Blackrose could not disagree. She knew her goals and those of the monarchs of the Unseelie Court differed somewhat. Parented by a bodach and an urisk, she was not of noble lineage. But taken from her parents—who were paid well in gems and land—Blackrose had been reared within the Unseelie Court. Her tutors had been the finest, the curriculum demanding. Nothing was stinted on her gear or attire. Yet never had she been permitted to forget that although she might be fair of face and form, sharp of wit and swift of hand, to her titles and honors would only be granted if she proved herself a worthy champion who won for the Unseelie Court what it desired.
When the seers came before the monarchs, bearing with them an orb of polished quartz that showed within its smoky depths that the way into the unicorn’s land was opening, Blackrose was prepared.
She had long ago chosen her equipment, testing herself against creatures far more fearsome than a slender semi-equine whose only weapon was a single horn. She had slain fachan and nucklelavee, and even a dragon—a much larger version of the little reptile who now fluttered ruby-bright to guide her along the unicorn’s trail.
Blackrose’s time had come and nothing, certainly not her rival from the Seelie Court, would keep her from her goal.
Ruby-scales flashed ahead. Blackrose drove the kelpie in the dragon’s wake, along the unicorn’s trail. With any luck the unicorn would be found and slain before her rival even located the spoor.
Then to her ears came the sound of sweet music.
Although the Seelie Court boasted seven times seventy princes and fair damsels by the score, although the arts of wooing and courtship were as treasured as those of music, poetry, and the chase, still between those fair lords and yet more fair ladies very few children were born.
Many a loving heart brooded over being denied what was given in plentitude to even rabbits in the fields and minnows in the streams. The wise said that infertility was the price for a long life. They told all they should be content with what gifts they had been granted. Most repeated quite loudly that they were indeed content.
Yet when a child was born the level of rejoicing gave lie to these claims of contentment. So it was when Sunset was born. Celebrations and dances were held and he was spoiled to an extent that would have ruined a less hardy soul.
Those days of infant indulgence passed quickly enough. As with most of his kind, Sunset grew swiftly, his childhood lasting hardly any longer than that of the human youth he might have resembled if any of human born could be so fair.
Even after he had gained the semblance of a young man, Sundeath knew well he was but a child. Enchantments and conjurations that were easily done by those who were in outward seeming his peers stumbled from his fingertips, stammered from his lips. His playing on harp and flute made the birds fall silent, rather than joining him in joyous chorus as they did with his fellows.
But Sundeath strove hard and his teachers were many and friendly. For every one who quipped and teased, there were ten who set tangled fingers straight, showed a more effective stance for bow or harp, and otherwise gave him reason to hope that someday he might be their equal.
When Sundeath was chosen as the champion who would hunt the unicorn, he was thrilled and delighted, for he was well-aware that many surpassed him in every way. When later—mostly from the giggles of coy damsels as they pulled away from him, accepting his poems and bouquets, but not his embrace—Sundeath gradually came to realize that he had been chosen not for all the achievements he had mastered, but for the one he had not.
Blushing, Sundeath realized that he had been chosen as champion of the Seelie Court because he was yet a virgin.
Angered, he sought at first to rid himself of this unwelcome qualification, but he found none within the Seelie Court who would accept his embraces. He might have lain with a human maiden, but his mother spoke to him, pleading his forbearance.
“Sundeath,” she said, stroking his golden locks as she had when he was still toddling about on chubby legs, “do not squander what you have. Time enough for that when the unicorn has been captured and its blessings brought to grace our land.”
Sundeath frowned. “I have read of the blessings a unicorn can bring. They are wonderful, true, but do we really need them?”
“We will benefit, yes,” the enchantress said. “Moreover, our enemies, those monstrous wretches who mock us by calling themselves the ‘Un’ Seelie Court, will be denied those same benefits. Think on this as well. If you win the contest, the unicorn’s life will be spared. Our hunt ends in captivity, theirs in death and brutal mutilation.”
She went on to describe how the pale blue horn of the unicorn would be sawn from the poor beast’s skull, how the beast would be hung so that its corpse could drain, how it would be skinned, then butchered.
“They make armor for their champion from the hide,” she concluded, “and feast upon the flesh and organs. The bones are made into a cage in which they keep their most dishonored prisoners.”
By these words, Sundeath was convinced that retaining his virginity so that he might hunt the unicorn was the right and noble thing to do, no matter the extent of the personal sacrifice expected of him. Even so, he looked for reassurance that his suffering would end.
“And after the unicorn is captured, Mother,” he said, giving her the title that many a fair elf longed to be granted, ranking it above “princess” or even “queen,” “who will care for it?”
She laughed lightly, hearing the question that underlay the question. “Oh, then the unicorn is tended by a fair host of tiny winged fairies. Like the flowers they so resemble, these take their pleasures in other ways than lovemaking. Therefore, their company is not abhorrent to the pure and dainty unicorn.”
So satisfied, Sundeath directed all his thwarted passion into his studies, determined that when the time came for hunting the unicorn none would say that he had been chosen for the one quality he did not possess, instead of for the many he did.
So he crafted the Harp of Desires and wove the Rope and Net of Gentle Persuasion. So he made himself a hunting knife of crystal and steel. He laid enchantments great and small upon all his gear. Later, he befriended Zephyr, the wisest of the steeds of flame and storm. Finally, he became wise in every bit of lore regarding the unicorn, so that when the time came he could bring the beast safely to its new home in lands ruled by the Seelie Court.
When the seers came, their silken robes whispering with excitement as they hurried to bring the news that the gate into the realm of the unicorn was opening, Sundeath was ready. He passed through the center of a faery ring, emerging into lands where a member of his kind could venture only once in many long years.
Standing beneath a sky that shown with pale light and a moon that gleamed black, Sundeath read the signs and omens. Swinging into his saddle, he set Zephyr′s gilded hooves upon the proper path. Taking out the Harp of Desires, Sundeath set his fingers upon the strings and began to play. His hope was to draw the unicorn to him, taking it from the path of danger long before the champion of the Unseelie Court could so much as frighten it.
As Zephyr paced with measured tread along the forest trail, Sundeath played the song of his heart’s desire, focusing upon the task set before him, and touching the string called Longing and the one called Love and the one called Comfort.
He was rather surprised when, coming to a wide glade encircled by ghostly stands of silver birches, what emerged from the curtain of pale green leaves was not a unicorn but a coarsely built but muscular horse. Upon it rode a woman of surpassing loveliness, armed and armored as for battle or the hunt. A tiny dragon with scales that glittered like rubies was perched upon her shoulder. Leaning against her ear, it peeped in alarm. As if shaken from a dream, the woman started, then with one smooth motion drew the long sword that hung at her side.
Without word of challenge, she drove her heels into her ugly steed and to Sundeath’s shock and dismay came charging toward him.
When the music first touched her ears, Blackrose wondere
d on what instrument it could be played. Although her ears told her the music sounded something like harp song—although far more delicate and elegant than any harping she had heard within the rough confines of the Unseelie Court—some sound strange and unfamiliar danced between the notes.
Vaguely Blackrose turned the kelpie’s head to follow the music, persisting even when Flamewing flew in loops and circles about her head, reminding her with hisses and spits that she was departing the unicorn’s hard-won trail.
For his part, the kelpie made no comment. Whether this was because he, too, was interested in the source of the music or because of the perverseness of his kind, Blackrose neither knew nor cared to know.
When the kelpie bore her from the cover of a forest of thorn into a lush glade beneath the darkness of the full moon and Blackrose saw the harpist, something twisted within her heart.
He was fair as not even the highest of the Unseelie Court were fair, with hair of sunlit gold. The eyes he raised from his harping to gaze upon her should have been brilliant blue but surprised by being violet. He was finely shaped in face and body. These were well-displayed, for he wore no armor, only a close-fitting suit of tawny fabric overlaid by a leaf-green cloak.
Blackrose, who shared her people’s hunger for beauty, felt a longing to have him as a treasure for her own. Fury lit her in the next moment, for she recognized now what unknown instrument the harpist had played. She knew the music of her own solitary heart.
How dare he toy with me! she thought. Sorcerer! Enchanter! Bind my heart and so take me from the field . . . I think not!
Almost more swiftly than these thoughts could be shaped, Blackrose spurred her heels into the kelpie’s flanks. Drawing her sword with less effort than a cat unsheathes its claws, she raced across the field to eliminate her enemy while he remained weaponless.
The man yelled, whether in fear or in answering challenge Blackrose could not tell. With his left hand he drew the harp close to his body for protection, while his right hand smoothly drew his dagger from its sheath. A crystal blade caught the pale light of the sky and glimmered as he brought it around to block her sword.
Blackrose expected that fragile blade to shatter, but it held as if reinforced with steel. Even so, dagger is no match for sword. Her longer blade glided across the back of the man’s hand. No blood beaded forth, not even a scratch marked the perfect skin. From this she knew that her opponent was protected by enchantments as she was protected by honest leather.
The momentum of this first clash had carried her past her intended victim. Now Blackrose wheeled the kelpie for a second attack. As far as she could tell, that crystal knife was the man’s only weapon. She felt certain she could overwhelm his protective enchantments.
The man’s dapple grey horse was taller than the kelpie, slender and graceful, although with a broad chest that promised strength as well as grace. The kelpie, however, was no horse but rather a fey creature, ornery of temperament as was shown by its wicked eye. Although the kelpie preferred to shape itself into the semblance of a somewhat stocky pony, for reasons of trapping the unwary it had long ago mastered more comely shapes as well. Now it adapted itself to the new challenge, becoming as large as the Seelie horse, but far stronger in build.
Transformation completed, the kelpie carried Blackrose back into combat, trumpeting its own challenge to the pretty stallion. The Seelie champion had not moved from his place near the center of the thorn tree-lined meadow. He had tucked away the harp. Now with one empty hand and the tip of the crystal dagger, he traced patterns in the air. His lips were moving in rapid sequence and Blackrose recognized the building of a spell.
“Flamewing!” she cried. “Distract him!”
The little ruby-scaled dragon dove from where in had been anxiously circling, plummeting like diving hawk directly at the Seelie champion. When a few feet away, Flamewing spat fire, then wheeled up and out of reach.
The fire did not touch the champion but transformed instead into a shower of sparks that framed the man within a halo of red, orange, and yellow. Nor did the dragon’s attack seem to interrupt the champion’s concentration in the least. His lips continued to move, the tip of his dagger to trace elegant and complex patterns in the air.
Undeterred, the kelpie thundered forward, his heavy hooves tearing divots from the turf. Blackrose readied her sword in one hand. With the other, she drew a long dagger, double-blades paired like serpent’s fangs either to cut or catch.
When the kelpie brought her close, snapping with square yellow teeth at the pretty dapple grey hide of the Seelie horse, Blackrose brought her weapons into play. She sought to catch the crystal dagger between her own’s double blades, while bringing the sword in, hoping at least to shear the man’s arm off at the shoulder, although she would have preferred to pierce him through his heart.
Neither goal was achieved. Even as the dragon’s fire had been diverted before it could sizzle and burn as intended, so her weapons struck against a ward that had been invisible until it lit in reaction to her strike.
Golden light flashed in protest at her violence, paling to something dimmer when, despite the fiery pain that vibrated right into her very bones, Blackrose persisted in her attack. She knew something of wards, knew from long hours of training that they could be broken and once broken were very difficult to reinstate.
Then what will he do? she thought with vindictive fury. He came prepared, yes, but when all that he has prepared is spent, surely he will fall victim to my sword—or if not to the sword, to a dagger, an arrow, an axe, even to the blows of my hands and the tearing of my teeth.
But she felt very odd as this thought arose, very odd indeed. Her tutors in the Unseelie Court had schooled her well in such techniques and never before had she hesitated to use them. Indeed, she had defeated a six-armed giant when he went renegade. He had held her in a crushing embrace, but the battle had ended when she had pushed out his eyes with her thumbs.
But now . . . Now . . . What was happening to her? Why did she feel this curious desire to retreat rather than persist?
Enchantment! she thought. Enchantment, perhaps lingering from the music of the harp. I’ll beat my way through his wards . . . I’ll eat his eyes, rip off his lips with my teeth, and hold his heart in my hands.
Sundeath was very glad that he had invoked his wards before beginning his ride through the unicorn’s realm. He had thought to delay, for such magics did diminish in power over time, but in the end caution had won. After all, he knew he was not the only one who sought the unicorn. He must remember that the unicorn’s sharp horn was not the only danger he faced.
This attack, though, was completely unexpected. He had thought to fight the Unseelie Court’s champion after the unicorn had been captured. So it had been with the last such competition and the one before. For all they cheated and schemed, those of the Unseelie Court had to rely on traditional means of tracking. The great magics were not theirs. At best they might bring some ensorcelled creature with them, perhaps one like this lady’s dragon, which possessed a sharp nose and keen eyes and wings to sail above the trees and so glimpse the unicorn in some distant fastness.
Those of the Seelie Court, however, could lure the unicorn to them, even as Sundeath himself had sought to do. Once the unicorn caught sight of the enchanter, other, older magics would take hold. This double luring was a technique that rarely failed, saving the lives of the elegant beasts and winning their blessings for the Seelie Court.
What went wrong? Sundeath thought as he began etching a spell against the whiteness of the sky. I played and sang. Instead of my heart’s desire this wildcat was brought to me.
That wildcat was even now thundering across the sward toward where he sat upon Zephyr, trusting the horse and his wards to defend him while he prepared a spell. Her steed had grown to match Zephyr in size and strength, though doubtless not in elegance or wisdom. Another evidence of cheating, but cheating on the part of the Unseelie Court was so expected that had they not cheated it m
ight be considered a form of cheating unto itself.
She held paired weapons in a manner that said without need of words that she knew how to use them. Despite the fearsome grimace that twisted her perfect lips and narrowed those long-lashed eyes to slits, she remained the loveliest woman Sundeath had ever seen. In contrast to her, the fey damsels of silver and gold and all the hues of the flowers of summer and spring faded to something perfect and lovely yet somehow half-alive.
Lips still shaping the words of the spell that would set upon her the chill of the north wind, the iciest heart of winter, Sundeath looked upon the face now inches from his own. It was alight with pain as she struggled against his ward, alight, too, with the golden glow of the damaged spell. She could break it, would break it, he did not doubt.
What she could not know was that this was but the first layer of his protections. How would she feel when she realized that the agony that burned in her bones had been as for naught? Would she run? Would she continue her attack even if it would mean her death?
Truth came to him as the final words of his spell took shape upon his lips. Truth that shook him and transformed his magic as it transformed him.
He had called for his heart’s desire and his heart’s desire had come to him. He desired not the unicorn, but what capturing the unicorn would win for him. That prize was not only passion but the rapturous union that would make of that passion more than a passing pleasure. His desire was for his other self, the other who would make him more than he could ever be alone.
He had called and she had come. If she died now, he would have slain her. And so he would slay himself . . .
Realization transformed his spell. Instead of the piercing ice of winter, the spell wrapped about the lady and her steed an avalanche of snow. Soft and smothering, it bound both in its embrace. It would not hold them long, but perhaps long enough for him to speak a few words.
Courts of the Fey Page 16
