A Mirror Against All Mishap

by Jack Massa

  “We must go now, quickly.”

  “But what of the queen?” Wilhaven demanded.

  “I am coming, my dears!” The tone was unmistakably Meghild, and yet it was not her voice. This voice held an eerie, inhuman quality that made Glyssa shiver.

  The thing that was now the queen floated through the doorway. Meghild’s gray hair and wrinkled face sat atop a tall body of quivering, translucent light. The arms and legs were fluid shapes that fluttered in and out of existence. Below the gashed neck, drops of blood hung frozen, cascading down to a gold sphere that pulsed like a heart.

  In her dread and amazement, Glyssa recalled what the witch had told her: that after the ritual, the queen would reside in a spirit body. Eidolon was the word she had used.

  “We must go,” Amlina said again.

  “No! Monstrous!”

  The guards on the stair had caught sight of the eidolon. Others were poking their heads through the doorway at the bottom of the tower.

  “That is it not the queen!”

  “It cannot be.”

  Abruptly the guards turned and fled, falling over each other as they rushed down the steps.

  “Cowards!” The eyes of the eidolon blazed. “Unworthy men!”

  Wilhaven dropped to one knee. “My queen. It might be wise if we left by your secret gate, the tunnel under the moat.”

  Meghild’s head looked down at him. “My clever Wilhaven. You at least are loyal.”

  “Aye, my queen. But your new appearance is startling—to say the least. And Penredd has gathered forces that oppose your leaving. If we go through the feast hall, I fear there will be bloodshed.”

  The eidolon sucked in breath, chest swelling, the fantastical limbs shuddering with power. “No! Meghild will not sneak from her own keep like some traitor. What kind of start would that make, Wilhaven, for the saga you will write about me? Come, my lovelies. I shall depart through my own front gate.”

  At the ends of her legs, feet like lion’s paws appeared, and the eidolon lurched down the steps. “How marvelous to walk again, to feel such strength!”

  Wilhaven shrugged and followed her. The Iruks held back, unsure.

  “What do you think, Amlina?” Glyssa asked, her fear pitching higher.

  The witch’s face looked dazed. “We’d best follow the queen.”

  “Aye, follow me, my loyal ones.” Meghild called from the bottom of the steps. “And hold your weapons ready!”

  * O *

  Swords and spears in hand, Glyssa and her mates rushed down the curling stair and through the corridor. As she ran, Glyssa’s dread was a throbbing pain around her heart—the fishhook, bleeding off her courage.

  The luminous spirit-body glided ahead of them, Wilhaven stalking at its side. The queen’s guards were nowhere in sight. Turning onto the passage that led to the feast hall, Glyssa heard a swelling uproar ahead. Through the archway, she glimpsed a throng of armored men and the gleam of drawn swords. Then Meghild stepped over the threshold, drawing gasps and moans of wonder as the warriors shrank back.

  The Iruks charged through the doorway and spread out beside the queen and Wilhaven, Amlina coming a step behind them. At the forefront of the mob of Gwalesmen, Glyssa spied Leidwith on one side, Penredd on the other. The queen’s guards who had fled now hovered behind the front ranks. All were staring wild-eyed at the shimmering eidolon.

  “Make way for the queen!” Wilhaven shouted.

  “What have you done?” Prince Leidwith howled in dismay.

  “They have killed our queen!” Penredd pointed his sword. “Slay that monstrosity. Slay the witch!”

  “Keep back!” The eidolon screamed, flinging up arms that ended in glittering claws. “I be Meghild, daughter of Isthhaven, son of Luth. I be queen of Tribe Demardunn, and I command this castle!”

  Most of the Gwalesmen stepped back, a few dropping to one knee.

  But Penredd shouted defiance. “Whatever that thing is, it is not our queen. I warned you all that something monstrous would happen. Now, if there is manhood in you, I say destroy that abomination, and kill the witch and her barbarians!”

  He raised his shield and started forward, sword leveled. After a moment, the men closest to him did likewise. Leidwith and all the rest still hesitated, gaping.

  The Iruks crouched in fighting stances, spears and blades pointed.

  Amlina moved behind the eidolon and laid a hand on its back. “Cover your eyes!” she cried, then shouted five syllables of evocation.

  Glyssa, eyes shut and shielded by her forearm, perceived a flash of red through her eyelids and felt a searing heat on her face. Howls of shock and pain rolled through the hall, then came the clatter of weapons dropping on stone.

  “Hurry now,” the witch said. “Their blindness will not last.”

  Glyssa opened her eyes to find men groaning and blinking throughout the hall. Some clutched their heads or reached with groping hands. The eidolon stood quiet and still, its light diminished. Amlina had used its energy, Glyssa realized, to cast the blinding magic.

  Then Glyssa spied a flash of movement, armed men moving toward them.

  “For the honor of Demardunn, kill them!”

  Penredd and three of his followers must have understood the witch’s warning and shielded their eyes. Now they advanced with murderous intent. Their shields and chainmail would give them an advantage over the lighter-armed Iruks. And, at the rear of the throng, Glyssa saw other men moving forward.

  “For the glory of your queen, stay back!” Wilhaven stepped lightly toward Penredd, sword and dagger pointed. Lonn, Eben, and Brinda darted forward to stand with the bard.

  Glyssa stood rigid, paralyzed by the clawing terror in her chest. No! She must not fail her mates now. And yet she could not move.

  Helpless, she watched as Penredd, growling like a bear, jabbed his sword at Wilhaven. The bard parried, but had to dance back, then immediately dodge a stab by the warrior on Penredd’s right. That thrust left the man open for an instant, and Brinda lunged with her spear. The point found the man’s belly, piercing the mail and sending him staggering back.

  Lonn and Eben had rushed the two warriors on the other side, their fierce attack forcing the men to retreat. Wilhaven, teeth bared in a mocking smile, now stood his ground against Penredd. But Glyssa knew that the bard would be no match for the heavier, better-armed prince. Penredd’s shield swept aside the bard’s long sword. Next instant, a vicious thrust scraped Wilhaven’s upper arm as he tried to twist away. In seconds, the bard would be slain, and then Amlina …

  “No!” With Glyssa’s cry, something broke inside her. It might have been the klarn-spirit, or the cold power birthed in her by the witch’s initiation. Whatever it was, suddenly she could move.

  Raising her sword, she screamed Penredd’s name and rushed him. The prince pivoted to face her. Glyssa used her spear to smash his sword aside and flung herself onto his shield. Her weight threw him back, off-balance, and Glyssa stabbed his face, her sword laying open his cheek and slicing his ear.

  Penredd screamed and fell, Glyssa sprawled on top of him. She clambered to her feet and crouched over the prince as he writhed, clutching his face through gushing blood.

  Seeing Penredd fall sapped the will of the other warriors. They shrank back and lowered their swords. The fight had lasted only seconds.

  “Come, we are leaving!” Amlina cried.

  Now it was a mad dash through the hall. The Iruks pushed and jostled aside the still-blinded warriors, while others who were not blinded, merely watched. Amlina and Wilhaven followed the Iruks, each holding an arm of the eidolon queen as she lurched and tottered along.

  Lonn and Glyssa led the way down the castle steps and across the courtyard. By the time they reached the gatehouse, the eidolon’s body had regained some of its ghostly light. The sentries at the portcullis fell back in amazement and made no challenge as the party hurried by.

  Down though the darkened village they went, with dogs barking but no one abroad to v
iew their unearthly passage. The eidolon, it’s light returned, no longer needed support, but flowed down the streets with long-legged, wheeling strides.

  “How wonderful to be free again!” Meghild cried.

  Glyssa ran with blood thrumming in her ears, exultant with the thrill of battle and their escape.

  But when they reached the docks, a glance up the hill showed torches and lanterns moving out from the castle.

  “They are following us,” Eben said.

  “Aye.” Wilhaven clutched his wounded arm. “Penredd’s not a man to give up, even with his face split open.”

  They ran down the beach, past the piers and the three warships, to the place where their boat lay anchored in the shallows. As they strode into the gleaming water, Lonn shouted for Karrol and Draven to raise the anchor.

  Slogging waist-high in the fjord, Glyssa glanced back to see the eidolon pause on the shoreline, then step into the water—or rather, over the water. For to Glyssa’s astonishment, the spirit-body cascaded over the waves, never breaking the surface. Ahead, Draven and Karrol had stopped on the deck to stare dumbly at the eidolon.

  “Make ready to sail,” Lonn shouted at them. “We’ve no time to lose!”

  Amlina and Wilhaven were the last to reach the boat, and Glyssa and Brinda leaned over the rails to haul them aboard.

  Eben had already gone to help Draven and Karrol haul up the yard, while Lonn ran aft to man the tiller. Glyssa could hear him rousing the windbringers and imploring them to lend their efforts.

  “How is your arm?” Glyssa parted the bard’s upper sleeve to examine the wound.

  “Sure, it’s just a scrape,” Wilhaven answered with a grin. “’T’will make a pretty enough scar, though.”

  After helping her mates secure the lines, Glyssa grabbed her spear and ran to join Lonn at the helm. Amlina, Wilhaven, and the queen stood with them on the rear deck as the boat slipped away from shore. The lamps and torches of their pursuers had reached the docks.

  Glyssa saw that the wind was against them, blowing up the fjord from the sea. Even with the help of the windbringers, the best Lonn could do was head to the opposite shore, sailing as far from the village as could be. But they would then need to tack into the fresh wind. Penredd’s crews were already clambering aboard the three warships, which were moored upwind. They would have no trouble intercepting the Iruks’ boat.

  “I believe they will catch us,” Lonn stated matter-of-factly.

  “Sure, I would not be worrying,” Wilhaven replied.

  Meghild’s head tilted to look down at him “So, my bard, that means you accomplished the little errand I sent you on this afternoon?”

  “Aye, dear queen. The watchmen succumbed to my lullabies and to the sweet, drugged liquor. And then the knots joining tillers to rudders succumbed to my hacksaw.”

  Glyssa recalled how she had woken from her trance to hear Wilhaven singing from down the beach, and how he said he had visited the three warships loyal to Penredd’s men to “do some politicking.”

  Now, in the witchlight that hovered on the fjord, she saw the result. Sails raised, the three cranocks drifted back from the docks. But when they tried to turn they floundered in the waves, as sailors cursed and shouted. One ship swung until its prow crashed back into the dock. The other two waddled sideways and collided, the snap of outrigger planks sounding distinctly over the water.

  “Ooh, worse than I expected.” Wilhaven winced. “’T’will take a small-month at least to make those repairs.”

  “Ha-hah!” Meghild laughed jubilantly. “So much for Penredd and his fools. And so, my lovelies, we are away, our voyage begun!”

  “Yes,” Amlina sighed. “We are safely away, I think.”

  With that, the witch’s eyes rolled up behind their lids, and her knees buckled. Glyssa and Wilhaven grabbed her arms to save her from collapsing.

  “Poor Amlina has worn herself out,” Meghild said. “Best you take her to where she can rest.”

  Glyssa and the bard half-dragged, half-carried the semiconscious Amlina forward on the rolling deck. The eidolon floated behind them, drawing mute, tight-lipped stares from Karrol and Draven who were stationed at the sheets.

  “You’ll soon get used to it,” Glyssa told them with a laugh.

  They conveyed Amlina to the crawlspace under the foredeck, which had been outfitted as her cabin, and left her lying on a narrow bunk. As they crawled out of the hatch, Draven arrived, his expression full of concern.

  “She’ll be all right,” Glyssa told him. “I know she will.”

  “I will watch over her,” Draven said. “Brinda and Karrol have the sheets.”

  Glyssa clasped his forearm and smiled.

  Wilhaven climbed onto the foredeck and stood with the queen. Her tall, glimmering form hovered at the prow, watching over the water.

  Glyssa went aft to stand at the helm with Lonn. He looked at her fondly and laid a hand on her shoulder.

  “You are well, my Glyssa?”

  The cold wind caressed her face, and she breathed in happily. “Yes. Much better now.”

  “You’ll have to tell me where you were these past six days.”

  “That I will,” she said. “But not tonight.”

  Lonn called the order to come about, and pulled the tiller hard as the yard arm creaked round the mast. As the boat leaned on its new tack, Lonn gazed at the prow, where the eidolon stood by the phoenix figurehead, like a beacon lamp lighting their way.

  “It might be an interesting voyage,” he said.

  Glyssa laughed. “Yes, I think it might.”

  Sometime later, Grizna the peach-colored moon rose behind them. At dawn they reached the open sea.

  Part Two

  To the Ruins of Lost Valgool

  Twelve

  In the morning the weather turned foul. Wind from the southwest drove gray clouds over the sky, and curtains of rain lashed the deck. The cranock rode nimbly enough on the rolling swells, and only a few waves splashed over the bulwarks. That was not the problem.

  The crew would sleep in shifts. At mid-morning, Lonn left Karrol at the helm and Draven and Eben stationed at the ropes, while he, Glyssa, and Brinda crawled into the sleeping tent—only to discover their bed furs soaked in a pool of ankle-deep water.

  Angry and exhausted, they tore down the tent and spread the furs to dry as best they might on the upper part of the deck. Their grunting and cursing roused Wilhaven, who had been dozing in his dry spot next to the foredeck.

  “Aye, I ought to have warned you.” Wilhaven yawned, scratching his beard. “In rough seas the bilge collects around the mast. Not the best place to set your sleeping gear.”

  “We’re leaking from the bottom!” Lonn complained.

  “Oh, indeed,” the bard said. “That’s to be expected in this weather. Don’t your Iruk boats need bailing?”

  “Only a little, in heavy rain or very rough seas,” Glyssa answered. “Our hide boats are watertight.”

  “Well regrettably ours are not perfectly so.” Wilhaven was untying several long-handled scoops designed for bailing. “Which is why a cranock comes equipped with these admirable tools.”

  He handed one of the bailers to Eben and tossed another to Lonn.

  “There was no leaking when we sailed in the fjord,” Eben pointed out.

  “Sure, and there the water was calm and the boat brand new.” Wilhaven set to work. “It’s the cracks between the planks, you see. They stretch and swell in rough water. You’ll want to patch them with new moss and tar, I’m thinking. Best to stop and do that before we leave the coast.”

  “Wonderful,” Lonn growled, setting to work with the bailing tool.

  Glyssa picked up the fourth bailer and joined them. She imitated Wilhaven, sweeping the pail into the bilge water and slinging it over the rail in a single smooth motion.

  “By the way,” Wilhaven asked cheerfully, “what name have you given your ship?”

  “Name?” Lonn said. “We Iruks do not name our boa
ts.”

  Wilhaven looked astonished. “Oh! But a cranock has a soul. A soul that is compounded from the spirit of the trees that gave their planks and tar, the hemp plants that gave their fibers for canvas and ropes, the beasts that gave their leather and hides for …”

  “We get your point,” Lonn grumbled. “But we do not name our boats.”

  “I have a suggestion,” Karrol called from the tiller. “We can call it the Leaky Ladle.”

  Despite his ill humor, Lonn joined his mates in grim laughter.

  But Wilhaven looked aggrieved. “Sure, and it would be a pity not to name such a fine ship.”

  “You are our poet,” Glyssa said. “Why don’t you name it for us?”

  “Well … with the captain’s permission?”

  Lonn shrugged. “You can name it if you want to. But to us it will just be ‘the boat.’”

  “Fair enough, my lord, and thanks.” Wilhaven paused in his bailing and looked toward the bow. There the light-body of the queen hovered before the waves, as it had all night and day.

  The bard’s tone grew soft and serious. “Amlina chose the phoenix as our figurehead. And like that legendary bird, Meghild has risen from her own death to live and stride a deck again. I name this ship in her honor: the Phoenix Queen.”

  Despite themselves, the Iruks were moved by his reverence.

  “That is lovely,” Glyssa said. “The Phoenix Queen it is then.”

  * O *

  Lying flat, tilting and lurching, Amlina opened her eyes. A gasp caught in her throat as she scanned the darkness, not sure where she was or how she got here.

  Fear seized hold as she remembered—chanting and shrieking, summoning that terrible force until it filled her soul, possessed her. Then screaming and hacking with the sword, blood everywhere …

  Amlina shuddered and thrust herself up, fully awake. She was in the small crawlspace on the boat. Of course, they were at sea now—a rough sea, to judge by the steep rocking.