Dandelion Fire

by N. D. Wilson

  “They are not returning,” Nimiane said quietly. “I had hoped to possess the boy at the first.”

  Carnassus shifted on his short legs, and his staff tapped the stone. Darius could hear its anger beneath him. “They may yet return,” Carnassus said.

  Nimiane opened her blind eyes, pulled in a deep breath, and lifted her face toward the roof. “Old man,” she said. “Your son is dead. He was strong. I felt his life pass, and I gathered its strength into the stones beneath your feet.”

  Carnassus didn't move. When he spoke, it was only a whisper.

  “What of the son of Mordecai?”

  “He lives. But fear the wolf before the pup. You told me Mordecai was dead.”

  Carnassus pulled his beard and swallowed. “So the faeren claimed. He did not return, so I did not doubt them.”

  Gathering up her cat, Nimiane stood. “His spark is hidden but not yet gone. Wherever he may be, his dying day will find him. Though we may extinguish the seed before the sire. Prepare the mountain ways. The first blow must fall.”

  Henrietta lay flat on her back, her limbs splayed. Tall, dry grass swayed around her. There was not a single corner of her body that wasn't clamoring for relief, hoping for healing attention. She had spent nearly an entire day on the back of a horse, and what part of the day she hadn't spent riding had been spent hiking, and she hadn't really slept the night before, and she hadn't eaten anything that counted as actual food since the eggs by the river.

  A single rock or clod or bulge of turf was digging into her back, where she thought her kidney used to be. And she didn't care. Wherever it was, her kidney had worse things to worry about, she was sure, and moving the clod would require moving herself first.

  She could hear the horses stomping and men laughing as they unstrapped bags and saddles. Someone was singing. How anyone could sing after being shaken and bounced and jostled all day was beyond her. She'd been to a rodeo once, and now she was pretty sure she knew what the bronco riders felt like afterward. And they only had to last eight seconds. She must have lasted eight hours, and it didn't matter that the horse had walked most of the time. It had always been moving.

  Something shrieked in her ear, and she jerked despite herself.

  Perched on an old log beside her was one of Caleb's birds. It was big, and its head was cocked, eyeing her. As tired and ready for death as she was, she didn't like sprawling beneath the bird. Its black, hooked beak looked needle-sharp, and its golden eye seemed hungry, especially glowing out of the black band around its snow-feathered head.

  Groaning, Henrietta sat up and scooted slowly away. “Wait till I'm dead,” she muttered. “Then eat whatever you want.”

  Thinking about the rodeo made her think about Kansas and her sisters and her parents. She wondered how many lasts she would have savored back in Kansas if only she had known—the last ride in her father's truck, the last time her mother handed her a bath towel hot out of the dryer after a shower, the last time she had smelled the ripening Kansas grain, her last barbeque, fireworks, baseball game, movie, or flushing toilet. A world of horse transportation wasn't likely to have plumbing.

  Henrietta took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. How often had her father been hunting his memory for lasts when it had seemed like his eyes could do nothing but focus on the horizon? She bit her lip and tucked her hair behind her ears. She had to stop it. No wallowing. She had to live now. Right now. Right where she was.

  First making sure that the big bird hadn't moved toward her, she looked around the patchy meadow for Caleb. He wasn't hard to spot.

  The big man walked toward her with his saddle over one arm and his black bow in the other. The black dog, pony-size but exuberant as a puppy, bounded around him. Caleb smiled at her and then turned and chirped through his teeth at the bird. It flared its wings wide, wider than Henrietta was tall, and danced in place, spitting its sharp call.

  The dog dropped to its belly in the grass, lolling a tongue the size of Henrietta's foot. Caleb set the saddle and bow on the ground and lowered himself onto the log beside the bird. He stroked its belly with the back of his still-gloved hand. It tucked its wings away and bobbed in place.

  “What kind of bird is it?” Henrietta asked. “Some sort of eagle?”

  Caleb clicked his tongue and glanced at Henrietta. “We call it a Black Sprey,” he said. “It has other names. It's smaller than an eagle. Bigger than a falcon. Smarter, too.”

  Henrietta stared at the flecking on its wings and its white legs and claws. “How many do you have?”

  Caleb laughed. “I have as many as I meet. They know me, and they will obey, but I do not have any in cages. They have their own nests and mates and young to tend. There are five with us now.”

  “Where are the other ones?” Henrietta asked.

  Caleb held out his hand, and the bird stepped onto it. He chirrupped with his tongue and teeth and then tossed it into the air. Henrietta felt the wind pushed down beneath its broad wings, and she couldn't help but duck. The bird climbed slowly and then coasted over treetops and out of sight.

  “They are feeding,” Caleb said. “They only eat fish, and here they must fly far for those. That bird was the first with a catch, the first fed, and now he will be the first to sleep. The others will find him with his head beneath his wing.”

  Caleb stretched his legs out in front of him and studied Henrietta. “You have flown far as well. How are your bones?”

  “They hurt,” Henrietta said. “For a while, I was hoping you'd just let me fall off the horse and leave me behind.”

  Caleb smiled, but only halfway. His eyes were focused on her, and they had their own thoughts. Henrietta shifted where she sat, nervous.

  “It will be harder tomorrow,” he said quietly. “When the world turns itself back out of shadow and into morning, the horses will have already been watered and kitted. Then we will ride long, deeper into the hills, and there we will find a dark doorway waiting for us, one that I pray will remain passable for another day. On the other side, more miles and more hills await.”

  “What if the door is shut?” Henrietta asked.

  “Then we will be lost in the rough foothills more than five hundred miles from where we would like to be.”

  Henrietta's eyes widened. “We have to ride five hundred miles?”

  “Not if the door is safe enough for life. No more than five remain beyond it.” Caleb stretched his arms above his head. “I would ride on through the night if the horses were not so worn. But we will be riding again soon enough.”

  Watching him, Henrietta couldn't help but yawn. “Do you have any food?” she asked. “I really am hungry.”

  Caleb stood up quickly and whistled. A circle of men stopped their laughter, and all turned in unison.

  “A bowl, when it's hot?” he asked. One of the men nodded, and they returned to their laughing. Caleb sat down. “They are stewing something, whatever herbs and roots they can find to soften salted meat.” He pulled in a slow breath and sighed. “Now, I would hear your story.”

  Henrietta ground the heels of her hands into her eyes and leaned forward, stretching. Where did her story begin? With her grandfather doing whatever it was he had done to collect the cupboards? With the arrival of Henry? With the arrival of her father when he was young? Should she tell him about the witch, about shoving her through one of the cupboards and most likely starting this whole mess?

  She took a deep breath, straightened up, and told the truth.

  “I don't know where to start.”

  Caleb picked up his black bow and smiled. “You need not begin at the world's formation.” He tucked a horn tip into the arch of his foot, bent the bow an inch, and slipped the string off the top. The bow straightened when he released, but not as much as Henrietta had expected. The black horns still swooped gently back, bending forward again at the tapered ends.

  “Does everyone use horn bows here?” Henrietta asked. “My dad got me a bow at a yard sale once, but it was yellow fiberglas
s.”

  “I don't know fiberglass, but here we use mostly ash or yew. My father brought this to me from the southern side of the ocean. I could not string it until I was nine, and could draw it no more than two fingers for three years after, though I tried every day.”

  Caleb wound the string around the shaft while Henrietta watched, and then leaned the bow on the log beside him. “But you were going to tell me the story of your arrival in FitzFaeren. Have you found a beginning?”

  Henrietta brought a thumbnail to her teeth. She didn't think she could lie to Caleb. He'd known she was lying about her name right away. Not that it mattered. She didn't really want to lie. One part of her wanted him to know everything that had happened. She wanted someone to, especially someone who could help her. But another part was nervous about telling him anything. And she didn't exactly like how the story made her look. Grandfather's key had been on her mind all day, digging into her leg from its station in her pocket.

  So she drew a deep breath, sighed, and told him what she remembered about her grandfather, and about the arrival of her cousin and the rediscovery of the cupboards. She moved fast, and even while she did, she was surprised at how much Caleb was unlike her. If someone had told her the same story in the same way, she would have been interrupting, badgering and begging for details, demanding explanations, and pointing out inconsistencies. But Caleb sat and watched her face. At most, he ran a hard hand over his rough jaw, but he never looked away from her eyes.

  Henrietta was the one who looked away. She found herself telling the grass and the dusk and the trees about overhearing her cousin and Richard and then waking up and thinking they had gone through the cupboards.

  And that is where she stopped.

  A man, thicker than Caleb but not as tall, walked up to her with a wooden bowl full of stew.

  “Thank you,” she said quietly, and she meant it. She was grateful, and not just because she was hungry. With the warm bowl in her hands, she didn't have to look in Caleb's eyes. While the story she had told had all been true, her own rashness had been avoided. And when avoidance had not been possible, she had felt blood rise to her face.

  She stared into the brown mixture in front of her and looked at her hands.

  “I don't have a spoon,” she said.

  Caleb pulled a small knife out of his belt and handed it to her, gripping the blade.

  “What that won't get, you can drink.”

  The man returned with another bowl for him, and Caleb slipped down into the grass beside his hound, propping his back against the log.

  “So you followed your cousin,” he said. “Where is he?”

  “Not here, I don't think.” Henrietta sipped at the bowl, but the broth singed the tip of her tongue. “Magdalene would have grabbed them, too.”

  “How did you escape the queen?”

  “I jumped out her window.”

  Caleb was ignoring his own bowl, still watching Henrietta's face. Finally, he looked up and away, focusing on something unseen. Her father did the same thing.

  “Why did you not return through your small gateway? The halls of FitzFaeren have strange hauntings, but you could have braved it.”

  “I tried,” Henrietta said. “But I got lost. It was night, and I got all twisted up in the hills.”

  “And you met Eli?”

  “I found him, he fed me, and I followed him till you grabbed me.”

  Henrietta watched Caleb think. Then he drained his bowl, set it beside him, and whistled.

  The men turned.

  “Where is the little Fitz?” he said. “Bring him over here.”

  “Sacked?” one of them asked.

  Caleb nodded.

  Henrietta couldn't help herself. “You still have him in a bag? Why would you do that? He'll suffocate.”

  Caleb looked at her, but said nothing. Then he stood slowly and crossed his arms.

  Two men were walking toward them, from beyond where the horses had been staked. Between them ham-mocked a lumpy brown sack, bulging and twisting while they walked. The men dropped the sack at Caleb's feet, and they both stepped back.

  “You may sit and listen,” Caleb said, and Henrietta knew he was talking to her. “But do not speak or ask questions.”

  Henrietta felt her ears get hot with embarrassment, but before it could turn into irritation, Caleb had addressed the sack.

  “Eli, onetime duke of FitzFaeren, onetime keeper of the libraries of Hylfing, onetime traitor, and onetime friend, would you speak with me?”

  Henrietta bit her lip. She had a lot of questions. The sack held perfectly still.

  “Respond,” Caleb said.

  The sack jerked, and Henrietta recognized Eli's muffled voice. “I'm not a potato. I'll talk in the air.”

  “Use no forces or spells or incantations, and you may be freed,” said Caleb. He continued, and his voice hardened. “But be warned. Encroach, attempt to necromance, and you will be resacked. And that only if your heart drums on.”

  “Fine,” Eli said. “Get me out of this filth.”

  Caleb nodded, and the men stepped forward and began unlacing a seam that ran the length of the sack.

  “Why can't he do spells inside the bag?” Henrietta asked.

  Caleb turned, looked her in the eyes, and she remembered what he had said. He wasn't angry, but she wished she hadn't asked.

  “It is woven from the fiber of sea kelp. Some use spiders' webs. They are stronger, but much too hard to get in quantity. Both stifle manipulation and tangle any created threads within.”

  He looked back to where Eli had rolled into the grass and was climbing to his knees and his feet. His bald head glowed with heat. Straggling hair plastered over his ears and onto his cheeks. His glasses were missing, and dust, turned to silt by his sweat, coated his clothes and spotted his skin. He looked like an extremely angry chimney sweep. At least Henrietta thought he did. She had never seen one.

  He puffed his cheeks, muttering to himself, and Henrietta waited for him to insult Caleb. Instead, he fished his glasses out of a pocket and tried to bend the wire frames to straight. Giving up, he put them on. One of the gold arms stuck out above his ear.

  Caleb waited silently. When Eli finally blinked behind cloudy lenses, he spoke again.

  “Eli, what rite were you performing when my men took you?”

  Eli squinted and licked his lips. For a brief moment, he looked like his sister. “I would think it was obvious,” he said. “I was light-bending. I was invisible, but your sea-crows revealed me.”

  Caleb shifted, taking one step closer to the much smaller man. Then he looked up at the dusking blue in the sky. Henrietta looked up as well. One early-bright planet hung above the trees.

  “For one such as you,” Caleb said, “light-bending requires no rites.” He looked down and smiled. “Taste truth, Eli. You may remember its flavor. It might carry an edge or a bite, but it will never betray you. What rite were you performing?”

  “I was summoning strength,” Eli said.

  “Sour,” said Caleb. “Truth is sweeter.”

  Eli sniffed loudly and rubbed his slick scalp. “If you know, then speak it yourself.”

  Caleb's look was cold and unblinking. His voice was colder. “My men described what symbols they found— the rite of skulls.”

  Eli sneered. “You trained yourself in dark power? Your father would be so pleased.” He squared his small shoulders. “It was the rite of skulls, indeed. But it would have had no effect. It was begun out of fear. I have no memory of its ending, and I would not have completed it if I did.”

  “I have seen it completed,” Caleb said quietly. “Once. It cannot be forgotten. Why would you begin such a thing?”

  “I told you,” Eli said. “I was afraid. Do you think I have forgotten who follows when those hawks are flying? I only thought of my own life and the hatred you have always had for it.”

  “You would turn to Endorian leeching to preserve your life? If you knew I was following, then you had
to know I would strike you down for such evil.”

  Henrietta looked from Eli's face to Caleb's. Eli really did look afraid. Caleb's face was lost in thought. He continued.

  “My family has shown you much mercy, Eli. There are many things I could think to blame you for.”

  A breeze crawled down from the sky, rattling the grass. The two men behind Eli watched him. The men around the campfire were watching as well. Even the dog at Caleb's feet lay still. One horse stamped.

  “There are things for which I am to blame.” Eli's voice was flat and lifeless. He looked into Caleb's eyes, and neither man looked away. Henrietta fidgeted in the awkwardness. She opened her mouth and then shut it again. After a long moment, Caleb spoke again.

  “Eli, the girl escaped your sister, the queen.”

  Eli nodded.

  “And she wandered lost, searching for the ruined hall and the door to her own world.”

  Eli swallowed, blinking.

  “Why did she not find it?” Caleb asked. “Speak truly.”

  “Because,” Eli said, and he glanced at Henrietta. He paused. Henrietta could just see past the lenses in his glasses. The light was fading fast now, and the shadows on his face had deepened, were deepening more. “Because I felt her mind and spun it in circles.”

  Henrietta scrambled to her feet. “You made me get lost? Why would you do that? You said the doorway had closed behind me. Was that even true?”

  Eli shrugged. “Probably.”

  Henrietta felt tears well up. Anger squeezed them out. She stepped toward Eli.

  “Henrietta,” Caleb said. His voice was annoyingly calm. “Sit and find silence.”

  The emotion in Henrietta's veins was not that easy to tame. “You're evil,” she said to the little man. “Why would you do that? Why would you take me away from everything, from my family, my parents, my whole life? What was the point?”

  A hand closed around Henrietta's arm. It wasn't tight, but she knew it would be if she tried to shrug it off. Her body was turned, and, blinking, she looked up into Caleb's shadowed face. The whites of his eyes stood out bright beneath his brows. He didn't look her in the eyes, he looked around inside them.