The Ardath Mayhar MEGAPACK®

by John Maclay

  READ ARDATH MAYHAR

  Trust me, as the spider said to the fly: read Ardath’s work. Enter into her world, and understand that it has many alternate universes into which you will travel. Be captivated by her worlds. They will never let you go, and you will never ask to be released.

  Promise.

  —Joe R. Lansdale

  October 2007

  FIDO IS A LOVING BEAST

  I love to turn fairy tales inside out and upside down. Asking myself, “What would happen if...?” I’ve done this to more than one basic fairy tale concept. I had fun with this one.

  The clanging of metal upon metal brought Florelle to the edge of the forest. “God’s boots and buckler!” she said aloud, reveling in her irreverence. “What can that signify?”

  She listened, her golden head cocked on one side, the better to hear.

  It was not the urgent yammering of the great iron bell that her father was so proud of. Besides, that only signaled war, and all the neighboring principalities had made peace long since. A couple of her father’s peers were, even now, working in the hayfields with him and all the serfs they could spare from necessary tasks.

  No, that sounded like—she sighed. Another noble lackwit, come to make his name by slaying the last dragon in all the known lands. Drat! He was hammering with his sword-hilt upon the metal-studded gate of the keep, even though the thing stood wide in time of haying.

  She pulled her oldest gown above her knees and sped back the way she had come. Poor Fido! He was such a loving beast. It always upset him when this happened. And she! It made her wince to think of all the far from noble dodges she had been put to in order to protect her unlikely pet.

  But she had reared him from a tiny creature, hardly eight feet long. Just from the egg, he had been, when his mother had fallen victim to just such a one as now stood at the castle gate. Florelle had been wandering the forest, as her habit had been since she was tiny, and had found him, lying all but starved in her path.

  For months, nobody had been able to explain the disappearance of hens and eggs from the poultry runs. Then he had graduated to live game, which had relieved her of much unpleasant scrambling about after disturbed hens in the most distant of the runs.

  It was too bad the forester had sighted him. By then, of course, he was at least half grown and a very respectable dragon indeed, with lengthy coils and scarlet wings. The word had gone out at once. Another dragon for the slaying! Wonderful!

  And all the idiots with nothing better to do had donned their armor to come and do battle with him. As if Fido knew how to fight armed men! Only his mother could have taught him that. All Florelle could do was to teach him to trick them, and that she had done with a will.

  Of course her father had been forced by tradition (and her mother, who felt herself to be tradition’s mainstay) to offer his daughter’s hand to the one who would deliver his principality from the fearsome beast. That was the way it was done, notwithstanding the fact that the aforesaid beast had never harmed a creature under his protection, unless you might count those early hens. Prince Paulus’s forest was singularly free of predators and of large rats, as well, though nobody could account for that, except for Florelle.

  Now she ran among the huge boles of oaks and beeches, and her thoughts were as unprincesslike as her gait. The charcoal—was there enough? Yes, she had seen to that after the last attacker, back in the late fall. And the cauldron of dye as red as blood? It was full. She had checked only a week ago. Still, she must warn her pet, for he was entirely too trusting for one of his species.

  Pausing before an outcropping of rock that had tumbled down the steep cliff at the edge of the wood, she whistled sharply. There came a grumbling roar in reply—a very soft one, she was glad to note. Fido had learned not to give full voice after shaking the ground all the way to the nearest cathedral town and setting the bells to ringing at midnight. That had given her a fright, indeed, though the scholars and theologians luckily decided that the Devil had been unusually active in Hell on that night.

  Fortunately, men were mainly fools, she had decided long ago.

  A large head with liquid green eyes and golden whiskers came slithering out of a cranny in the rock-slide. The eyes went soft when they saw her, and a burbling purr came from the cart-wide span of his mouth.

  She smiled in spite of herself. He was so loving! But entirely too trusting. She scrambled into the cavern and sat on a rock. The great creature arranged his coils among the stones that furnished his home and laid his chin—or what served as such—at her feet.

  “There is another one at the gate this moment,” she told Fido. “Metal from head to heels, and likely a helmful of purest granite. He will probably dine and sleep the night before coming out to find you, but I want you well hidden, just in case he is in a hurry. I shall slip away before the house wakes in the morning and stoke up the fires at the back of the cave.

  “You go into the deepest places and keep very still. Go to sleep—you do that so well, dear. I’ll make a dragon for him, smokes and flames and all, and if he is like the rest he will claim to have slain you and nobly renounce all reward before he leaves. Heaven knows what I should do if one came who had no honor at all and tried to claim me. I might well bring him here for a dalliance. Yet I would hesitate to give you a taste for humanity. That might become awkward.”

  The big creature burbled softly, and she patted the scaly head. “We shall worry about that when there is cause,” she said. “Until then, go quickly and hide. I shall visit you after we have put this newcomer to flight.”

  Fido arranged his coils and glided away over the stony floor, his scales rustling in a shivery fashion. His friend and mistress watched him go with a fond smile.

  Florelle arrived home a bit late and more than a bit untidy from her exertions. She was met by her mother, who was more indignant than usual at her daughter’s unladylike ways.

  “Here’s a fine young man, come all the way from Bar-Bludgeon to fight the dragon and claim your hand, and you are poking about in that dirty wood, getting insects in your hair and dirt on your dress. If only I had produced a proper daughter! But you are too like your Aunt Alzabel. Entirely too like! I wonder why I consented, when your father asked me to wed. I knew Alzabel. I should have been warned!”

  Florelle was too used to such tirades to listen. She washed and changed and went meekly down to dinner, where she was all a young girl should be, quiet, meek, agreeable. So much so that her mother glanced suspiciously at her more than once.

  The knight, once he peeled off his crust of armor, was very young. Almost, indeed, as young as Florelle. All of the others had been hard-bitten sportsmen with nothing in their heads but spoor and tracking techniques. They had wanted her as little as she did them, for all their lust had been for poor Fido. Until, of course, they came within sight of the cave, with its billows of smoke and its scarlet flames shooting out of the cavern-mouth.

  Once they established in their minds that a real...live...dragon lived there, it was a matter of much simplicity to send them flying. A bellow from Fido, rumbling up from the depths where she hid him, always had done the job quite well.

  She rather hated to do that with this one. He looked too ill-at-ease, too unsure of himself to play such a trick on him. After dinner, for the first time in her life, she consented to sit at one side of the fireplace with him while her mother sewed on the other, within sight but out of easy earshot.

  “Why do you come hunting our dragon?” Florelle asked him, pretending to poke back a stray coal into the fire. “From your look, I should say you would take naturally to farming, as my father does.”

  His hand stole from his side and found hers, where she had carefully left it waiting under a fold of her skirt. Florelle felt something that had not occurred to her before.

  A most interesting sensation, indeed. She looked questioningly at him, then at her mother
.

  A grin touched her lips. “Edred, do you like to get up early? Very, very early? There is something I might show you, before dawn tomorrow, if you would meet me at the postern gate.” She watched his face closely.

  A smile touched his own lips. He shot a glance at the old Princess, but her eyes were fixed on her work. “I’ll be there,” he breathed.

  * * * *

  Fido liked Edred at once. When he overcame his surprise, Edred found the big beast every bit as affectionate and interesting as did Florelle. Before the sun rose, the two young people had gone deeper along the cliffs to find another cavern, better hidden and less accessible than the first.

  Getting Fido there was not as chancy as it would have been later in the morning. Once he was well hidden they poured the cauldron of “blood” on the floor, whacked about with Edred’s blade to scar a few rocks, and made it look as if a terrible battle had taken place there.

  The Prince came, when they called him to view the place where the dragon had been slain. Though no body was found, everyone agreed that not even a Worm could withstand the loss of so much blood without dying, sooner or later.

  “He flew away,” said Edred, gesturing upward. “I would guess that he fell in the mountains beyond the cliffs. He could hardly fly at all, and he wavered in the air.”

  The Prince sighed, partly with relief that such foolishness was over, at long last, and partly with regret at what he must say next. “And now I must, by my word, offer you my daughter’s hand in marriage. What say you? Though I admit that she will be sorely missed.”

  Edred’s face reddened, but he stood squarely before the older man. “Sir, I will accept her hand, gladly, if she is willing. Not otherwise. And if it please you and your lady wife, perhaps we might live here with you. It seems you have need for another pair of strong hands about your fields. Farming is my interest and my love, after your beautiful daughter. My father has many sons and you have none. Would that be agreeable?”

  So the two were wed. Amid much rejoicing, they rode away for a fortnight of privacy, as was proper. They never told anyone they spent the weeks in Fido’s cavern, visited often by the big beast.

  And no one ever understood why they and their children spent so many fair summer days wandering in the forest at the foot of the cliff near the mountains.

  A HARPING OF WATERS

  A Celtic Myth Retold

  Years ago a friend who studied in Wales send me a set of Welsh folktales, which contained a wealth of fantasy ideas. This is not the only story to develop as a result.

  It was a long walk across the hills, long and hard and perilous, and few found business to take them there. None went for their pleasure.

  So it was that Gheros stared with astonishment at the shape striding down the low hill toward his stone hut. Not only astonishment touched his heart—more than a bit of foreboding accompanied the approach of the man—or boy, as he turned out to be—to the small dwelling. Just so had that other messenger come, all those years ago.

  A hail cut into his thought, and he saw the newcomer was a stripling clad in the green and purple of Lord Ambro’s livery. A bitter taste rose into Gheros’s mouth, but he forced a civil reply.

  “Who comes seeking Gheros, so far from the haunts of other people?”

  The lad stopped at the doorstone and wiped his sweating brow. “A messenger from our Lord,” he said. “You are commanded to return to the Palace in the Vale, bringing with you your harp and all your accoutrements. Every harper and dancer and piper in all the Four Dukedoms is ordered to attend, for a great entertainment is planned. You will be expected to come at once.”

  The boy was hot and weary, Gheros could see. Swallowing his feelings, the harper set a stool in front of the hut and brought water and bread. “Here, now. Drink and eat. Rest before you go about your work. It is a long and wearing way from here to the Palace in the Vale.”

  He stood looking down at the boy. “When I was younger than you by a bit, my own father went that path and never returned to this hut or my mother or me. Only his harp came back to us, in the hands of a peddler who knew Gher the Harper. He bought the instrument from the lackey who took it from Gher’s dead hand, before the face of Lord Ambro’s father. For love of my father, he brought the harp to me.”

  The lad rose to his feet. “A pity. More than one has died untimely at one of the Lord’s feasts.” Then he looked frightened at his own words. “Good day to you, Gheros the Harper. I must go with all haste.”

  Watching him hurry away, Gheros thought again of the messenger who came for his father. That was not so civil a person as this, by far. He haled Gher away as if he were a criminal going to gaol, rather than a master harper summoned to a feast.

  The harper turned into his hut. He had to stoop, though he was not over-tall, to clear the door-beam. As he straightened, a bird fluttered to his shoulder and perched there.

  “Ssirroo?” That trill was a language, as anyone could have recognized. It was also a question.

  “Indeed, Shura. I am summoned at last. To harp for a great entertainment, which means, I have no doubt, that another of the line of Ambro has been born to carry forward the cruelties of his sires. You shall go with me, if you like. After long years of waiting, my mother’s dream will be realized at last.”

  “Llirras!” said the bid, hopping excitedly on its crimson feet. Its black and white feathers ruffled and smoothed on his back.

  Gheros smiled grimly. “You are right,” he replied.

  He did not wait for another day. In the late afternoon, with the pale summer sun slanting across the hills and casting lavender shadow around his feet, he started out. His harp was on one shoulder, his pack balancing it on the other. The bird darted ahead or waited perched on bush or bramble, sometimes even returning to ride on the top of his hat.

  He traveled far into the night, until he could hear the sea and see its shining line beyond the last of the hills, which glimmered uneasily in the starlight. Then Gheros turned south, passing into the foothills of the mountain range holding the Palace in the Vale. In the edge of the forest, he camped, but he slept poorly and rose early.

  He arrived in two days at that beautiful Vale where the first Ambro had built his house. Yet Gheros did not go down at once to present himself at the gate allotted to tradesmen. He lingered amid the trees, watching for a time. Then he tuned his harp with great care.

  The bird watched, its bright eyes following every motion of his hands. Now and again it gave a quiet “Ssrrp!” It was not quite a comment, not quite a plea. When that happened, Gheros turned and smiled.

  “I do not expect to return to our home alive, Shura. Feel free to go, if that is your desire. You may find a mate, though your kind has become scarce. Live a long life, for my quarrel is not yours.”

  The bird ruffled and subsided, while the harper finished his tuning and took the instrument into his arm. He touched a note, and it went singing away into the reaches of the wood. A chord joined it, and another, forming no melody ever heard before by a human ear. The bird shivered its feathers, and even Gheros was pale beneath his tan.

  When the tune died away, he packed his harp into its wrappings and took up his bundle. “Time, Shura. Do you come, or do you fly free? I will not blame you, if that is your choice.”

  The bird flew to his hat brim and settled. Gheros sighed and turned his steps toward the ornate house below. He was admitted with two other musicians, just arrived for the celebration.

  One day more would see the feast begin. The musicians’ quarters were crowded and noisy, for every sort of instrument was being cleaned, tuned, restrung, and practiced upon. Singers vocalized, lutanists strummed. To one used to silence, it was a chaos, and Gheros fled to the kitchens, where he listened to the gossip of the ill-conditioned servants.

  A son had been born to Ambro’s pale wife. She still languished, half between life and death, but Ambr
o gave no thought to her. He was bursting with pride in his son, the heir who would quiet those who had begun eyeing the Four Dukedoms with acquisitive gazes. Ambro’s great-grandsire had acquired his oversized holdings by seizing them from heirless estates or childish heirs. Now, Ambro boasted, there was an heir to his holdings with a father young enough to rule until he was full grown.

  Gheros offered a helping hand to the harried cooks and serving wenches. He found himself accepted into the kingdom below stairs, and he heard much that sickened him and nothing that made him glad.

  Ambro was an even crueler lord than his father. The line seemed set upon growing worse with every generation. There had been times when Gheros wondered if his mother had been justified in her hatred, in her summoning of potencies and teaching them to him, giving him some power over the elements. As he watched the hierophants nod and smile, the guests smirk and sneer, he lost any doubt he might have known. There was no virtue here, from the temple to the tomb.

  On the morning of the feast, pale Cheras died in her tower room. No one mourned. She had been the vessel for bringing a new Ambro into being. Her body was taken to a chapel in the forest, and the guests were not informed of her death. None would, Gheros thought, have spared her a prayer, if they had known.

  The night of the feasting came. All the nervous musicians, singers, bell-ringers, mimics, jesters, and dancers jostled in a curtained room adjoining the hall. Gheros was among them, his bird on his red velvet cap that had been his grandfather’s. One by one (or however they performed), he saw his companions go out through the draperies. None returned, for they exited into another chamber, where they had been told their payment would await them.

  Gheros listened with a knowing ear to songs, dance music, jests. He tuned his harp, while he and the slender dancer and her musicians waited together. There came a round of applause, and the hand of the Director twitched aside the curtain.