The House of the Stag

by Kage Baker

  Gard collapsed backward onto a bench, putting his face in his hands. “We have to start his lessons now.”

  She came and sat beside him. “How does one train a shape-shifter?” she inquired, staring at the nursery mural.

  “I have no idea.” Gard looked over his fingertips at the mural too. It was done in soft pastels, featuring little rabbits dressed like people. Some of the rabbits, he noted, wore armor and carried spears.

  There was a tavern in Konen-Feyy-in-the-Trees, and in it a man sat, celebrating his good luck by getting as drunk as he could. Because he had begun his celebration with an immense meal, the inebriation was proceeding more slowly than it might otherwise have done; so he had had time to tell his story, coherently, to three or four different sets of tavern patrons.

  He was momentarily without an audience, but smiled as he tilted the wine jar to refill his cup.

  His name was Chelti Stoker. He had been an itinerant painter most of his life. It was not a profession to make a man wealthy, and Stoker was bone thin, with old paint under his nails and engrained in his skin, and a permanently desperate look in his eyes. His quiver of brushes and case of paints lay now at his feet. He was never so drunk as not to keep one foot across the quiver, in case someone tried to steal it.

  He prodded it protectively, now, as two men came to his table. “Oh. Hello,” he said, looking up at the man he recognized. This was a nondescript fellow who had listened to his story, without comment, the first time he’d told it. The other man was bigger, wore flashy clothes; he looked like someone’s hired bully.

  “I’d like you to tell your story to my friend here,” said the nondescript man, in a nondescript voice.

  “Strangest week I ever spent in my life,” said Stoker. “I’d offer you fine gentlemen a drink while you listen, but I seem to have emptied the jar.” He patted it suggestively.

  The bully grinned. “We wouldn’t want you to pass out before you finish your tale. Let’s hear the story first, eh? Plenty of wine afterward, if it’s a good enough story.”

  “Oh, you won’t have heard its like before! Listen well, friend. This time a week gone, my luck was out. I’d spent the day long crying my services up one street and down the next, and had nothing to show for it but the price of a bowl of broth.

  “So in here I came, to this very tavern, and ordered my poor mean bowl. And here I sat supping, lamenting that my mother ever bore such an unlucky son, when in through that very door came a lady. And such a lady!

  “She was tall, with long hair black as night, and a bosom like two boulders, and a red red mouth, and long gorgeous legs, and leather boots with such heels! Hai, I thought to myself, there’s a woman to make a man crawl at her feet, and weep, and plead. Now, you won’t believe this, gentlemen—I didn’t believe it myself. What should this proud beauty do but seat herself across from me and give me the look of invitation?”

  “What happened then?” said the bully, keenly interested.

  “Well, like I told you, I didn’t believe it. I turned and looked over my shoulder, to see who it was she’d settled her fancy on. Nothing behind me but the blank wall! I smiled, being polite, you know, and presently she ordered a jar of wine and two cups. When they were brought out, she crooked her finger through the jar handle and slung it over to my table, easy as though it weighed nothing.

  “She said, with kind of a throaty purr, ‘Little painter man, I’ll bet you’re a master at your craft.’ And she poured me a drink. I told her I was good enough for whatever job she had in mind. And I winked, like this, you know. She just laughed and told me to drink up. And I did. We chatted pleasantly here at this very table, if you want to know, and she was hot-blooded and amorous, and the end of it all was—well, I don’t remember the end of it all so well, but I remember she threw me over her shoulder when it was time to leave and walked out with me.

  “Next thing I knew, I was waking up from the loveliest sleep, only I couldn’t open my eyes nor move. This is because I was tied up and blindfolded, see, and I was wondering what in the world we’d been getting up to, when I noticed I was lying in something that was pitching and moving.

  “I thought for a minute I’d been carried off into service on a ship again, but I couldn’t smell nor hear the sea. And then her voice came quite close to my ear, telling me I was going for a ride in her sedan chair, and I’d find out more when we got where we were going.

  “It seemed like days we traveled, and she had a special way with her for keeping a man from getting the cramp, I’ll tell you. At last we came to some place like a palace, from the way I could hear guards shouting challenge-and-return, and clashing their axes and all. Then indoors and turning this way and that, right and left, upstairs and around, and at last the sedan chair was stopped. I got hoisted out and sat down in a chair. My hands were untied, and my blindfold was taken off, and—you’ll never guess where I was.”

  “Where were you?” demanded the bully.

  “In a nursery,” said Stoker. “A new one, with plaster still fresh and wet on the walls above the paneling, and cradles and cribs all pushed to the center of the room and covered with tarpaulins, and the carpets rolled up. And there was my beauty, only now her skin was a different shade and she was wearing armor. She smiled at me. I hadn’t noticed before how long and white her teeth were. Gods deliver me, I thought, that’s a demoness.

  “She only put my paint case and brushes in my hands, though, and she said, ‘Hello again, little painter man. Here are walls. Paint a mural to please a child.’

  “And I stammered a bit as I said I had one I did for kiddies’ rooms, with bunnies playing about and such, would that suit? She said that would be fine and asked me was there anything I needed. I asked for food and drink and she said she’d have some sent, and the lads would look after me in the meantime.

  “I asked what lads and she pointed behind me and, gods below, you don’t want to know what those two fellows standing guard behind me looked like. They carried black spears and hideous big swords. My beauty laughed and said they’d do me no harm, so long as I did my job.

  “Well, you can imagine I set to with a will then, eh? It was all freehand, no cartoons, but I’d painted those damned bunnies a hundred times and I could have done them in my sleep. The demons watched me, and after a while one of them asked me, quite civil, whether I couldn’t make some of the bunnies purple or green, and maybe paint some of ‘em with red eyes and tusks. So I told him, yes, indeed, anything to oblige.

  “And then after a while the other one asks whether some of the bunnies couldn’t have spears and be marching in an army, in addition to the other ones that were gardening and frying sausages and reading books and sailing little boats on a pond, and I said why not? And some of the bunnies had two heads by the time I was done, and some of ‘em had wings, and really I didn’t want to think too much about what kind of kiddies was going to be sleeping in those cribs.

  “But I finished it; I finished it before it all dried, so I did, even with me stopping for my meal, which was sumptuous, by the way. The beauty came in and congratulated me on how nice the walls looked. Then she gave me a fine big purse of gold and sat me down to another sumptuous meal, with plenty of wine, and I don’t recall how that evening ended either.

  “I woke up in a field by the side of the road, but I still had the purse with all the money and my gear. And here I am.”

  “You’re right,” said the bully. “That was worth a jar of wine. Fetch our friend a drink,” he added to the nondescript man, who rose silently and went off to the bar.

  “You’re most gracious, Mr.—?”

  “Quickfire,” said the bully. “You know, my friend, I think your amazing streak of luck is going to continue? I know a lady who just might pay you to tell her your story. She likes details, though. For example, have you any idea where in the house this nursery was? What could you see, out of the windows?”

  “Oh, I couldn’t tell things like that,” said Stoker, smiling to see the nondescript
man bringing a fresh jar of wine and a fresh cup.

  “I think her ladyship could pay you enough to persuade you otherwise,” said Quickfire, pouring out a drink for Stoker.

  “No, see, I couldn’t, much as I’d like to oblige. The beauty said there’d be a spell on me, to freeze my tongue against talking about that part of it.” Stoker accepted the cup of wine and spilled out a drop or two for the gods.

  “But spells can be broken, you know,” said Quickfire smilingly. “Drink up.”

  And, most unfortunately for him, Mr. Stoker did.

  Five minutes later he was being dragged out the door between Quickfire and the nondescript man, who told the tavern keeper they were taking Mr. Stoker to have his head cleared. The tavern keeper shrugged and went back to frying onions.

  Not until he walked out into the common room to clear away the empty cups did he notice Mr. Stoker’s paints and brushes were still sitting there, abandoned, under the bench he had occupied. The tavern keeper shivered and said an involuntary prayer, though he could not have said why.

  Gard sat at his black desk, studying the reports the spy had brought him. “What do his troops think?”

  “That he’s going to try to take Port Blackrock,” said the spy, one Mr. Bolt. “They’re not happy about it, either. They’re afraid of the Steelhands. Last time there was an uprising, Duke Steelhand hung men from the yards of every ship in the harbor, and the ones he didn’t kill got chained to oars in galleys.”

  “Do you think that’s what it’s all about?”

  Mr. Bolt shrugged. “Might be. My contact says there’s this mysterious veiled lady in the duke’s house, some kind of mage queen, and she’s supposedly given him some sort of secret weapon. If he had something magical, I suppose he might think he had enough of an advantage against the Steelhands to try for the city.”

  “Who’s your contact?”

  “Ah! He asked me to remember him to you. An armor smith named Bettimer Prise.”

  “So he makes armor now?” Gard smiled. “The boy’s come up in the world.”

  “He was in the duke’s own chamber, doing a fitting, when he saw the lady. And he’s got the contract for all the new helmets for the conscripts. He’ll likely be going with the army, when it moves.”

  “Very good. Tell him I remember him well. Tell him I’ll order a fancy helmet, one of these days when things are quieter. He can charge me whatever he likes.”

  Gard paid Mr. Bolt, who bowed and was escorted down through the Death Zone. Gard remained at his desk awhile, frowning as he reread the reports. At last he set them aside and went out to the garden.

  He found the Saint seated under a pergola, thinly shaded with vines. She had had her loom moved outdoors, in the mild weather, and Eyrdway slept in a basket at her feet. Bero and Bisha chased each other round and round a fishpond, watched shyly by a third child, who hung back. “Who’s that one?” Gard inquired, nodding toward the boy.

  “His name is Fyll,” said the Saint. “His father is someone in your army. His mother can no longer care for him. The messenger brought him up.”

  “What messenger?”

  “The one from the trevani Jish. She advises me all the trevanion are coming to my council.”

  “That’s nice,” said Gard vaguely. He held out a hand to the new child. “Come here, boy. Are you going to come live with us, now?” The child sidled close, but stood with his eyes downcast, saying nothing. Gard reached out and picked him up, studying him, noting the boy’s red eyes.

  “Mm. Yes, your daddy’s up here. Did you know your daddy was a brave fighter, boy?”

  “His name is Fyll.”

  “Fyll.”

  The child bit his fist. “My daddy’s a bad man,” he said at last.

  “Yes, he did a bad thing. But he won’t do it anymore, and he’ll be very pleased to meet you, Fyll. He’ll be happy his lost child has been found. So there’s nothing to be scared of, you see?”

  Fyll slid from Gard’s lap, edged away from him, and unobtrusively took hold of the Saint’s robe. Gard sighed. The Saint lifted the child to her lap and held him.

  “The garden is beautiful,” she said to Gard. “If you let me hold the council here, the trevanion might believe I stay with you by choice. We could put up pavilions over there.”

  Gard shook his head stubbornly. “I’ll set up pavilions in any meadow you like, down the mountain. Too many people know the layout of my house as it is, without inviting actual enemies to have a good look at it.”

  “They aren’t your enemies.”

  “Aren’t they, though?” Gard looked regretfully at the child Fyll. He looked at his own child sleeping soundly and thought of the new boy budding under the Saint’s heart. He thought about lost children, and the song the yendri had used to sing on starry nights when the world was new. Where did the boy come from?…. Where did any of them come from?

  He remembered Teliva’s curse. He wondered, uneasily, about mysterious mage queens.

  “I want it now!” insisted the simulacrum.

  Quickfire stared, appalled, at the brassy hemispheres of its hindquarters. They floated adjacent to each other, but the furrow was open air. So was the space lower down. He could see straight through the crack and glimpse the pattern of the blanket beneath.

  “But you don’t have any—”

  “Of course I do! You know I do. It doesn’t matter about the simulacrum. Just put it in!” The voice grew more strident.

  Quickfire felt a twinge in the small of his back. Gritting his teeth, he lifted his tunic and thrust into what he thought might be the appropriate place. He felt nothing but air, and the cold edges of the metal where he touched the hemispheres to either side. It was quite the least erotic moment of his life.

  Yet the simulacrum backed to him and cooed and squealed, and in all ways reacted with pleasure. “Move!” it ordered.

  He went through the motions, frantically imagining warm and buxom women, their mouths, their hands, anything to keep himself erect. The act seemed to go on forever. The simulacrum’s noises became more and more unnerving, until at last his imagination failed him. The simulacrum was rounding on him with a snarl of disappointment when a loud voice floated through a near window.

  “I really do not understand your lack of enthusiasm for this,” said Duke Salting, in what he felt were mild tones. The city council of Konen-Feyy, assembled before him on their knees, looked at one another miserably. Not one of them dared speak, however.

  In their pavilion, Quickfire sprang away from the simulacrum in relief. “Sssh!” he cautioned it. “Don’t want them to hear us, do we?”

  “You of all people ought to be grateful for my presence here,” said the duke, raising his voice. “I thought I’d be welcomed as a liberator. Here you dwell practically in the shadow of his house; how long do you think it’s going to be before this Dark Lord reaches his hand out to raid your homes and caravans? How have any of you managed to sleep these seven years, with that monster up there? Do you enjoy the prospect of demons raping your wives and children?

  “You can’t have thought this through very clearly. That’s the only possible explanation for why any of you would have the unmitigated gall to complain about quartering and provisioning my army!”

  His voice had gotten progressively louder through this speech, and seeing that he was likely enough to be killed anyway, the council head mustered the courage to say, “Please, sir, it isn’t that we aren’t grateful. We merely fear for your safety. Some of us have ventured up as far as we dared and seen his walls. They are terrifying. His sorcery rings the place round in black fire. Any force attempting to lay siege to the Master of the Mountain must surely die on the slopes! We would not see so brave a man, and such a valiant army, destroyed.”

  “Oh, is that it?” The duke sneered at them. “It’s the sorcery you’re afraid of? I’m glad to know that’s all it is. If I thought you actually doubted I could burn out a nest of greenie brigands, I’d be monstrously insulted. You needn’
t worry; that’s been planned for. On your feet! Come and see.”

  “Damn the man,” muttered the simulacrum, but it clattered to its feet and found a robe and pulled it on. Quickfire, sick with relief, pulled on his breeches.

  The councilmen were, meanwhile, prodded to their feet by the duke’s elite guard, who ringed them round with spears. They were escorted after the duke, who strode out to the yard behind the council hall. Here he had had his pavilion and those of his staff set up, after ascertaining that Konen-Feyy had no hotels worth commandeering as temporary headquarters.

  “Quickfire! We need to prove ourselves, it seems. Show this esteemed body of nobodies how we plan to break the Dark Lord’s house.”

  Quickfire strode from the pavilion, grinning. “But this courtyard is paved, sir; otherwise I’d find an anthill and trample it underfoot.”

  “Quickfire, don’t boast; it’s tiresome. Do as you’re told.” The simulacrum, veiled, emerged from the pavilion. The councilmen gaped at it. “Fetch out the weapon!”

  Quickfire obeyed, vanishing into one of the pavilions to reappear pushing a trunk. He opened it and tilted it outward, displaying the contents. A tube of some black and gleaming metal, ornamented in gold, was mounted on a pair of red-and-gold-painted wheels. Nested in the trunk’s lid was what appeared to be a much smaller model, lacking the wheels but mounted on a stock like a crossbow. “Is that an enchanted weapon?” asked the council head, feeling a glimmer of hope in his heart.

  “Watch it, and see what you think,” said Duke Salting. “I find their council house blocks my view of the lake, Quickfire. Do something about it.”

  Quickfire made to hoist the wheeled weapon out, but the simulacrum stepped forward and raised its gloved hand. “Dearest Duke, this is so mighty a weapon that its force would destroy their city. Be merciful, and let us demonstrate with the model instead.”

  “Madam, as you will,” said the duke. “Gentlemen, your wretched little walls will remain standing; now, remember how the gods punish ingratitude.”