by Lynn Kurland
Her reputation included mostly tales of what—and who—she buried in her garden, but he supposed that wasn’t a useful thing to bring up at the moment. He sat down, sipped, gasped, then leaned his elbows on the table to avoid falling off his chair. The woman’s coffee rivaled the king of Durial’s ale for its vileness. In fact, he wasn’t entirely certain the two of them didn’t have some sort of foul contest going to see who could brew the most undrinkable swill possible. It took him a moment or two to regain his composure, but when he thought he could speak with any success, he looked at his dam.
“Let us concede the point that a mage loses a part of his soul when he works black magic.”
“Not all dark spells, of course. Just the truly vile ones.”
“Don’t suppose you’ve made a list of those.”
“Didn’t suppose I needed to, especially where you’re concerned,” she said, “but we’ll discuss that later. Go on. You’re having thoughts and I don’t want to interrupt such a monumental event.”
He would have scowled at her, but he was too unsettled to—an unsettling turn of events in and of itself.
“Let’s agree on more dire pieces of magic,” he said. “We could argue spells of death, surely, but I say we concentrate on Diminishing.”
His mother leaned forward, obviously ready to dish. Bless the woman, she had always been willing to get her hands dirty discussing things that would have made another witch swoon into her cauldron.
“Shall we discuss what’s left of the victim, or what the working of that spell does to the mage?” she asked. “Well, to your sire, actually, given that he used it so often that the effects might be more readily examined.”
“Exactly that,” Acair agreed. “We can say without quibbling what was left of those he plied his trade upon, which wasn’t much.”
“Lumps of sorrow and misery,” she agreed. “Just my sorts of lads, but you know me.”
Indeed, he did. He looked at her thoughtfully. “So, what is your opinion on what the working of that spell did to him? Did he lose parts of his soul in the bargain?”
She shrugged again. “There was so little of his black soul left by the time I met him, I don’t know if I could answer that properly. Did he have no soul to start with, or did Diminishing cost him what he had left?” She looked at him with eyes that saw far too clearly. “Makes you wonder, doesn’t it, what Ruamharaiche’s well took of him when he lost control of himself there, if he had so little soul left. I understand he certainly didn’t lose any of his power, but there had to have been a cost of some kind.”
“I’m not traipsing to Shettlestoune to ask him,” Acair said grimly.
“Don’t look at me for that answer,” she said. “I’m not even sure knowing the particulars would aid you, not that he would admit what it had cost him. If you want my advice, think on that name I gave you.”
“Sladaiche.”
“I believe that’s the one.”
“From whence did he hail, did you say?”
“I didn’t say.” She pulled his cup away from him. “Best toddle on off and find out for yourself.”
He rose, leaned over and kissed her cheek, then leapt back and dashed for the door before she cuffed him.
“Oh,” she said, “one last thing.”
He had to admit he didn’t care for the tone of her voice or how just the sound of those words seemed to bring everything in the world to a grinding halt. He turned around and looked at her with a fair bit of reluctance. “Dare I ask?”
“I think you should go visit your grandmother.”
He staggered. He staggered into the doorframe, true, which he supposed was the only thing keeping him on his feet. “You cannot be serious.”
“Think on what her library contains. I have limited myself to an unvarnished and factual record of the Nine Kingdoms, but she has collected an entirely different sort of thing. You should know, having nosed about in her library more often than you should have. Potions, oddities, rare and unusual books that might or might not have anything to do with the world as we see it.” She nodded knowingly. “Faery tales aren’t always what they seem to be.”
“You want me to take my life in my hands and slip inside her house to look through her collection of children’s books?” Acair asked incredulously.
“Dolt, where do you think those stories come from?” she asked in exasperation. “The man you may or may not be hunting faded out of all histories centuries ago. For all I know, he’s older than that ageless prince from Cothromaiche. He was the stuff of legend when your sire started investigating him and that was centuries ago. If Gair could have found him, he would have. I suspect he’s likely a miserable seller of porridge located on the same street as your tailor, hiding in plain sight.”
“My late tailor, you mean,” Acair said, “but the point is still well taken.” He sighed and rubbed his hands over his face. “And you think Granny will tell me where he is?”
“I think your grandmother, my wee brat, will slay you the moment she claps eyes on you. She’s bitterly disappointed in the way you turned out. You also nicked one too many of her little figurines. She paid a great deal for them from Roland of Gairn and his progeny, and you know how rare they are. A woman doesn’t forgive that sort of thing.”
“They made excellent hostess gifts.”
“Which put her in the position of seeing her treasures in the glass cabinets of various noblewomen she loathes whilst she was unable to, for the sake of decorum, announce that the goods in question were actually hers.”
Acair supposed it might be wise not to mention the other things he’d liberated from his maternal grandmother’s cache of things he’d been certain she would never miss.
“I understand she has a tome called The Book of Oddities and Disgusting Spells,” his mother said placidly. She picked up her knitting. “Right up the old alleyway where you’re concerned, I imagine.”
He considered. “Think she would let me have a look at it?”
“Of course not.” His mother snorted. “As I told you before, if you show your pretty face at her gates, she’ll slay you as soon as look at you.”
He tsk-tsked her. “Are you suggesting, Mother mine, that I sneak over the walls and do a bit of burgling?”
“I’m not suggesting anything, but make certain you take note of any new spells she has guarding her walls. She’s terribly stingy with what she invents, which I find surprising considering how popular my diaries are. You would think she might want to figure prominently in one or two, but there you have it. Relatives are a mystery.”
He couldn’t have agreed more. He made her a low bow, then steered himself in the direction of loud weeping. He paused at the doorway of the fancy parlor and shook his head over the scene of devastation that greeted him. Mansourah was standing in the middle of the chamber, drenched to the skin by two wailing workers of magics that should have had him weeping. Acair cleared his throat loudly.
“You do know, ladies, that Prince Mansourah’s twin, Turah, is even more handsome than he is.”
His cousins turned and looked at him as one.
“Is he?” they asked, also in unison.
He suppressed the urge to shiver and instead carried on with the business of getting his little company underway. “Indeed he is, so there’s plenty of Nerochian royalty to go around. No need to fight over this one when there’s more to be had at home—and definitely a better specimen. I’d rush off and see for myself if I were you two.”
The breeze left by their passing came close to knocking him off his feet, but at least the deed was done. Mansourah walked unsteadily over to him.
“I should kill you for the insult, but instead I find myself wanting to kiss your boots.”
“Hold that thought,” Acair advised. “I would also suggest not going home for a bit. They’ll lose interest after a while, but I have the feeling
that might take longer than you’d care for. You might want to warn your brother.”
Mansourah smiled briefly. “Or I might not.”
Acair looked on him with a friendlier eye and would have complimented him on that lack of brotherly compassion, but he didn’t want to offer praise too soon. A few more opportunities to do a foul turn instead of a good one, then they might have something to discuss.
“I understand Léirsinn is outside trying to convince your pony not to stomp you to death when he sees you,” Mansourah offered. “The sooner we interrupt her, the better.”
Acair shook his head in wonder at the way things were looking up. Nastiness from a prince of Neroche, a mystery from his mother, and a potential bit of excitement at his Gran’s. He thought it best to bid his mother a final good-bye, collect Léirsinn and Mansourah, and march off into the pleasant morning light whilst the winds were so favorable.
He didn’t imagine that would last.
• • •
Several hours later, he was making his way through the forest to the north of his sire’s rotting, bastard-brother-infested keep and marveling at how quickly the worm, as the saying went, had turned. He felt exactly as if he were walking over his own grave.
It was absolutely ridiculous, of course, but that was his life of late. No magic, no mischief, and no ability to properly astonish the glorious woman walking next to him, never mind giving that cloying prince of Neroche a proper send-off. All he could do was crawl about like a pitiful mortal, wondering when the next mighty mage would find him in the way and squash him like a bug.
Things had to change, and quickly.
That was precisely why he was stooping to the madness his mother had suggested of traipsing hither and yon to collect the bits of himself he had apparently left behind whilst about his three favorite activities, a list he supposed he didn’t need to make for himself. He could hardly bring himself to think on any of them without indulging in a heavy sigh. So much havoc going undone was such a terrible waste. Telling his companions about his escapades had lifted his spirits briefly, but now he was back to the dull business of keeping himself alive long enough to have his magic back.
It took less time to reach the site of his initial foray into true shady-doings than he’d anticipated, though he supposed he should have expected that. He had been a lad of tender years, after all, venturing forth from Ceangail on his own two feet in deference to stealth. The appropriate spot had seemed quite a distance to him at the time, but he now realized that it was closer than he should have been comfortable with. He held up his hand to stop his companions, hoping they would ignore how that hand trembled.
“We’re here.”
Mansourah, to his credit, only frowned at the house sitting there on the sunnier side of the slope. Acair had little idea what sorts of things that lad there had combined as a strapping youth, but he imagined it had included what for those Nerochian lads might be counted as the occasional bad deed. Cutting the blooms off their mother’s rosebushes, pushing over the occasional snoozing bovine, filching the odd bottle of wine from their father’s stash of that nasty stuff from Penrhyn, who knew? It seemed to be the extent of the imagination of those northern lads, so he couldn’t mock them for it. One lived with one’s failings as best one could.
“Have you never been back here?” Léirsinn murmured.
“Return to the scene of such a prattish crime?” he said with as much disdain as he could muster, which unfortunately wasn’t much. “Nay. I only revisit scenes of past triumphs. This doesn’t qualify.”
He supposed he didn’t need to add that he was finding those visits increasingly difficult to make during daylight hours, but what was there to be done? He was a black mage extraordinaire and some people just had no ability to enjoy the odd ribald jest or the nicking of an irreplaceable portrait. That was hardly his fault.
But returning to a place languishing in the middle of trees that he was sure clung to life through sheer willpower alone? Preposterous. It looked nothing more than what it was: a modest country house set on a small landhold where the owner had likely died without heirs, no doubt a fortnight or two after he’d taken a tumble off an orchard ladder.
Acair steadfastly refused to think about the fact that he had knocked just such a man off just such a ladder. That crotchety old bastard had been a mage. He certainly should have been able to take care of himself.
“Well, what now?”
“An excellent question, young Mansourah,” Acair said absently. “I think a brief turn about the old place might suit.”
“If you say so,” Mansourah said doubtfully.
Acair excused himself and went to do just that. A careful scouting of the border of the orchard and house convinced him only that he’d been a fool to even set foot near the place, deliciously tempting rumors aside. If he’d had the wit the gods had given a common garden slug—something his mother was convinced he didn’t possess—he never would have bothered.
He rejoined his companions, checked briefly for any untoward familiarity with Léirsinn on Mansourah’s part that would spell the end of the man’s life, then frowned.
“I don’t see anything, but perhaps I’m not seeing what’s there.” He looked at Mansourah. “Don’t suppose you’d care to have a look about, old bean?”
Mansourah took his bow in his hand, shifted his quiver of arrows to quite possibly a more advantageous locale on his back, then melted into the shadows of the forest.
“How does he do that?” Léirsinn asked, sounding a bit more breathless than circumstances warranted.
“It’s likely how he manages free ale,” Acair said sourly. “He sneaks up and poaches it whilst the lad who paid for it is distracted. I’m sure his technique has been perfected in just such spots as that rather rough pub we frequented in Neroche.”
She gave him a chiding look. “I believe he’s a very skilled bowhunter.”
“Yet still so unwed,” Acair said, shaking his head. “One wonders why, doesn’t one?”
“One does,” she agreed. “One is also a little surprised there isn’t a line of noblewomen forming somewhere for your eligible self.”
“I’m surprised by that as well,” he said honestly. “I think there might be, but the trouble is I’ve yet to encounter anyone from that very long line whose first instinct was to stab me with a pitchfork. I might have to look further afield.”
She smiled and he had to remind himself quite sharply not to fall into those limpid leaf-green pools she called eyes.
“You might,” she agreed.
He reached for her hand and tucked it under his elbow before he dropped to his knees right there on that carpet of fallen pine needles and spewed out a maudlin sentiment or two. Her fingers were freezing and that in spite of the winter clothing—completely black, of course—his mother had so thoughtfully provided for them. If he and Léirsinn looked a bit like a pair of ne’er-do-wells out for a bit of burgling, well, his mother was nothing if not practical.
Mansourah, of course, would need to travel a few more leagues out of Fionne of Fàs’s sights before he dared discard the lovely ermine-trimmed cloak and boots he was sporting. At least the man had managed to escape without committing to wed either of the twins he’d left sobbing into their porridge.
Love was a complicated business.
But so was the rubbish he was currently embroiled in, so he set aside those flowery thoughts for examination at another time and tried not to wonder if his mother might have sent him on an errand that would prove to be fatal, just for the sport of it.
He honestly wouldn’t have been surprised.
He jumped a bit when Mansourah materialized next to him, then he glared at their companion.
“Magic?” he demanded.
“Skill,” Mansourah said distinctly. “I could teach you, if you like.”
When hell freezes over, was half out of
his mouth before he thought better of it. He didn’t imagine Mansourah of Neroche had anything useful to teach him, but he was in reduced circumstances. At the moment, he was open to quite a few things he would have otherwise dismissed.
“Did you see anything?”
Mansourah shook his head. “No spells, no animals, no one inside. Are you sure about this?”
“My mother claims I should be.”
“Your mother also thinks I should wed one of your cousins.”
“You could do worse,” Acair said with a shrug.
Mansourah shut his mouth around whatever he’d intended to say and apparently settled for a look of consternation. “Miach would kill me.”
“I’d be more worried what Queen Mhorghain would do to you, but that’s just me.” Acair looked at Léirsinn. “I think you should remain—”
“Nay.”
He sighed. He wasn’t sure what else he could offer her in the way of protection, not that she would have accepted it. He had a dagger down the side of his boot and a very large collection of insults at the ready to hurl in her defense. Perhaps that was the best they could hope for at the moment.
He nodded, then looked at Mansourah. “I must admit that I don’t know exactly what I’m looking for,” he began.
“Sometimes that’s the best way to find it,” Mansourah said easily. “Let’s see what’s inside.”
Acair didn’t want to feel a twinge of anything that couldn’t be comfortably placed in the Reasons to Murder a Prince of Neroche saddlebag he’d dedicated to that middle-ish child of the terrifying Queen Desdhemar of Neroche, but again, there it was. His life could hardly be called his own at the moment. All the more reason to see if there was anything to what his mother had advised him to do. He nodded to his companions, then led the way forward.
The house in front of them turned out to be nothing more than a rustic little place that had obviously not been lived in for years. Spells hung in tatters over doorways and alongside windows. He opened the door, somewhat surprised to find it unlocked, then pushed it fully open. He ignored the shiver that went through him—exhilaration, naturally, not fear—and was more grateful than he should have been that a spell of something foul didn’t immediately fall upon him as he walked inside.