“No,” Elizabeth said, her voice hard and cold. “There I cannot see through illusion. You could bring anyone disguised and I would not know. You must bring my Da here to me in my world. You say he cannot live here. I will not keep him long, I promise. But I must see him, touch him, have him hold me in his arms.”
Denoriel stared at her wide-eyed, realizing for the first time that she had never believed his assertions that Harry was alive and well, and thus had never trusted him. He very nearly told her to stew in her own juice, since she would not trust him … but then, he thought, who could the poor child trust? Her father had murdered her mother, her stepmother had abused her innocence, her father’s minister had bespelled her. Denoriel saw her eyes, black with misery, fill with tears and the tears slip down her sunken cheeks.
“I need my Da,” she whispered. “If he is alive and well, I will know I have somewhere to hide myself if all turns black.”
There had been nothing more Denoriel could say. Reason was powerless and there was no doubt that the child would soon be in little better a state than when the spell of dissolution was destroying her. He kissed her hands again and promised her that somehow he would bring Harry to her.
The light that came into her eyes, the deep, easy breath she drew—because the promise that she would see her Da was proof that he was alive, proof her friend, her protector was no liar—showed that the promise itself had begun her cure.
Denoriel drew breath to speak, but from around the edge of the yew hedge down the short path to the center came a young man’s voice. “See, I told you!”
Instantly Denoriel cast the Don’t-see-me spell and slid away to his right toward the dead-end path and his Gate.
“Yes, you did. You were right!” That was a boy’s happy exclamation. “There’s Elizabeth.”
Edward stepped away from his companion and ran the few steps from the end of the yew hedge into the center. The two guards who had followed him stopped where the yew hedge opened into the center path and they could see everything.
“Bess,” the prince cried happily, “I am glad to see you here. When Dr. Cheke asked why you were missing lessons, your governess said you were not well.”
“How comes it that you are all alone here, Lady Elizabeth?” Lord Stafford asked.
Elizabeth rose to drop a curtsey to Edward and then leaned forward to kiss her brother’s cheek. “I felt a little better this morning and thought the air and the quiet here in the maze would do me good, Your Highness.” Then she turned to Stafford. “Alone? No, I am not alone.”
“I thought not,” Stafford said with a tight smile. “Just as we came around the edge into the path, I could swear I saw a man kneeling at your feet.”
“A man?” Elizabeth forced herself to take an even breath and then another. “No, I did not bring my guard. Good Lord Stafford, the sun must have dazzled you. You must have seen Blanche. She did kneel down to fasten my shoe, which had come unlaced.”
“Oh? And to where did she disappear?” the boy asked, in a know-it-all tone.
“I did not disappear, Lord Stafford,” Blanche said, rising from behind the bench. “You startled me when you spoke and I dropped my pocket. I just stepped over the bench and knelt down to gather it up.” She held up one of the pockets that she kept tied about her waist beneath her apron.
Stafford stared at Elizabeth but she did not flinch or blush. She looked back at him, her eyes bright gold, shockingly bright, in the sun. There was no particular expression on her face. Stafford wondered if his vision could have dazzled, coming from the shaded path between the hedges into the sunlit center of the maze. Could he have mistaken the kneeling maid for a man?
Elizabeth only smiled, an entirely unreadable smile.
Chapter 19
His presence masked by the Don’t-see-me spell, Denoriel stood at the edge of the dead-end path listening to the exchange among Elizabeth, her brother, and the boy Blanche had called Lord Stafford. He did not misunderstand the expression of angry frustration that appeared briefly on Stafford’s face. The boy was watching Elizabeth, trying to catch her in wrongdoing. Likely it was Stafford he had caught glimpses of in the distance when he and Elizabeth had been riding. Had Rhoslyn bespelled the boy to spy?
He extended his senses, feeling for magic. Perhaps there was the faintest echo, but if Stafford was bespelled, it was so well done or the spell so small that he could not sense it with any surety. And there could be other reasons for his spying. There was a great deal of pushing and prodding to be close to Edward, and Elizabeth was envied her brother’s affection by most of the older boys.
Denoriel sighed. In any case it would be impossible for him to undo such a subtle spell and he did not dare ask Ceindrych or Mwynwen—each for different reasons—to help. He watched as Edward asked Elizabeth if she would walk back with him and she agreed. The boy then asked an eager question about the Latin translation he was working on and took his sister’s hand. The older boy fell in behind them, scowling.
As he watched, Denoriel began to reconsider his plans for Harry’s visit. He had intended to bring Harry through the dressing room as he had brought Ceindrych, but that now seemed too dangerous. Surely there would be cries of joy and eager conversation between Harry and Elizabeth. The maid’s chamber was an inner room, and he could not be sure what other rooms adjoined it—probably servants’ rooms, but not impossibly the chambers of some of the less important boys. If one was spying, it was perfectly possible that more were. In any case, the sound of a man’s voice in Elizabeth’s apartment—whoever heard it—would be utter disaster.
Better they should meet outside. If they were seen it would be far less reprehensible to be walking in the garden than to have a man in her bedchamber. But when and where? He was afraid Stafford would be watching the maze—or having friends or servants watch, which meant that they could not chance meeting Elizabeth there by daylight, nor could he and Harry walk out of the maze in daylight to meet her elsewhere. Besides, by daylight there was always the chance that someone who had known Harry would recognize him. Living Underhill, he had changed very little from his appearance at seventeen.
At night then. The moon was nearly full and the weather promised fair for tomorrow. Tomorrow night when the moon was well up. Just before midnight.
Still wearing the Don’t-see-me spell, Denoriel followed Elizabeth and Edward as they crossed the very small formal garden in front of the building in which they lodged. He watched Elizabeth say an affectionate farewell to her brother and promise him that she would attend lessons on the morrow. Stafford, Edward, and his guards went toward the prince’s apartment and Elizabeth toward her own. Denoriel caught Blanche by the arm.
She gasped with surprise, which drew Elizabeth’s attention, but she only nodded very slightly to give permission. Blanche allowed the pressure on her arm to draw her toward a bench shaded by a small tree and several square-clipped bushes. Seated, she immediately opened the housewife attached to her belt and looked diligently at its contents.
“By God’s Grace, you have brains,” Denoriel murmured from right behind her. “Never mind that you cannot see me. I am here. You heard what I promised Elizabeth. Can you bring her to the maze tomorrow night when the moon is well up? That should be before midnight.”
“No, I cannot!” Blanche sounded sharp, although she whispered and looked down at the pins, needles, and thread spread in her lap as if she were telling over the contents of the housewife. “How can I get her that long way through the Wilderness without light? Mostly the moonlight cannot get through the trees there. Do you expect me to carry lighted torches? We cannot see like cats as you can, m’lord.”
For a moment Denoriel stood silent, calling himself a fool. As he tried to think of an alternative, his eyes wandered around the small garden. Toward the center there were some flower beds surrounded by a narrow lawn. Beyond the lawn were four benches, each near the middle of one of the square sides of the garden. Each bench was shaded by one or two trees and several well
-trimmed bushes.
The benches would be shadowed if the moon were high. Yes, and he could give Harry an amulet carrying the Don’t-see-me spell. Harry would only need to touch it and say the words of invocation to disappear. Elizabeth might be scolded for walking in the garden at night, but so close to her chambers and with Blanche in attendance, there should be no real trouble. She could plead a headache, and that she needed the air and the cool.
He said as much, and added, “Very well. Tomorrow night when the moon is high, just before midnight—right here. If you slip out of the house wearing dark clothing and sit on the bench in the shadows, no one should see you.”
“Can I tell Dunstan?”
That was a good thought. If her twin shadows were in attendance, there would be that much more chaperonage. “Yes, and Ladbroke if necessary, but not the guards.”
Blanche uttered a small chuckle. “I doubt anything they see or hear will surprise them, but they are bred to honesty. They might answer questions truthfully—which would never be Dunstan’s fault.” She sighed. “Oh, I pray that this will settle my lady. She has lived through too much.”
“I, too,” Denoriel breathed.
When Blanche had gone in, Denoriel made his way back to the maze and Gated from there to Logres. Miralys was waiting and carried him to Llachar Lle, from where he dispatched one of his servants with a message for Harry. If Mwynwen asked for it, the servant was to give it to her but then find Harry and tell him Denoriel had sent a message. Denoriel was taking no more chances on messages going astray.
He need not have worried. The problem of Mwynwen’s attitude toward Elizabeth had been dealt with soon after Elizabeth’s visit to Underhill. Thoroughly annoyed by Mwynwen’s possessiveness, Aleneil had ignored Denoriel’s concern for Harry’s distress and told him that Elizabeth had been Underhill and had been terribly disappointed over not being able to see him because he had gone away with Mwynwen.
In fact, Harry had noticed that his lover had had something unpleasant on her mind for some time. He had thought it was bad news about his physical condition, and had not questioned her, determined to enjoy himself without worry about the future as long as he felt completely well. He had accepted death before he came Underhill and was not afraid.
After Aleneil’s disclosure, it did not take long for Harry to put two and two together, and his reaction had been rather violent. Not that he argued or shouted. Merely at dinner, he repeated to Mwynwen what Aleneil had said and asked—coldly—whether he were a free man or a slave bought by his need for her care.
To his surprise Mwynwen burst into tears and sobbed that she was sorry, so sorry but that wasn’t the worst that she had done. Harry just stared in surprise. The Sidhe were not known for saying they were sorry about anything—or, for that matter, for actually being sorry. But then Mwynwen confessed that when she had been asked to break the spell of dissolution on Elizabeth and Heal her, she had not removed the spell completely. She had left a piece of the spell—not anything that could harm the child physically, but a twist that might make her memory less perfect.
Harry, whose mind had grown into a man’s, even if his body had not altered much, was coming to know his lover and understand her. He realized that it was for herself she wept, for falling short of her Healer’s oath, not for any hurt she might have done to Elizabeth. And she had not answered whether he was free to seek another healer or bound to her. He pushed away his untouched food.
“What I was asking was whether I was free to live with Denoriel and find another Healer, or whether my debt to you and the services owed require me to continue to live here,” he said, his voice icy.
“What services?” Mwynwen had snapped, lifting her head. “You mean our play abed? I thought you lived here and loved me because you loved me—and yet you will leave me because of that stupid human child. I did not even try to harm her. I meant the girl only good. I wished to blur her memory of you and ease her pain of loss … but what I did was wrong. Not that I meant harm or did harm—and she is only human after all—but I said I would clean the spell from her completely and I could have done so … and did not.”
“Then I am free to go?“The chill in his voice only deepened.
After a small, tight silence, Mwynwen put her hand over his. “Harry, I said I was sorry. If the girl comes again, I will not keep you from seeing her—but do you not understand that it is very cruel of you to keep her desire for you alive? Let her forget you. Forget her.”
“One does not forget one’s child,” he said. “She may not be the child of my body, but I held her in my arms soon after she was born and she is the child of my heart. She is the daughter I will never have … and I cannot forget her nor hope that she will ever forget me.”
“Child?” Mwynwen repeated, and her eyes filled. “Richey,” she whispered, naming the changeling she had cared for and who had died in Harry’s place. “He was truly my child—and yes, you are right, I will never forget him, even though you are his gift to me to fill my heart.” She tightened her grip on his hand. “Don’t leave me, Harry. For your child, I will mend what I did amiss. I promise.”
“Then I will stay,” he said, leaning forward to kiss her.
Even as passion stirred in him when their lips met, however, he determined to tell Denoriel about the remnant of spell as soon as he could. Perhaps another Healer would be able to remove it. He doubted that Denoriel would trust Mwynwen to do it; he was not sure he trusted her himself. But she was so beautiful and so passionate and she did care for him—and his heart had near broken at the thought of leaving her.
Truthfully, he was not sure he could have fulfilled his threat. He was overjoyed that she wanted him even though he was making it clearer and clearer that he was no longer her child but a man grown; however, he did not forget Elizabeth, and Lady Aeron took him to Denoriel’s apartment that very evening. He was lucky and caught Denoriel at home.
It turned out that he had been unnecessarily worried, for Denoriel was happy to pour out the rest of the story into his ears. When Queen Titania had made it impossible for Elizabeth to speak of Underhill, as Oberon had done to him, the Queen herself had found the bit of spell and removed it.
When Harry returned, he mentioned that to Mwynwen and watched her complexion gray. She said nothing, and he took her in his arms and murmured comfort to her, but he was sure she would not dare to interfere with Elizabeth again—and he was satisfied.
Thus when, many months later, Denoriel’s message came for Harry, Mwynwen sent the messenger to him without delay with the message unopened. Harry put aside the delicate and exquisite fly he was tying—he both used them for fishing himself and traded them to a gnome, who had them spelled to attract fish and sold them to a dwarf in a troupe of players.
The gnome took his pay from the dwarf partly in mortal goods and partly in information. The mortal goods, the gnome sold at the Goblin Fair, the information he traded to Harry, who thus had kept up with his father’s wives and their fates and to some extent with the political events in England. The flies were more valuable than news, however. The gnome would gladly have paid Harry in gold, but Harry did not need gold, because either Mwynwen or Denoriel would ken for him as much as he wanted. Instead he was building quite a store of favors owed from the gnome.
Lady Aeron was waiting as Harry stepped out of the house and he took time, as he always did, to hug her and kiss her soft muzzle before he mounted. Midway to Llachar Lle, they met Miralys, who paced them as far as the front of the palace.
“I think we’ll be right out,” Harry said to both of them, which was more true than he had expected because Denoriel was coming out of the palace as he mounted the steps to the portico.
Their eyes met. Harry turned back, went down the stairs he had climbed, and remounted Lady Aeron. Without any words exchanged the elvensteeds brought them to Logres Gate, from there to an Unformed domain, and from there to Shepherd’s Paradise. Both dismounted and went to their accustomed seats.
“I’m
sorry I’ve been neglecting you,” Denoriel said. “It seems like months since we have been together.”
Harry grinned at him. “It has been months.”
“I’m sorry,” Denoriel repeated. “I hope you are not getting bored and that you haven’t been lonely.”
“Bored!” Harry’s eyes danced. “No, I can assure you I’m not getting bored. And I’m not lonely either. I miss you. I miss hearing about Elizabeth, but I have friends here and I have been doing yeoman work for the Bright Court.”
Denoriel looked anxious. “Yeoman work for the Bright Court?” he echoed. “Whatever have you been doing, Harry?”
“Cleaning up some sinkholes that should never have been allowed to form.”
“Sinkholes,” Denoriel echoed again in a failing voice, then thundered, “Harry! Have you been hunting alone in the chaos lands because I did not take you there as I promised?”
Harry laughed aloud. “Hunting in the chaos lands and other places, yes, but not alone. Did you not know that there were Sidhe tormenting helpless creatures, right on the border of slipping over to the Unseleighe Court, because they could no longer think of how to amuse themselves? And that there were others talking about Dreaming?”
“Of course I knew.” Denoriel shrugged helplessly.
Harry stared at him, aghast. “And you did nothing?”
“What could I do? I had nothing to offer them.” Denoriel grimaced. “Young as I am, what gave me joy they had seen, done, tasted many, many times, so many that the taste was too well known … flat, gone.”
“Did you never think to offer them danger?” Harry countered. “A life on the edge of nonbeing tastes sharp and sweet.”
“What danger is there in the elfhames?” Denoriel asked.
Harry looked at Denoriel blankly for a moment, then rose from his seat to embrace his friend … his father of the heart. Yet like his mortal father, this father too was not perfect. Oh, Denoriel was not selfish and autocratic. Harry was quite sure that Denoriel would fling himself in the path of any harm that threatened his precious boy, but he could only worry about Harry being bored; he could not think of a new game, a new challenge to pique his boy’s interest.
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