Uncertain Magic

by Laura Kinsale

  Something strange, she was certain. It was November Eve. Tonight, if he kept his word, Geoffrey’s guns would somehow elude the Irish militia.

  So far, she had not even seen the Irish militia. She’d seen nothing but mist and Faelan’s back all day, except when they had stopped to eat and rest. He hadn’t said much then, but his face and eyes had told her volumes.

  Tension was there, anticipation and intensity. She closed her eyes, remembering how he’d taken her the night before, in the squalid room in Glenbeigh: fiercely and silently, deeper in himself and farther away than he had ever been, and yet demanding as if he could not taste her or feel her or pull her close enough.

  He dismounted now, and walked back to where she sat, damp and tired, with her hood pulled up against the fog. From her perch on the pony, her eyes were just on a level with his. She could see the dew that clung to his heavy lashes, while his eyes seemed to take on the color of the coming night.

  “Wait here,” he said. He looked at her a moment, and then suddenly reached out and slid his hand roughly behind her neck, drawing her against him for a long and heady kiss. He stood back, and a hint of the wolf-grin touched his lips. “That should give them something to talk about.” He caressed her cheek lightly. “Keep your face down, little girl, and don’t pull back your hood.”

  So she sat, while he disappeared into the house. A moment later he was back and they started off again, this time with a little more force applied to the round, patient ponies, who thought it was high time to put an end to the day.

  It was full dark, but the mist was already luminous with the promise of a harvest moon. The ponies plodded on down the road between the wet gleam of slate shoulders, until Roddy felt the sudden, agitated touch of a human mind. A few moments later she sensed horses, at the same time the ponies pricked their ears. Her mount raised its head with a little huffing whinny.

  The answer was shrill and far away. The distance surprised her. After London and Dublin and populous places, in this deserted land her talent seemed far more sensitive than she recalled.

  The ponies went along a little faster then. Faelan turned off the road at some landmark Roddy could not fathom, and led the way down a steep gully where the moonglow did not follow. She clung to her saddle as the pony stumbled and felt its way by sound and smell, nose to tail behind the others.

  The man they approached was nervous. His unease had increased since he’d heard them coming, which made the horses he tended restless. Vague pictures, ghoulish and creeping, insinuated his braver thoughts. He kept repeating an Irish word to himself, and Roddy finally matched it with an image of a half crown—the tie that kept him to his post in spite of growing panic.

  Faelan said something, very soft, and suddenly her pony ran into the one ahead and stumbled to a halt. Roddy waited, puzzled, sure that the man and his horses must be very near now. It seemed that she could hear the muffled beat of agitated hooves ahead.

  They stood there for a full minute in utter silence. And then a howl rent the night—a sudden, inhuman peel of sound that made the ponies shy and Roddy gasp and clutch the saddle and the reins and anything else she could reach as her heart leaped into her throat and stuck there in pounding terror. The sound had come from just in front of them; it couldn’t have been a foot from Faelan, she was sure. But just as she was opening her mouth to call out to him and hauling her pony around to flee, he hissed a sharp order that halted her, more from its tone than from the unintelligible words.

  The truth struck her at the same moment that she realized the man ahead had lost his battle with his wits and fled. Faelan had made that sound, Faelan himself, and now he was on the ground and striding toward her, half dragging her off her mount. “Help me,” he ordered near her ear. “Calm the horses—can you?”

  He was already stripping the pack pony; he took her wrist and pulled her past the frightened native animals toward the sound of thumping hooves. Silver-white shapes swam into view: the other horses, locked in the traces of a bulky carriage and threatening to kick free in their panic.

  Without having to think, Roddy began to sing. It was as if the music came to her from the misty air, a strange sensation she had no time to contemplate as she eased up to the frantic beasts. Their ears pricked toward her; the one in the lead which had been trying to rear settled down with a suddenness that was eerie. Roddy moved toward it, took its shining white head between her hands, and felt the soft muzzle against her cheek. The song drained out of her, and a moment later she could not even remember what she had sung.

  Faelan’s laugh behind her made her turn. “You’re home now, little sidhe,” he said. There was exultation in his voice. She heard him come up to her shoulder and felt something soft pressed into her hands. “Put that on, and get inside. Hurry, or we shan’t be in time for our ball.”

  The thing in her hands seemed to have a luminosity of its own; she held it closer to her eyes and saw that it was made of silver thread that caught the moonlight and held it as the mist did. A veil. It draped open into a full-length mantle, a clinging sheen of light.

  She heard the creak as Faelan mounted into the driver’s box and hurriedly yanked off her cloak and hood. Beneath it, the white gown that Faelan had insisted she wear that morning took on a new significance. With the silver mantle over her shoulders and her hair freed from the hood, she felt like a sliver of moonlight herself.

  She thought suddenly—giddily—that she would like to dance, but the horses were backing and reversing under her husband’s hands. With a small cry, she ran for the door of the carriage and scrambled inside.

  Cobwebs engulfed her hair, and she almost jumped back out again. She lost her chance when the carriage moved forward into jolting motion, and she fell against the seat, coughing on the sudden cloud of mildew and dust that rose up around her.

  She clawed at the sticky web in her hair, bringing curls all down in a tumble around her face. The night wind blew in the open windows, tangling the golden mass further, but at least it carried the cobwebs away and cleared the mildew from the air. A strange excitement filled her; she grasped the windowsill and put her face to the rough breeze, watching the dark shapes of trees race by. The coach came up out of the gully and topped a rise. The trees disappeared, and the fog began to break, so that the carriage seemed to fly above a landscape made of light and shadow.

  Far too soon for Roddy, the vehicle began to slow. Outside, the mist had gone to moving clouds. She could see the mountains now, huge and black, with the rolling bogs spread out at their feet. A deep night scent rose from the low places, and in the darker crevices, pale blue light hung like wispy lanterns of imagination.

  Beyond the bogs an incandescent sheet of silver lay, and more mountains beyond that: the sea, and distant, mysterious lands, islands and brooding hills where clouds ran like fleeting, silent stags.

  The carriage rattled to a stop. Roddy peered out. A stranger stood on the road, an old man in an ancient footman’s uniform, looking up at Faelan with a toothless grin.

  “Senach.” Faelan’s voice blew to her on the breeze, soft, half laughing and affectionate. “God’s blessing on you. Will you drive Finvarra and his lady?”

  In the moment before the old man spoke, Roddy realized that her talent had deserted her. She frowned, focused, and found the old man as mysterious to her as her husband. But Senach’s obscurity was not like Faelan’s; not a blank wall, but a well of nothing that seemed to drag her in. Even the minds of the skittish horses had disappeared into that infinite depth. The more she tried to concentrate her talent, the more she felt the pull. Her fingers clutched at the window frame, her thumbs digging into the moldering upholstery that hung in fat tatters from the door.

  “I’ll be greetin’ Finvarra’s lady first,” Senach said, in the melodic English of the countryside.

  He turned his eyes toward the carriage door. Roddy had no idea who Finvarra was, but she had a strong impression that she was the lady in question. She took a nervous breath, remembering Fael
an’s gentle greeting, and tried to convince herself there was nothing to fear in this strange old man who wore servant’s clothes and held himself like a royal prince. She fumbled for the door handle, and let herself slowly down.

  She stood just outside the carriage, with the wind lifting her hair and the mantle into a shimmering fall of light. The horses were still; not the stamp of a foot, or the jingle of harness. Only the wind, faint and playful, that blew their white tails as it blew through her hair.

  She found herself moving, a few steps that took her near the old man.

  Senach touched her face with his fingertips, lightly, so lightly that the touch, too, might have been the wind. His eyes were pale, like Faelan’s, but emptier. Sightless. She stared into them, and it was like looking into the depths of a bottomless lake. There was fear for a moment, the dizzy sensation of falling, and then he smiled, with a smile that took her up like a dreaming mother’s arms; like a lullaby, soft and safe.

  “Lassar,” he said, and turned her toward the carriage with his spidery touch. “God bless. I’ll carry ye safe home.”

  Faelan came down from the box, leaving the horses as if they were stone statues. He opened the door for her, and climbed in after. As Roddy settled gingerly back in the musty seat, he drew the silver veil through his fingers. “Lassar he’s named you.” Faelan’s touch was warmer, firmer than the old man’s. “Flame. I like that.”

  “He’s blind,” Roddy said.

  In the dark, Faelan’s lips in her hair felt like swallow’s wings. “Do you think so?” he asked complacently. “I’ve never been certain.”

  The carriage moved into a smooth, forward rock. Roddy clutched at Faelan’s hand. “But he’s driving!”

  “He knows the way.”

  “Faelan!”

  His arms came around her, restraining her plunge for the door. “Ho there, little sidhe—we’re safe enough with Senach. Haven’t you recognized a kindred spirit?”

  She stiffened in his embrace. Her voice came out a little shrilly. “I don’t know what you could possibly mean. I’ve never tried to drive a coach-and-four blindfolded, I’ll tell you!”

  His grip stayed firm across her shoulders. The swaying carriage brought their bodies together, and he kissed the top of her head. “No. But I’ll wager you could, if you tried.”

  “Of course not—” She broke off, and looked sideways at him in the dimness. A sudden terror gripped her, that he knew; that he had guessed her secret. She stared into his eyes, light blue in the moonlight from the door, and searched frantically for the telltale fear and disgust, the awful knowledge that had destroyed her great-aunt Jane’s life and marriage long ago.

  She did not see it. In the changing shadows, he was as impenetrable as ever, but the smile that curved his fine lips seemed warm—almost proud.

  “Cailin sidhe,” he murmured. “Do you remember when we helped the mare? I told you then, I knew a man who felt what you feel. Senach can see through the animals’ eyes, if he can’t see through his own.”

  “That’s crazy,” she said, and meant it. Never before had she encountered someone else with her talent, and she found she was as unprepared to believe in it as any ordinary person would have been.

  He laughed. “Ah, but we’re home now, little girl. I think everyone is a little mad in this place.”

  Roddy gave him a startled look.

  “Yes,” he said, in a taunting voice. He took her chin and forced her close, his lips brushing and exploring on her skin. “Were you hoping I was sane? I’ve seen you with that hope in your eyes, little girl. But we can’t be sane—not tonight. It’s November Eve, cailin sidhe, when mortal folk stay home in bed and Finvarra and his lady ride a coach with four white horses on their way to dance with the dead.”

  She wet her lips and said, “Finvarra?” in a dry whisper.

  “The King of the Fairies of the West, my love.” His arm tightened around her, and his lips caressed her mouth. “Will you dance with me tonight?”

  Her breath seemed to be coming very short and fast; her heart thumped louder than the horses’ hooves. It was fear and confusion, but it was something else besides: the night and the moonlight and the wind that rushed past. Like wild music, it hummed in her veins, and sparked a chill of pleasure as Faelan slid his hand beneath the silver cloak and explored the shape of her breast.

  The touch on her skin was solid and human, in spite of his words. It reassured her. She leaned against him, pressed into his flesh-and-blood warmth. There was some purpose in this, she told herself. There were Geoffrey’s guns and the militia, things all too real and dangerous. She could not afford to give in to the fancies that seemed to fill the air around them.

  King of the Fairies, indeed. She reached up to his cheek and gave him a hard pinch, and told him to stop roasting her.

  “Ow!” He jerked his head away. “Good God, woman, I’ll steal your luck for that.”

  Roddy laughed, relieved to hear the common teasing in his voice. He grabbed her and dragged her closer and growled, “I’ll carry you off to Tir-Na-Oge and hold you prisoner in my castle.”

  “Good!” she said, muffled in his black cloak.

  “You’d like that, would you?” She felt his low chuckle, a vibration against her cheek. “You’re hopelessly fairy-struck, I fear.”

  She lifted her head, just enough to see his face: his blue eyes like the glowing mist, his dark brows and lashes as black as the mountains. “So I must be,” she said, speaking lightly. It covered the truth in her words, she hoped.

  He touched her temple, spreading his fingers through her hair. “It will serve you well enough tonight.” His thumb grazed across her brow. “Those eyes of yours—keep them high, my love, and don’t look down before anyone you see.”

  Then, as if that had been the most natural advice in the world, he sat back and turned his face from her, pulling out his pocket watch and holding it toward the window to read.

  She had no notion of what time passed, and didn’t ask. The road was smooth, eerily so, as if they traveled on the path of the moon she saw shining across the silvered water. The bulky hills rose and fell beside them, brooding shapes that matched the mystery of the islands and headlands across the bays: some sharp and small, some broad and long; all dark, all silent, all patiently waiting as the carriage flew along under a blind man’s hands.

  Her first warning of the militia was an agitated shout, a demand to halt that Senach ignored, and then the crack of musket fire behind them. They were among people, almost before she could realize that her gift still eluded her. The carriage did not slow at all; it picked up speed and flashed by figures silhouetted against the lurid spark of campfires. There were more shouts, more gunfire, and then her talent struck her with a vengeance, dragging her ahead to where a sentry stood frozen in the road and watched the white horses bear down on him.

  She felt his terror; it washed into her own, and she tried to pull away, to force it back, for she feared she would be with him when the horses ran him down. But the images engulfed her. She saw with numbing clarity the animals’ flared nostrils and red eyes of reflected fire, heard the thunder of hooves and wheels, felt the shaft of horror as the soldier stared up into Senach’s fixed and glassy gaze. The militiaman’s body moved somehow, his limbs reacting to what his mind could not comprehend: that the coach which exploded through their camp had a blind man at the lines. The soldier abandoned his duty and threw himself aside. The last she felt of him was the solid, painful impact of his face and shoulder with the dirt at the side of the road, and then her gift was gone again.

  They were in empty country, so suddenly that she found herself still clinging in panic to Faelan’s sleeve beneath his cloak. She let go of him, though it was an effort. The road was rougher now, and the carriage began to tackle a slight rise. Faelan took out his timepiece again.

  He put it away and grinned at her. “A quarter till midnight,” he said, and yanked once on the signal bell. “We’ll give them time to catch up.”


  The horses slowed to a trot, then a walk. Roddy sat with her arms and ankles tightly crossed, trying to convince herself that Faelan actually had some rational plan. The more she thought of the hot exhilaration in his grin, the more it seemed to border on mania. When she considered the whole situation—a blind driver, a mad rush through an armed camp, the half-wild talk of fairy kings—it seemed that he was far less than sane.

  Not even this pause made sense. Why plunge through the militia like avenging angels and then slow down to wait for the pursuit?

  She stared at his dark profile against the moonlight. And while she stared she began to hear music. It came, a fair, faint sweetness, there and gone, and there again. Faelan did not move, but the horses picked up a trot. Their hooves filled the air with muffled thunder, and she thought she had imagined the distant tune.

  But she began to hear it again; in snatches, in small, strange moments of suspension, as if for an instant the horses’ feet flew instead of struck the ground. The haunting melody grew louder. Beyond Faelan’s profile the sky took on a lighter glow.

  The carriage leveled out and then dipped into a valley where a tangle of vegetation blocked the view. Roddy had opened her mouth, ready to force out a half-formed question, when the coach rose again and made a sharp right turn. The encroaching bushes fell away like dark, frightened sheep, and then, on the hill above them, she saw it.

  A house. A huge house, stark black against the shimmer of underlit clouds. Tall, symmetrical windows lined the long facade, spilling cold light into the lingering wisps of fog. She grabbed at the rotating seat as the carriage swung left again. The mansion disappeared from view. When she saw it again from her own window, the source of the glow in the clouds above the structure was unmistakable.