A flurry of squeaking and scrabbling noises erupted from beneath the table. Several hours later, after she had finished dusting the entire study and washing the windows, Gwynn reached back under the table, gently nudged several of the sleeping gremlins out of the box, and put it back on top of the table.
Carima was not completely stupid, though, Gwynn found. She showed up again after lunch, trailing only a faint and rather pleasant odor of rosewater. And carrying another present for the Maestro.
“What is it?” Justinian asked, holding the package as if he expected it to explode.
“You’ll have to open it,” Carima said.
After a pause—was he casting a masterfully unobtrusive spell of detection, Gwynn wondered?—Justinian tore off the paper to reveal a small toy brass dragon. He looked puzzled.
“Here, hold it away from you like this,” Carima said, coming closer to Justinian than seemed quite necessary and putting her small, red-nailed hands over his long, ink-stained fingers. “And press this little catch.”
The toy dragon’s jaws opened with a tiny roar—more like gremlin’s squeak, really—and a jet of flame shot out.
“How ingenious,” Justinian said. He pressed the little catch again and imitated the dragon’s squeak as the flame shot out.
The gremlins, who had poked their heads out from under various pieces of furniture when they heard the squeak, dived back under cover when they saw the flame. Carima sat smiling as she watched Justinian roaming around his workroom, lighting candles and incinerating unwanted odds and ends.
“How does it work?” he asked finally.
Carima shrugged.
“Probably something mechanical,” Justinian said, pushing up his spectacles and peering more intently at the little toy. Over the next few minutes, he singed quite a bit of his hair, trying to peer down the dragon’s throat while it was flaming. Carima didn’t seem to enjoy this turn of events nearly as much. She kept grabbing at his elbow and imploring him to be careful, which was bound to irritate him. Gwynn readied a fire-extinguishing spell and watched his investigations with silent interest.
“Radolphus should see this,” Justinian said finally. He trotted off, with an anxious Carima trailing behind him. Gwynn followed at a more leisurely pace.
The dragon was an enormous hit with everybody who saw it. At least until it ran out of flame an hour later, during a mock battle with some of Master Kilian’s yearling salamanders. Carima had no idea how the thing worked or how to fix it, which Gwynn hoped would cancel out at least some of the goodwill the witch had gained by bringing such an entertaining present in the first place.
“That’s no problem,” Justinian said, holding the little dragon to his ear and shaking it. “I’ll just take it apart and see what’s wrong with it.”
He trotted off to his study. Carima, to Gwynn’s satisfaction, retired to the guesthouse with a headache.
“Well,” murmured Master Radolphus, “so much for the poor little dragon.” Justinian’s complete lack of mechanical ability was legendary.
Gwynn, who was slipping out the door, smiled. And then stopped at the next words she heard.
“It’s an unnatural device, that’s what it is,” Master Horatio said. “No better than the she-devil who brought it. You mark my words, it’ll lead to trouble, having her here. Especially the way she’s hanging around that young whippersnapper.”
“Whippersnapper?” Radolphus repeated.
“Justinian!”
“He’s nearly thirty and a master mage,” Radolphus said.
“Too young to be trusted around a baggage like that,” Horatio said. “It’s bad enough bringing in every hedge wizard and potion-dauber to this infernal conclave of yours—did you have to invite the inhabitants of the brothels as well?”
“I’ll thank you to be civil to the witches when you meet them at dinner tonight,” Radolphus said, with more anger in his voice than Gwynn had ever heard. “Or you can stay in your chambers and sulk for all I care.”
“When I’m running this college—” Horatio began.
“If you succeed in replacing me, you can run the college as you wish, but until then, you will follow my orders!”
Horatio snorted and stormed out. Gwynn, too startled to hide, stood looking after him with her mouth open.
Radolphus swore softly, and Gwynn heard several thumps, like books being thrown. She tiptoed away.
Was Horatio really going to be the new headmaster? If that happened, Gwynn realized, it would be the end of her studies. Horatio didn’t approve of teaching women to read and write, much less cast spells.
And he didn’t approve of Master Justinian either.
Back in her room, Gwynn tried to study, but no matter how hard she tried to focus on the pages of her book, she kept seeing Master Horatio’s face, or Carima’s, or—enough! She slammed the book closed and headed back to the Maestro’s study. Most of the time, she did only enough cleaning to meet the Maestro’s far-from-exacting standards, but when she was unhappy, as she was then, cleaning made her feel better.
It usually made her feel better, but when she entered, she found the table littered with pieces of the little mechanical dragon. She stared down at them, feeling both a fierce satisfaction that Carima’s wonderful gift was no more and a curious sadness. After all, it wasn’t the little dragon’s fault Carima had brought him. She knew the pieces would stay there, eventually mingling with all the other clutter on the worktable. Justinian would use the flat pieces as bookmarks, and the cat or the gremlins would play with others, and eventually there would be nothing left of the ingenious little thing.
On an impulse, she took the discarded marzipan box and used it to gather all the pieces of the dragon and put them aside. Perhaps someone else could fix it.
When she’d finished that, she decided she’d done enough tidying for the time being.
But the next morning, she was busy sorting out the amulet drawer when Carima reappeared, in yet another expensive and revealing gown. Gwynn was relieved to see that at least she hadn’t brought any more presents. The Maestro was busy with some new chemical experiments and greeted Carima with absentminded politeness. Although he did send Gwynn down to fetch midmorning tea for them.
“And some more gingerbread, if Cook has any,” he said, glancing at a large glass cookie jar that was empty except for a few crumbs.
“Bless the boy,” Cook said, when Gwynn arrived in the kitchens. “As if I’d run out of his gingerbread. I think he likes it as much now as when he were an apprentice.”
“You knew Master Justinian when he was an apprentice?” Gwynn asked, in surprise.
“Dearie me, yes,” Cook said, laughing as she led Gwynn into the pantry and began filling a bowl with cookies. “Quite a handful he were. Bright, of course, but always up to some mischief. Some things never change, do they?” she added.
Gwynn smiled. But Cook’s face fell suddenly.
“Except everything’s changing now,” she said, in an undertone. “I don’t know what we’ll do if they make that horrid old Horatio headmaster. He don’t approve of women servants in college. He’ll replace us all with a bunch of ham-handed men. Throw us out in the cold. I came here as a kitchen maid. Eight years old. I’ve spent my whole life here and—”
Cook suddenly stopped and whirled toward the doorway.
“Who’s there?” she asked.
Gwynn cast a quick spell of detection.
“No one,” she said.
“Not now, but someone could have been a minute ago. Too many strange faces around, between all the servants who came with them foreign magicians and the extra help we took on for the duration. Here.”
Cook thrust the dish of cookies into Gwynn’s hands and hurried back into the kitchen.
Gwynn followed more slowly, glancing around. At least a dozen maids and manservants were busy in the kitchen. Several smiled at her, but more than half the faces were unfamiliar. But why was Cook so anxious? None of the newcomers looked sinister. The
boy turning the spit and the three pink-cheeked girls peeling vegetables were probably extra help hired from the village for the duration of the conference. No doubt so were the plump woman mending a brown mage’s robe and the hump-shouldered crone ironing and folding linens. The man loading up a tray was probably the servant of one of the visiting mages, but he looked perfectly ordinary. And even if one of them had tried to eavesdrop, what Cook said wasn’t that awful. Why was she so worried?
Probably it was just the strain of the conference, and her worry over what would happen if Master Horatio prevailed.
“Off with ye,” Cook said, bustling back with the tea tray. “Don’t hang about here,” she added, in an undertone. “You should be keeping an eye on that wicked witch. I can’t for the life of me see why Master Radolphus allows it, her hanging about here. Ought to throw the baggage out. No better than she should be, I warrant. I’d throw the whole lot of them out.”
It was probably the one subject Cook and Master Horatio agreed about, Gwynn thought, as she made her way back to the study.
Carima was having an uphill battle gaining Justinian’s attention. Although he roused himself long enough to devour much of the gingerbread, he quickly returned to his retorts and beakers. Carima eventually gave up trying to talk to him and merely hung about, no doubt waiting for his preoccupation with his chemicals to wane. She amused herself with folding little bits of paper into animals.
Gwynn watched, fascinated, as the little bits of paper were slowly transformed, in Carima’s hands, into birds, fish, cats, deer—a dozen intricate miniature animals.
“What do you think of this one, Justinian?” she would ask, when she had finished one.
“Mmmm,” Justinian would say, barely glancing up.
“Origami,” she said, noticing Gwynn’s attention and visibly torn between being annoyed at Justinian’s preoccupation and pleased that someone, at least, was paying attention to her. “It’s an old art form from the East. From Cathay.”
Justinian finally gave up pottering with his chemicals in time for luncheon. Gwynn watched them cross the quadrangle, Carima half-running to keep up with Justinian’s stride, hanging on his arm, chattering breathlessly.
Gwynn breathed a sigh of relief when they’d gone. She cleared a place on the table to put her bread, cheese, and ham, pulled up one high stool, and sat down to eat with one hand while paging through one of the books Master Justinian had assigned her that week with the other. With Carima gone, the gremlins emerged and began scouring the place for crumbs and licking up any spills.
Gwynn’s eye fell on a little origami bird, standing next to her plate with its head down, as if pecking the table. She eyed the little thing with distaste. As with the dragon, it was something she would have enjoyed but for the association with Carima.
She would throw the little things in the fire, she decided, and reached over to pick up the bird. But when her fingers touched the paper, she felt a small spark, then an overwhelming flood of sensation.
She jerked her hand back and took a deep breath to steady herself. There had been a spell on the origami bird; that was obvious. But it hadn’t harmed her, as far as she could tell. Apparently the spell’s only purpose was to trigger those seconds of sensation in the mind of its target. Like a dream that slips away when the sleeper wakes, the spell eluded her attempts to define it. She had a vague impression of fingers, touching her with featherlight strokes in sensitive places. A feeling of languid heat. A suggestion of a pair of eyes gazing into hers. It wasn’t unpleasant, really. More unsettling. Except that the whole thing was somehow associated with Carima. That was unpleasant. Were those supposed to be Carima’s eyes and fingers? Even more unpleasant.
She steeled herself, and touched the little bird again. It was only paper. Evidently she had triggered a onetime spell. She flicked the little paper toy into the fire.
A love spell, she realized, or more likely an aphrodisiac one, doubtless intended for the Maestro. And carelessly designed—the spell had affected her, even though she was not only the wrong person but the wrong sex. But if Master Justinian had picked up the little bird—
She felt a sudden surge of fear and anger. She hopped off the stool and looked around, seeing a half dozen of the little folded animals in various parts of the study. She wasn’t going to let the Maestro touch a single one of them, she thought, reaching for the nearest one.
The little spark again and the brief but overwhelming flood of sensation. Gwynn found herself staring down into her hand, at the tiny paper cat she was holding. Touching one of the little animals with her thoughts focused on Justinian was a rather different experience, she reflected. Not at all unpleasant. But considerably more unsettling.
She picked up a box, and the silver pelican-shaped sugar tongs that kept finding their way from Master Radolphus’s study into Justinian’s. She carefully picked up another little animal with the tongs. She felt no effect, so she placed it in the box and gathered the remaining origami animals, one by one, being careful to touch them only with the tongs.
Back in her room, she chalked a small magic circle on the floor—a small circle being all there was room for—and used the handle of her candlesnuffer to snag a paper animal from the box and place it in the circle. Then, for the next several hours, she used every technique she knew, trying to tease out as much information as she could about the spell on the paper toy. And about the spell’s creator.
Finally, she sat down cross-legged beside the circle and scrubbed at her aching eyes with tired fingers. She hadn’t learned much, certainly not enough to unenchant the little animals. It was as if Carima’s spells were at odd angles to the way she expected them to be, like Chthonian script. But she felt a renewed respect for witch magic. It might be very different from the magic she was learning, but it was powerful.
Perhaps it was a good thing if, as Master Radolphus had often told the apprentices, witch magic rather narrowly focused on love spells and healings. And sex, she added, recalling the effects of touching the little animals. Radolphus must have thought the students were too young to know about that.
But what should she do with the little animals? She could keep them around and study them some more, but she didn’t think there was any more she could learn from them, at least not at her present level of magical skill. And she was afraid that if she left them in anywhere about the college, someone would find them; perhaps someone who shouldn’t. Carima was still around, she thought ruefully. If she wanted to study the spell some more, she was sure Carima would provide some more samples. So she should dispose of these. Burn them. Or deactivate them and put them back in the Maestro’s study.
Deactivating them was probably the best thing, she thought. Carima might notice if the little animals all disappeared. And if she was careful how she did it, setting off the little spells didn’t need to be unpleasant. Quite the contrary.
No, she thought, angrily. They’re Carima’s tricks. She poked her tiny fire until it burned its brightest and, one by one, fed the little animals into it.
She was careless with the last one, and it brushed her arm on the way down. Again she felt the overwhelming rush of sensation, stronger than before and very far from unpleasant. She sat for a long while, thinking, her face flaming with a heat that had nothing to do with her tiny fire.
The sound of the tower bells ringing to signal dinner startled her out of her thoughts, and she hurried to throw on a clean tunic and race down to the dining hall.
Normally, the inhabitants of the college could all fit in one end of the cavernous dining hall, with plenty of room in the corners and alcoves for misanthropes to hide and students cramming for classes to lurk quietly with their books. The conference crowd filled the hall to overflowing.
Gwynn found a seat at the corner of a table stuck up in the minstrels’ gallery. The food, though plentiful, was usually cold by the time it arrived so far from the kitchen, and she shared her table with a trio of taciturn dwarfs and a group of apothecaries’ apprenti
ces who seemed more than half-convinced that she was a kitchen maid sneaking into the banquet.
But she’d chosen the place on purpose. The minstrels’ gallery was designed to give the guests of honor an unimpeded view of the performers, which meant that it gave her an equally good view of the head table. She could even catch the occasional snippet of conversation.
Most of the occupants of the head table were elderly, even the two women seated near one end. Gwynn assumed they were the senior members of the witches’ delegation. Master Justinian’s dark head stood out among the gray and the white.
As did Carima’s emerald green dress among the black, brown, and gray mages’ robes. Not that Carima was officially seated at the head table. But shortly after the dinner began, she flitted up onto the dais and perched on the arm of the chair next to Justinian. The aged astrologer who was supposed to be occupying the chair had drawn himself as far away from Carima as possible and appeared to be making a desperate attempt to pretend she wasn’t there.
In fact, everyone was deliberately ignoring Carima except Justinian, who acted as if nothing out of the ordinary were happening.
And Master Horatio, seated at the other end of the table, as far as possible from the two elderly witches. He spent so much time glaring at Carima that he barely ate.
“No business being here,” Gwynn heard him mutter during a lull in the conversation.
“What’s old Thunder Brows so upset about?” one of the young apothecaries asked.
“He disapproves of the conference,” Gwynn said.
“Why?”
“Brings in the riffraff,” one of the dwarfs rumbled. “Like us. Not big on nonhumans, old Master Horatio is.”
“Or women practitioners,” Gwynn added.
“How’s he feel about apothecaries?” the apprentice asked.
“Lesser form of the art,” the dwarf said. “Mere tradesmen who should be sent to the back door.”
“Stupid old fogy,” the apprentice said.
Unusual Suspects: Stories of Mystery & Fantasy Page 13
