Lord Samhain's Night

by Jo Beverley

  Forbidden Magic

  This is a full length regency historical in which the heroine snares a lord by using a magical statue that’s reputed always to demand a price for its gifts. When the Earl of Saxonhhurst turns out to be eccentric and possibly mad Meg believes she’s found the sting in the tail.

  The Marrying Maid

  in Songs of Love and Death. In this Georgian novella, a young lord seeks his destined bride to gain his magical powers and avert a family curse. He searches the fashionable ladies of England, but finds his bride in very unlikely form. The collection is available in hardcover, paperback, and as an e-book.

  The Marrying Maid was an honorable mention in the Year’s Best Science Fiction, edited by Gardner Dozois.

  FLOWER POWER

  What if aliens come in an unexpected form?

  Flig the Bugwort looked at the crowd, her sap sinking down to her roots. She didn't have a good feeling about this place at all.

  On the sunny side -- the ruler's crazy plan seemed to have worked thus far. Flig's essence had been transported through space to this planet and into the dominant life-form, and she’d arrived safely in the middle of a crowd. Her foliage and round yellow head was identical to that of the natives. She and Tor should be able to explore without being detected.

  On the cloudy side, there was something very wrong with the crowd. No one was moving. No one was communicating. Were they infested with some terrible pest? They looked healthy enough.

  Flig extended a leaf and brush it against that of a neighbor. Not so much as a twitch.

  Maggot it. She'd predicted there would be social nuances they hadn't been able to pick up through space. And where, for rot's sake, was the gardocyne Tordemayne? They were supposed to form together, but Tor couldn't be any of these witless wonders.

  Flig waggled herself so Tor would be able to see her, but none of the plants reacted. Rot it. She'd have to find her. Gardocynes lived to grow huge, so they naturally avoided all danger. Tor was probably standing as still as all the others, hoping not to be seen.

  Fungus head.

  Flig was glad that home base couldn't read thoughts.

  She explored the abilities of this strange body. She could move the stem, leaves, and head, but she couldn't make anything else work. This planet was awash with green energy but didn't seem to be doing anything with it. She wove it into a local communication system. She could communicate with Tor by bouncing off home, but she needed something faster than that.

  She wiggled the communication leaf in a questing circle. "Hey Tor! Shake a petal."

  Nothing happened. Then: "Don't be disgusting," said a thick, slow voice. The Gardocyne obviously was bouncing communication off Verdamonde.

  Flig reminded herself that no one ever got anywhere by harassing a gardocyne. They just hunkered deeper in the earth for a year or two.

  "Come on, Tor. There must be hundreds of us here. Do something to show me where you are. Do anything and I'll spot you among these zombies."

  Flig eased out of the ground a bit and stretched up tall. "Show yourself, Tor!"

  About ten plants over, a yellow top moved slightly in a way that might be more than a breeze-blow. Flig suppressed a sigh. Sending a gardocyne on this adventure was insane -- except that the ruler has presented it as an honor, and would be happy to get rid of a popular rival.

  If they wanted to thwart the ruler's plan, they didn't have much time. They needed to be out of here before the sun moved and cut off the essential light because the scientists hadn't been sure what would happen then.

  If the gardocyne couldn't come to the bugwort, then the bugwort would have to go to the gardocyne. Flig eased her roots out of the ground -- and practically fell on her stamens!

  How the drought did these plants get around? Only the central root was capable of bearing her weight and that was inflexible. Fretting about lost time and the expenditure of energy, Flig made some more adjustments so she could use the lower bifurcation for a kind of shuffle. Perhaps these creatures hopped, but with all the rest of them so still, she wasn't going to bounce up and down. All this stillness might be a religious ceremony. She might get crushed for sacrilege.

  With the ungainly shuffle, she worked her way through the indifferent crowd, murmuring polite apologies, though she was pretty sure by now that they were dealing with an extreme communication problem. The ruler was hoping for diplomacy and trade treaties that would bring in essential minerals. If they couldn't communicated, however, the mission would be a failure.

  Bugslime! She’d only brushed against the plant, but bits began to fall. White bits, not yellow.

  She looked up. The plant's whole top was white and strangely filmy. Some kind of mold?

  "Ugh." She began to frantically brush the stuff off -- then stopped, horrified. Each bit of white fluff held a seed. What in the name of the sun was the etiquette for a situation like this?

  Someone else's seeds.

  On her leaves.

  "Flig," said Tor. "Are you coming? This place is creepy."

  "Yes, in a moment."

  Home base was recording all this. She'd never live it down. If there had been any chance of diplomacy she'd probably ruined it.

  She tried to detect how the seeding plant was reacting.

  No more than any of the other plants.

  Come to think of it, there were a lot of seeds up there. She'd never seen so many on one plant. Talk about excess! With so many, however, perhaps the parent was glad to see some gone. It must be a terrible job, caring for so many seedlings. Perhaps everyone was still and quiet from exhaustion.

  Flig felt terrible, though. Very carefully, she placed the fluffy seeds back among their siblings.

  Not a word of anger or thanks. Creepy. Tor was right. Flig wanted to get their reconnoitering done and get out of here. She scuttled over to the gardocyne and adjusted one of Tor's leaves so they could communicate directly. "What do you make of this?" Flig asked.

  "It's horrible. I'm so small!"

  "You're the same size as everyone else."

  "That's what I mean." Then Tor suddenly jerked. "Flig! There's something on me!"

  "Where? Oh, yum." Flig curled a leaf over the black insect and crushed it.

  "Don't eat it!" yelped Tor.

  "Rot." Sight of such a juicy bit had made her forget the dangers. Food here might not suit them, though it was impossible not to take some in through roots and leaves. It was too late, though. The rich juices were flowing in through her pores. After a moment, she said, "It's all right, I think. Very like a prime root-cutter. Want some?"

  "What's the point? This stupid body wouldn't grow to a decent size if I ate every root-cutter on this planet. Roots and leaves will have to do."

  "Well, I wouldn't depend on roots," said Flig bracingly. "By the time you've fixed them up for walking they won't be much good for sucking up food any more. I don't know how these plants manage. Come on. Let's get on with our mission. Sooner done, sooner back to our real selves at home."

  That was enough to get the gardocyne to ease her roots out of the ground. Flig spent the time snapping up passing insects so that home base could record their nutritional value, and watching the crowd for hints. They did nothing but soak up the sun.

  At least none of the insects seemed particularly dangerous, but Flig did some modifications so she could defend herself and Tor. She manipulated some of the minerals in the earth into a little slugpluggers. She tried it on an ant and the insect exploded into bits.

  Not bad. Even without regular weapons they might come out of this intact.

  Thus far, in fact, the adventure had been so safe it was boring, but she was sure that couldn't last.

  "This is hard."

  Flig looked down. Tor seemed to have got a plant with a larger bifurcation but she was still struggling with the changes.

  "Just pull free. We've got to get out of the crowd to see what's really here. There could be all kind of monsters. Leaf rollers as big as your head!"

&
nbsp; Tor went as still as all the rest. "Why can't we stay here until they suck us back?"

  Flig bent his head right against Tor's so that the words wouldn't be sent back to Verdamonde. "Because we're brave explorers, moss-brain. Everyone's watching, and what we do will decide our fates. Do you want to go back to your favorite rooting grounds, your offshoots and your food, or do you want to start from scratch again out in the scrub?"

  "They couldn't do that!"

  Flig pushed her petals hard against Tor's. "You haven't figured this out, have you? We're supposed to fail. We're supposed to look stupid. Sure the technique works but we'll get no credit for that. We have to be brave. We have to be bold. We have to make contact, or at least discover something useful, or when we get back we'll be nothing but bug-fodder."

  Too late Flig realized this wasn't the way to inspire a gardocyne. Any bugwort would be checking weapons and quivering to be off after a speech like that, but a gardocyne came from a long seedline of safely growing to massive dimensions.

  "I can't be brave," Tor said. "I might as well simply stay here and rot." She began to sink her roots back into the earth.

  Flig worked on a cheerful tone. "Of course not. No one would expect it. That's why I'm here, remember. To protect you. But you have to come along with me, Tor, for the look of things."

  She got a leaf under one of Tor's and tried pushing up. "I haven't seen anything here to trouble us and the scientists seem to have got it right. We look like one of the most common life-forms, and there's so many of them there can't be any serious predators. It's going to be easy. In fact, our greatest problem here is going to be making it look good back home."

  Tor muttered something, but she wriggled back out of the earth. "Lead on then. Unless," she said nervously, "you think the danger will come from behind."

  "There is no danger, Tor. Think about it. Would all these others be just standing soaking up the sun if there was a problem?"

  "I suppose not."

  Tor made no more complaint as they edged through the silent plants. Soaking up the sun. That's what they were doing. But why? And for how long?

  Flig stopped being polite since no one paid any attention. Gardocynes were exquisitely polite, however, so Tor continued to apologize every time she brushed leaves. Flig plotted a course that avoided the seeding ones. Tor would die of embarrassment.

  Then the crowd suddenly ended. Flig stopped to assess. A strip of barren earth stretched between them and another mass of plants which looked identical to the one they were a part of.

  Even Tor was shocked enough to come forward to the edge of the terrible bare, grey earth. "What could have caused that? I'm not walking on that. My roots would rot."

  "Don't worry. We'll walk along this edge and go around it."

  Flig too was almost shuddering at the sight. Earth incapable of supporting life. What had happened? Some totally new kind of fungus? Selective drought? Some monstrous pest eating a path through here?

  Then the earth began to shake.

  "Flig!" wailed Tor, and Flig grabbed her and dragged her back among the crowd. She looked to either side but saw no sign of fear. That didn't reassure her at all. Perhaps these plants were all slaves, subject to some terrible mind control.

  Enormous objects come crashing along the barren land. They were stubby roots of some enormous plant that rose up to the sun. Or stubby feet of a terrible bug.

  "It's not fair," moaned Tor. "I want to be big too."

  The thing stopped.

  "Shut up," Flig whispered.

  A strange pinkish leaf came down, down, toward Tor. Flig raised her gun, hating to draw the thing's attention, but ready to die to defend.

  The thing brushed past Tor and grabbed one of the nearby crowd. Seconds later tattered bits of the yellow head drifted onto the blasted earth and the thing stamped on its way.

  Both Flig and Tor looked around, expecting some reaction now. Rage. Grief. Some care for the naked, bleeding stem.

  But the crowd kept on soaking up the sun.

  "No predators," shouted Tor, quivering with shock. "No predators! What was that then? A thing as big as me back home and here I am a midget. It's not fair. We should have come as something big like that-"

  "Shut up," said Flig and hobbled over to the ravaged plant. There was little fluid loss, but it couldn't survive without a head. Ripped right off. She looked again at the plants all around.

  "Do you know what," she said slowly. "I don't think these things are..." She didn't know how to express the strange notion that had come into her brain.

  "Are what?"

  "Like us."

  "Of course they're not like us. This is another planet. Or do I have to remind you of that? We've taken their shapes, that's all, but they have no dignity, no soul. They're horrible, stupid, and small."

  "I mean they are really not like us." Flig went over to another plant. It was the hardest thing she'd ever done, but she brutally wrapped a leaf around its stem and squeezed. Sticky sap oozed, the smell making her feel sick, and slowly the head began to droop.

  "Flig. Are you mad!" screamed Tor, stumbling over. "Stop it. Stop it. Oh, I am sorry," she said to the plant, trying to push the head back up. "We will make reparation. I don't know what but we will..."

  Flig let go. "Don't waste the effort, Tor. They don't have a brain."

  "No brain? How could they live?"

  "Just suck up fluid, take in light, make seeds..."

  "What's the point of that?"

  "Not much. Verdamonde's not going to get very far with trade treaties, is it?"

  Tor looked at the wounded plant. "They have to have a brain. I tell you what, they've been enslaved! What are we going to do about it?"

  Gardocynes were not brave, but they had a strong sense of moral duty, especially as others had to carry out their crusades. Flig hoped that the noble declaration was playing well back home, since this exploration was not going to achieve its original aim. She looked for ways to increase their chances of honorable return.

  "We must ask for instructions from our great ruler," she said in an inspiring tone. "Surely Verdamonde must help these poor creatures achieve their true destiny!"

  She counted the beats necessary for their message to cut through space, and for the response to land on them.

  "O brave Flig and mighty Tor," boomed the ruler's voice. "Our sap gushes with sympathy for these unfortunate creatures. Do not fear that we will abandon them or you. Even now we are assembling a force to come to aid you in this noble battle. Volunteers flock to the transmitters outraged by the cruelty you have revealed. You, Gardocyne Tordemayne, and you, Flig the Bugwort, are appointed leaders of this rescue mission. The bravest and the biggest. Who better could there be? Soon the inhabitants of that oppressed planet will be free to live as plants should, free to move, free to defend themselves, free to shape their own destinies..."

  Flig looked at Tor to see how she was taking this but these atrocities seemed to have stirred her beyond her innate caution.

  "But they must be big, great ruler," Tor declared, head high. "The pink predators are huge, as big as a gardocyne, faster moving, and cruel as a gardocyne could never be. Make them ten times our size, and broad to match."

  "Twenty times," Flig interrupted, "and with longer bifurcations on the roots, great ruler, so we can move more speedily. You must change us, too, or we could never command."

  "It is all being planned as you say, our noble heroes."

  "And well armed," Flig said while the going was good. "The minerals here can be shaped into weapons. Send us enough essence to make bugzappers of suitably enormous size."

  "Enormous," moaned Tor in delight. "But I don't think I can use a weapon, Flig."

  "Carry one for show."

  Tor's leaves were drooping. "Perhaps there's only one of those things."

  Flig almost said, "I hope not," but remembered and said, "Perhaps. But these creatures will need our protection for a long time to come."

  A new wor
ld.

  Once they'd rid this place of the huge oppressors, perhaps there would be no need of trade. Flig still thought these plants weren't like them. Perhaps they had been once, but now.... She didn't think they could ever look after themselves.

  They would need a ruler....

  A strange feeling swept over her, and then like a pop! The transformation came through and she was looking down on a mass of mindless yellow heads, with a scattering of the white seeders among them. She looked out over greenery and trees, all, it would seem, beaten down to rock-like stupidity. Despite their oppression, much of the growth was lush, indicating rich soil, ample sun, and reliable water.

  A world for the taking. A world wasted on this floppy-heads.

  Her long bifurcated roots worked properly now, able to carry her at speed, and a substantial bugzapper formed along one leaf. All around her Verdamondians appeared, laughing at their strange new form, but flourishing their weapons, ready to destroy the tyrants.

  And then down the strip of blasted earth, Flig saw one of the monsters coming.

  Horrible. Horrible. Not a scrap of green to it. A pest. Definitely a pest, with four pink limbs and a big round head.

  At sight of her, a mouth opened and a screech came out.

  Not so brave now, was it?

  "Attack!" cried Flig, conqueror of the new world.

  I told you it was odd, didn’t I?

  Stories like this come when I let my muse out to play.

  Most of the time she’s happily spinning out stories of love and triumph set in England’s past, with no really weird elements.

  An excerpt from A Scandalous Countess

  Penguin-NAL, February 2011 in print and e-book.

  (Lord Dracy, a scarred ex-naval officer, has just won a race between his mare Cartagena and the Earl of Hernescroft’s Fancy Free. As winner, he gets both horses, but he wants one of the earl’s stallions instead.)

  “Come in, Dracy, come in,” said the earl. “Claret, brandy, port?”

  “Claret, thank you,” Dracy said, noting that the footman had left and the earl was serving the wine. So, a private discussion.