The Fire Duke

by Joel Rosenberg

  “But you seem to have healed well. I’m so glad.” Her smile took his breath away.

  Ian found it difficult to guess her age. The white hair suggested age, but of course there were women and men who went prematurely gray. Her complexion was smooth—only the vaguest hint of laugh lines around her eyes as she smiled—but not the rosy glow of an eighteen-year-old girl who hadn’t quite lost her babyfat. There was a certain sureness in her posture, a graceful economy in her movements. She reminded Ian of Selma Dougherty, the retired ballet teacher whom he had taught beginning foil.

  But Mrs. Dougherty was seventy, and wiry, and this woman couldn’t be half that age.

  Except for the eyes. They were very old eyes, somehow, although Ian couldn’t quite figure out why they seemed that way.

  “Jeg hei’t Ian Silverstein, gud freken,” he said in formal Bersmal, finding the words coming to him as he spoke, “jeg star till dinab Deres’t‘jenest.” I am called Ian Silverstein, good lady, and I am at your service. Strange how that didn’t seem either silly or stilted when said in Bersmal, not the way it was in English.

  She nodded. “I thank you for accepting our poor hospitality,” she answered in the same language, her voice a sweet contralto, rich and warm and musical around the edges: an oboe, not a flute. “Although methinks I can speak thine English quite well enough, Ian Silverstone,” she said in English, translating his last name the way Torrie’s dad had. Her voice rose and fell as she talked, making the English words sound vaguely Scandinavian.

  “Indeed you can,” he said, thinking about why he wasn’t even thinking of correcting her pronunciation or usage, even of his name.

  “Please to speak it, an’ it give you comfort.” She frowned for a moment. “Ah, that should be: I think I can speak English well enough,” she said. “If it’s more comfortable for you?”

  “Either language is fine, apparently.” He nodded. “Thank you for your”—he held out his hands—“help.” What a limp word. Help? He had dragged a badly battered Hosea half down a mountain, tearing his hands and blistering his feet, and clearly hurting himself worse than that, so badly that he had been in a coma for how long?

  She shook her head. “No, it is we who must thank you. You brought Orfindel to safety, and he’s long been dear to mine family.”

  “Where—who—” Ian didn’t know quite where to start. “Where are they?”

  “My husband and your companion are down at the terry, having left you in my hands.” She gestured toward a table and chair. “Sit you down, and I’ll bring you something to eat; they will join us shortly.”

  “And how do I speak Bersmal?” he asked in Bersmal, more to himself than anything else.

  “Ah. Gift of tongues, it’s called,” she said in English. “Orfindel has it stronger than anybody I’ve ever heard of. Stay around him, and some of it shall,” she paused, cocking her head, “scrape off? No, rub off: some of it shall rub off.” Her smile brightened the room as she raised a finger. “Just be sure you don’t lose that accent. It’s charming.”

  She walked over to the iron stove, and pulled open its massive door. A wave of heat washed over Ian’s face and torso.

  She just reached in and pulled out a pie sitting in a clay pan.

  With a muffled cry, Ian lunged toward her to stop her—

  Her flesh would blister instantly, and even if she did manage to drop it without shattering the hot pie, splattering her bare legs with the bubbling filling, her hands would be ruined, and he had to—to stop himself after half a step.

  There was no need to interfere. She wasn’t screaming, writhing in pain. She wasn’t even hurt.

  The oven was hot enough that even at this distance, the heat flashed warm against his face, and she had reached in and pulled out a pie, and instead of writhing on the floor in agony, she simply balanced it on one hand, while the air above it shimmered like it would over a road on a hot summer afternoon. She took a metal trivet down from a shelf, and set it carefully on the table before putting the pie on it.

  Ian realized his mouth was still hanging open, so he shut it.

  She glanced over at him and smiled. “Oh. I beg your pardon,” she said. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.” She gestured at a seat. “It’s just that Harbard and I are generally alone here, and I’ve fallen out of practice at doing things the way you young ones do.”

  “I’m not that young,” Ian said, although he wasn’t quite sure why. It sounded like the first part of a stupid come-on.

  Her eyes twinkled. “That is, I would think, a matter of perspective.” With a side glance at Ian, she selfconsciously used a hook to remove the cover from another pot. Steam wafted up into the air; the rich smells of stewing meat made Ian’s mouth water.

  There were distant sounds from outside that Ian couldn’t quite place. A deep thrummmm, and a couple of loud whacks. In a moment, there was another whack, followed by hoofbeats and a rush of voices.

  “Ah, the ferry is back,” she said, wielding what looked like a cross between a triangular-bladed spatula and a hunting knife, dividing the pie into quarters with two quick slashes. “They shall return hungry, or I’ll be surprised.” She set out plates and metal spoons, and quickly served a quarter of the pie onto each plate. “Shall we go greet them?” she asked, looking up.

  “Sure.”

  She walked to the door, which swung away in front of her, and stepped out into the day, Ian following.

  The first thing he noticed was the river. The Gilfi was wide and fast, gray waters rushing away from the far mountains with a constant whussshh, a snake cutting across the continent.

  The cabin lay just above the flood marks on the riverbank, and below, a stone path wound down the steep walls of the riverbank toward the ferry’s dock. It was a simple arrangement, really: a cable had been strung across the river, and the ferry, a barge, was attached to the cable by loops at the front and the back. A loop of cable ran from the near bank to the far bank, coiled around the motive power for the whole thing: a windlass, powered by a single horse walking in endless circles. There were apparently arrangements for heavier loads—in a corral beyond the windlass, another horse pranced about, as though tired of waiting.

  There seemed to be something strange about the horse, but Ian’s attention was drawn to Harbard lowering a ramp from the ferry, then guiding a horse-drawn wagon down. The drover accepted Harbard’s help up to his seat, then flicked the reins, sending the wagon down the road parallel to the river, the one that gradually sloped up the sides of the banks.

  The ferry empty, Harbard and Hosea secured it to its dock, then unhitched the horse from the windlass before walking up the long path toward the house, pausing only for a moment when Hosea waved to Frida.

  “Well,” she said, urging Ian back into the cabin. “Let us eat. Sitsitsit,” she said. “We don’t wait on ceremony here.” She ladled thick stew into each of four bowls, and had them and mugs filled with some hot liquid on the table by the time the door swung open ahead of Hosea, followed by Harbard.

  While he was half a head shorter than Hosea, Harbard somehow seemed to be too large for the room, as though at any moment he would stretch out in some direction, and unintentionally tear a hole in wall or ceiling or something, like a normal man wearing a tissue-paper shirt.

  Harbard removed his cloak and hung it on a peg near the door, under the spear. Blunt fingers tentatively reached out and touched the spear for just a moment, and then fell to his side.

  Hosea smiled as he hung his own cloak, then took a seat next to Ian.

  “It’s good to see you well, Ian,” he said with a nod. “In fact, it’s good to see anything at all.”

  Harbard scowled as he dropped into a chair across the table from Ian. He leaned forward, not saying a word, but looking at Ian for the longest time.

  It was amazingly hard for Ian to meet that gaze.

  It was strange, because there was no physical similarity, but something about the way Harbard held himself reminded Ian of the actor Pe
ter Falk, the one who played Columbo. There was no hesitance in Harbard’s voice, but something about the angle of his head, something about the way his eyes didn’t quite work together, was the same.

  He was trying to decide what that meant when Harbard sat back, shaking his head. “I don’t know about this one, Orfindel,” he said.

  “Hosea, please,” Hosea—or was it really Orfindel?—said. “I’ve been known as that for a time now, and I rather like it better than many of the other names. We all have our favorite, eh, Harbard?”

  A grunt was the only reply. Harbard turned back to Ian. “Well, be welcome in my home, my guest,” he said, a trifle begrudgingly.

  “I thank you.”

  Harbard glanced over at the steaming mugs on the table. “Tea? Wife, you have freshly squeezed cider set out with dinner, it would appear.”

  “I like it,” Frida said. “And I’ve mulled it specially; the herbs will help our visitors to rest, and heal.”

  “Have you tasted the better stuff?”

  “No.” Her lips were set in a thin line. “Taste it yourself, if you please.”

  “Fah.” Harbard took a large clay jug down from a shelf on the wall, uncorked it, and tilted it back heavily. “Ahh. Not the best cider, but still a few days from its final turning.” He splashed some in a pewter mug he placed in front of Hosea’s place, and set another mug in front of Ian.

  “None for me, please,” Ian said, regretting it instantly when Harbard glared at him. “My apologies,” Ian went on, “but I don’t drink … intoxicants,” he said, substituting the English word when the Bersmal escaped him. “I mean no offense.”

  “None is taken,” Frida put in quickly, with a glance at her husband.

  Harbard turned his glare on her, then waved it away as he sat himself heavily in his chair. “Well, none taken, none taken.” He picked up a still-smoking piece of pie with his hands, unmindful of the way some of the hot yellow-brown filling spilled out, across the backs of his fingers, and bit into it, swallowed heavily, and smiled. “And never let it be said, wife, that your food is unfit.” He licked at his fingers.

  Frida smiled. “I would hope it to be better than simply not unfit, husband.”

  “Yes, yes, yes, it’s very good.” He growled. “I meant no offense, too, just as Ian Silverstone meant none.”

  “And I take no offense, husband.”

  “Just the last word, eh, wife?”

  “Perhaps.”

  Ian would have eaten the stew first, but when in Rome …

  He spooned up a mouthful of the pie, and blew at it for a moment to cool it before putting it in his mouth.

  Grmph. It tasted so good that it was almost painful. The crust was just okay—a bit on the crisp side, but with a nice fullness to it—but the filling was somehow sweeter, richer than any apple pie he had ever tasted before.

  Hosea smiled at him. “She is known to be good with an apple, eh?”

  “Amazing,” Ian said around another mouthful.

  Harbard brushed the crumbs from his beard, then took up a spoonful of stew. “And this is very good, wife, as well.”

  “Thank you.”

  Harbard looked over at Hosea. “How much does this one know?”

  Hosea’s smile might have been a few degrees cooler. “He knows that his friends are in danger.”

  Harbard quickly swallowed a mouthful of stew so he could snort derisively. “His friends are dead, if His Warmth gets the idea that they won’t work as bait for you. And likely dead anyway.”

  “I think not.”

  Ian didn’t want to think about that. He cleared his throat. “Why Hosea? Or Orfindel? Would somebody please tell me what this is all about?”

  “Hmm.” Harbard pursed his lips. “Where to start?”

  “Start at the beginning, maybe?” Ian said.

  Harbard glared.

  “Very well,” Hosea said, his index finger idly doodling on the tabletop. “And what would that be?”

  “We could start with the Hidden Ways within the Cities,” Frida said, “or with the Brisingamen.”

  Harbard took a final mouthful of stew, set down his spoon, sat back in his chair, and steepled his fingers in front of him. “I’ll begin.”

  Some things are simple (Harbard said), but some things are not. It’s a simplicity that a child will grow out of his clothes, will find that which once comforted him and kept him warm to be too small, far too confining.

  So it is with a people outgrowing where they have lived.

  A long time ago, one of the Elder Races—call them the Dana’s Children, or the Tuatha Del Danaan, or simply the Tuatha—found that they had outgrown their little towns and villages, and that they needed larger cities for themselves and their servants to live.

  It wasn’t just that there were too many of them, for there weren’t; the Tuatha were always few in number, and never terribly fecund—

  “—unlike some I could name,” Frida said, with a decided sniff.

  Harbard tilted his leonine head to one side and paused a moment before speaking. “Are you telling this, wife, or am I?”

  “Oh, tell it, tell it—but tell it right.”

  “You’ll have your turn,” Harbard said. “Be still.”

  Frida sniffed again.

  And they were never terribly fecund nor fertile (Harbard went on). It was that, well, first they had ruled over fields and meadows, and then they had ruled over hamlets and villages long enough, and then they had presided over castles and surrounding towns—now they wanted cities.

  But they didn’t want just any cities built—they wanted them special, distinct, suited to the Tuatha, and growing more and more suited to the Tuatha year by year. The Tuatha have always been, well, discriminating, perhaps. Or choosy.

  So they did what others of the Elder Races had always done when they needed something made, something beyond the ability of them and their servants. They sent one of their kind to pay a call to the greatest… watchmaker? No. Tinkerer? No. Builder? Builder, call him the Builder. Or the Doomed Builder, for he has never built anything important without great cost to him.

  He was hard to find, because like all of the Elder Ones, he had been able to alter his form. Once, taking the form of a giant, he had agreed to build a wall around Asgard, asking as his only pay that Freya be his wife—although the Aesir had combined to cheat him of his pay.

  “Loki,” Ian said. “I heard that story, long ago, back in elementary school, I think, some class on mythology. Loki turned into a fly and stung his eye, and into a mare in heat and led his horse away.”

  “Well, so it is said.” There was a twinkle in Hosea’s eye. “Loki was always the best of the Aesir at changing of shape,” he said, “but it was also said that he was always a little slow at it. The stallion … caught up with him before he could change back from a mare, and there he was: pregnant. It’s said that none of the Aesir saw anything of him until he showed up with a marvelous stallion sometime later. Sleipnir,” Hosea said, and smiled. “I’m told Loki never quite walked comfortably again.”

  Harbard gave out a low growl. “Do you know, Orfindel, why telling a story is like having a woman?”

  Hosea raised an eyebrow. “Very well, Harbard: why is telling a story like having a woman?”

  “Because,” Harbard says, “one can enjoy it so much more if one isn’t constantly interrupted.”

  “My apologies.”

  In another form (Harbard went on, his mouth twisted for a moment into a frown), at another time—and this was all so long ago, Ian Silverstone, that it’s hard to remember which happened first—he and a son had built a maze to contain a monster, but only he had escaped. Flying, that time, not limping.

  He didn’t always limp, but Asa-Thor once carried him back, injured from the cold North—and therein lies another tale for another time—and it was so cold that one of his toes froze solid, so solid that when Thor reached up to push the naked foot back in the basket, the great toe snapped off in his hand, and Thor th
rew it skyward, where it remains as a cluster of bright stars. In yet another form—

  —but I digress, and if I digress much more, I’ll be interrupted yet again.

  He had sworn himself never to lay a stone on a stone again, for building had only brought him pain and sorrow, but the Tuatha were insistent, as only Tuatha can be, and finally he agreed, at least in part. He would not forswear himself—it’s my belief that he could not forswear himself—but he would and could carve their cities for them, each out of a mountain high in the Medial Mountains, far above the Vanish Plains.

  And this time, his price was simple: he was to be left alone. The Tuatha were to see to it: they were to guard him, to protect him, for as long as the Cities stood, so that he would be left alone as long as he wished it.

  They agreed, and he got to work. What he had promised to do was far too much for one to do, even one of the Eldest—if he ever could be two places at once, and I think he once could, he had long lost the ability—so he mated with a troll, and produced a race of small creatures, short of stature but deft with their hands, clever in the ways they could flay stone from stone, leaving behind a tunnel, or a room, or a statue.

  And they built it. It took many generations of his small-statured servants to rough out the mountains into shape, and many more before the first rooms were cut from the stone, and even more until the work was all done … but in those days the Tuatha were patient, and they waited patiently.

  And one day it was done. One day the last hinge was installed on its sealed bearings, one day the last course of tile was laid down into niches in the stone. One day the final flue was carved for the kitchen ovens; one day the last wooden door had been fitted carefully into place, to swing open and shut with ease.

  The Cities were built; and shiny and new, they were ready for their inhabitants. They were complex and strange cities, mind, with many secret places and passageways, none of them known to the Tuatha.

  Which enraged them. Tell me where all the secrets are, one cried. No, tell me! another said. I want to be the one to know.

  He nodded. Certainly, he said. After you have fulfilled some of your part of the bargain. Leave me alone and guarded for a short time, perhaps just a few millennia, and I’ll tell you everything you want to know. But it is the way of the universe that I seem to be cheated of my payment, and this time, at least this time, I’ll have at least a taste of the solitude and privacy I’ve bought with generations of work.