Widdershins

by Charles de Lint

  “Good trick,” Geordie said.

  The doonie shrugged, but Lizzie could tell he was pleased so she clapped again.

  When he offered the bowl to them, Lizzie took it first and had a long swallow. She couldn’t remember the last time anything had ever tasted so good. The water was cool and fresh, as though it had just been dipped from a mountain stream.

  “Not too much,” Timony said. “At least not all at once.”

  Lizzie had another mouthful, then reluctantly passed the half-full bowl to Geordie. While he drank, she walked back over to the place where Jilly had disappeared.

  “I still think it would be cool to know how to—”

  She didn’t get to finish. Two strangers suddenly appeared in the spot and she scrambled back.

  “Whoa,” she said, then took up one of the defensive stances that her old gym-mate Johnny had taught her.

  “Easy,” Geordie said.

  Lizzie had time to see that the newcomers were both young women—one red-haired with a feral tangle of curls, the other dark-haired and dressed like a skateboarder. Then the red-haired woman flung herself at Geordie and wrapped her arms around his neck. They were obviously old friends.

  “How could you scare us like that?” she demanded. “We thought you were dead.”

  “I think I was.”

  The woman pushed back to look him in the face. “What?”

  Geordie smiled. “This is my sister Christiana,” he said, introducing her to Timony and Lizzie.

  “And I’m Mother Crone,” the dark-haired skateboarder said.

  “That’s Timony,” Lizzie said. “I’m Lizzie and I’ve got to say, you don’t look like a crone.”

  “Oh, you’d be surprised at how old she is,” Christiana said.

  The dark-haired woman shot her a look, but Christiana only shrugged and offered a sweet smile in return.

  “I’m . . . surprised to see you,” Geordie said to Mother Crone.

  “You shouldn’t be. I’ve never meant you any harm.”

  “I know. You sure were right about the danger. But . . .”

  “But I should have let you decide for yourself what to do about it,” Mother Crone said. “Believe me, I know that now.”

  Okay, what was going on here? Lizzie wondered. She hadn’t even known that Geordie had a sister. Now who was this other woman going to turn out to be? His mother? Too young. But there was obviously history here.

  “But I’m fine now,” Geordie said. “I guess you didn’t see that I’d get past dying and come back.”

  Christiana hooked her arm in his. “I need to hear this whole story.”

  But Mother Crone wasn’t done yet.

  “First I owe you an apology,” she told Geordie.

  “No, it’s okay. I understand why you had to keep me at the court.”

  “Well, for that, too, but I meant for something else.”

  Geordie’s eyes narrowed. “You had another enchantment on me?”

  “Moons, no. It has to do with our relationship over the past couple of years. Or rather, the mess I’ve made of it.”

  “You don’t have to explain.”

  “I think I do. I want to.”

  “But—”

  “Hear her out, Geordie,” Christiana said. “For my sake.”

  She unhooked her arm from his and gave him a little push toward Mother Crone.

  “You guys need to talk this out,” she said.

  She walked away from them and made a show of having a great interest in the petroglyphs on the rocks. Geordie and Mother Crone waited a moment, then moved away as well, going to stand by the edge of the mesa. Lizzie watched them talking until she realized she was staring. Turning away, her gaze went to Timony, who was still looking at the pair with big eyes.

  It took her a moment to realize that he was starstruck.

  “Okay, what do you find so interesting in all of this?” she asked him.

  “It’s—she’s a seer. I wasn’t sure at first, because she looks different than I remember from the last time I saw her, and people called her by a different name, but I’m sure it’s her.”

  “Which means—what?”

  “Well, she’s like royalty, isn’t she?

  Lizzie smiled. “So what? Do fairy have their own version of E!? Is this like the fairy version of Entertainment Tonight?”

  “I’m not sure what that means.”

  “Do you like to follow the gossip of the rich and famous?”

  “Well, surely. When was the last time you saw a seer? It’s like being allowed into the inner workings of one of the courts.”

  “Not judge and jury, I’m guessing.”

  “No, no. The fairy courts. That’s where I saw Mother Crone before. It was at the wedding of Tatiana’s daughter Saireen to the Prince of the Golden Court in Demaskendale. Of course, being a doonie, I wasn’t a member of the court, but I had a good seat in the second hundreds.”

  She gave his arm a little tug. “Well, let’s get closer so we can hear what they’re saying.”

  “Oh, no,” he told her. “We must allow them their privacy.” He gave a slow shake of his head, then added in a tone of voice that Siobhan might have used after meeting some admired musician such as Johnny Doherty. “When Geordie told me he was a fiddler at her court it never really registered.”

  “I think there was more going on than fiddling,” Lizzie said. “Or at least fiddling that didn’t involve musical instruments.”

  Timony’s eyes went wider. “Do you really think?”

  Lizzie laughed. The sound of it was odd in her ears until she realized that she couldn’t remember the last time she’d been able to laugh.

  She gave the doonie a hug.

  “You know what?” she said. “I think everything’s going to be all right.”

  “I hope so.”

  He gave Geordie and Mother Crone another look that seemed wistful.

  “Now what is it?” she asked.

  “It’s just . . . I never had a wife or even the possibility of one. I always thought it would be nice.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I think they’re overrated.”

  Timony gave her a surprised look.

  “Or maybe it just never works out for me, either,” she said. “I always seem to fall for musicians. But if they’re in my band, it usually gets awkward. And if they’re in another band . . . well then, they’re never around, because either they’re travelling, or I am.”

  “Maybe you need to look for someone with a different sort of job.”

  “You don’t exactly get to choose who you fall for.”

  “But surely you’ve met other intriguing men,” Timony said. “What about that Grey fellow?”

  Lizzie laughed. “Oh right. Hook up with a guy who hates the music that’s my life—not to mention that he hates humans, period. No, if I was going to get involved with anybody I know right now, it’d be Con—the guitarist in my band—but that would just be a big mistake.”

  “Well, if it can’t work out for us,” Timony said, “I hope it works for them.”

  He nodded to where Geordie and Mother Crone were still talking.

  Lizzie shook her head. “I don’t know what their deal is, but did you not catch the way Geordie and Jilly were looking at each other?”

  “But Mother Crone is a seer.”

  “Doesn’t matter, if they don’t have the sparks.”

  “I don’t know about that.”

  Lizzie turned to see what he was looking at in time to see Mother Crone give Geordie a kiss that was anything but chaste.

  Geordie

  Galfreya and Christiana are pretty much the last people I expected to run into out here in the middle of otherworld nowhere, but I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised. At least not with Christiana. By all accounts—her accounts, mind you, related over lazy Sunday afternoons at Christy and Saskia’s place, or after-hours at some bar where I’ve been playing—she’s in and out of the otherworld all the time. She’s had more adven
tures than a character in one of those old movie serials, and some of them were seriously strange.

  So it’s not such a stretch to find her here, out in the middle of nowhere. I’ve had her pop up in places almost as unexpected.

  But Galfreya . . .

  Galfreya rarely strays far from her court in the mall. It’s enough of a way to define her that it was certainly a point of contention in our relationship, even if I never pushed her on it. It’d just sit there in my head. A minor annoyance, most of the time, because I liked the music in the mall. I liked being with her in her own space. But there were times when I’d just want to be with her in some of my old haunts—the places that I felt defined me. The Lee Street Market. Fitzhenry Park. The clubs in Crowsea and Lower Foxville. The sessions at the Harp.

  She’d always have some reason not to come with me. It got to the point where I thought maybe she couldn’t leave the mall. Like if she ever did, she’d burst into flame the way stories say a vampire will when it steps into sunlight. Or maybe she’d live up to her speaking name and turn into a hag, or she’d dissolve into water, or something.

  It wasn’t something she’d ever talk to me about.

  Hazel and Edgan would tell me not to take it personally.

  “All seers have inexplicable eccentricities and habits,” Hazel said. “It’s not something they choose, or the price for their gift. It just seems to work out that way.”

  “Like pipers.”

  She gave me a confused look.

  “They’re all a little crazy,” I told her. “It just seems to come with the territory.”

  She nodded. “That’s it. It comes with the territory. In Mother Crone’s case, she remains here, in the court.”

  Edgan’s explanation was more like a parent dealing with a problem by saying “because I say so.”

  “She’s the seer,” he told me. “So she can do what she wants. Who are we to question her?”

  “Would it kill her to come out with me once in awhile?”

  He shook his head. “That isn’t the point. The point is that this is how she is. You can either accept it or not. It has nothing to do with you. She leaves the court at no one’s bequest, and she is not required to explain why.”

  “Because she’s a seer.”

  He nodded gravely, obviously happy that I understood. But I didn’t. I just didn’t see the point in arguing it with a couple of treekin—especially since Galfreya herself wouldn’t discuss the matter. I had to either accept it or not.

  And for the past couple of years, that’s just what I did. I accepted it.

  So finding her here, this far from the court—not to mention in the company of my brother’s shadow . . .

  It was confusing, to say the least.

  But as she continued to talk, I realized I wasn’t about to get an explanation now either. That wasn’t why she was here.

  When I did understand what she wanted, I shook my head.

  “There’s Jilly now,” I said.

  She nodded. “There’s always been Jilly. I know how you feel about her and I respect those feelings. But we have something special, too, and what we have can be real.”

  “It’s not that.”

  “I have to earn your trust again. I understand that.”

  I shook my head. “It’s not just that. You say you had me under an enchantment and I believe you, but the truth is, you almost didn’t need it. Deep down inside, all I wanted these past few years was to not be locked into a relationship with any woman—even one as gorgeous as you. I know that sounds crazy. But really, for all my trying to get you to commit more, I wanted it casual, too.”

  “But you were always pushing for more.”

  “I know. I did want more. It just took me forever to figure out who I really wanted it with. It took me learning she feels the same way that I do. It took me dying and her crying over the changeling mess that was left of my body—and if that doesn’t bring the point home, I don’t know what could.”

  “I’m not going to just give up,” she said.

  “We can’t choose who we love—or who we don’t.”

  “Don’t you think I know that? Why do you think I’m here? I’m ready to give it all up. The court, magic, everything.”

  “You shouldn’t have to change who you are to be with the person you love.”

  “No, that’s just the way it works when a fairy falls for a mortal.”

  “Galfreya . . .”

  She didn’t let me finish. Instead, she just kissed me—a hard and passionate kiss filled with magic, but the magic of a woman, not a fairy. It was demanding and expectant, but yielding, too. And I admit it was a long moment before I finally pushed her away.

  What can I say? I’m a guy and she’s a gorgeous woman. We have history. My body responded to her because of it, because it knew the familiar way we fit together. Because it felt right, just the way it always did.

  But I did push her away.

  “You can’t say you didn’t feel anything,” she said.

  “That’s not the point.”

  “I think it’s the whole point.”

  She stepped toward me again, but I backed off a step.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “But it’s too late. Everything’s changed. I want to be with Jilly now.”

  She folded her arms across her chest.

  “And where is Jilly?” she asked.

  “She’s . . .”

  I didn’t even know how to begin to explain the world inside Jilly’s head.

  I settled on, “She has some stuff she needs to deal with.”

  “Without you.”

  I wasn’t particularly happy about it myself, but that was neither here nor there.

  “It happens,” I said.

  I glanced away from her across the mesa top. Christiana was leaning against a pile of rocks that were covered with petroglyphs. Lizzie and Timony were farther away, the doonie studiously trying to pretend that he wasn’t watching us. I turned back to Galfreya.

  “There’s not a whole lot else to say,” I told her. “Maybe we should rejoin the others.”

  Her gaze met mine, and I saw the world of hurt sitting there in her eyes.

  Why now? I couldn’t help but wonder. After all the time we’d been together and she’d never said anything, why had our relationship suddenly become so important to her?

  She looked as though she was going to say something else, but then she simply nodded and we started back toward the others. Christiana immediately bounced up from where she’d been sitting.

  “How did it go?” she asked.

  “It didn’t,” Galfreya said.

  And then she disappeared. Took that step from this world, away into another.

  Christiana looked confused. “What’d I say?”

  “Nothing,” I told her. “But if you were aiming for a career as a match-maker, you might want to consider some other options.”

  “But you guys are so great together.”

  “I guess we were. In our own way. But . . . everything’s changed.”

  “She only did what she did to keep you safe,” Christiana said. “Because she loves you. Granted, she should have talked with you about it first, but come on, Geordie. Give her a chance. I know she’s sincere.”

  “I want to be with Jilly,” I said.

  “You . . .”

  “And she wants to be with me.”

  Christiana’s eyes went wide and then she grinned.

  “You have got to be kidding me,” she said.

  “Why is that so strange?”

  She shrugged, still grinning.

  “It’s just—well, according to Christy, the two of you have been doing this dance for pretty much ever, but no one ever thought you guys would get your heads out of the sand long enough to realize how perfect you are for each other.”

  I smiled. “So you approve?”

  “Approve? What does what I think have to do with anything? But yeah. Since you’re asking. I totally approve. Jilly’s going
to be the coolest sister-in-law.”

  “I didn’t say we were getting married.”

  “I know, I know. It’s just a figure of speech. Everything’s good. In fact, it’s great.”

  “What’s great?” Lizzie asked as she and Timony came up to join us. “And where did Mother Crone go?”

  “Who cares?” Christiana told her. “Geordie and Jilly are finally going to be a couple.”

  Lizzie smiled.

  “But speaking of Jilly,” Christiana went on. “Where is she? And what was all this crap about you dying and coming back?”

  “It’s a long weird story.”

  “And we’re in a hurry to go where?”

  So we all sat in the shade of the petroglyphs and got caught up with each other’s stories. But the whole time I couldn’t stop worrying about Jilly. I knew—better than anyone, maybe, considering I was the one who’d died—just how powerful Del was. I wanted to be full of hope, but the longer Jilly was gone, the heavier my heart grew.

  Joe

  There was something solid underfoot—dirt, he thought, though he couldn’t see it. It just had that rough and uneven texture against the soles of his boots. And he could hear the sound of moving water. A river, maybe. Or waves lapping against a lake shore. There was an echo, so it was hard to tell what it actually was, or where it was coming from.

  Everything else was mist. An oddly dry mist that was of no particular temperature, but it certainly wasn’t cool.

  Joe didn’t know where he was, but he knew it couldn’t be good. The last thing he remembered was turning, but not quickly enough. That club of Minisino’s caught him on the back of the head and then . . . and then . . .

  There was this.

  Whatever this was.

  Mist. Silence, except for the sound of that water. Nothing to smell. Nothing to see.

  All things considered, he could guess where Minisino’s club had sent him. There were stories about a place that lay between the world of the living and wherever the dead go when their time was finally up and done. A kind of holding ground. Supposedly, everybody paused here on their journey. Most went on, took the next turn of the wheel. Those that didn’t . . . they stayed here, or haunted the world of the living. Restless. Unhappy. Unable to go back, unable to move on.