King's Son, Magic's Son

by Josepha Sherman

  "You're a fine, handsome fellow," I told him, while the griffin returned the favor by nibbling gently up and down my arm. He was handsome, not that awkward merging of eagle and lion so fancied by artists, but a beautifully designed creature in and of himself, sleek and lean, yellow eyes fierce, the smooth, dusty-smelling feathers and short, rough fur a tawny gold, the beautiful wings wide and strongly muscled.

  Strong enough to bear us both with ease.

  I slipped warily up onto the warm, tawny back, locking my legs around the base of his wings, trying not to think about the deadly power of that hooked, predatory beak. The griffin gave a little murmur of unease, sidling like a nervous horse. I felt his muscles tense beneath me, and held my breath, because there wasn't any room for me to throw myself aside.

  But after that first, nervous move, the griffin made no attempt to toss me off, and as I stroked the sleek neck and crooned to him, he gradually relaxed, accepting my weight.

  "So now. Come, my friend, Tairyn awaits us."

  I felt the powerful hindquarters bunch as the griffin pushed off against the crenelation. And then we were airborne, the griffin spiraling up and up into the clear evening air. He was clumsy at first, adjusting to my unfamiliar weight, then graceful as any eagle as he caught the wind, sporting and playing in the sky, responding to my delight, glorying in his young pride and strength. I watched the great royal castle dwindle beneath me into a gray-walled, lead-roofed toy left out in the night, set by a river no wider than a dark, glinting ribbon. Lundinia was spread out before me, what I could see of houses and streets and bridges in the darkness looking like some perfect miniatures from a craftsman's fancy.

  Can they see us down there? There might be just enough light left in the sky. What must they be thinking?

  I alreacty knew what the guards on the palace ramparts were thinking: they had seen us, and we'd left them all busily crossing themselves. What of it? They knew what I was.

  I hoped the griffin knew where he was going; I certainly didn't. We swept out over the city walls, riding the wind, over a rich blackness that I knew hid fields and hills. I crouched low over the tawny neck, wind whipping at hair and clothes, the first stars above us, hearing the steady beat of yellow wings as the griffin caught and discarded this current and that, then feeling those wings straighten as he found a wind to his liking, soaring down the sky in a long, silent, glorious glide.

  And without warning, we flew right through a suddenly glittering Gateway, a shimmering blaze of magic, and left the human world behind.

  CHAPTER XVI

  THE OUTSIDER

  We came out through that magical Gateway into glory.

  How to describe Faerie to those who will almost surely never see it? It was true, just as stories claimed, that no sun shone in the deep blue sky. But I barely noticed the lack, for all around us was color, as though all the realm had been painted in the very first, the Primal, colors, yet untouched by time, glowing with their own wild sense of being. The sky, the ground, the very air blazed with magic, more than my merely human self could ever hope to control, and it was a fortunate thing the griffin took that moment to land lightly in a tiny, forest-girded meadow because otherwise I think I would have fallen dizzily from his back. As it was, my dismount could hardly have been called graceful, and I clung frantically to his warm golden side as though I was drunk.

  And still the magic that was Faerie beat at me, demanding to be drawn into my being, to be used, to overwhelm and kill my human mind. . . .

  Hastily I slammed shut every mental barrier I knew, silently reciting Discipline after calming Discipline until, with a strange, almost physical snap, the pressure on me was gone.

  The land had accepted me. At least as much as it would accept any human magician.

  Well, thank you, I thought wryly.

  At any other time I would have loved to explore the glowingly green forest around me (yes and, very gingerly, the magic it held, too). The trees were sturdy, graceful things, intriguingly not quite those I knew, and their leaves were starred with flowers like bright, living gems. The underbrush seemed to consist mostly of sleek, dark green ivy, again not quite like any plant I could name, each leaf outlined in palest silver. The whole smelled like a good, healthy forest, though there were strange, sweet or spicy undertones I couldn't place. Nor could I put a name to the birds that were singing so lustily all about me, their voices like so many silver flutes.

  Lovely, yes. But none of this is telling me why it was so urgent I come here.

  "Where is everybody?" I asked the griffin, in my heart meaning Ailanna, only she, because surely my love belonged in so enchanted a spot. "Where—"

  "Here," a voice said suddenly.

  I nearly knocked myself over spinning around to face:

  "Tairyn! Gallu, man, did you have to . . ."

  But one didn't take that tone of voice to a Faerie Lord, most certainly not in his own realm, so I started again, more carefully, "What now? Where are we? And where, for that matter, are your people?"

  Tairyn was clad in a silky tunic and hose, simple and elegant of cut, of so many subtle shades of green the eye couldn't trace them all; standing against a background of forest as he was, he was nigh invisible, save for the long, straight silvery hair and the fairness of his sharp, fierce, beautiful, face.

  That face right now was unreadable as stone. "I shall not involve them. There is too great a peril."

  Wonderful. Too great a peril for Faerie Folk, yet here he was summoning a human—

  Wait, now. Tairyn was hardly the sort to do anything at random. What could possibly imperil someone of Faerie yet not harm a human? No danger from sunlight, not in this sunless place . . . but there was still . . .

  "Iron," I said very softly, and saw the faintest of flickers in the cool green eyes. "That's it, isn't it? Someone has brought iron into your realm."

  Tairyn remained still as stone, plainly waiting for me to puzzle things out for myself.

  "But how?" I exploded. "This doesn't make sense! Only humans can safely make use of iron, yet no human could find a way here, let alone survive in this realm without your permission. And no one of Faerie would be crazed enough to try handling something that could slay with the merest scratch—" I stopped short, staring at Tairyn, my mind racing.

  "Crazed . . ." I murmured. "Of course. Whoever is trying to work with iron in this realm is no longer sane."

  The Faerie Lord stirred at last. "No."

  "Ha, you didn't want to admit it, did you? It hurts to realize one of your superior race can go just as mad as one of my poor little mortal kind!"

  "It hurts," Tairyn corrected coldly, "to realize a child has died."

  I winced. "It does, indeed. So be it, Tairyn. Which way?"

  "I cannot tell you."

  "What?"

  "I am not being petty, human! If I use the smallest bit of my Powers to trace the shataliach, the . . . mad one, that one will know I am on the hunt."

  So there's a Faerie word for madness, eh? Means such isn't as rare as you'd like, my haughty Tairyn! Of course I didn't say any of that aloud, only mused, "But he, she, whatever, would neither expect nor have a way of picking up my alien aura?"

  "Exactly."

  Suddenly I ached to shake that icy calm of his. "Och, Tairyn, you expect wonders from me! Look you, I'm truly sorry for the poor child and its parents. But just a short time I was thick in the middle of human affairs, and suddenly, wham, here I am in your realm instead, expected to turn from courtier to hunting hound without the slightest hint of a track."

  That didn't move him? Of course not. Tairyn hadn't any comprehension of human pity or human confusion. I sighed at the sight of that fair, cold, impassive face and asked in surrender, "Can you at least show me where the poor little one died?"

  Tairyn dipped his head. "Follow."

  He dismissed the griffin with an absent wave of his hand. I'll admit it wasn't without a qualm that I watched the beast obediently soar away. Now I was completely de
pendent on Tairyn if ever I wished to find the way home again.

  If the thought had occurred to him as well, he didn't show it.

  Far to my left I could see an intriguing hint of soaring towers looking for all the world as though they had been carved from ice or crystal. Tairyn's palace? I started to ask, but he never even glanced that way. Moving with a wild animal grace that barely stirred a leaf (and yes, roused my envy), he led me straight ahead into a small, pretty grove. Seeing the bright, luscious-looking red berries clustered on every bush, I could understand what might have lured a child so far from everyone else.

  Ahh, but there, there was the spot where the child— the boy, I sensed that now—had been struck down. The grass was burned black from the touch of iron, and my heart began racing in sympathetic panic as I felt the echoes of fear and pain still shivering in the air. Although I wanted nothing to do with the place, I forced myself to kneel and touch the ground where the small body must have lain—

  And shot back to my feet. "He's not dead!"

  "Impossible."

  "I'm telling you, Tairyn, the boy is not dead!"

  "But—that—this is ridiculous. I saw the body myself."

  "Look for yourself!"

  I gestured to the small, charred spot. Tairyn took one small step forward, then stopped, fair skin gone even paler. "I . . . cannot," he murmured through clenched teeth, and I realized that even the residue of iron was strong enough to sicken one of Faerie-kind. And an idea struck me.

  "I wonder, now," I began carefully, "did you see the body?"

  "What are you—"

  "Look you, the death was supposed to be from iron, yes?"

  "Yes," Tairyn repeated flatly.

  "And the very thought of such a death horrifies you."

  "Of course it does, human!" For an instant, his Faerie calm was shattered, for an instant I saw true terror blaze from him. Then Tairyn slid quickly back into his imitation of stone. But I could still sense the fear hiding behind that smooth surface.

  "I don't blame you for your terror," I murmured. "Ailanna's told me what an agonizing death iron-poisoning is: cruelest, perhaps, in that there's no hope, no way to cure it."

  Too late, I remembered how dangerous it is to speak too knowledgeably of Faerie ways. Very much aware of Tairyn's sudden predatory tenseness, I knew I didn't dare show my sudden alarm. So instead I snapped as sternly as I could, "Och, don't give me that menacing stare! I'm not your enemy, man! I won't go spreading word throughout the human realms!"

  "No."

  That could have meant a world of things, but I took it as acceptance and hurried on, "Those of your people who handled the corpse would have needed to be very wary, lest the smallest shard of iron be on the body to scratch them as well. They would have been too fearful to look too closely. Will you stop staring at me? I am not insulting your people's courage!"

  "But you are saying we were fooled."

  "Well? Isn't it possible?"

  A human might have hesitated, quibbling over this or that. The Faerie Lord, incapable of falsehood, said only, "Yes. The body might have been nothing more than a seeming."

  "And of course not even the boy's mother would have known the truth. I'm sure that for safety's sake she would have been kept from even touching her iron-slain son, no matter how great her grief."

  "Yes," Tairyn repeated, and to my immense relief, I saw that he was suddenly accepting what I was trying to tell him. His eyes kindled into cold green flame, so cruelly alien in that moment I didn't dare meet their gaze. "Come," he said shortly. "Let us find this iron-wielding shataliach, this stealer away of children."

  Of course. Easily said. I'd just put my nose to the ground like the hound he seemed to think me and scent out the track.

  But my sarcasm, fortunately, was silent. Because as it turned out there really was a track: iron is so very alien to Faerie that its use had disturbed the very essence of the land, leaving a trail like the faintest line of heat that cut through the forest and air alike. I set out in wary pursuit, Tairyn silent at my side; if the echo of iron bothered him, he showed not the slightest sign. Neither of us dared use any spells by this point, lest even my "alien" human magics alert whoever was holding the child captive, but I kept my hand curved about the hilt of my sword, wondering if this would be the first time I'd use it in combat, not sure if that idea thrilled or alarmed me.

  If I'd had any doubt the one we sought was crazed, I lost that doubt when we came upon the cave. Or rather, when we came upon where the cave had been. Right now, it was hidden beneath such an insane tangle of clashing concealment spells—each one threatening to cancel the next—that only the truly magic blind could have missed it.

  "Crazed, indeed," I murmured.

  Tairyn nodded curtly, hunter tense. "But how do we get past all . . . that without alerting the shataliach of our presence?"

  How, indeed? I took a wary step forward—

  And the small, furry brown earth sprite that had been huddling, unnoticed amid all the chaotic magic, right by my feet, took fright. Leaping up with a shrill little shriek I nearly echoed, it darted off like a terrified cat, knocking my sword askew, tripping me. I fell headlong, crashing through the concealment spells like any clumsy lout.

  Time seemed to stretch. As I lay sprawled on the floor of the cave, I saw that there before me was the one we sought—och, no doubt about that! If the concealment spells had been bizarre, the aura of distorted, crazed magic swirling here was a hundredfold stronger, jarring as a flood of garish hues and discordant sound, a stunning impact on every psychic nerve. And through it all, sharp, ugly, wrong, was the cold chill that was iron.

  The shataliach was a woman, kneeling on the cold earthen floor as though feeling nothing of its chill. She was wildly disheveled, her soft blue gown soiled and torn, her silvery hair a tangled cloud, but the ghost of her Faerie beauty still clung forlornly to her.

  Ghost, indeed. To my horror, I realized that what glittered in her green, mad eyes and shimmered on her fair, empty face was something alien to humanity and Faerie-kind alike.

  Cythraul. In the Anglic tongue: demon.

  No, not the banal, forked tail figure out of Anglic tales. Cythrauliad, demons, are real enough, entities of a very different realm, whether Uffern or some other place of endless evil I cannot say. Cythrauliad are cruel, empty creatures full of empty, empty hate for anything that lives, anything that knows love or joy, the things no demon ever can know.

  This was, mercifully, but a smaller demon, its powers chaotic and confused: where a greater Evil would have instantly reacted in enmity to my magic of the Righthand Path, the thing was barely even aware of me. How the woman had ever summoned it, I have no way of knowing. But why she summoned it, let it possess her—

  "Lalathanai." From the way Tairyn said it, I knew it to be the woman's name. "Her own son died."

  There was no pity in his voice, of course; being of Faerie, he could know none. But there was a hint of regret for a young life lost.

  Yes, and now crazed Lalathanai was very plainly trying anything she might to bring her son back to her. Even if it meant slipping into human realms to steal away an iron knife, so cold and deadly to her kind it, in turn, stole away the last of her sanity.

  Even if it meant risking demonic possession.

  Even if it meant murdering another child.

  Lalathanai, or what was left of her, didn't seem to notice us. She continued to croon softly to the knife, to the child who lay drugged or entranced on the floor before her. With that insane swirl of magic filling the cave I had no way of telling if she really was working an incantation, but when she raised the knife for a killing blow it didn't really matter. No time to draw my sword: I hurled myself forward from my knees with all my might. We crashed to the cave floor together, Lalathanai beneath me—

  For the moment. Wild with demonic strength and her own madness, she wrenched herself free, hissing, the sound somehow more terrible than any honest scream, stabbing at me with the knife
. Struggling to my knees again, I caught her wrist in both hands just in time, trying to make her drop the thing, and she bit me, hard enough to make me gasp. Her terrible, demon-haunted eyes blazed into my own, and for one dizzying moment my arms lost their strength. . . .

  Lalathanai twisted free again, leaping to her feet, lunging—

  Tairyn's coolly thrown rock hit her cleanly on the side of the head. The iron knife went flying from her hand, but to my horror, Lalathanai never even staggered. Even though her face was now awash with blood, she raced silently for the weapon.

  I got there first. As my hand closed about the hilt, Lalathanai threw herself at me. And I—I gave her the only mercy I could.

  As the iron knife pierced her heart, I heard the cythraul flee, silently wailing its psychic pain. The madness fled with it. Lalathanai, or what was left of her essence, smiled at me, silently blessing me with peaceful, grateful eyes even as the life faded from her. I lowered her lifeless body to the cave floor, wondering numbly if I should say some manner of prayer.

  As I hesitated, aching with pity, wishing her healing in whatever afterlife her spirit might find, Tairyn was waking the ensorcelled child. "Take the knife," he told me, but the coldness in his voice was countered by the gentle curve of his arm and hand around the whimpering boy who clung to him. "It cannot remain in this realm."

  No, it couldn't. Healer that I am, I'm hardly squeamish at the sight of blood. But this . . . I couldn't look at the knife. Instead, I wrapped it hastily in a scrap torn from my tunic and stuck it into my belt.

  Tairyn was staring at me. If I'd expected some miraculous thawing of how he felt towards me, I'd been mistaken. Helpful or not, his glance told me, I was still human. Alien. Inferior.

  Why, you cold-blooded, unpleasant—

  "You rescued a child," the Faerie Lord said, stopping my almost certainly suicidal words just in time. "A child shall rescue you."

  "Now what might that mean?"