Realms of Shadow a-8

by Lisa Smedman

  The man shook himself. Perhaps he chided himself for becoming so emotional over a plant, or perhaps he shuddered in an echo of the druid-wizard's longing. He stood and entered his cabin, closing the door behind him, leaving the rose to nod and twitch alone. It turned to face the druid-wizard-almost as if it knew she was there and regarded her with curiosity. But that was just the way some breeze had blown it.

  Angry with herself, the druid-wizard resumed her human shape abruptly enough to cause herself pain and strode to the cottage's back door. She hated her weakness, but she could not deny that she wanted the man- wanted to make him speak to her as he had spoken to the rose.

  As she knocked, she forced her turmoil aside and focused upon enhancing her beauty. She drew from the vague image of the woman she had seen in the man's mind, as well as from her own ideal self-image. Her eye color intensified; her hair took on new highlights and curls; the top few buttons of her shirt undid themselves. No man had ever resisted this spell.

  The man opened the door, a puzzled half-smile betraying surprise at the appearance of a visitor so soon after his moment with the rose-and at the back door, no less. For a moment his heart had surged with the wild hope that… but no, he must not indulge such fantasies.

  When he saw the woman, puzzlement gave way to lust and wariness, the latter because one such as this woman would never appear at a place such as this without trouble in the land or powerful magic at work.

  Time for the druid-wizard to play her part, if she was really to make this man her own.

  She adopted an expression of uncertainty and stammered a pattern of truths and half-truths. "I… I… felt drawn to this place. I have no one, and I dreamed that I must journey… I saw you with your rose, and I thought I would like to know love like that. So… here I am.

  "I’ll leave if I came in error," she added, to dispel any doubts that might remain after her speech.

  He said not a word-not one word for her in that voice! — but drew her inside.

  Now I’ll see if I can call forth love as effectively as I can call forth pain, she thought. And, once I do, to see if love can grant me as much gratification. Perhaps, as some attest, even more.

  She let her body take control-drew his head to hers, kissed him deeply, felt him kiss back. From there they fell to the floor, and so the day passed.

  Afterward, as they sat at the table over fresh bowls of stew and the druid-wizard secretly used her magic to destroy any chance of a child taking root, the man finally spoke to her.

  "I dreamed I would meet you," he said.

  He had recurring dreams of a woman linked to him with powerful bonds. The bonds, though they kept the woman's spirit close to his, stretched over chasms of time and space. Her features were usually indistinct, but he thought she might look something like the druid-wizard.

  "Was that the same dream in which your rose spoke to you?"

  He looked at her askance. "No… you heard that?"

  “Yes, I'm sorry. I couldn't help myself."

  He frowned, then shook his head. "It's fine. It's probably good that you came now. I think I might have started to invent things, to hallucinate, if I'd been alone much longer."

  Perhaps you already were hallucinating, the druid-wizard thought. She said, "How long have you been here?"

  "I don't know. A long time. I got tired of cities and people and just wanted to get away for a while. How about you?"

  "I've been alone for a long time, too. I live in the city, though, and I have… pets."

  "That must help."

  They fell into pregnant silence.

  "Will you go back to the city, then?" he asked. "To take care of your pets?"

  "Oh… yeah, I should. It's still home for now, even though I've found true love." She met his eyes and smiled as though at a joke. "Would you like to come with me?"

  True love, she had said. The man supposed they were true lovers-he had dreamed of a woman something like this one, and this woman had been drawn here. But the words rang crass. He considered expressions of true love best uttered in times of great emotion, great change-not over bowls of half-eaten stew and among garden tools and cupboards. Just because she didn't share this fancy… that didn't mean he and this woman weren't destined for each other.

  In any case, he had been away from the world long enough.

  "I think… I think I will go with you," he said.

  His thoughts drifted. What did this woman do, he wondered, when she wasn't trying to find her true love in the wilderness? And what city was she from?

  He posed his questions.

  "I do magic tricks," she replied, "in Phlan, on the Moonsea. I plan to move soon, though."

  The druid-wizard watched the man clean up their dishes. Engineering his love had been easy; now she must figure out how to draw upon its power.

  3

  "Long is the times but there are times when… so you see what I'm saying."

  — Chever's last notes

  In the days and tendays that followed, the druid-wizard grew fond of the man. She enjoyed watching his thin muscles flex as he applied his pickaxe to stones with which he planned to line a walkway from the garden to the creek, for whoever might choose to occupy his cabin after they left. A small application of her magic could have broken the stones much more easily, but the time was not yet right to reveal to him exactly what kinds of "magic tricks" she could do.

  One day, he showed her the parchment pages she had seen through the window when she first came upon the cabin-pages he studied in his spare time.

  They were the notes of Chever.

  The druid-wizard's eyes narrowed.

  The man would not say how he had come by them. The druid-wizard guessed the experience must have been horrifying, as his face went gray and slack, and his eyes took on a faraway look, the few times she had tried to get him to divulge on the subject.

  The man believed that the notes held some of the universe's secrets, which would be his if only he could unlock the notes' meaning. Sometimes he felt on the verge of something great, but so far his efforts had rewarded him with only enough enlightenment to make him want more.

  On sunny days, the man showed the druid-wizard his favorite groves and clearings. When it rained, they toured hidden caves. He told her about strange beasts he had glimpsed higher up on the mountain slopes and about the occasional eccentric he had met while scavenging for food. In most of the places the man showed her, the druid-wizard could detect faint, benign magic-in sharp contrast to the darker magic to which she was more accustomed.

  One day, as the man bathed in the creek, an old peddler arrived at the door. The druid-wizard bickered with the woman for a while-the woman was pushy; the druid-wizard didn't want to buy anything-before deciding she had had enough. As the man rounded the corner of the house, hair still wet, torso naked, he was just in time to watch in helpless disbelief as the druid-wizard turned the old woman into a cow.

  He ran to the cow, screeching, "What have you done? You've killed her! Where did she go?"

  He was making about as much sense as Chever’s notes. "She didn't go anywhere. She's right here." The druid-wizard indicated the cow.

  "But… what about my supplies? How am I going to fix my rake?"

  "Your rake…? You aren't going to need a rake in Phlan. Besides, wouldn't you much rather have steak?"

  "Steak?!" the man cried, and he seemed to crumple. "What have you done? Who are you? What are you doing here?"

  "I told you I did magic for a living."

  The man lowered himself to a bench near the front door and held his head in his hands.

  The druid-wizard felt, for the first time in a long while, a hint of remorse.

  The peddler-cow, who had known a moment of bewilderment, now came to her senses. She lunged for the druid-wizard, but the druid-wizard held her at bay with an invisible wall of magic.

  The man didn't notice the cow's expelled breath as she bit the wall; his thoughts lay too deeply inward. The druid-wizard ge
ntly prodded him to his feet. He lifted his head to gaze at her, his eyes full of accusation.

  "Come inside," she said. "I have something to show you."

  Head bent, he obeyed. As the door closed behind them, the shield holding back the cow dissipated, and she began to charge the door.

  Thud.

  The man jumped the first time it happened, then peered out at the cow.

  Thud.

  "Is she all right?"

  Thud.

  "She's fine; just angry with me." The druid-wizard raised her hands to cast a spell. "Here, let me-"

  "No! What are you doing?"

  "I'm only going to give her rest."

  His eyes seethed with mistrust.

  "I promise," she assured him, "only rest."

  His shoulders relaxed a little. He nodded reluctantly.

  The druid-wizard cast the spell, and the cow sank to her knees and quieted, sides expanding and contracting as she took on the steady breathing of sleep.

  The druid-wizard returned her attention to the man. She started to speak then paused. Finally, she said, "I know this whole thing might be hard for you, but please don't hate me for what I am." The plea felt unnatural falling from her lips, despite the fact that she meant it only as a way to regain his trust, a way to stay on track with her plan. "It's not as bad as you think," she reasoned. "So that woman wasn't bothering you, but think if she had been-she'd never bother you again. I can give you that-I can take away your troubles."

  He just looked at her.

  Why couldn't she think straight? This should be merely a case of problem and solution. All right, so… what was the problem? The problem was that the man was sad. How does one fix sadness? With cheer. Simple as that.

  Relieved to have found solid footing again, she offered, "I can change things in other ways. Imagine what fun we could have with something like this."

  She held up her hand, palm forward, and created a handfang-a mouth in the center of her palm. She raised an eyebrow suggestively and quirked a smile.

  The man cried out in disgust.

  It was just as well, the druid-wizard supposed. He probably wouldn't have been amused to discover the acid that served as handfang saliva.

  The man left, slamming the door behind him. The druid-wizard watched him from the window. He tripped on one of the sleeping cow's legs but didn't fall. Nor did he look back.

  He would come back, though, she knew. His rose was here-as were Chever’s notes.

  At least while he was gone the druid-wizard could dispose of the cow. She did so using a burst of combustion.

  This whole adventure was proving a little more complicated than she had bargained for. Perhaps it was time she took the notes and left.

  But she couldn't stop worrying at the situation. It didn't make any sense! How could the man feel betrayed? Had she not done something he himself must have wished he could do many times-if not to the peddler, then to some other annoyance or enemy?

  Not sure whether she planned to leave alone or with the man, she began to pack her things.

  4

  "It comes and says I say what? i don't understand? And i wish I it hadn't asked…"

  — Chever’s last notes

  The man's greeting, when he returned, was flat and pained, the result of an hour's soul-searching.

  "I can't stand to be apart from you." He saw that the cow had gone, but he suppressed the urge to ask whence. "I couldn't stand to have you out there in the world without knowing whether you lived or died, whether you loved or hated me. I can't allow this to end bitterly."

  He noticed her mountain gear, packed and almost ready to go. She had not yet added Chever's notes.

  "I'll come with you," he said. "You're going home?"

  "Yes, but first I'm going to try to find one of those creatures you told me about. The ones that live higher up in the mountains. "

  It had occurred to her that it might be nice to bring home a little something for herself, an addition to her collection.

  "Then I'll go home," she said after a while. "If you really want to honor our love that far, you should bring anything you wouldn't want to lose."

  She nodded meaningfully toward the back door-the rose.

  The man nodded, tucked the notes into a pack, and took a shovel and a large pot through the back door.

  The druid-wizard removed one of the spellbooks from her pack and studied it idly. She had time to wait. Her only imperative was that she return when the Shadovar summoned her, and that wouldn't be for a while yet. She would sense it when that time drew near.

  After an hour or so, the man reentered carrying the newly potted rose plant and a leather sling he had fashioned for carrying it mounted upon his pack. The rose had flinched as he had cut it from the ground, as though the unavoidable loss of some of its roots brought it conscious pain. It had wilted in his garden the past few tendays, largely neglected for the company of a flesh-and-blood lover. Its leaves had yellowed, and some of its petals drifted to the floor.

  “I’m ready," the man said.

  He eased into his pack and rose-carrying contraption, and the druid-wizard closed and repacked her book.

  5

  "… Shapes and sizes, things make no sense yet all make together fit AAARGH! Can't think in two places at once. Can't lose either one, either."

  — Chever's last notes

  They found one of the horrors they sought during the third day out. They watched the beast for a while, and the druid-wizard remembered when she had crouched as a wolf to watch the man in much the same way, not so long ago. She would not lose him now.

  She directed the man to a position opposite her in the undergrowth, so that the creature's path would lead it directly between them. She imbued her arms with a spell of strength, removed her boots, and formed her feet into panther claws.

  After a few minutes, the creature emerged and shambled down the path.

  One of its heads swung from side to side, on the lookout for food. The other head lay at an unnatural angle off of its shoulder, bobbing limply whenever the creature took a lurching step with a clubfoot. It already looked as though it had spent several sessions in the druid-wizard's spell-testing chamber-its creator, whether it had been evil magic or nature, had done much of the druid-wizard's work for her. She particularly appreciated the lolling second head-the irony of death in such close proximity to life. Many of her own creatures possessed similar features. It was almost as though she had been destined to capture this very beast-but she saw destiny everywhere now, ever since she had met the man.

  The druid-wizard tensed as the creature's live head swiveled to peer her way, but then a crackle sounded in the opposite direction-that would be the man. When the creature's head pivoted toward the sound, the druid-wizard sprang.

  The creature snuffled when the druid-wizard landed on its back and choked its live head in her arms, scratching at its sides and back with her panther's feet. She closed her eyes to better feel its spirit casting about within its body. She felt its fear-its confused thoughts grasping to regain the contentedness it had felt moments earlier.

  Already its thrashing lessened. The best moment passed, but the druid-wizard could still feel the pulse of power she had gained from the hunt's climax. She would remember it every time she visited the creature in her museum.

  The druid-wizard suspended the creature, gasping, at the end of a magical tether. The man approached it with curiosity verging on awe. He saw its anomalies, but he also saw its original design. A graceful neck. Tapered fingers. Deep, brown pools of wisdom in its eye sockets.

  "Can you relieve its pain at all?" he asked.

  The druid-wizard shrugged and cast another spell. The creature fell back on its tether, still panting but calmer for the moment.

  The druid-wizard was pleased that the man felt comfortable calling upon her magic-his request told her that he was growing accustomed to it.

  "What kind of a creature is it?" the man asked.

  She had no a
nswer. She remained silent.

  The man didn't seem to notice. He had begun to whisper to the creature, as he used to do with his rose. It watched him-looked into his eyes-and its breathing evened out.

  The druid-wizard felt a pang of envy and stood.

  "We should go," she said. "The sooner it settles into its new home, the better."

  She yanked the creature after her and turned to hike back down the mountain.

  The man followed, admonishing her to treat the creature gently.

  She smiled fondly through her annoyance. The man never failed to amuse her with his concern about such insignificant things.

  6

  "So much darkness, darkness… can't see and… light! But it's only more darkness!"

  — Chever's last notes

  "Do you think you can help it?" the man asked one day. "Can you make it whole?"

  They had just rejoined the river the druid-wizard had followed to the mountains, and the man had grown increasingly concerned about the beast's welfare.

  The druid-wizard affected an expression of sorrow.

  "I’ll try," she said.

  She could make it whole, but that would defeat her purpose.

  "That's all I ask."

  At long last they glimpsed Phlan. It was just in time, by the man's reckoning. The creature had eaten and drunk little and appeared on the verge of starvation or dehydration. Its eyes had grown glassy, as if it found the world no longer worth seeing.