The smile the kid gave him was—oh, hell. Kelly could have made some flip comparison—saccharine enough to give him bladder cancer—but it was a pure sweet smile, sharp as glass, confident and adult and absolutely piercing. It was their mom's smile. He bet Matt didn't even remember enough to know that if he saw it in a mirror.
Kelly almost stepped back. Instead he reached out, squeezed Matt's left biceps, and thumped him on the other shoulder so hard his glasses slipped. Matt leaned into it, though, beaming. "Man," Kelly said, and meant it, "man, I'm proud of you."
Matt just grinned wider. "Thank God that's over, huh?"
Kelly winked. "Come on," he said. "Let's ditch this crowd and go buy you your first legal drink."
* * *
The bouncer examined Matt's license suspiciously—the only reason he had a license, as a New Yorker by birth and inclination, was because Jane had insisted he learn to drive—and ran a thumb across the birthdate before he handed it back. Nothing easier to fake than a New York driver's license. They weren't even laminated.
It was looking touch and go until Matt—suddenly remembering that he was ordained now, and allowed to use his magic once in a while, leaned on the man.
Not enough to be unethical. Just enough to help him make up his mind. He felt the click as the guy decided not to be a pain in the ass and smiled; all it had taken was a little pressure.
"Happy birthday, kid," the bouncer said. "First drink's on the house."
"Thanks," Matt said brightly, and followed Kelly inside.
The place hovered somewhere between hole-in-the-wall and dive, and was leaning crookedly toward the latter. Matt fiddled the buttons on his right cuff to make sure it was closed over the fresh tattoo. An infection at this stage of the game would be just the thing.
"Right," Kelly said. "Can I get you a beer?"
Matt considered. He wasn't about to get lit in this crowd. Not when he had to walk home with Kelly while Kelly was dressed up like a cross between a bargain basement Billy Idol impersonator and a West Village gay cruise. "Yeah," he said. "Anything but Budweiser."
Kelly made a face, but came back with two bottles of Coors and handed Matt one. They clinked; Matt drank from the neck and said, "I'll get the next round."
"We're playing for beer," Kelly said. "Drink up. Oh, there are the guys. I'll see you after the set, all right?"
He was gone before Matt could clear the second swig of beer from his mouth to answer. It's not like he could have said no anyway. He glanced around; the room was small and smoky, with a floor of broad splintery boards, but it was less than half-full and there were stools by the bar with a good view of what passed for a stage—a niche with a couple of klieg lights trained on it.
Kelly's two band mates were shuffling equipment around. Matt thought about going over to help them, but his arm hurt, was sticky with lotion, and there were already three empty beer bottles by Deke's foot. Matt shook his head, claimed that seat by the bar, and set about finishing his beer. He wanted at least part of a second one inside him before Irn Bru started to play.
He was going to need it.
Two girls tried to pick him up while he was sitting with his back to the bar. He waved them off, semi-politely. Legs crossed in a figure four, bottle resting in the crook of his knee, he recited Vassilisa the Beautiful to himself while he waited.
"Well," said the old witch, "only remember that every question does not lead to good. If thou knowest overmuch, thou wilt grow old too soon. What wilt thou ask?"
He suspected that he was not the first Slav to have reason to be glad he'd never met the Baba Yaga in an elevator. On the other hand, he thought, fiddling with his concave iron band, he had a better chance of running up against her than your average Polack. And a better chance of getting eaten, too, unless the one he tripped over was the Polish one-chicken-leg version.
The two-chicken-leg version was prone to ethnic cleansing when annoyed by anything other than Russians.
That was enough to finish a beer on. And reach for the pretzels, too.
* * *
It was a pretty good gig. The crowd could have been better—there was Matty, sitting out there on that bar stool with a beer cradled in the bend of his knee like a parody Pieta—and you'd think he could look halfway enthusiastic. But the guys managed to get into the swing of the music, and two or three girls got up and danced, and that meant a couple of guys did too. They swung through a bunch of covers—a Ramones tune, a Billy Idol tune, some amped-up Zeppelin—and even kept people on the floor for the two original songs. Kelly drank another beer while Paul sang, and shook sweat from his hair as he grooved over the bridge.
Yeah, they kind of sucked. But they would get better. And there were enough people dancing and drinking that they might even get invited back.
One of the women was stunning, tall and black-skinned, a real Grace Jones type. She shot him a look over her shoulder, caught his eye, turned, swaying to the music, pressing her breasts together with her upper arms. That long look through her eyelashes.
Christ, too good to be true. He turned his head to check on Matt, to see if he'd seen the best-looking girl in the place coming on to Kelly, but his vision was blurry and all he saw was a bright blond head ducked down, turned away, as if Matt was dismissing one of the young women standing beside him.
Ah, Matty, it's not worth it, Kelly almost said, and just in time remembered the microphone right beside his mouth. He bent over his guitar, easy chord progression, E-D-G-A, and pretended he didn't see the woman running her hands along her hips, rubbing her dress up, as if she was imagining his fingers lifting the ruffled skirt, tracing the line of her thighs.
After the set was over, he went to her.
To his complete shock, she handed him a business card.
"Black Cat Talent? You're an agent?"
"I'm your agent," she said. "If you want me to be."
He studied her face. Not kidding. "I'll have to talk to the guys—"
She shook her head, put one finger to his lips. "No guys. Just you."
"Oh, shit." His own exclamation startled him. It wasn't supposed to work that way. He slipped the card into his pocket furtively. "I don't think—I mean, can I call you tomorrow? I need to sleep on it."
Her brow furrowed in displeasure, but she nodded, a picture of a woman showing patience to a naïve child. She handed him a second card, and with this one a pen. "Write down your name and phone number?"
He did—scratch scratch—and handed it back. His nerves buzzed. This isn't me. This isn't real. But when he glanced back at the guys, there they were, packing up and swilling beer.
He'd only had five or six himself; he knew he wasn't drunk enough for the room to be spinning, or to be losing time. But he found himself with no idea of how he'd wound up pressed against the dirty wall beside the door to the men's room, the tall woman in his arms. She smelled of something peppery, and her lips were resilient and plump, soft as pillows. Her small breasts lifted under the silk of her top. He slid his hand down her thigh, slid it up again.
The ruffled skirt slid with it.
"Come away with me," she whispered. "Come stay the night."
"Where?" Oh, he couldn't bring her home. Gloating over a little attention was one thing, but strange women at the breakfast table were entirely too much to throw in Matt's face. "I have to tell my brother I'm not—"
"He knows," she said. "We told him on the way out. Remember? He's taking your stuff back to your place."
He did, as she said it. A blurry recollection—how much beer had he drunk?—but definite. Down to the disappointed tilt of Matt's head. "Sure," he said. "Where to?"
"Sweetheart," she said, "come home with me."
* * *
Matt saw Kelly vanish. Not literally, but he saw him slip down the hallway with the woman in the light-colored dress, and he didn't see them coming back again. And then something happened—a soft hiss, a groan, as if the old yellow brick of the storefront building called to him. He had a mom
entary flash of a nervous cow, its head thrust over a stall door, lowing for attention, and put his hand reassuringly on the wall.
Kelly. He'd resigned himself to going home alone, and was going to collect Kelly's gear from Deke and head out if Kelly hadn't reappeared by the time he'd finished his beer. Instead he left the bottle on the bar and stood, not moving with any particular silence—but silent enough, in a noisy room.
As he ducked into the corridor, he was just in time to see the woman's long brown leg vanish through the fire door. Damn.
Strangely, there was no alarm. His skin itched. The ring on his left hand burned with cold sudden fire.
After a moment's hesitation, he scrambled back to the bar and demanded the phone. Local calls only. He must have looked freaked out enough that the bartender handed the black plastic touch-tone over without protest.
Jane answered on the second ring, and didn't sound sleepy. "Jane—" a false start. He tried again. "Kelly's been taken. By a Fae."
She listened silently for thirty seconds while he cupped his hand over the reciever and explained at speed. And then she interrupted. "Matt. What do you want me to do?"
She couldn't have brought him up shorter if she'd jerked his leash. "Help me. Help him."
"Come over," she said. "We'll get a team on it. We'll talk about it." Her voice sounded distant, and he realized it was because he was staring at the phone in his hand. Yes, talk. While he lost Kelly the same way she had lost Elaine.
Maybe there was still time.
He hung up on her.
God damn it. He'd been sitting there thinking about witches.
He hit the door so hard it rebounded off brick and would have caught his heel if he hadn't been moving as fast as he was. This time, the alarm detonated. He was at a run by the end of the alley, but Kelly and the girl were a block and a half away and moving fast, even though they seemed to be only walking.
* * *
She led him up a thorny hill. They must be in Central Park, though Kelly wasn't sure how they'd gotten here, and he could hear the soft—and not-so-soft—noises of furtive lovemaking nearby. The sweat dried on his neck, though the night was humid. "You said you were taking me home."
She kissed him again. "Where do you think we are?"
And then she grabbed his shirt collar in both hands while he was thinking about that and kissed his eyes, once each. "Welcome to Annwn, Kelly Szczegielniak."
He stepped back, for he saw her.
The face was not too changed, but now she was naked except for a loincloth, and her breasts and cheeks and belly were covered with neat rows of nubby scars. The teeth behind her plush violet lips were filed to points. She was not smiling.
His hands were on fire where he touched her. Rings, he realized, rings on his fingers. He dropped the grip—unwilling to release her—and saw where his touch had raised welts on her skin. "Lady," he said.
She stroked his face with the back of her hand. "Take off your rings, Kelly. And I will show you things you never dreamed."
"It's a trick," he said. "You lied to me."
"Of course it's a trick." Her hand cupped him through his tattered jeans. He hissed and meant to shift away, but somehow what happened was that he moved against her. "That's what we deal in. The queen of Faerie would treat with thee, young warrior. Come with me."
"Fae." He would have stepped away, he told himself, if the thorn trees weren't jabbing his back. She let her lips brush his face; he felt the rasp of her conical teeth.
"The thing you crave, my queen can give you. Prometheus has no power to create greatness in a mortal man."
He'd been set to deny her. Three times, ritually. The words filled his throat.
They choked him.
She kissed him again. "What say you, mortal man? Would become—of a sort—immortal?"
"You cannot." But he said it against her lips.
"The Queen of Faerie is a Leannan Sidhe."
Vampire muse. Oh yes. She could teach him greatness. As she devoured his art, it would flare like lightning. All his heat spent in a blaze.
All it would cost was the rest of his life.
He opened his shirt, showed her the iron in his skin. "I am warded."
"You are marked," she corrected. She touched him with a bridged hand, hissed, pressed her palm sliding flat to his chest. "Piquant," she said, and ducked her head to flick her tongue against his nipple. "It will be like embracing a man of fire." Her touch seared him. He cringed—but toward her, not away.
He paused. There were ways to handle this, ways to make it safe. How could he say no? But his head was spinning, and he could barely remember his name, never mind the strictures he should set.
"She'll make you legend," she said.
But he hesitated still, though his fingers curved to touch it. He ached, his mouth full of saliva. Even Matt made fun of his playing, damn them all—
"There's a price for that."
"Oh yes," she said. "Your life. If you take the gift, you know how it ends. John Lennon. Jim Morrison. Jimi Hendrix. Janis Joplin. If you blaze, my love, you burn. But think, love, of your name said on a breath with theirs." And then she grinned, filed teeth and red tongue. "If anyone can pronounce it."
Ten years of brilliance, or fifty of failure? In a hundred years, what would it matter?
Who remembers the also-rans?
"I'll need safe-passage. A promise I can go home."
"So long as you eat nor drink anything in Faerie," the woman said, "you have my word you may go home at dawn. With your music. One night's revel is all she asks. One night's revel, and your death."
He tugged the rings from his fingers, and let them fall to the ground. And took the Faerie's hand.
From dark night, the whole world went brilliant. The air shone with the fire of ten thousand candles refracted in infinite crystal, and Kelly swayed on his feet. The court that towered over him was white and massive, the windows fluted Gothic arches in stone that moved like wind. He caught a breath at the loft and the beauty of it—all white, so white, and shining—and then another breath at the creatures that peopled the space. "Oh," he said. "Oh—"
The woman's fingers stopped his lips. "Say not the name of the divine. For it is painful to us."
That might be useful later, Kelly thought, but for now he nodded and fell silent, staring about him. What he saw was . . . one hell of a revel. Music pealed about the court, though he could not see the musicians, and a slow pavanne went its way across the center of the floor, lords and ladies dancing with stags and centaurs—or, he thought, as his vision blurred and shifted again—perhaps the lords and ladies and the stags and centaurs were the same. Something heavy-horned and green winged passed across the great hall, its talons dripping blood.
No one paid it notice.
The hall beside the dancers might have teemed with creatures, except the spaces were broad and there were a good many niches for conversation or simply sitting on a window-ledge, watching the pageant pass. Kelly saw creatures great and small, gross and gracile, sublime and shocking—winged things, and things that flew, and a brazen bull that clattered on eight silver hooves, tossing its head in seeming agreement with the gold winged, cruel-faced piskie who rode its horns and whispered in its ears.
Tables groaned with food, and the mere scent of the wine was dizzying.
Men and women who might have been human or Fae were lined against the walls like caryatid pillars. Their hands were tucked—no, he saw, bound—into the smalls of their backs and their faces were hooded with white silk, which had the effect of making them seem headless—and armless—from a distance. So they were like long rows of ruined classical statues, except for the rainbow colors of their skins.
And of no few of these, the Faerie host made sport. With their tongues or hands or genitals—or organs Kelly had no names for, or with whips and crops, or with wands of thorns—they plied the bound victims, and laughed coldly at the response. Some of the humans writhed in pleasure or agony; some sobbed o
ut loud. Some begged through their masks for surcease, and some to be taken harder, offered more.
"They are here by consent," the woman said, when Kelly flinched from a particularly heartfelt moan of pain. "They are not poets or singers; in return for our sufferance, they offer what entertainment they can." She looked aside. "The Daoine queen will not house such. She chooses her pets . . . elsewhere. But my mistress finds the intensity of their sensation . . . cheering, and so she has them set about the court."
"And is that the price of my . . . admission?"
"You are a musician," she said. "And a Mage. My queen will keep you to herself."
I'm not a very good musician, Kelly thought, but bit his lip, and walked along.
Jim Baen's Universe-Vol 2 Num 3 Page 12