Daughter of Danger

by John C. Wright

  “I have a fairy mother and a human father. Half human. Yes.”

  “I see…”

  Elfine held up her hand. “Wait, not half. Let me think. Daddy is the son of an apsara and a mortal king named Pururavas. My great-grandmotherfather Yla was both daughter and son to Vaivasvata. Vaivasvata was the child of the sun god and the goddess of the dawn but was born human. Later he was granted immortality because he survived the Great Deluge and preserved a remnant of mankind. So whether he counts as being a mortal or not is a tricky question.” Elfine shot her a challenging look.

  Ami said, “I– I don’t really have an opinion.”

  “Where was I?”

  “The Great Deluge.”

  “Yes! Since the world was empty of people, not to mention being really damp, Vaivasvata commanded Yla to marry himself to herself to carry on the bloodline. Which displeased the gods. Yla is both father and mother to Pururavas. Moth, disguised as the Moon, acted as best man during the nuptials and as midwife during the birth and therefore claimed the child as his own. You see, the old tradition is that the best man married the bride if the bridegroom did not show up. So my family is officially Moth, but I am either seven-eighths or three-quarters fairy, depending.”

  Ami said, “Depending on…?”

  “Whether Yla really shared the marriage bed only with herself and himself or if the bridegroom was Moth in disguise all along. Ayre fled from Iran to the Isle of Man after his son Nahusha—my half-brother from an earlier marriage—who was being borne aloft on a palanquin by a thousand great rishis, touched the great sage Agastya, who was bearing him, with the sole of his foot, so for that lapse was turned into a serpent. Any questions?”

  “If you are Iranian, why is your hair blonde?”

  “I wished it blonde. It is one of my glamours. I have ninety-nine sisters, and they all look like me, so I wanted to stand out.”

  Ami said, “How did your, I think it was, great-grandfather, disguise himself as the Moon?”

  Elfine said, “You have to do it during the hours at night when the real moon is not in the sky, or the moon will look down, see what you are doing, and strike you down with madness. That is why it is called lunacy.”

  Ami asked, “If I find my past, will it be as complicated and weird as yours?”

  Elfine shrugged.

  “And am I one of– one of you? Also a twilight girl?”

  “Yes!”

  5. Twilight Girls

  Ami was so surprised at such a clear and definite answer that she stopped walking. “You seem very sure.”

  “I seem sure because I am sure! And I think you are a Moth, like me. Maybe. Not sure there.” Elfine danced with impatience and made shooing motions until Ami started walking again.

  “Why?” Ami asked.

  “Why which?” replied Elfine, waving at some pigeons flying by.

  “Why are you sure I am of the Twilight Folk?”

  Elfine ticked off on her fingers. “One, you are wearing a famous magic ring.”

  “You can tell it is a magic ring?”

  “Not when it is white. Humans don’t wear such things. Not these days. Magic is unlawful for the Daughters of Eve. Even for us, it is not entirely healthy—well, we Halfways are sort of like loveable rogues.

  “Two, you were sprained and bruised and scraped last night, but this morning, your skin is fresh and fair. Daughters of Eve do not recover so fast, not without prayer, and you didn’t pray.

  “Two and a half, when I told you my family tale, I watched your eyes and listened for when you expressed doubt. The mist would have mugged a human hearing such a tale and darkened your heart to disbelief. You looked skeptical at all the right spots.

  “Three, you plucked a nail of cold iron, iron cold forged, right off my neck without flinching. No Daughter of Nox could have done that. Witches and mermaids, yes. Elfs, no.

  “Four, I saw you eat bread this morning, so you are not a fallen angel, and you did not flinch or cuss last night when I mentioned the screaming in Hell, nor did you look scared.

  “Five, I saw tears in your eyes. And I put you in the bathtub to look for suckling marks and to see if you displaced water properly. A witch could do some of the things you did—flying from roof to roof or throwing light from your finger—but they don’t cry, not real witches who have signed the Dark Compact.

  “Six—well, I am out of fingers. You are neither a Partholan nor a mermaid because I put a pearl from the sea around your neck, and it did not change or grow brighter.

  “So I covered all the possibilities,” Elfine concluded spreading her hands with a smile. “You are a Twilighter. A Halfalfar. A Demi.”

  “And why a Moth?”

  “That case is not airtight, but I have my suspicions. You saved me when I screamed, and I was wearing a coat. You thought I was a mortal, and you risked your life for a stranger. And you were not even really dressed. No Cobweb would do that! Only Moths like mortals. Half the Moths are mortal anyway, poets and heroes and such. And Moth girls are the prettiest!”

  Ami blushed. “What?”

  “Prettier than elf-maidens! That’s why demigods and dark elfs, owl-men and mer-men, hideous satyrs and handsome princes all want to marry us! All sorts of monsters! You’re too pretty to be a Cobweb.”

  Ami said, “Monsters? What do you mean by monsters?”

  “Monsters!”

  “Goat-men? Werewolves? Are those what you are talking about?”

  6. Not Real Monsters

  Elfine shook her head. “Werewolves are not real monsters.”

  “That is a relief.”

  “Werewolves are an abomination made by black magic and a dark spirit that enters a man and makes him a beast. They eat corpses. They have to kill someone they love to damn themselves and seal the spell. Real monsters are born from mommy monster eggs in the normal way and look like their parents.”

  “What about the goat-man?”

  “That could be a satyr or could be a pooka. Listen: it is very strange and very bad that you saw three monsters walking around armed in the human world! Very bad! And wearing red caps!”

  “Why is it bad?”

  “Because the Sons of Adam still have scraps of their father’s authority. Monsters cannot enter their world, cannot cross the threshold, unless they are invited, and no churchbells are ringing in earshot. But the mist makes men not able to see monsters these days, not clearly. Now, the elfs keep men like cattle, right? Like sheep!”

  Ami nodded. “I see. I think I see. You are saying humans cannot see monsters so could not invite them into the world, and the elfs would not. It would be like a shepherd asking a wolf to tear his flock. So who is inviting them in?”

  Elfine said, “Our people. The Twilightlings.”

  “Why would anyone do that? And why send them after me?”

  “You said. He said. The goat who fell, I mean. You said he told you that they are anarchists, which means they are against the world rulers. And they want your ring.”

  “Who are the world rulers?”

  “Elfs,” said Elfine with a dimpled smile. “Elfs rule men.”

  7. The Black Spell

  Ami creased her brow. “That sounds familiar. How did it happen?”

  “I am not sure when it started. Back in Eden, elfs helped Adam with his cattle and Eve with her fig trees and vines. When Adam broke faith with Heaven, the elfs broke faith with Adam. A pale queen named Sin entered Eden from the sunset, and her son, the shapeless wraith named Death was in the shadow she cast before her, and the elfs bowed and vowed to serve her in return for the bread, and wings, and all the kingdoms in the world, and the glory of them.” Elfine peered at her face. “You don’t know that story?”

  “They sold their souls for bread?”

  “They were famished because the manna, soma, and ambrosia on which they fed no longer sustained them. Once they ate bread, they could mate with the fair daughters of Eve. Adah and Tsillah were really attractive. So I heard.”

 
; “So they sold their souls and became the rulers of all the cities of men?”

  “No, of course not. The pale queen cheated them.”

  “Then how did they become the world rulers?”

  “Step by step. In King Arthur’s day the Church was strong, and the elfs were driven back, their idols smashed, their hearts filled with malice. The elfs deceived the north with phantoms and pagan gods, and the south with a false prophet. Christendom was beset by Norsemen and Paynims as between an upper and nether jaw!”

  Ami rubbed her temples.

  Elfine said, “What’s wrong? You have a funny look on your face.”

  “I am sure I know this story. Tell me what happened next.”

  “Well, time marched on in the human world, and it never stops to play and dance like it does in ours. The Greeks and Romans quarreled and split the Church in two, and the Crusaders rode, and conquered, and quarreled, and failed, and their great deeds were slandered by foul tongues. Constantinople fell to the Paynims. The Sons of the North split the Church, making divorce lawful, setting the miter beneath the crown, and scorning the Queen of Heaven. Then, the Anarchists arose and began throwing dynamite and shooting kings. The mist grew and spread, and men forgot more and more. Does that sound familiar?”

  “Yes. There was a Crusade. A Last Crusade against the Anarchists! Is that in the story?”

  “I don’t think so. What else do you remember?”

  Ami shook her head. “Was there a part of the story where a mighty prince seeks his wife in the underworld. Something like that? She agreed to embrace him if he promised not to light the lamp and look on her. But he broke the promise and saw she was a corpse, and from the worms in her rotting body she gave birth to hags and evil phantoms to rend him, and he fled back into the sunlight. Was that part of it?”

  Elfine frowned. “Oberon with an army of ten thousand thousands entered Hell seeking his wife, but he alone escaped, and he is missing an eye. He changed his name to Alberec. Is that the story you mean? Saint Mary Magdalene offered to show him the way in and out, which her cousin Lazarus had shown to her, but Oberon was too proud to follow the advice of a harlot.”

  “That might be the same story.” Ami said, “I remember someone telling me all his fellow knights were slain, and he alone escaped. What happened next?”

  “After Titania was lost, her servants scattered and hid. That’s us. Erlkoenig seized his father’s scepter, and winter came into the hearts of men. The black mass and the burned sacrifices of the Prussians and the Russians spread the Black Spell from pole to pole, and covered all mankind.

  “The Black Spell was complete. The Cobwebs were established as the manservants of the elfs and the goatherds of men and were given red caps to wear.

  “Then Erlkoenig the Elfinking set his human servants, warlocks and assassins and sly deceivers and false bards, among the parliaments and academies of the day-lit lands and bent the minds of men into docility and worldliness, then to bloodlust, then to occultism, then to love of nothingness. The men give the elfs their children and their goods, and more and more of the riches Heaven gives Man are taken away.”

  Ami said, “So this rule by the elfs is recent?”

  Elfine said “I don’t know how men count recent. There was a great war among men, and all the kings were thrown down or turned into shadows of what once they were. The sighting of the Angel of Mons was the last time the mists parted. Men forgot that magic was real. The roads to elfland were hidden, the unicorns were driven into the sea, and the islands of the young were drowned. Poets were struck with madness and fled from all words fair and fine, high and noble, and wrote drivel and gibberish instead. Songs about patients being etherized on tables.” Elfine shrugged. “That is what Father told me.”

  “What were those the creatures that attacked me? They wore red caps.”

  “The red caps are necromancy. They are dyed in the blood of an unbaptized child to grant the wearer the false appearance of the authority of Adam. It allows them to speak the speech of men and be seen. But the caps you saw were stolen. No elf would give such a cap to a werewolf! Elfs love and defend nature. Werewolves are against nature.”

  “You are sure?”

  Elfine nodded, her certainty plain to see in her eyes. “If the gunsel shows you a policeman’s badge, you know it is counterfeit. That is a very bad sign.”

  “A sign of what? What does it all mean?”

  “It means the elfs have dropped the scepter. The Black Spell is breaking. If monsters are gathering in the world of men to prey on men, men will learn to see them. No elf glamour is strong enough to hide all the monsters! And when that happens, it means war, and turmoil, and the end of an age!”

  Ami said, “I was told to tell you that when eternal day breaks, twilight is no more. Then will all their deeds be laid bare and judged. That hour is at hand. Those were her exact words.”

  “Whose?”

  “I don’t know. I left that part out. You told me to tell you everything that happened after I woke up!”

  Elfine stopped walking suddenly.

  Ami said, “What is it?”

  Elfine said, “Look around!”

  Ami turned slowly in a circle. She saw crowds, crowded streets, crowded traffic, crowded buildings, garish ads. “What should I be seeing?” Then, her eyes fell on a large marquee, unlit during the day: COBBLER’S CLUB.

  Elfine said, “This is where you saved me. An alley on the other side of that building. Where is the hospital you fell from? It has to be near. We should just start walking in an ever-widening circle, and ask any passersby where the nearest hospital is.”

  Ami said, “No need. I saw the address in the Yellow Pages last night. It is two blocks that way. I’ll recognize it by the stonework around the windows.”

  Chapter Four: The Scene of the Crime

  1. Reception Room

  A general practice hospital occupied the top twenty floors of the building. The other floors were occupied by other clinics, specialists, and doctor’s private practices, including clinics specializing in other medical arts.

  Elfine and Ami stepped from the elevator into a corridor on the seventieth floor. Behind wide glass doors at the end of the corridor was a waiting room furnished in pale pastels. Soothing pictures of abstract designs hung on the walls. Behind a wide window was a nurse at a reception and admissions desk.

  Ami looked sidelong at Elfine’s green showgirl outfit with its plunging neckline, miniskirt, and green pointy-toed slippers with their white pom-poms. “Why don’t you occupy yourself here until I am done talking to the nurse, Elfine?”

  Elfine put her hands behind her back and looked down at the water fountain and then up at the air vent. “Do your best, but you won’t get anywhere. The city folk are secretive, and no one helps those in need.”

  Ami frowned. “That is very cynical.”

  “Not really. They know predators walk among them in disguise.”

  There was an old lady talking in worried tones to the receiving nurse. Minute after minute went by. Ami sat in one of the chairs, waiting her turn.

  Eventually, the old lady was escorted by a young orderly to another room. The nurse at the desk beckoned to Ami, “Yes? Do you have an appointment?”

  “I am looking for my sister,” said Ami. “She is about my height and weight. She’s a year younger than me. Were any women matching that description admitted here recently? I am quite worried.”

  The nurse looked up sharply. Her eyes narrowed. She was staring at the folded American flag Ami was carrying. Ami casually tucked the flag under one arm.

  The nurse said smoothly, “Yes, we did have someone matching that description admitted last night. What is your name?”

  Ami’s mind went blank. She was not going to tell anyone her name was Ami Nesia, but she did not have a falsehood prepared. The was a sign on the desk that said visiting hours were over by 10:00.

  “Ten O’clock,” said Ami.

  “What?”

  “Tin
a. O’Clark. Tina O’Clark. It is an Irish name.”

  The nurses eyes narrowed further, taking in Ami’s skin, hair color, and the shape of her eyes. “You don’t look Irish.”

  “It’s my husband’s name.” Behind her back, she pulled the ring off her right hand and placed it on her left ring finger. Then, she brought out her left hand and displayed the silver-white band on her finger, smiling.

  The nurse looked at the ring skeptically.

  Ami felt a moment of giddy desperation. Into the silence, she let words rush out of her mouth without thinking, “His name is Sparky. Sparky O’Clark. We met in the park.”

  The nurse picked up the handset of the phone on her desk. “Wait a moment, Mrs. O’Clark. I am sure the director would like to speak to you. He may have some news about your sister.” She pushed a button on the phone, waited a moment, and said, “Director? There is someone here who would like to speak with you about the Jane Doe we admitted. Yes. The one from Room Sixty Sixteen. Last night. Ah…? Yes, Doctor. Certainly, Doctor.” The nurse hung up, and looked at Ami. The nurse’s face was a careful mask, trying to show no emotion. “He will be out in a moment. Doctor Pillory is our Director of Forensic Patient Affairs. He wants to discuss your sister’s case with you.”

  Ami said, “Has something happened? Is she all right?”

  The nurse’s mouth curled into an absurdly unconvincing smile. “No, Mrs. O’Clark. Everything is fine. Please sit and wait. It may be a few minutes.”

  Ami said, “Okay.” She went over and sat in a chair near the door, and when the nurse turned to speak to the next person waiting, Ami walked casually out the glass doors and into the corridor.

  2. Security Room

  Elfine was not there. Ami took a deep breath in through her nose and expelled it slowly through her mouth. She did this a second and a third time, trying to calm her heart and clear her mind. What should she do if Elfine had abandoned her? She could walk the mile back to her apartment tower, but the building security would not let her into Elfine’s apartment.