Dragonwitch

by Anne Elisabeth Stengl

  When the Brothers Ashiun reached the rooftop, they found me standing with my back to my dead brother, gazing out across the city to where the Mound had taken root.

  “There,” I told them. I did not try to explain the death of my brother, the sudden oncoming of dominion that filled me with physical potency. I merely pointed. “There he lies, and there he sucks at the blood of my demesne. Root him out!”

  The child in the darkness.

  Alistair saw it standing on the brink of the chasm, bathed as always in white light. Next, the monster from the darkness that bayed in the voice of a wolf would leap upon him and devour him.

  And then he would wake. As he always did.

  But this dream was deeper than ever before. He ran toward the child and the light, never drawing any nearer. There was a stench too that had never been there before: a rank, poisonous, rotten stench, like the breath of some dead thing come to life. His shoulder hurt like fire, but he ran anyway, pursuing the child and the death that must come.

  For years now, he had experienced this same dream, sometimes for many nights running, sometimes not for months at a stretch. But it was the same dream, and he knew the pace of it and the violent end. He must reach that end before he could wake.

  But he was running and not catching up. He would never reach the child. He would never reach the light. He would run in darkness forever, without death, without end.

  “No!” he cried. “Come and kill me, monster! Kill me as you must!”

  The baying of the dogs was too far away. The light was too distant.

  “Help me!” he cried.

  A golden voice sang. He turned to it as to a light, and the song became a Path at his feet. A new Path, one he had never before trod in this darkness of his subconscious. This wasn’t how the dream was supposed to go, but he was desperate now. The voice sang, and he pursued it, changing course and running.

  ———

  Suddenly his eyes opened and he looked upon uncut stone in a dimly lit tunnel, and the sound of flowing water filled his ears. And a voice. Not the golden voice he’d pursued. No, a chattering, swift, high voice, speaking unintelligibly.

  This was not what Alistair last remembered of waking life.

  He closed his eyes, and his throat constricted but was too dry to make a sound. Where was he supposed to be? What should he remember? He tried to lift his hand, and pain shot through his shoulder. He grimaced and was still. Why was he in this damp tunnel? Why was he so cold?

  Why didn’t that unseen person stop babbling?

  The second time he tried to groan, he managed to make something close to a noise. More like a grating in his throat. He decided to risk opening his eyes again and still found himself looking at the stone and shadows.

  His uncle was dead.

  That memory crashed through his consciousness, dragging with it everything else. His uncle . . . his cousin . . . his lost future. He ground his teeth, and the groan this time was a little stronger. But there was something else he needed to remember, something on the edge but not quite within reach.

  Why was his shoulder on fire?

  A voice he felt he should recognize cried out in a burst of anger, interrupting the foreign babbler. “What? Etanun is here?”

  The first speaker replied, sounding anxious. Alistair, after a battle of wills against his own body, turned his head. He saw Mouse, the scrubber urchin, dressed in rags and ill-fitting shoes, kneeling beside a large orange cat. The cat was listening and watching as though he understood.

  Then the cat opened his mouth and the golden voice from Alistair’s dream fell from his lips. “And he stood by and watched goblins march into the Near World? Let them break through the gate and come right in? Well, that goes to show—”

  Alistair screamed.

  The cat screamed and arched his back, spitting feline curses.

  Mouse screamed and fell off the ledge into the running water below.

  Perhaps, Alistair decided, he’d been a bit premature. Yes, he’d had a shock, and one couldn’t expect a fellow to lie down and take a world that inflicted talking cats upon him. But then again, this could only be a continuation of his dream.

  Suddenly relearning to move, he sat up straight and his hands clutched at the cold ground. A dripping Mouse climbed back onto the ledge, glaring daggers his way. The cat, tail slowly smoothing back to a respectable size, mirrored that expression. Then he sat, licked his chest and paws a few times to prove how unafraid he was, and said in the coolest tone:

  “So you’re awake. What have you to say for yourself in all this, eh?”

  Alistair’s shoulder throbbed, and he put his hand to it, feeling the distinct pucker of a scar. “A dream,” he whispered. “It’s all a dream.”

  “How metaphysical of you,” said the cat. “But we’re neither of us impressed.”

  Alistair looked up and down the tunnel and realized where he was, though he had never before been in his uncle’s famous passage. He saw how it wound away into rock, how the water flowed through a gray-lit opening. The smell of smoke and death lingered from his dream.

  “What is happening?” he asked.

  “Oh, a great deal,” replied the cat, making his silky way to Alistair’s side and sitting down. “Gaheris has been attacked from the inside by goblins let through the death-house gate from their world into yours . . . possibly by a traitorous knight of my order, but I wouldn’t like to be casting slurs on the Murderer just yet, you understand. My comrade-in-arms has been taken prisoner and, according to this person”—with a glance at Mouse—“it appears that everything comes down to our needing to rescue the Chronicler before it’s too late. Isn’t that right?” The cat addressed this last to Mouse, who nodded. The cat turned to Alistair again. “Caught up now, are we?”

  Alistair stared. “Why does my shoulder hurt?”

  “You were stabbed by Corgar, warlord of Vartera’s horde. You’re lucky you didn’t lose your head.”

  “What’s a Corgar?”

  “A goblin.”

  “As in slavering jaws, gaping eyes, stone hides?”

  “The same.”

  “They don’t exist.”

  “Neither do talking cats.”

  Mouse, wet hair plastered and dripping, leaned forward, chattering again in that language Alistair could not understand. But the cat understood and responded, “Why do you think that matters?”

  “Why does what matter?” Alistair demanded.

  Cat twitched an ear at him. “I wasn’t speaking to you.”

  “You were speaking to . . . him?”

  “Yes.”

  “And, er, he understands you?”

  “Yes.”

  “But so do I!” Alistair shook his head. “How can we both understand you? We don’t speak the same language!”

  “Proving yet again the superiority of immortal tongues,” said the cat, smugly sinking his chin into the downy ruff of fur about his neck. “You’ll understand anything I want you to, and nothing I don’t. It’s the way of it with Faerie.”

  Mouse looked from the cat to Alistair, then said, “Please, what are you telling him?”

  “Nothing,” the cat said, tucking his tail closer to his paws. “What did you think I was telling him?”

  “You won’t . . .” She glanced at the young lord again. “You won’t tell him my secret, will you?”

  “What secret?”

  “That I’m . . . that I’m not what I seem.”

  The cat’s ears went back. He turned to Alistair. This time when he spoke, Alistair understood him but the girl did not. “You do realize, don’t you, that she’s a girl?” he said.

  “Of course I do.” Alistair glared. “Do I look stupid?”

  “Would you like me to answer that?”

  “What did he say?” Mouse demanded. “What did you tell him?”

  The cat shrugged and allowed her to understand his words. “I made certain your secret is as safe as it ever was.”

  She breathed a great
sigh, relieved. “Now,” she said, “will he help me rescue the dwarf?”

  “Ah yes. The Chronicler,” the cat said musingly. “He’s not a dwarf, you know. He’s a small man. There is a difference. I’ve met dwarves. They’re ugly little brutes, nothing like him.”

  “What does it matter?” Mouse cried, ready to explode with anxiety. “Dwarf, man, he’s Etanun’s heir! I must bring him back to the Citadel, don’t you see? I must bring him back, or the Silent Lady’s life is forfeit!”

  All traces of smugness vanished from the cat’s face. His purr turned to a growl.

  Alistair stood, a little shakily, putting a hand back to support himself against the stone wall. Some memories were beginning to leak back through, memories he had thought part of the nightmare. He recalled his uncle’s empty chamber and Mouse struggling to pull a hunting knife down from the wall. He recalled the shouts of goblins, a rock-hard hand coming through the doorway.

  “What did she say?” he asked. “Does she know something about all this?”

  “About the goblins? No. Not directly, that is.”

  Alistair did not like to ask the next question but knew that he must. After all, the world was a twisted, upside-down place this morning, and anything was possible. “Did she bring them here?” His eyes strayed briefly to her, then away.

  “What, her?” The cat shook his head. “I hardly think so. This is much more likely to be the Murderer’s doing. But with the gates unwatched, Corgar could have pushed through without anyone’s help.”

  “What gates?”

  The cat did not answer. Although seated between them, he somehow seemed untouchably distant. Alistair could almost believe the creature had slid into another world entirely and that he and Mouse looked in from the outside, unable to join.

  “Please,” Mouse said. “Please, help me rescue the heir. It is the only hope.” Her voice was so distressed, Alistair almost reached out to her, though he did not know what she said.

  But the cat replied, “I have a better idea,” and paced toward her. His posture was that of a tiger, though his size had not altered. Mouse scrambled away from him, but he kept coming until he had her backed up to the edge of the rocky ledge. “Why don’t you take me to your little temple?”

  “Without the heir?” Mouse gasped.

  “Now.”

  She shook her head. “I cannot return without him! The Silent Lady would be slain!”

  “Not if I’ve rescued her first,” said the cat. “Which will happen much more quickly if I’m not sidetracked by goblins and misproportioned mortals.”

  “No.” Mouse’s face set into hard lines unfamiliar to her young face. “I will not go without him.”

  “What’s going on? What does she say?” Alistair demanded.

  The cat’s fur bristled, and his claws dug into the rock. “You will take me now, girl,” he said.

  She whispered, “I won’t.”

  Suddenly the cat unfolded himself into a tall man in red with flashing eyes and a head full of fiery hair. He grabbed Mouse by the fabric on her shoulder and lifted her to her toes. His face was that of a wildcat, and his voice was a snarl.

  “I haven’t time to waste on fool’s errands,” he said. “Imraldera’s life is at risk. I do not know where to find your pagan temple, but you will take me there and show me where my lady is being held, or so help me—”

  His voice broke in a caterwaul as Alistair’s hands descended on his shoulders and dragged him backward. He dropped his hold on the girl, who nearly unbalanced into the water again, and was himself tossed into a heap. But he was up again in a swirl of his red cape, his gaze fixed on Alistair, who was as tall as he and perhaps a little broader, and whose face was white as a sheet with terror. A grin flicked across the cat-man’s face before he sprang and knocked the mortal man from his feet, pinning him to the ground.

  “Don’t interfere, mortal!” he growled. “I’m not a man to be—”

  Again he broke off, this time spitting a curse as Mouse struck his face with her fist. His hand darted out, snatching her wrist and wrenching it until she fell to her knees. She winced but shouted, “She told me you were good! She told me you were her fellow knight! She said you would help us!”

  The cat-man paused, his teeth bared, his breath caught. Mouse’s black eyes fixed upon him in storm-like fury. “She never told me you were a monster!”

  Still gripping her wrist, Eanrin looked from her down to Alistair, who was terrified and trying not to show it.

  They were neither of them his enemies.

  Eanrin released Mouse’s wrist, got to his feet, and offered a hand to Alistair. “All right, boy,” he said, hoping his voice sounded friendlier than he felt. “I’ll not hurt you.”

  “Are you sure about that?” Alistair said, hesitating to accept the hand.

  “Mostly sure,” Eanrin growled. He assisted Alistair to his feet, then faced the trembling Mouse. Her dark skin wore a sickly pallor, and her drying hair stood out comically from her head. But her eyes were fierce, unwilling to release the anger.

  She looked remarkably like another young mortal girl Eanrin had once met in a far dark forest.

  Eanrin shook himself, stretching out his neck and swinging his arms to work out kinks. Then he brushed off his sleeves with all the care of a dandy. “Very well, girl,” he said coolly, as though passing the time of day with an inferior. “We’ll accede to the Murderer’s demands if you insist.”

  Her voice was small but sharp. “They’re not my demands. I care nothing for you or any of this. I am here only on behalf of the Silent Lady. I do not wish to see her condemned to death.”

  “Condemned by your own so-called goddess.”

  “Do not speak insolently of the Flame!” the girl said. “If the goddess demands the great sacrifice from any of us, we are glad to give it. Her knowledge is greater and her purity vaster than our comprehension. I am sure her prophetess would say the same!”

  “I’m not,” the cat-man growled.

  “Then you do not know the Silent Lady.”

  “No,” he said. “You’re right. I do not know this Silent Lady of yours. But I do know Imraldera.” He sighed then and flicked dried mud from the front of his red doublet. “And I know she would not have sent you without reason. I don’t understand it, but I . . .” He grimaced. “I will have to trust it. Even as I must walk the Path of the Lumil Eliasul though I cannot see its end.”

  Neither Mouse nor Alistair understood his last words. Alistair had understood only the cat-man’s side of the conversation anyway, and now his brain felt numb. Both he and the girl in boy’s clothes stared at the red-gold creature before them and found him more frightening than ever now that his words were also strange to them. They looked to each other, the one tall and pale, the other short and dark, seeking comfort in this world that had gone all wrong. Lacking the bond of language, they at least shared the bond of mortality.

  “Now,” said Eanrin, coming to a sudden decision. He shook himself and was a cat again, crouched between the two humans, speaking so both could understand him. “We climb back to Gaheris and rescue the Chronicler.”

  “What?” Alistair said. “Why are we rescuing him? What about my mother? What about all the other folk of Gaheris?”

  The cat gave him a flat-eared glare. “Sometimes I believe I spend my whole life giving explanations to humans. I shall inform you briefly, for we have little time available to us. My Lady Imraldera has been taken captive by this one’s”—nod to Mouse—“people, and will not be released until the heir to Halisa is found.”

  “Halisa, the sword of Etanun?” Alistair asked, unbelieving.

  “Good little mortal, keep up. Yes, Halisa, Etanun’s sword. The Chronicler supposedly is his heir, your legendary Smallman. Surprise! We must nab him, take him south to fetch the sword, liberate my kidnapped comrade—”

  “She’s not kidnapped,” said Mouse. “She offered herself.”

  “Whatever you say. We rescue her, and then our favorite
little hero returns to drive Corgar back into the Far World, where he belongs. Understand?”

  Alistair’s mouth went dry. Insane. He had gone insane! That was the only explanation for any of this. But he heard himself saying, “We can never journey to . . . to wherever she’s from and back in time to save my people.”

  “We can,” said the cat-man, “if we use the Paths I know.”

  “But none of this—”

  “Please don’t tell me that none of this is true or that it can’t be happening. I don’t have time for it, and neither do you.”

  “But, the Chronicler is the Smallman?”

  “Makes sense, doesn’t it? He’s small enough.”

  “That’s a metaphor!”

  “Well, don’t you sound all mortal about it?” The cat yawned, showing long white teeth, then blinked as though bored with it all. “Do you never pay attention to prophecies, portentous tellings, and the like?”

  “No.”

  “Can’t say I blame you. I’m not overly fond of them myself.”

  12

  THUS I SPOKE MY FIRST COMMAND, and thus was I obeyed. For Etanun and Akilun went at once down into the city, following the light of the lantern through the winding streets. I watched from above as the Twelve set upon them from all sides, desperate to bar their way. Each of these fell before the might of Halisa in Etanun’s hand. Not even the four strongest, standing beside their four bronze stones, withstood his mighty arm, though all the hosts of Etalpalli had cowered before them.

  While Etanun stood over the slain, Akilun stepped forward to the Mound itself, to the very mouth of Cren Cru, the doorway through which the firstborn had vanished. I saw him fling wide the door; I saw him thrust the lantern into that darkness.

  And Cren Cru fled. He did not try to fight, could not bear to have the brilliance of Asha enter his darkness. So he fled Etalpalli, and the Mound vanished, leaving only a raw, gaping wound in the ground.

  Etanun and Akilun, their mighty gifts blazing, stood victorious.