedal and Kedur. They lay with Nolan in his cradle. One was black and one was white, and the baby was red as fire. In seven short years he grew to be a tall man, and the pups grew to be giant hounds, each big enough to fell a stag by itself. They were all constant companions to each other, and the dogs served Nolan as well as if they had been men.

  “Now in those beginning days dogs were not yet heard of. That is why Aftalun had bedded and then transformed Vlonda, the warrior maiden: to give this gift to man. Wherever Nolan went with his hounds, people watched in envy and awe. The dogs fought beside him in battle, guarded his sleep, kept his possessions safe from thieves, provided meat for his table, helped him and, in course of time, his children through danger of every kind. They fought with fierce animals, ran through fire, swam through floods, climbed towers and jumped pits in his service, and neither of them ever mouthed a complaint. And Nolan, their master, was the best king Vaire has ever known. No one in the realm lacked anything during his reign.

  “Nolan lived for two hundred years. Before he was an old man, every great lord had a dog; wars were fought for the stealing of dogs. But the most faithful followers were put to shame by the faithfulness of the dogs, for it is in the nature of a dog to be constant and in the nature of a man to be willful. That is why each can help the other. But petty men came to envy the dogs, and hate their nobility,
and kick them for spite, and use their name as a name of reproach.

  “Nolan saw all this with sorrow. He feared that his loyal companions might be subjected to insult after he was gone—for Kedal and Kedur, being born of Aftalun, were immortal. So, in his old age, Nolan turned his canton over to his sons and set out for a final adventure in the mountains to the south. Kedal and Kedur bounded around him like young pups. When the three of them reached the slopes of Lorc Tutosel, he breathed easier, for he judged that they would meet no people there. But at the top of the first pass their way was blocked by a hideous, misshapen old man. ‘Filthy curs!’ he shrieked. ‘Go dig in garbage, go roll in manure!’ Nolan tried to silence the old man, but it was too late. The mocker slipped away, and the dogs had turned to stone.

  “Nolan spent the rest of his days in the mountains, living in the open, windy pass between the two stones that once were his faithful servants. And folk will point out to you the peak where Kedal and Kedur still watch over Vaire with tears rolling now and then from their blind, stony eyes. For what Nolan feared has come to pass: every shepherd boy now has a dog, and men have forgotten that dogs are the gift and get of the gods. But no one goes near those mountain ways, for Vlonda remembers. She roamed long in search of her brother and her sons, and folk say she still skulks, brooding, beneath the shadows of Kedal and Kedur.”

  “I’ve never had a dog,” Frain remarked. “Abas hates them. He will not allow any in Melior court.”

  I got up and rummaged about on the shelves, searching. There were plenty of clasps and the like done in staghound form, but I wanted the best. It was presumptuous of me to place the emblem of Vaire on Frain, but I refused to worry; in this way, at least, I would claim him as my son! Finally I found a brooch that satisfied me: a noble dog, done in red gold, leaped within the encircling crown of Adalis. I took off my own dark blue cloak and put it over Frain’s soiled tunic, fastened it around his sturdy shoulders with the brooch.

  “Wear this,” I said, “and if anyone calls you pup, smile.” I suppose I was weeping again; he put his arms out to me, hesitantly. I welcomed his embrace. I wept quietly for a while, to get it out of the way, but I was thinking far ahead.

  “Stay here a few days,” I told Frain, “and stand by me at the burial. Then I will go with you to see your brother.”

  “You will?” He was startled.

  “Yes.” I smiled grimly. “It seems to me that I also have reason to hate Abas, King in Melior.”

  Chapter Two

  A fortnight later we reached the southern outskirts of Acheron with twenty retainers at our backs. I would not have gone there with any lesser force or for any sake except Frain’s. I looked at him often as he rode. He sat his big, powerful black horse as if he had been born on it. He wore the fairest linen I could find him now, and my blue cloak, and he looked every inch a prince—but warmer, more generous of heart than any prince of Melior had ever been. Sometimes I dreamed of seeing him, my son, on that throne, forgetting the horrible altar. I will not say I thought of killing Tirell—I would not have slain him by any design—but if any mischance should occur, I thought, it would be well if I could help Frain to take his brother’s place. I did not know Tirell then or understand the strange forces that drove him.

  As we neared the woods of Acheron Frain gazed ahead anxiously, but no one appeared to give us welcome. Suddenly a monstrous black creature rushed toward us. The raven Morrghu, I almost said, but it moved along the ground. It lifted wide black wings and sounded a kind of stuttering bray that made me shiver. My men shouted out at the sight of the thing, and I confess I pulled my horse to a halt. But Frain trotted forward to meet it, and the nightmare came up to him, frisking, and rubbed its nose against his leg. He fended off its horn as if it were a lancetip. Yet he smiled, seeming surprised and oddly pleased. He caressed the awful creature, rubbing its head and ears.

  “So that is the winged unicorn, Prince Tirell’s pet?” I asked, shaken. “It is not much like the handsome animal on this brooch!”

  “Yet even this beast can be fair when seen in the silver waters of the high lake at Acheron,” Frain told me.

  Then he saw a figure among the trees and spurred forward with the beast after him. Tirell was a tall man, black-haired and with a face like carved white jade, very manly and beautiful of feature but cold. Frain grasped his hand and kissed him as I rode up, giving him the embrace of a brother, but Tirell pushed him aside in annoyance. I felt as if I had been struck, watching.

  “King Fabron,” said Tirell, “welcome. Pray join us at our fire.” Courtesy scant enough, and spoken in a toneless voice. I followed him with no more answer than a nod. But as we came to the fireside I forgot my anger in amazement. Frain was talking to the loveliest woman I had ever seen.

  He seemed confused, doubtful before her, not at all like my stalwart son! But as she turned her glance on me I understood why. Her eyes were like sparkling water, all dazzle. I could not see into them. I sensed she was a daughter of Adalis, and I soon had to lower my own gaze.

  “Lady, all good ever come to you,” I stammered like a bumpkin, offering my hand in greeting. Only the tips of her fingers touched mine.

  We ate, the four of us, in uncomfortable silence. Frain was perhaps more used to that constraint than I, for he made no attempt to break it. The food was delicious, out of place in that wilderness. There were several kinds of fine bread, and meat cooked to buttery tenderness, and strange fruits in sunset colors. I was half afraid to eat, suspecting it was enchanted fare. But for Frain’s sake I ate. It was evident that Tirell had not suffered much privation during his absence. I saw resentment and a sort of hopeless weariness form in Frain’s eyes. After we had eaten he went wordlessly away to a bed among the trees somewhere.

  “So,” said Tirell to me as soon as Frain was well away, “you have not told him that he is your get.”

  I was surprised, but not overly surprised; I knew of the visionary powers inherent in his line. “What for?” I asked crossly. “To manifest to him my most greedy and heartless stupidity? I would like him to think well of me for a while yet.”

  “He will be no more than a puppy of a man until he knows the truth.” Shamarra’s voice flowed like cool water. My reply was colder.

  “He has a brother whom he follows with greatest love. Should I tell him that he has no brother?” I turned to Tirell. “Do you not want his help against Abas?”

  “He would help me notwithstanding,” said Tirell with an indifference that turned the compliment into, an insult. “And you, Fabron—will you also help me?”

  “Why should I?” I challenged him. “To replace one mad King with another?”

  “You think me mad?” asked Tirell, unconcerned.

  “You who spurned Frain’s embrace, yes. I think you mad.”

  He shrugged. “Well, for the matter of that, I do not care who sits on the throne as long as Abas is slain. Let Frain have it if he likes. Or take it yourself, since I know Frain will not want it.”

  “No!” Shamarra exclaimed.

  “I must agree with the lady,” I said stiffly. “The rightful heir must take the throne. Otherwise, every canton king and powerful noble in Vale will be vying for it.”

  “For Melior?” Tirell questioned ironically. “The bosom of the sweet goddess and site of her high altar? Who would want to be ripped to death on a slab of white stone?”

  “He is highly honored who weds with the goddess in death!” Shamarra cried furiously.

  “That is the only way you are ever likely to get me, my bloodthirsty wench,” Tirell told her with honeyed malice. “It does you no good to pant and whisper in the night.”

  She leaped to her feet with flashing eyes. “Fool!” she shouted, choking. “Don’t you know that I am your sacred destiny? I am goddess, and you will be Sacred King!”

  “Destiny be damned,” he said coolly. “I have told you I will wed no one since—since she is gone.”

  “But I am Mylitta!” Shamarra shrieked. “One of me is. She
is in me! All women are in the goddess!”

  “Don’t say her name with your beak of a mouth!” Tirell sprang to his feet instantly, towering above the fire, and I sat stunned, unable to move. Even in Abas I had never seen such fiery blue rage as shot from Tirell’s ice-blue eyes. It smote me like a sword. I thought that he would strike the lady, but indeed I could not move! Then Frain appeared drowsily from between the trees and stepped in front of his brother.

  “Out of my way!” thundered Tirell.

  “No, brother,” said Frain quietly, as if in calm discussion. “You will have to knock me down first if you wish to beat a woman.”

  Tirell stood for an instant looking like frozen lightning. Then: “Send her away from here,” he said hoarsely, and strode off into the darkness beneath the trees. Shamarra stood straight and shining, looking after him.

  “I will not be dismissed,” she said to Frain. But even as she spoke to him she looked beyond him as if he were not there.

  “Do you have the power to fight him?” he questioned her abruptly. “Who are you? Yours is not any name of the goddess that I know.”

  She turned her eyes to him slowly, smiled, and sat by the fire. “You have grown a bit in Vaire,” she said.

  He sat beside her. “Who are you?” he asked again.

  “I am the lake,” she replied.

  “The goddess of the lake, you mean?”

  “I mean I am the lake, as Adalis is Vale, or Vieyra is Vale should famine arise, or Morrghu in time of war.… But I am one with all these forms of the goddess, as they are one with me. I am in Eala and Eala is in me. I am only one of me.”

  “Can you shift shapes?” Frain pressed her.

  “Perhaps.… I have never done so.”

  “Then what are your powers?”

  She made a sad little face at him. “Few enough, and certainly not to be named to you! Over Tirell I have not even the power of love. Nevertheless, I will stay with him.”