An Heir to Thorns and Steel

by M. C. A. Hogarth

  “Of course I can see you,” I said, removing my glasses so I could rub my eyes. “Damn it all.” And then my heart stumbled. “Why... how... am I bleeding?”

  “It’s just a cut,” Chester said. “You must have given it to yourself when you fell. You scared the living spirit out of me, Locke.”

  I stared at the little slice across the back of one finger. He was right, surely, but... an afterimage of the pain of a dragon’s maw shimmered through my mind, popping my elbow and hand into bright relief.

  “What did you see?” the doctor asked, taking my pulse and staring at my pupils.

  “A dragon,” I said. “And after that... voices. I couldn’t see them, though.”

  “And the pattern?” he asked. “Are the episodes recurring more frequently or less?”

  I didn’t want to answer that question, but, “More often.”

  “Have you taken the poppy?”

  “He did once,” Chester said. “It didn’t take him long to get past it, though.”

  I shrugged. “It felt good while it lasted.”

  “But not since,” he said.

  I shook my head. “I can’t even remember...” I sighed. “What day it is. The hours seem fluid. Surreal. How long has it been since that night, Chester?”

  He stared at me. “It was yestereve, Locke.”

  “Only?” I asked. My bones insisted it had been days past. Should I be frightened? And yet all I felt was such a weariness. “Well, then.”

  “You must take the doses regularly,” Stirley said. “If you don’t, we have no way of evaluating their efficacy. I know they’ll moderate pain, but what I don’t know is if they have any power to control the reoccurrences of these episodes.”

  “I don’t—” I stopped and touched my fingers to the bridge of my nose. Even now I could still smell something alien in the air: lilac and animal musk and ash. The long breath I drew in escaped me trembling. “I am not pleased at the prospect but I’ll make the effort.”

  “Good,” Stirley said, rising. He returned with the satchel and the spoon. I noticed that he had adulterated the syrup as Guy had insisted was normal and wondered if it would have any effect at all diluted when a straight shot had worn off so quickly. But I took it as directed.

  Stirley shrugged his coat back on and tucked his scarf beneath the lapels. “You’ll see me in a week?”

  “I suppose,” I said.

  Opening the door, he said, “You might consider informing your parents.”

  Never. “I’ll do that.”

  After he left, Chester remained next to me, watching me.

  “I’m not going to break,” I said.

  “I imagine not,” Chester said. His voice was too somber. I wanted to look away from him. “Did you think to protect me from something?”

  “The illusion was quite convincing.”

  “You sent me away because you thought to spare me the sight of your shame,” he said.

  God, to put it so baldly. “No,” I said. “In honesty, I sent you away because I thought the dragon would maul you.”

  “A dragon bite, eh?” Chester said, grinning. “Bit worse than a dog bite, I suppose.”

  I flexed my hand, feeling the cut split across my knuckle. “Quite a bit.”

  He nodded and returned to the table and to my amazement resumed work. Truly a gem, Chester. I gained my feet and staggered after. If the poppy was working on me, I could barely feel its effects... certainly the smells lingered until the perfume of ink and parchment replaced them. But aside from a certain deliberation of thought, I did not notice the drug at work.

  That should have scared me and didn’t. Many things had ceased to scare me that should have. But then it was hard to compare to a dragon threatening torture and demons eating one alive.

  The sweet-voiced angels with their little tongues had my permission to come again, though.

  An hour after midnight’s chime Chester was gone and I was in front of my chamber pot, losing another argument with my body. Since I didn’t remember eating I could only conclude that it had resorted to scavenging unnecessary organs for material. My attempt at sardonic self-deprecation died abruptly when I noticed the blood, bright as a banner, amid the bile. I wasn’t supposed to be vomiting blood.

  And then the nightmare began. First the seizures. And then the hypersensitivity. And the pain, starting with my dragon-chewed parts and flaring from there to encompass the rest of me. And when that episode released me, the circuit began again. In between episodes I dragged myself clear of walls and furniture, the better to save my flailing limbs from injury, or made feeble attempts to dump the chamber pot, or wished desperately and impotently for tea, alcohol, or for the damned poppy to work.

  As my body and mind warred through the night, exhaustion blurred my thoughts into indistinct emotional gradients. Rage. Fear. Depression. At last a weary resignation without beginning or end. I was here. I would always be here, in this place without control, without hope.

  Morning’s wan sunlight washed my sweat-stained face and pricked blood-sullen colors from beneath my closed eyelids. I stared dully across the floor at the hearth, feeling the twisted fabric of the rug beneath my ribs. I had no energy to rise. My entire body felt like a giant bruise mediated here and there by the sharp grasp of pulled muscles. The taste in my mouth was better left undescribed, though blood was the least of its flavors. I was parched—God, how I longed for water!—and weaker than a newborn foal.

  Naturally, Cliffton chose that moment to arrive.

  “Young Master Locke,” he said, standing very properly upright alongside my door. “Do you require assistance?”

  I stared at him. Surely some dry witticism was required at this point. ‘Why no, dear fellow, it is my custom to take my leisure sprawled akimbo on the floor.’ Or perhaps, ‘Good gracious, man, whatever gave you such an idea?’

  What I really needed, alas, was assistance. But I couldn’t bring myself to ask for it. I wanted autonomy so badly that relinquishing even the pretense of it was impossible. I wanted to be the Morgan Locke who needed no help, and could not except by the complicity of others. So I said, “Why yes, Cliffton. It would be a great help to me if you could prepare some tea.”

  “Of course,” he said... and left me there.

  It was the one thing that saved me from hating him. My father’s work as ambassador to Candor and Haven-on-High had guaranteed us prestige, and my parents had many servants. Most of them had known me since childhood and were incapable of concealing their pity or restraining themselves from helping me. Alone among them Cliffton left me alone if I so requested. If I looked like hell’s dogs had been chewing on me, still he would take me for my word if I told him all I needed was for him to fetch me tea and biscuits.

  Knowing he was here gave me the strength to force myself to my hands and knees. I did not suspect him of indiscretion; I had no evidence that anything he observed during his weekly visits returned to my parents. But I had no doubt if he found me in dire enough circumstance he would report it. He bowed to my need for privacy, but my parents paid his salary.

  “While the tea is brewing, shall I see to the laundry?” he asked. “Or perhaps, the cleaning.”

  I winced. I’d made as good an effort as possible to wash up after myself but I hadn’t had much time between seizures to do it properly. But if I gave him no direction, he would stand in the kitchen for the hour my parents required of him, motionless and inscrutable and utterly conspicuous. “As you have time,” I said. “The laundry first.”

  “Of course,” he said and walked with stately stride into my bedroom. How he managed such poise with such a stout body I had no idea. But with him out of sight I could finish the agonizing process of drawing myself to my feet, using the kitchen table as a crutch. By the time he reappeared to tend to the whistling tea kettle I was upright and able to accept the cup with somewhat steady hands. My skin felt tender and new.

  “Scones, young master?” he asked.

  The thought o
f food nauseated, but I had to eat. “That would be pleasant, thank you.”

  So he served me scones with clotted cream, which I ignored, and lemon marmalade, of which I made sparing use. Bite by aching bite I chewed my way through breakfast while he cleaned, washed and tidied. Such an embarrassment, to be so thoroughly accommodated. I knew it was expected of us to have servants, but the need for them felt like an admission of weakness. I wanted nothing more than to be self-sufficient, to have the strength to clean my own flat with Cliffton’s casual ease.

  I finished my meal as he unpacked the last of the foodstuffs he’d brought. “Does the young master require aught else?”

  “No, thank you, Cliffton.”

  He nodded and bowed, and without another word saw himself out. I stared glumly at the closed door. So efficient. Would that I were so.

  When the flush ran up my arms I groaned and pushed my plate away. “Enough!” I said. “Enough with the feeling-so-much and the hearing of voices and the pain and the jerking like a broken puppet. Enough, already.”

  Beneath my skin, the tingling shimmered. I felt illuminated, as if someone had traced me in outline with gold leaf. For a moment—oh, so brief a moment—I almost felt... as if... it belonged there. As if it presaged a peace, an encompassing of the world entire and my place in it—

  —and then a clatter issued forth from the closet, followed by a yelp. Startled, I swung my buzzing head toward my bedroom. Did I imagine it? But no, with the clarity of my hypersensitive ears I heard scrabbling and then a hasty silence. Another hallucination, perhaps, but a curious one. Demons, angels, dragons... all very formidable, very impressive and fantastic. I couldn’t imagine why I’d hallucinate a burglar hiding in my bedroom closet. Not just any burglar, but an incredibly inept one. Despite knowing it had to be false, I staggered to my feet and made my way to the bedroom.

  The quiet emanating from the closet had a distinctly nervous quality. I set my tingling fingers on the knob, caressing the smooth arc of the brass handle. When it began to chafe, I turned it and opened the door.

  Two pairs of eyes stared up at me, lilac and ember-orange, attached to incredibly unlikely creatures. One covered its muzzle in alarm and the other glared at it in apparent irritation.

  “Now look what you’ve done,” the larger one hissed in an angel’s alto.

  “Sorry!” the smaller one said in her higher voice, ears flattening to her skull. “I didn’t mean to!”

  I stared at them both. Those were the voices from my recent hallucination, but these creatures were not angels. Not unless the artists who’d rendered them in the Cathedral’s stained glass had failed magnificently in their charge.

  “Well, you’ve found us,” said the first. “We were planning to wait until you were better, but... guess there isn’t much reason now to hide.” She poured herself out of the closet as if she hadn’t a bone in her body. The smaller one followed her more hesitantly. While the first paced my bedroom, this smaller one knelt and looked up at me. She was shaped like a person... a child-sized one, not even four feet tall. But she was covered in soft white fur dappled with golden spots, and her long tail had white and caramel stripes to match the ones on her pointed muzzle and the tips of her conical ears. She wore a pale leather collar with a metal tag, brushed at its rim by a short bob of white hair. Her companion, by contrast, was a foot taller, plain gray with a white and black tail, black ears and a shimmering fall of white hair that reached her thighs. Her collar was black and the insides of her ears had been tattooed with silver stars and crescent moons.

  They were utterly improbable. But they smelled... ah, like musk and lilac, and their voices....

  “Look at his expression,” the gray one said. “He doesn’t even know what we are. I know you tasted him, but are you sure?”

  “He’s the one,” the smaller animal said.

  I found my voice with difficulty. “Talking foxes. I had no idea I had such an imagination.”

  “We’re not foxes,” the smaller one said. “We’re genets. And we’re real, just like you, Master.”

  “And we can talk because we were created that way by elven magics,” the gray one said.

  The smaller one shivered. I could watch the sun ripple across every strand of fur on her side, so acute had my eyesight grown. My head ached with the strain of holding so much vision. Even her soft voice was too much. “I wish you wouldn’t say that, Kelu.”

  “Elf-made, elf-made, elf-made!” the larger one chanted.

  “Enough!” I said. “The elves are dead and gone lo these many years, my dear figments. They don’t exist, and neither do you.”

  “We do so exist,” the gray one said. “And so do the elves who sent us to find you, curse their names.”

  “Kelu!”

  “Oh Almond,” the larger one said, rolling her eyes heavenward. “They’re not here to hear us.”

  “What about him?”

  “Yes, look at him,” the gray one said. “He doesn’t even know who he is, much less what we are to him.”

  “You are small sparks in my head,” I said, reaching backward until I could clutch at the closet door. “Or large ones. Caused by my not being capable of containing the seizures or mind-storms or whatever it is that’s killing me. I assure you, I know precisely what you are.”

  “We aren’t hallucinations,” the white-and-gold genet said, ears drooping.

  I laughed. “Prove it.”

  “Gladly,” the larger one said, and lunged for me. Her teeth fastened on my wrist and ground into my flesh. Bright spears of pain shot up my arm and I fell. Her tongue lapping against the resulting wounds felt too hot, too delicate. I squirmed, bathed in a sudden sweat.

  “KELU!” the smaller one cried, appalled.

  “He asked.”

  I smelled animal musk and champagne and honey. I was drowning in sensation.

  “Move,” the little one said, and I felt the tongue leave my wrist. A warm body pressed along my ribs, the petite chain of a spine flush to my side. She drew my arm up around her body until I could rest my hand over her heart. If she had breasts, they were too small to be felt through the thick ruff of fur on her chest. So soft... I found myself caressing it absently, feeling the slow throb of her heart through her skin. I turned to fold myself around her, and she purred, a low vibration against my stomach and chest.

  The sensitivity faded. The aches in my joints grew faint. The noise in my head receded. I sighed against the bob of her white hair.

  “Well,” said the larger one, subdued, “he really is an elf.”

  My eyes opened. It seemed a pity to speak, but I couldn’t let such a comment pass. “Pardon?”

  “We came to find you to bring you home,” the larger one said. “Your brother’s dead, so it’s time for you to marry his fiancée.”

  I laughed and cuddled the smaller one closer. She wriggled until she had slotted herself into all my hollow spaces, and the sense of well-being increased. I felt drowsy and warm, as if she was a puddle of sunlight. A huggable one. “If you want to convince me that you’re not illusory, you’re going to contrive a better story than that.”

  “It’s not a story,” said the pale one. She twisted her head up to look at me with those lilac-petal eyes. “It’s true. The Lady Amoret sent us to find you. She was to marry the King, but he has vanished. You are the only other elf of royal blood.”

  “Royal blood,” I said, laughing and rubbing my jaw against her shining hair. “Let me guess: I have an entire island to myself, and rafts of servants... a harem of beautiful women, perhaps. And a crown... I must be a king, yes? Some long-lost prince.”

  “You can live wherever you please, Master,” the smaller one said. “And every elf is your servant.”

  “No harem,” the gray one said. “Poor you.”

  “But you are the king’s brother, and you have the royal blood, which makes you either a prince or the king, since the king is dead.”

  My idle caress of her chest fluff stopped. I managed a
weak laugh. “Of course. Naturally. Me, a prince.”

  “An unexpected one,” the gray one said. “Your mother had to work very hard to have you, given the way things are with elves.”

  “My mother,” I said firmly, “lives in a house not far from here, with my very married father when he is in town. Admittedly this is not often, but I assure you I would have noticed a brother. And both of them are assuredly human.”

  “You are an elf,” the smaller one said.

  “If elves look anything like they do in their portraits,” I said, unable to help a touch of bitterness, “not only am I not an elf, but you are both blind. The people in those paintings are as like to men as willows are to oaks. And I assure you, there is no word in the entire text about elves who are cripples.”

  “Nevertheless, Master,” the small one said. She pressed back into me, driving all thoughts of anger and disappointment from my mind, replacing them with... sweet things. The smell of almonds and lilacs and a sense of peace and release.

  “Well, if he’s the one, we should make arrangements,” the gray one said. She leaned backward, arching toward her tail with a grace that looked improbable. “We need to get him back before the sea goes rough with the summer storms.” She jerked at something on her tail. “Rrgh. Tangled. Stupid place to put it. Wish we could have taken bags.”

  “Why couldn’t you have?” I asked, amused, though the situation made perfect sense to me: why would I hallucinate animals in clothing?

  “Because slaves aren’t allowed to have things,” the gray one said, baring her teeth.

  The little one in my arms flattened her ears, tickling my chin as they swept back.

  “If you’re not allowed to have things,” I asked, “what are you fiddling with?”

  “Something that belongs to you,” she said and pulled that something free. She thrust it at me. “Here, take it.”

  I pulled it off her palm by the long steel chain: so elegantly crafted to be made of so prosaic a metal, but it was obviously not silver. At the end of this chain hung a pendant of sorts, a lozenge of steel stamped with three circles, each inscribed with peculiar marks, from which depended a crimson tassel. “Strange jewelry,” I said, chafing my thumb and forefinger over the thin metal. It felt alarmingly real, but then, so did the genets. Smooth and cool.