The Iron Dragon’s Mother

by Michael Swanwick

  * * *

  The hotel room had a background funk of cigarette smoke and brown soap. But with the windows thrown wide and a breeze coming from the marshes, that wasn’t too bad. “I hope your day was better than mine,” Raven said. “First the spawn came down with diaper rash and when I got that sorted out, he started teething. Then the barmaid finally twigged that I wasn’t male and wanted to impose a ‘tribade surtax’ on the room. It took me forever to shout her down.”

  “What do you care? We’re just going to skip out on the bill anyway.”

  “It’s the principle of the thing. I don’t like to be charged for services I’m not receiving. How was your outing with Enna?”

  “Exhausting.” Cat threw herself down on the bed. When she closed her eyes, the room spun. “The poor, unhappy creature thinks I’m a goddess sent to her to make everything hunky-dory again.”

  “That’s the script we crafted for her, yes. Making progress?”

  “I dunno. I suppose. Remind me again why I’m doing this instead of you? It really does seem more your kind of thing.”

  “Because more than anything, Enna needs truth and sincerity—and nothing makes my stomach ache worse than truth and sincerity. Anyway, this will all be over with soon.”

  * * *

  Cat lost track of exactly how long it took. But eventually there came a day when she led Enna out of town and up the meadow trail to the top of Eddystone Hill. “So you can feel the wind coming off of the farms,” she’d explained. Their pickup truck, Sophie, who liked dirty jokes, country-and-western music, and lying about her service record, Raven had already sent back to the Armies of the West with a full tank of gasoline and a fresh set of spark plugs. When Cat and Enna reached the top of the hill, Raven was waiting there.

  “I brought the diaper bag.” Raven dropped it at Enna’s feet. “It’s got wipes too.”

  “Goddess?” Blind Enna turned more or less in Cat’s direction. “Who is this? What’s going on?”

  “I have something for you.” Cat accepted the baby from Raven and said, “This isn’t meant to replace your daughter. Nothing and nobody can do that. But it’s an infant and it needs to be protected.” Cat placed the baby in Enna’s arms. “Everybody has to have a purpose. This can be yours.”

  Suddenly laden with the weight of a child, Enna made a harsh, bleak noise, like the cry of a seagull. “Whose…?”

  Now Raven spoke. “It’s your sister’s child. You remember your sister who disappeared when you were a girl?” This was a complete fiction, which was why they had both agreed that she should be the one to tell it. “His parents died in the Brocielande Station raid, which makes you his only kin. Take good care of him.” She started away and then turned back. “His name’s Will. Will le Fey.”

  Cat unpinned and unwrapped the veiling from her head and let a light breeze unreel it downhill, twisting like an air serpent. There was no one nearby, no longer any need for anonymity. “This is the last time we will meet in the flesh. You will always be in my thoughts, however, as I am sure I will be in yours.” She kissed Enna on the lips. “May the peace of the Goddess be always with you.”

  “But I still have questions!”

  “Look inside yourself,” Cat said, ignoring the cynical grin that flashed onto Raven’s face. “The answers you seek are there to be found.”

  Silently and without fuss, a stairway appeared in the air, leading up into darkness.

  Treads materialized under Cat’s feet. Moving cautiously, she began to climb. Raven was already a dozen steps ahead, carrying the satchel they had come in search of so very long ago. Cat looked back and saw Enna, with Baby Will in her arms, head down, already dwindling. With each step she took, the stairs disappeared behind her.

  It felt exactly like climbing into the sky.

  Pain is never permanent.

  —Teresa of Ávila

  The air was filled with microscopic blades of ice.

  Cat had forgotten how frigid Sasha’s house was until she inhaled and thousands of those blades slashed her lungs and made her gasp. The witch-woman didn’t scare Cat anymore. As well be afraid of a high-tension line because it could kill you. Well, so could anything. A sprig of holly could kill you if it were fired from a powerful enough gun. Accelerate it to the speed of light and it would hit with all the force of a hydrogen bomb.

  But the cold was a problem.

  Teeth chattering, Cat watched Sasha extend a hand toward Raven with glacial grace. “I’ll take my treasures now.”

  Raven scratched the side of her face. “Yeah, well, about that. I told you I was holding you to your exact words. You said to bring back the bag. So here it is.” She let the satchel fall to the floor with a soft thump. “You said nothing about its contents.”

  Sasha scooped up the satchel, upended it, shook it. When nothing fell out, she clutched it so tightly that the leather shattered into brittle pieces and fell to the floor. “You dare play word games with me?”

  Raven twisted a hand and a cigarette appeared in it. She stuck the fag in her mouth and snapped her fingers. Smoke curled up. “Trickster, remember? I’ve got a license to swindle. I could fax you a scan of it, if you’d like.”

  The two stared hard at one another. It seemed to Cat that they were evenly matched and that witnessing this clash of titans would have been tremendous fun if only it weren’t so scathingly cold. At last, Sasha said, “What exorbitant demands are you making for the return of my rightful property? Stolen, I might remind you, by members of your family. Which is, I happen to know, legal justification for me to declare vendetta upon your entire shabby tribe of trailer-camp hedge wizards.”

  Rubbing her arms with her hands didn’t seem to do much good. But when Cat stopped, the results made her redouble her efforts.

  “My terms are surprisingly reasonable. First, no vendetta. No reprisals of any kind for whatever actions I may have taken in pursuit of your Big Bag o’ Magic. Second, my client gets to use the key and the whistle, as per our original agreement. If they’re still in her possession when her quest is done, she’ll mail them back—you provide the self-addressed stamped envelope. If they’re lost, stolen, or damaged, the cost is swallowed by you. No reprisals for that either. Oh, and all past and present debts I may owe you are wiped out in perpetuity. That’s a given.”

  Cat’s feet and the tip of her nose were numb. She buried her nose in the crook of her elbow and stepped one foot on the other, back and forth, over and over, in a vain attempt to restore warmth.

  Sasha’s face was so white it gleamed. The crystals of ice in the air formed a pale nimbus about her head. “Your debt is zeroed out. But I’m restoring ten percent for every hour that passes before I get my baubles back.”

  “Deal. They’re in a heap on the top step of the staircase you sent us down. I gave Cat the key and whistle and dumped the rest there on our way in. Technically, that’s in your house, so they’re already in your possession and no penalty applies.”

  For a long, still moment, Sasha was motionless. Then she said, “You’re a cunning little stunt. But you’ll be back. Your kind always comes back. My house is like a casino to you. You’re not the first to leave it a winner, not by a long shot. But not a one of you is able to quit while you’re ahead. You’ll keep returning, over and over, until your luck runs out at last. Because deep down inside you want to lose. You deserve to lose. In all the world, the only home you have is here and you know it. When you’re finally feeling guilty enough to admit it, my stove and my knives and I will be here waiting for you.”

  “I just bet you will.”

  “Am I wrong? Then tell me so. But first, remember what the penalty is for lying in my house.”

  “I—”

  “You ran away from the one place where you ever belonged and you’d rather die than return to it, don’t pretend otherwise, I know the whole sordid story. Ever since, you’ve been going up and down Faerie, causing mischief, never setting down roots. Where do you belong if not here?”

&nb
sp; “I’m tired of these games and I’m going to leave now.”

  “Shall I show you to the door?”

  “At your rates? We’ll climb out a window.”

  * * *

  A fist thundered on the motel room door. BLAMBLAMBLAMBLAM! “Open up! Her Absent Majesty demands it!”

  Cat opened the door. “Hello, Raven.”

  Raven sauntered in, pulling off a slicker wet with rain. “Wow. What a storm. Have you been out in it? You really know how to choose a day off, Cat. Hey, Esme, guess what? I brought the makings of s’mores.”

  “Yaaay!”

  With a maximum of ceremony, they made s’mores on one of the motel grills under the eaves of the leeward side of the building. Then Raven produced packets of Kool-Aid and they put a much-needed streak of red in what remained of her hair and half a rainbow’s worth of colors in Esme’s before the child tired of the activity. Then Esme demanded a story. So Cat told The Moon Is Never Silly and Good Ladybugs Make Good Neighbors and The King Who Was as Dumb as Mud and His Three Sons Who Were Even Stupider Than He Was, Hard Though That Might Be to Believe. Then, when Esme clamored for more, Cat looked helplessly at Raven. Who grinned, cockily of course, and said, “I guess it’s my turn.”

  Sitting cross-legged on the bed, Raven traced an X over her heart to make the sigil of truth and said, “Skipping over a lot of tedious and unnecessary backstory, there I was in wingtips, an ascot with a diamond stickpin, and a three-piece Brooks Brothers suit, looking perfectly out of place on a nude beach. Males only, of course, and ichor-blooded purebreds to boot. Gods forbid a female should see their troublemakers. They had trolls in livery standing guard over their clothes! That’s how anal-retentive they were. Their cars, on the other hand, were just sitting there with the keys in the ignitions, a fortune in drugs in every glove compartment, and some very nice guns in clips under the dashboards. So, figuring I was a frazz overdressed for the occasion, I sauntered over and sweet-talked a Jaguar XKE with a trunkful of stolen antique Atlantean pottery—the smutty stuff—into running off with…”

  “This is a lovely story,” Cat said, “but is it really appropriate for Esme’s ears?”

  “Aw, she doesn’t mind. You keep forgetting how old our little sweetie is. Hey, Esme! You know how to hotwire a car?”

  “Well, duh.”

  “Know how to roll a blunt? How to set up a meth lab? How to field-strip and fire a Kalashnikov?”

  “I’m just a little girl,” Esme said indignantly. “If I tried to fire an automatic weapon, the recoil would knock me over. Everybody knows that.”

  “None of that matters. If Esme wants the perks of being a little girl, she’s just going to have to act like one.”

  “All right. Here’s something that I know for a fact you’ll approve of. So sit quiet and just this once, don’t interrupt, okay?” Raven clapped her hands three times sharply, the way a professional storyteller would, to call for silence. She touched her head, her lips, her heart, and her sex, signifying that her every word would be, in some sense, true. Then she said, “This is the tale of Mother Eve and the Policeman.”

  * * *

  Mother Eve went to Tiffany’s and stole some jewelry. She had enough money to pay for it. She just didn’t care to. But the security people saw her do this thing and sent for a policeman.

  When the policeman tried to arrest Eve, however, he was careless and she took his gun. Then she forced him to take off all his clothing. She stripped down to her underwear and put on his uniform and equipment. Then she got into his cruiser and sailed off into the streets of New York City with the siren screaming, taunting her pursuers over the radio.

  But that game grew old fast. So she took a shortcut through Central Park and ditched the cruiser in the lake. After that, she disappeared into the crowd in such a way that nobody knew where she’d gone. This was a thing she knew how to do.

  That night, Eve saw the police officer she had robbed sitting in a bar, dressed like a civilian. He was very handsome, but he looked sad too. It was possible that he had just lost his job because of her. So she slid onto a stool beside him and murmured into his ear, “I think you should come back to my apartment with me. I have a new pair of handcuffs I haven’t tried out yet.”

  In a better world than ours, he would not have gone. But this is the world that Eve made, so the evening went pretty much as you might expect.

  * * *

  Esme clapped enthusiastically. Raven stood and bowed, grinning as if she’d done something particularly clever. And by some standards, Cat had to admit, perhaps she had. “Esme?” she said. “Go to the motel office and get us some sodas. Also, if they have candy, you can have as much as you want. Tell them to put it on my account. They can call the room, if they don’t believe you.”

  “I don’t have a raincoat.”

  “You can wear Raven’s. It’ll be big and floppy and fun for you.”

  As soon as the door closed behind Esme, Cat said, “Every time I start liking you, you pull something like this. Why is that? And how did you know about Mother Eve? She’s just this character that Helen made up.”

  “Is she? Well, maybe she is. As for how I know, you were being tracked across Europa, remember? A team of investigators interviewed every member of the hobo camp you stayed in that they could find, and the centaurs who busted up the place as well. Did you know that the bullbeggar had the hots for you? You wouldn’t want to hear some of the things he tried to convince us the two of you did.”

  “‘Us’?”

  “Yeah, I was part of the team. I’m a paid employee of the Conspiracy—just like you were, back in Carcassonne.”

  Face motionless, Cat thought as fast and hard as she could. It had not escaped her notice that Raven had not asked who Helen was. Now she said, “So … are you still working for them?”

  “No! I told you, we’re on the same side. I replaced one of their persecutors in order to get the skinny on you.” Raven raised her hands as if in supplication to an unseen Power. “Nobody ever believes a word I say! Which is ironic because I’m always right about absolutely everything.”

  Cat made a farting noise with her lips.

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You’re a fountain of insight. Fine. Great. Here’s the thing, though. If it weren’t for the reports I’ve been giving the Conspiracy putting you five hundred miles south of here, this area would be crawling with agents. Ys is important—and not just because your brother is there. All the big mahoffs in the Conspiracy are obsessed with it.”

  “Why?”

  “Okay, this will take a bit. Ys is older than you can imagine. Ancient. Pre-Cyclopean. Before it was destroyed and rebuilt, its name was Yspra. Big place, capital city of a kingdom that stretched up and down the coast, dominating what later became Brittany. But that city was built on the ruins of a much older one, name of Hysprana. Port city, the hub of your standard mercantile power. Before that came a demonic, wizard-haunted center of power named Hy-Paragnon. Evil place. Destroying it bankrupted the civilizations of its time and ushered in a dark age that lasted for millennia. Read a history of it once and had to go on a weeklong bender to blot out some of what I learned. But before it was corrupted, Hy-Paragnon was a city of learning and justice esteemed throughout Old Faerie. Its name then was—”

  “Hyperuranion!”

  “Whoa. Looks like you’re a step ahead of me. So you already knew all of this?”

  “No, but I heard about the Treaty of Hyperuranion. And I know that the Conspiracy wants to break it. So they can—how did the Barkster put it?—‘plunge all of Faerie into an age of unending war.’” Cat shrugged. “That’s pretty much all I know.”

  “Well, there’s more. The Treaty of Hyperuranion can’t be broken. It’s binding on all signatories and on their heirs and assigns. It can be renegotiated and even negated—but only at the same place where it was originally signed. Hyperuranion. Or Ys, as it’s presently called. With representatives of all involved parties present. Only Ys is underwater now. Dragons do
n’t do water. Fire and air, fine. Land, if they have to. But not water. So long as Ys remains sunk beneath the sea, the treaty is inviolate. See?”

  “Oh.”

  “Which means you’re walking into one hot mess of magic and intrigue.” Raven’s expression was as serious as Cat had ever seen it. “So that’s yet another reason why we should get this over with as soon as we possibly can.”

  Esme returned then, clutching a sopping-wet paper bag whose bottom burst the instant she entered the room, sending candy bars and cans of Dr Pepper scattering everywhere. Cat and Raven got down on their knees to gather them up and Esme joined them and long before their task was done, they were all in a heap, laughing their heads off.

  So the afternoon went, until Esme grew tired and cranky and refused to take a nap. Then Raven said, “Okay, here’s the challenge: Lie down in the middle of the bed and stare at the ceiling. No wriggling, mind you. See if you can make a picture in your mind from the cracks in the ceiling. Then I’ll put my hand over your eyes and count to ten. See if you can remember that picture for that long. Bet you can’t.”

  “Sure I can,” Esme said angrily.

  “Then prove it.”

  Esme lay down and Raven passed a hand over her eyes. It was like a conjuring trick: The eyes were open when the hand covered them and closed when the hand moved away. Seconds later, the child began to snore.

  “Okay,” Raven said. “We’ve got some final planning to do if we want to leave first thing in the morning.”

  They spread out the map on top of the chest of drawers. Raven drew a small star in the Bay of Dreams. “Here’s where we think Ys has to be. So this is the part of the coast where we should go. It’s pretty remote. Dirt roads only, but Jill’s got four-wheel drive.” She drew a spiral on the coastline. “Over here is the closest point to the city. So that’s where we’ll be heading. Esme and I will set up a tent and wait while you go fetch your brother. Esme loves camping out, so that will be fun for her.”