The Catswold Portal

by Shirley Rousseau Murphy

  He didn’t speak but lunged at her suddenly, roaring with uncharacterisic rage, crashing against the bars.

  “What is it?” she said, coming close to him. “Oh, what has she done to you?”

  He threw himself against the bars again, so hard she thought he would break through. But his yellow eyes were filled with pain. And when she reached through, stroking his face, all fierceness left him. He said, “Queen Siddonie killed my mate. And when I knelt before my dead love, Siddonie’s soldiers threw nets over me and pinioned my wings.”

  His eyes blazed. “I could have ripped an ordinary net, but I could not break her spells. Her evil is powerful.”

  “Maybe I can free you,” she said, reaching to stroke his broad, soft paw.

  She tried for a long time, but no spell she could remember would open the Griffon’s cage. She left the Griffon at last, defeated.

  Near the end of the long row of cells, she came to a caged harpy. The beast’s long bird’s legs made it ungainly. It stood taller than Melissa, and its feathers gleamed white in Melissa’s spell-light. Its woman’s torso and breasts were sleek with white feathers, but its white wings were so ragged she thought it must beat them against the bars. Its thin bird’s face was stained brownish under its eyes and around its yellow beak. It stared between the bars at her pitifully. Its voice was soft and whining. “You have come to free me.” It wrung its long white hands. “I am wasting in this cell, surely you are here to free me?” But in spite of its wheedling voice, its gaze was canny and appraising.

  Melissa tried an opening spell, but she couldn’t spring the lock. At last she said, “Can you tell me where to find the Toad?”

  “In the next cell,” it said, suddenly not pleading anymore but irritable. “Asleep. What could you want with the Toad?”

  “I want to ask it a question, I want it to tell me about my past.”

  The Harpy laughed. “If you want a vision of the past, he’s no use to you. All he does is sleep.”

  “Surely I can wake him.”

  “Do you no good. He has no powers left, the queen destroyed his vision-making powers. He can’t tell so much as what you had for breakfast. He remembers only a few homilies, all useless.”

  “But…”

  “Siddonie thought the Toad could tell the future. He never could do that. No one can tell the future. The queen is a fool. Look at the beasts she has brought up from the Pit—for what? Not one of us can tell the future. Nor would we help her if we could.”

  “That’s why she brought you all here? To tell the future?”

  “That, and for her entertainment. She puts the fiercest among us in the courtyard to fight each other.”

  “I suppose the Griffon is the fiercest?”

  “Oh, she doesn’t do anything with the Griffon. She can’t manage him.”

  “Then why does she keep him?”

  “She likes to see him captive, of course. The more freedom a beast has known, the more she wants it behind bars.”

  “But you were all free.”

  “The Hell Beasts have been bound to the Pit of Hell. We are not totally free.”

  Melissa considered this as she moved to the next cell and looked in at the Toad. He lay sprawled on the stone floor, asleep. He was huge, nearly filling the cell. A lumpish beast, his green skin was covered with warts, his pale throat ballooning with each breath. Before she could try to wake him, the Harpy reached around with an icy hand and pulled her away. “If you wake him he’ll blow himself into a stinking air ball. Phew. He won’t speak to you.”

  Melissa’s head was beginning to ache. “Are there human prisoners here?”

  “Behind that wall.” The Harpy pointed a white finger toward the featureless black interior of the cellar.

  Melissa cast her spell-light, picking out barrels and shadowed pillars, and beyond these, a stone wall grown over with moss. “Do you know the spell to open it?”

  The Harpy laughed, darting her pink tongue between sharp teeth. “Do you think I’d be in here if could command any of her spells? Do you think I haven’t tried?” And quite suddenly the beast began to cry. Heaving sobs shook her, tears coursed down her white feathers, darkening the brown streaks. When at last the beast stopped crying, her eyes were red, and her voice was sharp with self-pity. “I thought you came to free me, but you didn’t. You wanted the human prisoners. I’ll never get out of this cell. I’ll never see my little mirror again.”

  “What mirror?” Melissa asked, frowning.

  “My mirror was my only companion, my only legacy from my dead mother, and that bitch queen has taken it from me. If you cannot free me I’ll never see it again. Never.” The Harpy combed distracted fingers through her feathers, and one white feather floated to the cell floor.

  Melissa reached through the bars and took the Harpy’s hand, trying to comfort her. “Why did the queen take your mirror?”

  “I wouldn’t bring images for her.”

  “I don’t understand. The queen fears images.”

  “She fears images in the present,” the Harpy said patiently. “My mirror could show the past. There is something in the past she wants to see.”

  “Then can you show me my past? I don’t need the Toad. You can tell me who I am.”

  The Harpy stared at her cannily.

  “I can remember nothing of my childhood,” Melissa said. She considered the beast warily, searching its small cold eyes.

  “I cannot bring any image,” the Harpy said assessing Melissa with a keen avian stare. “Unless you steal my little mirror for me.”

  “Could you show me my childhood? Could you show me who my parents are? And where I come from?”

  “If I had my mirror, I could show you those things.”

  “Where does she keep your mirror?”

  “It was in her chambers, but not anymore. I can speak to my mirror from any distance. I made it give her images that drove her to nervous trembles.” The Harpy laughed. “She couldn’t rid herself of them. She kept taking my mirror out and looking, like digging your finger into a sore wound. At last she moved it to the king’s chambers.”

  “How can you know where it is if you can’t bring visions without it?”

  “It calls to me. Every night my little mirror calls to me. Oh, I know where it lies hidden—in a wardrobe in the king’s chambers. But that is not a vision, that is love calling.”

  “If I get it for you, will you show me my past?”

  The Harpy reached through the bars to stroke Melissa’s arm. “If you bring my mirror, I will give you whatever vision you choose.”

  “It would be terribly dangerous to go to the king’s chambers.”

  “Two visions. And you will be safe enough; she never goes to his chambers anymore. Nor has the king slept in her bed since the weakling prince was born. The queen blames the king for the child’s illness.” The Harpy smiled. “The king blames her. He was a fool to marry her. Of course, he is still a fool. Go when the queen is at supper.”

  “If I were caught thieving in the king’s chambers…”

  “Everything in life is dangerous.”

  “I could be killed for such a thing. The laws would call it treason, to steal from the king’s chambers.”

  “Three visions.”

  “As many visions as I choose.”

  “You already have the best of the bargain. The king will be no problem; any woman can twist him around one finger. All you need do is climb into his bed, and you can have anything.”

  “I do not intend to climb into his bed.”

  The Harpy smiled wickedly. “If you did not, that would be an opportunity lost, my dear. Think of it. The right woman has only to take herself to the king’s bed to become the new queen of Affandar.” She clasped her long white hands together. “Oh, I would like to see someone dispossess that bitch.”

  “If I steal the mirror, you will give me all the visions I choose.”

  “Five visions. That is my last offer.” The Harpy fluffed her feathers, stir
ring ancient dust. “Someday the Netherworld kings and queens will fall and we will rule again. The Hell Beasts will rule again.”

  “Five visions,” Melissa said. “But you must describe to me the queen’s powers so I know them exactly.”

  “Everyone knows her powers.”

  “I don’t. And I must know them if I am to steal the mirror.”

  The Harpy sighed with exasperation, as if Melissa were very dull. “A daughter of Lillith can open all that closes and close all that opens: locks and spell-doors, of course. And she can open a were-beast to his alter shape. And she can close his power to change. But her real strength lies in this:

  “Siddonie can close away truth so only falsehood remains.

  “Thus does she mean to twist the peasants so they follow her: she means to close their minds to truth. Thus,” said the Harpy, “does she mean to enslave the Netherworld.”

  “And can nothing prevent her?”

  “Many powers united might prevent her.” The Harpy looked hard at Melissa. “The power of the Catswold might prevent her.”

  “Who are the Catswold?”

  The Harpy stared at her, her eyes opening wide. “The Catswold are shape-shifting folk of the eastern nations.” She searched Melissa’s face. “You know nothing of the Catswold?”

  “No, nothing.” Uneasily she looked back at the womanbird. “How can there be people in the Netherworld that I don’t know about?” But she was reminded uncomfortably of the forgetting spells Mag wove over her when they visited the villages, those little deaf spells that had touched her in the middle of numerous conversations.

  “The Catswold have many powers,” the Harpy said. “But Catswold folk are independent and stubborn.” She looked hard again at Melissa. “They will not easily unite, even to defeat Siddonie. Likely the Catswold will never organize into a formidable force against the queen, as the elven and the human rebels are organizing.”

  “How many rebels are imprisoned?” Melissa said impatiently. “When were the last ones brought down?”

  “There are twenty-nine rebels here. The last three were brought five days ago. Siddonie tortured them. Their screaming kept me awake.”

  “You heard them through those thick stone walls?”

  “My hearing, like my eyesight, is quite wonderful.”

  “When the queen tortured them, what information did she ask?”

  “I couldn’t hear her, just their screams. But she would want to know the rebels’ plans, and she would want to know the names of their leaders.”

  “Couldn’t you have shown her that, in your mirror?”

  “Why should I? That is part of why she locked me here, because I wouldn’t help her.” The Harpy wiped her bill on her shoulder.

  “You side with the rebels, then,” Melissa said hopefully.

  “I side with no one,” the Harpy snapped. “Siddonie drew me out of the Pit with her cursed spells, and then she took my mirror. I want to see her dead. But I do not side with the rebels. Now go and fetch my mirror.”

  Melissa turned away, both amused by the Harpy and annoyed at the feathered beast. As she moved to the next cell, she saw that the Toad was awake. It had risen to sit on its haunches, its huge, warty belly distended. It fixed Melissa with a bulging stare that seemed empty of all intelligence. Melissa glanced back at the Harpy. “What are the homilies it remembers?”

  “How to sour goat’s milk. How to grow artichokes. How to please the Griffon.”

  Melissa stared in at the Toad. “Will you tell me how to please the Griffon?” She doubted that the Toad would answer, it looked so dull.

  “Caress of gold warmed by sun,” the Toad said in a slow, expressionless voice. “Kiss of emerald blessed by Bast, can please the steed of Nemesis.” The beast looked at her without expression.

  Melissa repeated its words, then, “Toad, can you tell me about my past? Can you help me remember who I am?”

  The Toad stared at her then lay down again. In an instant it was asleep.

  She shouted at it and reached through the bars, but her fingers could barely reach its warty hide. It slept on, deeply.

  Well, at least it had told her how to please the Griffon, though likely she would never need to know that. The Harpy, looking out at her, seemed to divine her thoughts. “The Griffon would as soon eat you as look at you.”

  Melissa said nothing. She left the Harpy and approached the wall that hid the rebel prisoners, and pressed her ear to the mossy stone.

  She could hear nothing. She tried all the opening spells she knew, but the wall remained solid. She drew her light over the mossy stones looking for seams, but found none. She turned away at last toward the stairs and climbed quickly.

  Chapter 10

  Uneasily Melissa approached the door of the queen’s solar, wishing she knew why she had been summoned this time, and afraid she did know why. Yesterday when Briccha sent her up with the queen’s new riding boots, she had paused in Siddonie’s wardrobe to listen to the queen and two men talking in the chamber beyond. She had recognized the voice of the queen’s seneschal. The dark, stooped man made her uneasy; Vrech came into the scullery sometimes to paw the girls, embarrassing most of them, and enraging Briccha. He was harsh, mean eyed, and not too clean.

  Standing in the queen’s wardrobe, she had listened to talk about imported wines and medicines from the upperworld, and Siddonie had said something about the portal in Xendenton and about a caravan carrying goods to Cressteane and Ferrathil. Vrech said they should not use the southern portal, that it opened on the upperworld in too crowded a location. Siddonie had snapped that she knew that, but it was less than an hour’s ride away and he should be able to manage his affairs so no one suspected anything. The queen spoke with cool familiarity of the upperworld cities to which the tunnels led. When the conversation lagged and a chair scraped, Melissa had fled for the hall. She had reached the other end of the passage when Vrech came out, followed by a thick, stiffly moving man with grayish skin and mud-colored hair. The two men had started down the stair when Vrech glanced along the hall, looking her over.

  “That’s the girl,” he said softly.

  The men had paused, staring at her. She looked back boldly, but fear touched her. Finally they had moved on, laughing. She was terrified they knew she had been listening. And now, summoned by the queen, mounting the last steps and starting down the hall, she was certain she would be punished for spying.

  She had been summoned not to the black door that led to the queen’s dark chamber but to the adjoining solar which opened between the queen’s rooms and the king’s. She expected another dark room with black furniture and closed draperies.

  But she entered a bright room, the draperies open to the green day, and four oil lamps burning. The walls were of a pale, smooth material she didn’t recognize. The cream satin draperies, tied back, revealed a balcony then the far forest and a sweep of granite sky. The queen stood before a white marble mantel. She was dressed in pale riding pants, soft boots, and a white satin shirt clinging to her breasts and open at the collar. Her black hair was coiled elaborately, her black eyes were intense. A memory touched Melissa—she saw the queen dressed in strange clothes, a tight dress that ended at the knee. The vision filled her with fear and hatred. Even her dislike of the queen, and her knowledge of Siddonie’s cruelties, seemed not enough to support the deep, total hatred that now swept her.

  “I have decided to shorten your hours in the scullery, Sarah. Will that please you?”

  “I…Of course it will please me.” She was not to be punished, then? Did the queen not know she had eavesdropped?

  “I plan to give you some tests. I believe you will find them interesting.”

  “What—what sort of tests?”

  “Why, to discover your magic skills.”

  She shivered, puzzled and apprehensive. “I have no special skills.”

  “Did you not bring a light to guide your way up the passages to me, just now?”

  “That is cottage ma
gic—anyone can do that. There is no power to that—not like your powers.” She didn’t like treating this woman with deference, but she sensed that it was wise.

  The queen smiled. “Do you remember the winged lizards which flew over you when you went to the Hell Pit? Ah, yes, I see that you do. My lizards saw clearly what you are capable of—Sarah. It takes a special talent to call the Lamia from the Hell Pit.”

  Melissa felt naked and defenseless, as if she were suddenly suspended again over the Pit, about to be dropped into the flames.

  “It takes great talent to make the Lamia obey you.” The queen’s smile was so cold Melissa shivered. “I mean to train your talent in more complicated magic, Sarah.” The queen looked at her deeply. “You are to be my disciple. You are to learn the powers of a queen.”

  Melissa gawked. She dare not speak. Why should the queen want to train her?

  “And now, my dear, shall we begin to use your real name? I much prefer Melissa.”

  She swallowed. “If you wish.”

  “Why did you lie to me about your name?”

  “I didn’t mean to lie. I am used to Sarah; it is what I am called. Any other name seems uncomfortable.” She was sweating, her throat was dry and constricted.

  “I’m sure you will learn to respond to Melissa. It is your birth name. Come closer and kneel.”

  Melissa took three steps and knelt on the pale, richly patterned rug. Coldly she listened to the queen’s spell binding her to a disciple’s rules and submissions. She had not been asked if she wished to serve. Siddonie of Affandar did not ask, she commanded.

  The spells were long and complicated. The queen’s power pressed so strongly on Melissa she was hardly able to breathe. Silently, terrified, she wielded a counter-spell to block Siddonie’s enchantment. But she began to feel deeply lazy as the malaise of enchantment took her. How rich was the queen’s voice. And Siddonie was so beautiful, her pale skin creamy against the satin shirt, her black hair and black eyes gleaming like ebony.

  Melissa jerked her thoughts back, alarmed. She fought Siddonie’s charm harder with all the skill she knew. But blocking Siddonie’s powers, keeping her face passive, again she imagined another room, where Siddonie sat at a desk, a very young Siddonie, no more than a child. The room glowed with a white, harsh light, and beyond the window loomed infinite space, as if the stone sky had vanished, leaving a void, a terrifying emptiness.