by Jeff Wheeler
Julian’s intense, dark eyes taunted his brother. Louis-Rey kicked his shins. “Down, wretch.” Julian knelt, his chains clattering on stone as Louis-Rey put a foot on his neck.
“There. He’s in perfect form. Renaud, strike off his head.”
The man balked. “Is that really necessary, Your Highness?”
Louis-Rey said acidly, “What, do you need the royal seal?”
The red-bearded man continued, “I’m very sorry, sire. Only he spared me ma when she was ill and couldn’t raise the tax.”
Yancy saw that Louis-Rey couldn’t do it himself; maybe the blood connection would deny him Keulocka if he killed his brother. Louis-Rey’s long face contorted, ugly. “Will none of you kill this dog!”
The guards stood well back. They looked at the ground, at each other. One stepped forward and lifted his blade unconvincingly. Julian staggered away.
Louis-Rey cast down his sword with a clatter and raised his hands to Julian’s throat.
“Stop!” cried Ivy, her voice burbling through water. The top of the fountain darted out and splashed Louis-Rey. As steam rose from his sleeves, he shouted and jerked his hands back.
Swiftly, Yancy threw her spells—small and spare, yet strong with a wizard’s wanting. She pulled mightily for some slack in the bound-up force of Keulocka wrapped around Ivy. Julian’s chains clattered free.
Louis-Rey hadn’t seen her, only Ivy. He bellowed, “Teach that witch-girl to follow orders! If she interferes again, I swear you’ll suffer!”
The guards approached warily. Clearly, they had no more interest in harming a little girl than they did the prince’s gentle brother. An ominous roar rose from the dragon as they got close to Ivy. The water swelled around the girl, the source-trickle from the creek growing to a stream.
Yancy panted, worn by the struggle with the sparsely available magic. Julian had seized his chance and leaped on Louis-Rey, but he was clearly hurt and exhausted from the fight on the beach. Gasping, Yancy fought to free Ivy.
Blood joined the water on the rocky bank. Julian had Louis-Rey’s dagger; their close clinch made it effective against the sword, but that wouldn’t last.
Yancy sat in the water, reaching down with both hands, opening up her heart to the lake’s spirit. Working spells felt like pushing a boulder uphill. She didn’t have time for niceties. She spat into the creek, then drank. Exchange complete, she blew out all her breath and lay down on the narrow bed, just enough water covering her that if she breathed, she’d die.
She had to break Louis-Rey’s hold on the dragon. She called to Keulocka, offering her own life to heal the breach. Through the thin layer of water, she could see so clearly where the hurt lay.
The water around Ivy spiraled faster, higher, lights sparkling through it at breakneck pace. Ivy’s palms curved toward Yancy, her plea fighting the magical restraint.
The nervous guards backed off. “Stand or die!” Louis-Rey yelled. Renaud approached the brothers rolling on the ground. As Louis-Rey raised his sword to strike, Renaud knocked it away.
Around her, Yancy could feel the creek bubbling up. She grasped the stones on the creek bed and let the water flow into her mouth. “Please, Keulocka. Have all of me. Be yourself again.”
Blinding power. Lightning filled the entrance with searing white. The moon splashed through to fill the creek with silver. The dragon rose again, simmering up from Yancy’s heart, seeping like smoke from her lungs, dark and cold and fetid as her final breath. What had been the maelstrom stretched toward Ivy, yearning for the heart that was hers.
Ivy’s fountain paused, then spread, the lake dragon widening her arms. Keulocka broke free to meet her sister with a giant, groaning release of arms and legs. A great bellyful of water splashed over the stones as two dragons flew at each other—collided like a wave—and merged.
Ivy ran to Julian. He pushed her behind him. Louis-Rey wrenched the dagger from his brother’s hand.
Suddenly, Julian was lying on the ground, and Louis-Rey crouched over him, his hands dark with his brother’s blood. Yancy sat up and fought for breath. Sparks blinded her—her own returning life. Ivy’s taut, anguished face hovered over Julian, who lay like a discarded husk.
As Yancy dragged herself out of the creek, Ivy raised her arms. Above her, mammoth as a shadow, the dragon did the same. Ivy’s skin glowed from within, her whole body shifting from blue to rose to green. She stretched out her arms toward her father.
A wave broke over Louis-Rey. He jerked as water exploded into him, picking him up, bursting into his mouth and out his nose, then through Julian’s. The dragon clasped them in clammy arms, flowing from one through the other in a watery arc. Blood on the ground—blood in the water—the dagger pushed out of Julian’s breast from within. Keulocka washed them clean and bound them tight.
Then the dragon deposited the Prince of Keulocka on the ground and slipped back into the water. Yancy cried out as Keulocka rippled away through the moon’s trellis on the waves.
Julian lay alone on the rocky ground, hands pressed to his breast where the dagger had been. He groaned as Ivy helped him sit. His voice had come loose, juddering with agony. Yancy crawled to him as he grunted and coughed, hacking on hands and knees as though to get the lake out of his lungs. Ivy hovered with worry. Yancy touched his back. He waved his arm and yelled raggedly, “Stay away!”
“Look at me, Julian.”
“I can’t,” he gasped. “He’s inside me . . . twisted . . . hate . . .” He choked on the word.
Yancy grabbed his shaking shoulders. “You’re still Julian! You’re still the man I love.”
“You’ll hate me . . . Louis-Rey! The monster’s kicking to get out!” He bent in two. The sobs sounded like they came from underwater.
Ivy slid her hand into his. “You’re my father,” she said quietly. “We won’t be parted now.”
One by one, the guards came to salute him and pay their respects.
Julian hid his face in Yancy’s sopping shoulder. Ivy stepped in front and said clearly, “My parents are tired. We’d like to go to the college now.” Yancy smiled to see her witch-girl already acting like a queen.
The guards stepped smartly into formation and led the way up through the cave. Yancy followed Ivy, Julian’s arm over her shoulders as she supported his limping weight. He sighed heavily. At last he said, with something of his old humor, “At least now I know what he’s up to.”
Her heart lifted. “You’ve saved us all, Julian. Your sacrifice—” She swallowed. “The lake’s back on an even keel. Can you feel it? We restored the balance. The dam is broken and the water’s found its new level.”
“I can feel it all now, you know. The lake. The dragon. You and Ivy. Louis-Rey, clamoring to have his way. He’ll tempt me, distort things—”
“Those guards refused to kill you, Julian. People love you, for good reason. You have a noble spirit. You can endure it if anyone can.”
“I could endure him when no one else could,” he said morosely.
Ivy turned back to look at them, then slipped her hand through Yancy’s. “Will you go back to work at the college now, Mistress?”
“If you’ll have me, Princess Camilla.”
Ivy giggled. “Mama Yancy, Papa Julian.” She tested the names. “It’s just Ivy!”
Julian said, “I vote we return to the cottage. You keep studying, Ivy. One day you’ll make a great lake maid, like your mother. And when I retire, and you take over as princess, we’ll only be a lake-row away.” He gave Yancy a tiny, tired smile. “We can tend roses together in our old age.”
“If Damien doesn’t eat them all.”
Adele Gardner
A Clarion West graduate and an active member of SFWA, Adele Gardner has twice won third place in the Rhysling Awards. She’s had a poetry collection, Dreaming of Days in Astophel, as well as 224 poems and 40 stories published in venues such as Legends of the Pendragon, The Doom of Camelot, Strange Horizons, Podcastle, Silver Blade, Daily Science Fiction, Liquid
Imagination, Mythic Delirium, Goblin Fruit, Songs of Eretz Poetry E-Zine (including several Father & Daughter Special Features), and more. Two stories and a poem earned honorable mention in The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror. Previously published as C. A. Gardner and Lyn C. A. Gardner, Adele lives and writes under her middle name to honor her father, Delbert R. Gardner, her mentor and namesake, for whom she serves as literary executor. Learn more at www.gardnercastle.com.
Professional Integrity
By Michael J. Sullivan | 11,000 words
“Say that again,” Hadrian said.
“I want you to kidnap me.” Red-headed, freckled, with deep green eyes as fresh as the leaves of trees after a hard rain, the young woman sat, or more accurately perched, on a stool. Holding a purse on her lap, she was all smiles.
Royce, who had been watching the passing carriages, chose that moment to shut the tea shop’s door. He also closed the adjoining room’s partition, sealing the three of them in a world of doilies, crumb cakes, tiny cups, and parasol stands.
“We’re thieves,” Royce told her in a quiet voice. “We don’t kidnap.”
“It’s the same thing, really,” the young woman insisted, maintaining her blinding grin.
“Really—it isn’t,” Royce said.
“No, seriously. You’re just stealing, you know…a person—me.”
“Fine,” Royce said. “Consider yourself stolen.”
“No, not now. You have to kidnap me tomorrow night.”
“Why?” Hadrian asked, leaning forward carefully.
He sat across from the young woman—who’d said her name was Kristin Lamb—at a little table with an untouched teapot and three cups. He was certain a good bump would send the whole thing over. The entire room was like that, filled with glass and porcelain.
“Because that’s when he’s coming, and he needs to think I’ve been abducted.”
“Who’s he?”
The woman’s bright grin stretched to a full-on beam. Kristin looked up and then closed her eyes, lost in a moment of memory or dream. “Just the most wonderful man on the face of Elan—the Viscount Ianto Don Speakman.”
“And why do you want him to think you’ve been kidnapped?”
Kristin’s eyes popped open, and she shifted in her seat. “Is it really necessary for you to know?”
“No, it’s not, because we don’t kidnap heiresses,” Royce jumped in. He was hovering halfway between the table and the door to the street. “Now if you know a neighbor you don’t like who has a jeweled tiara she keeps in a dresser drawer, we can do business, otherwise—”
“Yes, it’s necessary,” Hadrian said, and turned to face her more directly, the scabbard of his bastard sword dragging across the rug.
“Well, you see, we’re going to be married.”
“Okay, so why do you want your fiancé to think you’ve been kidnapped?”
“Well…” Kristin’s fingers played self-consciously with the heart-shaped silver locket hanging from a chain around her neck, her face blushing. “He’s not exactly my fiancé.”
“How much not your fiancé is he?”
She looked away, her sunbeam smile growing cloudy. “He doesn’t know I exist.” Her white-gloved hands came up to cover embarrassment.
“Not going to make much of an impression on him if you disappear then, is it?” Royce took advantage of the woman’s covered face to glare at Hadrian and jerked his head toward the exit.
Royce wasn’t the sociable sort. Most of their jobs were set up through a liaison which avoided this shortcoming, but after their last arranged venture, which resulted in the two being trapped in the roots of a mountain by a long dead dwarven jester, Royce had insisted on handling this meeting personally.
“No, it will!” Kristin’s head popped out of her hands. “When he’s heard I’ve been taken, he’ll rush to my rescue. And tomorrow will be perfect. Ianto and Parson Engels come every month. They spend their nights drinking with my father until they all pass out.”
“Oh, yeah, definitely sounds like the most wonderful man in Elan.” Royce moved behind Kristin and, with an earnest expression, pointed at the door.
“Oh he’s not a drunkard. He’s a man of honor and only partakes to please my father. He’s much too polite to say no.”
“Luckily we don’t suffer from the same malady. Hadrian? Shall we? No need to keep wasting this lady’s time and we really—”
“I’ll pay fifteen sovereign tenents.” Kristin pried the mouth of her purse open. The coins poured onto the delicate table with a clatter. One rolled off, hit the floor, and spiraled around before ramming into Royce’s foot. “See!”
Royce plucked the coin with a look of amazement. “You brought the money with you?”
“Ah-huh.” Kristin nodded, making her ponytail bounce. “I thought you might not believe me.”
“Oh, trust me, I don’t believe you.”
“What?” She patted a gloved hand on the pile she’d just poured. “This is real coin.”
“I know—I’m not referring to the money,” Royce said. “I honestly can’t believe you made it this far.”
“Oh.” She threw a dismissive hand at him and smirked. “Well, I only live a few miles outside of Medford.” Kristin pointed toward the window, which framed their view of the crowded plaza of Gentry Square where scores of nobles strolled in the midday sun. “I could have walked. Really I could have, but these are new shoes…” She stomped a dainty foot on the rug, making a muffled thump. “And Daddy is always saying the horses need exercise.”
“I meant in life,” Royce said. “I can’t believe you’ve lived this long. You’re what? Twenty-five? Twenty-six? By now I would have bet gold you’d have drowned by looking up in a rainstorm.”
Kristin’s eyes widened. “Don’t you dare insult me!” She squared her shoulders and straightened the sleeves of her gown. “You make it sound like I’m an old hag. I’m only twenty-two!”
Royce looked at Hadrian and rolled his eyes. Turning back to Kristin, he made a ridiculous bow. “Oh—well, my apologies.”
Kristin’s face became a beacon of hope as she leaned forward. “So you’ll do it?”
“No!” Royce’s tone echoed with finality.
“But, Royce—” Hadrian started.
“Listen,” Royce stopped him. “Aside from the fact that we don’t kidnap—or even pretend to—tomorrow is a full moon, which adds additional risk to an already stupid idea.”
Hadrian ignored him and leaned toward Kristin, careful not to put his weight on the table. If I get out of here without breaking something it will be a miracle. “Let me get this straight. You’re willing to pay fifteen tenents just in the hope your disappearance will be noticed by this Ianto fellow?”
The woman wiggled her eyebrows. “Clever, right?”
“Not if clever means the same in your world as it does in ours,” Royce said.
“My father will panic when I disappear. And Ianto—being the daring, brave, and wonderful man he is—will offer to find me. And when he does, I’ll throw my arms around his neck and thank him with kisses. Oh—he’ll notice me.”
“And then you two will live happily ever after, I suppose?” Royce stared at the woman, his disgust replaced by pity. Hadrian had seen the same expression after his partner’s bay mare broke her leg stepping in a woodchuck hole.
“Absolutely.” Kristin bounced once more in her chair.
Hadrian picked up the woman’s empty purse and began putting the coins back. “Listen, I’m sorry, but I have to agree with Royce. You don’t need us. Save your money. If you really think your disappearance will work, just sneak out and pretend you were kidnapped.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“Because he locks me in.”
“Who does?”
“My father.”
“So? Climb out a window.”
“I can’t.”
“You’re bedroom doesn’t have a window?”
“He
doesn’t lock me in my bedroom.”
“Where does he lock you?”
“In a steel box…in the basement.”
Hadrian stopped gathering up the coins, opened his mouth, and then closed it. He glanced at Royce, who failed to offer any help, but appeared genuinely interested in the conversation for the first time. “Your father…wait…” Hadrian forgot himself and leaned on the table with his elbow, causing the thing to tilt and creak or possibly crack; he wasn’t sure which. Jerking his elbow nearly took out the porcelain teapot. He watched to make certain the table wouldn’t collapse, composed himself, clasped his hands, and leaned toward her again. “Why in Maribor’s name would your father lock you in a box?”
Kristin shrugged, making the lace of her dress dance.
“Have you asked?”
She looked at Hadrian with a smirk.
“So what did he say?”
“He just says it’s for my own safety and won’t say anything else.”
“And your mother? What does she say? Why does she go along with this?”
“My mother died when I was five, and I’m certain that’s part of it. After what happened to her, he’s overprotective.”
“What happened to your mother?”
Kristin focused on the teacups. “We were attacked by wolves just a few miles from home. She was killed. He’s always saying he won’t let it happen again.”
“So he locks you in a steel box every night?”
“No. Just when Ianto and the parson visit, which, of course, is why Ianto hasn’t noticed me.”
“Yeah.” Royce nodded his head. “I can see that being a problem.”
“Exactly,” Kristin nodded along with him. “So all you have to do is come in after they’ve passed out, go downstairs, and steal me. You can leave a note telling them where to leave some ransom money…you can keep that too, by the way. Then just tie me to a tree or something and send another note saying where they can find me.”
“You know, that really doesn’t sound too hard,” Hadrian said.