The Case of the Spellbound Child

by Mercedes Lackey

  Probably because their loyalty is not primarily to the Crown or any political group, but to the land itself. So they don’t get embroiled in anything that could cause them to lose the things they have pledged themselves to protect. There were probably those who would consider that treason. Sarah just thought of it as a “higher calling.”

  “Well, that’s one of the three,” Sarah observed, as they passed by a very old oak. She stooped and picked up a twig off the ground; there were five leaves, still green, and a half-grown acorn attached. She tucked it into her waistband, and they moved on, with Suki scampering away ahead of them or lagging behind, just within sight. One thing that they knew would always help summon Robin was the combination of Oak, Ash, and Thorn—three trees that had a very long tradition in magic.

  The canopy was so thick that the atmosphere was a kind of deep, green twilight, scented with old leaves, and lightened by birdsong and the occasional calls of rook, wood pigeon, and crow. Neville and Grey kept themselves busy by keeping up with Suki—not that she should need watching here, but it was good practice as well as good exercise for them. The deep shade was welcome, given the warmth of the morning. Nan had already rolled the sleeves of her dress up above her elbows, and Sarah did the same.

  The path was bare dirt now, and the woods on either side of it thick with trees slim and stout, heavy bushes, and clumps of fern. Not something Sarah would have considered forcing herself into, but apparently Suki didn’t feel the same; thrashing in the undergrowth signaled her presence off the path up ahead.

  A few dozen yards more, and Suki came running back to them out of the woods, holding up a hand-sized and verdantly green twig from an ash tree. She handed it to Sarah, who tucked it in her waistband with the oak twig.

  And finally, just before they were to take the turning that would lead them to the clearing the gardener had promised, a sudden gust of wind tore through the branches overhead, and a third twig came spinning down to land right at their feet. Although there were no thorn trees about, it was a thorn twig that Nan carefully plucked from the ground and handed, wordlessly, to Sarah.

  Sarah smiled to herself, and handed all three to Suki. “Run on ahead of us, dear,” she said to the child, who was only too willing to do exactly that, the birds following her in the air.

  “Do you think—?” Nan asked.

  Sarah laughed. “That thorn twig was no accident. I’ll bet a new pair of stockings he’s waiting for us when we get there.”

  And sure enough, when they pushed their way through the fragrant ring of balsam firs that edged the little clearing, Robin and Suki were busy playing leapfrog in the center of it, while Neville and Grey watched from a nearby tree and laughed at them. They both tumbled in a heap, laughing, into the long grass, as the two young women shoved their way into the clearing. Sarah was just pleased they’d put Suki into a green dress today, in anticipation of grass stains.

  “How now, Old One!” laughed Nan at the two of them, scrambling to their feet.

  “How now, mortal!” Robin retorted, making a mock bow. “A little bird told me you and the Masters are interested in my moors.”

  Robin was at his most other today. He made no attempt to hide the pointed tips of his ears, which poked their way through a tumble of brown curls festooned with a strand of ivy and a few leaves tangled here and there. Sarah wasn’t quite sure what to call the outfit he was wearing. Jerkin? Tunic? it was sleeveless, green, looked something like leather, and was laced up the front. He wore baggy green trousers of something soft she couldn’t identify, and bare feet. So—he wasn’t Prince Robin Goodfellow today, he was just Robin, or Puck. She wasn’t sure if that was a good thing for what they were about to ask of him, or a bad one.

  “Well, we are,” Nan replied, sobering immediately as Neville flew to her shoulder, and Grey to Sarah’s. “Obviously we needed to talk to you, so thank you very much for obliging us. It’s a bit of a story, and we’re not sure how much more might be going on—or even if it’s something magic is involved with.”

  “But given how unlikely it is that something has come our way that doesn’t involve magic, we thought we’d better ask your advice,” Sarah finished.

  “Then sit, and tell!” Puck urged, patting the ground beside him.

  He watched with amusement as Nan selected a rock, and Sarah, a log, to spare their white dresses. Then he grew serious as Sarah began telling him everything they knew, starting with the letter to Holmes.

  “Well,” he said, when she had finished—it hadn’t taken long, because of how little they actually knew—“This is mortal business, and I don’t meddle in the affairs of mortals.”

  “Much,” Nan amended, fearlessly.

  He flashed a grin at her. “Much,” he admitted. “I do have a weakness for protecting mortal children, as you two know.”

  That’s what I was hoping you’d say, Sarah thought. “But we just wondered if there is anything at all you can tell us about the comings and goings on the moor, since there are mortal children involved, two at least,” coaxed Sarah. “Is there a magician on the moor, do you know?”

  “Pfft. There’s a mort of ’em,” he replied, surprising both of them. “Not powerful, not like some of the ones you’ve taken on in the past, but the witchery blood runs strong in that part of the world, and there are plenty who can see through a millstone better than most. Good and bad; the moors can be dark and dangerous, and attractive for them as has good reasons to hide from other mortals. But there’s not one that stands out, and not one that hunts children that I know of. But that can be hidden.”

  “Even from you?” Nan asked, surprise written all over her face.

  “Especially from me.” He nodded, and the pointed tips of his ears showed just for a moment among the tousled locks of his chestnut hair. “Horseshoe nails and Cold Iron’s not proof against me, but there are spots out there that have been held by generations of them that are no better than they should be. Those places have been witched for long generations against my interference and my sight. And the pity of it is, I can’t even tell where they are by finding the blank spots; it all just blurs away into the waters and the wild.” He scratched his head. “So my answer is, aye, this is possible. Lots of things go astray on the moor, and plenty of those things are human children. But if there’s magic involved, I can’t find ’em, nor can I find who took ’em, nor where. If anybody did at all. Remember, all you know for the moment is that you just have one lone woman who chased her kiddies out of the house herself.”

  “Well . . . fiddlesticks,” Nan said, slumping. “I guess we’ll have to rely on the mages and the constables to know whether and maybe where we should go. But can you at least help us by giving us moor-speech in case we do go on the hunt?”

  “Moor-speeches, there’s more’n one, though the differences are small,” Robin corrected. “Aye, I can do that. Open your mouths and stick out your tongues.”

  They obeyed, even Suki. Robin put three petals on each of their tongues. Nan couldn’t tell what they were from, but had the suspicion they were flowers that only bloomed on Dartmoor. “Now swallow without chewing,” he ordered, and they did. The taste was floral, not bitter, but also not sweet. For a moment, Sarah was disappointed, because nothing happened.

  But then—suddenly, it felt as if her head had swollen until it was about to burst, and her ears rang with what seemed like a cacophony of a dozen voices babbling at her, all at once.

  Her head swam, she put both hands down beside her to steady herself—

  And then everything was back to normal, and the voices were no longer in her ears, if they had been in the first place.

  “Crikey!” Suki said, sounding a little dazed. “What were that?”

  “That was the voices of the moor settling into your heads,” Robin said cheerfully. “You won’t get the full mastery of them until you’ve slept on it, but they’re there, just as if you’d le
arned another language, and if you’ll take my advice, don’t pick the voice that sounds exactly like the person you’re talking to. Pick one for yourself that sounds more east or north, or west or south. You’re still all Dartmoor, but you won’t cause suspicion if you sound a bit foreign to whoever you’re speaking to. Otherwise they’ll be bound to wonder why you sound like you come from their very village, but they’ve never seen you in their lives.”

  “That’s good advice, thank you,” Sarah said gratefully. “What about John and Mary?”

  “Oh, they’re Masters, they can get their education from their Elementals, once they arrive on the Moor,” Robin said blithely.

  Sarah sighed a little. “I can see where being a Spirit Master just isn’t as useful as one of the other Elements. Most of the ghosts I encounter aren’t particularly helpful.”

  “Hey now, ho now, if you weren’t a Spirit Master in the making, you’d never have met me!” exclaimed Puck. “For us Old Ones are more Spirit than Elemental, you see. And I’d be sad to never have had our acquaintance, ’deed I would.”

  Then he cocked his head to the side, as if listening to something. “Methinks your friends have got some news, if not all the news you need, and they’ll be hoping you can give them something. So . . . I’ll tell ye something more, and that will be all that’s in my budget. Just as I can’t see the bad ’uns who’ve hidden themselves while they are working small evils rather than great, no more can John and Mary. And if you were to ask my advice, I’d say to you, take speech of Holmes. The bad ’uns that are doing small, small things are gen’rally doing the same small, bad things they’d be doing if they weren’t using magic to do them. And your Mister Holmes is good at tracking down that sort.”

  He winked, and a moment later a whirlwind whipped around in the clearing, making them all shield their eyes from the dust and bits of debris. And when the wind died just as quickly as it had come up—Puck was gone.

  * * *

  As soon as they were within sight of the bungalow, they saw Alderscroft at the edge of the bridle paths, peering anxiously in their direction. As soon as he spotted them, he waved vigorously to them; the birds took off for the veranda and Sarah and Nan picked up their skirts in both hands and sprinted for him. “I’ve had a telegram from Yelverton,” he said. “The district constabulary there says there have definitely been more children than normal going missing without explanation over the last four years. He couldn’t go into detail over a telegraph, of course, but I hope one of my Earth Mages will have more information tonight.”

  “And if not, that’s enough to send us out to investigate,” Sarah said firmly. “Will you send a message about this to Mycroft? Robin told us that if we can get him, we need Sherlock involved.”

  “Did he now?” Alderscroft looked astonished. “I wouldn’t have thought that would be something he’d suggest—but let’s not talk here. Come up to the veranda and Mary and John and I can tell you the little we learned while you were talking to the Old One.”

  The telegram, it transpired, was just as terse as one might expect from someone who was paying by the letter to send one. 4 yrs chldrn mssng stop cld use hlp stop, it read. “Clear and concise, but not exactly informative,” John remarked. “But I suspect a chief constable who was not obsessing over a problem he can’t explain would not have sent that last, even to Lord Alderscroft, agent of the Crown.”

  “Good observation,” Alderscroft agreed. “It tallies with my experience of rural constabularies. They don’t much like to ask for help.”

  “Well, you can’t blame them,” Watson pointed out. “Londoners come swooping in and solve their cases and they get written up in the newspapers as a lot of provincial dunderheads. Which is unfair, very unfair. They’re shrewd on their own ground, it’s only when things outside their experience impact them that they flounder, as would anyone.”

  “Well, this one has asked for help, so I suggest we work with him rather than around him,” Mary put in.

  Sarah nodded, as did Nan, and reiterated what Robin had told them about not always being able to see where magic was being worked even though it was on his own ground, as it were.

  “. . . and he thinks, given that these places on the moor have been used as bolt-holes for centuries, that you won’t be able to find them by magic either,” she concluded. “Which is why he suggested contacting Holmes.”

  “If the Oldest Old One suggests it . . . he’s probably given us as much as he’s able to. I’ll telegraph Mycroft,” said Alderscroft. “He’ll be predictably annoyed at being made into Sherlock’s letter-box, but we’ve done him yeoman’s service lately and haven’t asked for much.”

  All this time, Lord Alderscroft’s secretary had been sitting close by, taking notes. Finally he spoke. “Shall I see about train schedules to Yelverton, and possible accommodations with your peers, my Lord?” he asked, with polite practicality. Then he allowed the faintest of expressions to cross his face. “One supposes one might be able to telegraph for reservations to an inn. . . .” His tone suggested that he doubted it.

  “By all means, please make the inquiries, but I might have an alternative for accommodations,” Alderscroft said. “It will depend on what one of my Earth Magicians says.”

  Sarah waited for him to elaborate, but the conversation passed on to other things. It seemed that learning anything more was going to have to wait until after dinner.

  * * *

  “Would you like to see how I communicate with other Masters and Magicians?”

  The Watsons were using the magical workroom Alderscroft had set up for guests—the Fire Master really had thought of everything when he’d had this bungalow built. Suki had gone to bed lulled into a state of near-torpor by generous helpings of Eton mess—that meringue, whipped cream, and sliced strawberry delight that was her very favorite of desserts, rated even above the most decadent of chocolate cakes and mousses. The birds had gone off to their perches in the bedroom to sleep. Nan and Sarah had been sitting on the veranda, listening to the sounds of the night, when Alderscroft addressed them from the doorway.

  “Definitely,” Nan replied, getting to her feet. “And we’d like an explanation of that so we can figure out how we can do the same.”

  Sarah was a mere pace behind her as she joined Alderscroft at the door, which he held open for her. “I confess, I am not sure of that myself,” Alderscroft replied. “Most of us use some form of physical object to communicate with. Air Mages generally use a crystal ball, Water a shallow bowl of consecrated water, Earth a polished slab of obsidian. Fire Magicians—use a fire. I have no idea what a Spirit Magician could use.”

  They continued down the hallway from the sitting room that led to Alderscroft’s study.

  Nan sighed. “Like so many things involving us, a mystery. How do you communicate with a magician that’s not of the same Element as you?”

  “With the help of our Elementals, we use the objects we normally use; the Elementals are the bridge between us, rather than the power itself,” Alderscroft said, unlocking the door to a room along the hallway just after the door to his study. He gestured for them to go in.

  It was not a large room, and it was not as ornate as she would have expected, although it was papered in red damask. There was a closed, floor-to-ceiling cabinet along one wall, something not unlike an altar on the south side of the room, and—somewhat incongruously—a set of three comfortable red-plush chairs facing a small fireplace. “I like to come here to read, or discuss things in a very private setting,” Alderscroft said, with a slight smile. “There is no reason why a workroom can’t serve more than one purpose. But this arrangement will be quite convenient for our purposes as well. Please, take a seat.”

  They did, one on either side of Alderscroft. There was a small, very bright fire already going in the fireplace. He gestured toward it. “This is what a Fire Master uses for scrying or communication; the Element itself, rath
er than a representation of it.” He took his seat, and pulled a notebook out of his waistcoat pocket. “And the first on my list is Harold Linwood, the proprietor and owner of the Rock Hotel in Yelverton. He is due for attempt to speak with me at any moment.”

  He gestured—Nan sensed, rather than saw, a rush of Fire energies toward the flames, but Sarah nodded as if she had seen something that made sense to her. Well, good, at least one of us is getting something useful from this.

  For a very long time all three of them just sat there, staring at the fire. The two small windows on either side of the fireplace were open, letting in the cool air—a good thing, or even though the fire was small it would have gotten very warm and stuffy. And just when Nan was about to ask if the innkeeper might have gotten delayed, the flames moved in the fireplace in a very . . . peculiar fashion, and a voice came from it.

  “Are you there, my Lord?”

  It was a strong voice, though it sounded as if it was coming from a great distance, and the tone was diffident. When Nan leaned over and peered more closely at the flames, she thought she saw a tiny figure of a man in the midst of them. Or half a man, to be precise; he was only visible from the waist up.