Phoenix and Ashes em-4

by Mercedes Lackey

  She waited, hot with embarrassment and anger, daring the Empress to say anything—

  "I am power," the woman said, with a secret little smile. "There are many sorts of power."

  "Like Lilith's?" Eleanor countered. "Using your body to get what you want?"

  "Ah, now, you have your mythology mixed." The Empress laughed. "Lilith's offense was that she would not obey Adam, for she was created his equal, from the same clay and on the same day as he. For that she was banished, and God created subservient Eve from Adam's own flesh. Or so," she finished, with a chuckle, "the myth would tell us. And yes, there is power to be found in providing something that someone wants, isn't there? And if someone wants something very badly, it becomes a weapon in your hand."

  "It's a weapon I'd be ashamed to us," Eleanor replied, and then wondered—ashamed because it's underhanded, or because I'm afraid?

  "And if you could have the way of using the weapons of the senses as your stepmother does?" the Empress persisted. "If you knew by using them, you could have the young man for yourself, taking him away from your stepsisters?"

  She lifted her chin and stared. "I wouldn't," she said shortly—but then, flushed again, and dropped her chin, and with a sick feeling, admitted, "Or—maybe I would. But I wouldn't do it to make him my slave the way she would!"

  "Ah!"The Empress stood up, a beatific smile on her face taking the place of the too-knowing expression. "There you are, my dear! That is what you needed to see! That it is how we use the tools we are given, not the tools themselves, nor even the fact that we use them, that makes all the difference. Passion reversed is manipulation that leads to slavery. Passion proper is freedom. But both are passion—"

  She took one blood-red rose from the bouquet she held, and extended it to Eleanor. "I am as much Passion—Fire—as I am the Fertility of Earth," the Empress continued. "It does not do to forget that. Pass on, little Fool and seek the next stage of your growing."

  Eleanor took the rose, and the moment she did so, the landscape around her changed.

  She was no longer in a garden.

  Instead, she was on a vast and empty plain. In the distance were mountains; dividing the mountains from the plain was a powerful, swiftly-moving river.

  Seated before her, on a massive, square-built throne, was a man. He was dressed in archaic-looking armor, but it was very rich; gold-chased and engraved. He wore a crown and carried the traditional emblems of rule, the orb and scepter. As he looked down at Eleanor from his throne, she understood why the books called the Emperor a ditticult" card. ...

  So she began her trial of the Emperor, by showing her own temper and determination.

  "Not tonight, I think!" she impudently announced to that stern face, and turning away, summoned true sleep with a wave of her heavily perfumed rose.

  21

  June 21, 1917

  Broom, Warwickshire

  "I'M NOT GOING TO BOTHER with trying to teach you anything now," Sarah said, as Eleanor finished recounting her latest dream-conquest, the Tarot card of the Lovers. She had conquered the Emperor far more easily than she had thought she would— but then, he was an easy card to understand. Not an easy card to handle, but easy to understand.

  Secular power, intensely masculine, warlike, patriarchal... the embodiment, in a way, of all the traits that men found admirable. And, in the inverse—rigid, bound by tradition, unable to change, territorial— all the things that had turned the war into a disaster. His Element was Fire, a fire so fierce that nothing grew on his plain, so in his way he was as much an embodiment, even in proper position of sterility, as the Empress was of fertility ... a curious pairing.

  She hadn't had much difficulty with the Hierophant, either—who was to spirituality what the Emperor was to the secular world. Both ruled by law, by conformity, by order. Both concentrated on the obvious sources of control and power, ignoring the ones within—the male counterparts to the High Priestess and the Empress, with all that this implied. Law, infallibility (presumed or actual), an intolerance for the "heretical" and the rebellious—

  It had occurred to Eleanor that the world had been run by men of that stamp for some time now, and look where it had gotten everyone. And it had also occurred to her that both the Emperor and the Hierophant would expect softness and conciliation out of a female, not confrontation. The Emperor, given his Empress, would expect manipulation; the Hierophant would expect submission.

  So confrontation was what she had given them. She had stood her ground and told them both the truth about what their traits, taken to extreme, had done to the world—truly conquering the cards instead of merging with them—with their own weapons of order, law, and logic. Unable to face her logic, they had faded away, leaving behind the heady taste of secular and sacred power.

  But the Lovers—that was another uncomfortable card. Not the least of which because Eleanor had gone through the Hierophant's rigidly designed, mathematically precise temple to find herself in the garden behind it, and there she discovered she was facing the original—and stark naked—Adam and Eve. It was quite a shock to her senses and her sensibilities. She had never seen anyone else naked before.

  Much less a man. She had literally leapt back with a yelp, and averted her eyes from the two figures, who appeared not at all uncomfortable with their nude state. Which was odd—because hadn't the Fruit of the Tree made them ashamed? These two were not at all embarrassed.

  And yet, there was nothing remotely sexual about them. The Empress had had more sensuality and erotic attraction, fully clothed, than both of the Lovers put together.

  Nevertheless, Eleanor hadn't known where to look, and her face had been flaming as red the roses in the Empress's garden.

  She should have known this was coming, after all, she had seen the card in Sarah's deck. But somehow it had come as a complete surprise and shock, and she had been so dumbstruck she hadn't known what to do.

  The Archangel of the card had stepped in to save her from dying of embarrassment, shooing the two away. They had gone off to sit under the tree with the serpent in it, to immediately begin to quarrel about who had tempted whom, and whose fault it was that everything had gone wrong.

  They sounded like a couple of children, and that was when Eleanor understood why they were so devoid of eroticism. They were children. Children without the innocence of the Fool, for they had already learned how to lay blame, to lie, and quarrel.

  The Archangel sighed, and shook his head sadly. It was odd; he looked exactly like the Archangel portrayed on the card—which meant, at least to Eleanor's eyes, he didn't look all that much like an angel at all. More like an androgynous man with wings. There was none of the glow, of the majesty, that she would have thought would be the hallmarks of a real angel.

  He's an image, a reflection—the symbol for something, rather than the actual thing, she decided. And an image created by someone who hasn't ever seen the real thing, or even taken much thought of what one should look like. It had always seemed to her that there ought to be a reason why the first thing an angel said when it appeared was "Fear not." Presumably, the mere sight of one was enough to strike fear into the hearts of those who saw him.

  This angel looked as if he was more likely to say "Welcome to the garden, have a seat" than "fear not."

  "It wasn't so much that they tasted the fruit," the Angel said to the empty air, carefully not looking at Eleanor. He sounded exasperated, like a teacher with two dunces for pupils. "It was that they lied about it, and then tried, and keep trying, to blame each other. He forgives everything, you know, so long as you admit you did it and are properly sorry for it—"

  He glanced at Eleanor, and now he looked sorrowful. "They began with such promise, and yet one small thing has kept them from fulfilling that promise."

  "Responsibility," Eleanor said, instantly, before the Angel could get in another word. "They're not taking responsibility for what they did— so that's the reversed position for this card, isn't it? This card represents responsib
ility. And choices, and temptation, and balance between male and female—" The words kept tumbling out of her, as if she had turned on a spigot. "You're part of it too, since you—you aren't Michael, are you?"

  He shook his head. "Raphael."

  She nodded. "Raphael, whose sign is Mercury and whose element is Air; the positive of Air is freedom and an unbounded imagination, and the negative aspect of Air is carelessness and light-mindedness—"

  It seemed as if some of the Magician's knowledge was with her now, and couldn't wait to get out. The more she babbled, the more symbols she saw here—temptation, in the form of the Tree and the Serpent, but more knowledge too. There was another tree, without a Serpent twined around it; it balanced the other. What did that tree represent?

  If the first one is the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, what is the other one? It seemed to be covered with little flames rather than leaves or fruit. Was it a sort of Burning Bush? That was another kind of knowledge—

  "And Fire," the Archangel said, helpfully. "Don't forget that's there too." He nodded at the tree.

  There was something about that Tree that should be ticking off memories and wasn't. As if the back of her mind recognized the symbolism, but wouldn't talk to the front of her mind about it.

  She nodded, fixing her eyes on the Angel's face so she wouldn't have to look at the two naked people sprawled inelegantly beneath the tree. If they weren't physically upside-down, their position was close enough to make them look "reversed." "Of course—passion again, but it has to be passion in balance with everything else. And of course there's the Serpent and the Tree from the Garden—that's Earth—" But she wasn't quite grasping it.

  "Ah, but what is the thing that you must take from them? The symbol of the power that's here?" the Archangel asked shrewdly. "It was the cup from the Magician, the scroll from the High Priestess, the Empress's rose, the Emperor's orb, the Hierophant's crown—"

  "Knowledge, wisdom, passion, power, law—" she said aloud, thinking very hard. There was a problem here. The Lovers were both stark naked and had nothing in their hands. Balance, responsibility—what represents that? Choices—making good ones and bad ones— There was no symbol of any of these things anywhere about.

  There were still the apples on the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, but—

  But I've already had knowledge, and anyway, I don't think that's the answer.

  She looked at the Archangel sharply. "It's nothing I have," he replied, with one perfect eyebrow raised at the exact angle required to convey admonition. "And don't even think about pulling out one of my feathers. Do that, and you'll find me treating you like something other than a lady."

  Well, whatever these Tarot creatures were—one thing that they were not was to actually be what they appeared to be. This one might wear the outer semblance of an angel, but she didn't think even a minor one of the cherubim would talk like that, much less an archangel. Which, she had to admit, was something of a relief. She really didn't want to have anything to do with a real angel.

  Adam and Eve were looking bored, and had even given up on their quarrel while they waited for her to come up with the symbol of what she must take from them.

  What could it be?

  Wait, what if it wasn't something material? This card was about balances, and there couldn't be anything more heavily weighted in favor of the earthly as a symbol than everything that stood in front of her. Except that the dominating Element of this card was Air. So—did it follow that what she was to take was the opposite, immaterial balancing earthly?

  "The kiss of peace," she said, sure now of herself. "From both of them."

  "Oh, well done!" the Archangel applauded, as Adam and Even came towards them at a wave of his hand. Eleanor tried not to look, but it wasn't easy, when the two of them bracketed her and leaned forward to kiss her cheeks at the same time. She closed her eyes, but she could still feel them there, and as their lips brushed her cheeks, she felt her face flaming.

  And that was the moment—

  "That was the moment," Eleanor said, swallowing hard. "I have gotten something from every one of the cards I passed through—something that stayed with me, that is. But from the Lovers—" She shivered, and looked up at Sarah. "Responsibility, Sarah! It all came to me, then, just before I fell into sleep. Responsibility! The burden of making the right choices! I—I—" She couldn't put into words what she had felt at the moment; it was just very big, and very heavy, and she was only beginning to see the edges of it. But part of it was that she wasn't just responsible for herself . . . she was responsible for however she affected everyone she came into contact with.

  "I'm not going to bother with trying to teach you anything now," Sarah said, gravely. "For the life of me, I cannot think what I could offer you that you aren't already getting in your dreams." And before Eleanor could protest, she held up her hand. "I am not saying not to come here anymore. But I think you have a new teacher—though I don't know who or what it could be, that can work through dreams." She shook her head. "I've heard of that, but no one I know has actually gotten that sort of teaching."

  Eleanor went very still. "Not even Mother?" she asked softly.

  Sarah shook her head. "Not even your mother."

  Eleanor slipped back into the house well ahead of the return of her stepmother and the girls. They had gone to Longacre Park for a tea party—the expected company had arrived, and with it, an invitation to tea.

  And while it sickened Eleanor to hear the girls try to outdo each other in their boasting about how Reggie had been attracted to them, she wanted to hear what had happened. So she sat by the hearth with mending in her hands, and waited for them to come back.

  The motorcar rattled and chugged its way into the old stable, and the three came chattering up the walk and in through the door.

  Or rather, the girls were chattering. Alison was silent. Rather to Eleanor's surprise, they were not chattering about Reggie; instead they were talking about his aunt.

  ". .. dotty!" Lauralee laughed. "Absolutely dotty! Why she couldn't even keep track of which of us was which! And if I heard one more story about her cat, I think I should have begun screaming!"

  "Mother, if that's all we have to worry about, I don't believe you are in any danger of being discovered," Carolyn said, sounding complacent.

  "On the whole, I am inclined to agree with you," Alison replied, her voice plummy with satisfaction. "Calling that silly old woman an Elemental Mage is beyond being charitable. She hasn't any more power than a village witch."

  They moved into the sitting-room. Eleanor did not need to work magic to hear them. They spoke as if they were unaware that she was still sitting there in the kitchen.

  "Aren't we doing anything tonight, Mother?" Carolyn continued. "It's Midsummer Eve—I thought you'd decline the invitation to the card party tonight."

  "And not a time when we should be stirring anything," Alison said warningly. "No, not on the shortest night of the year. It is true that the boundaries between the seen and the unseen weaken on this night, but it is not in our favor. We will leave the work we performed on May Eve to strengthen—which it will, so long as nothing interferes with it. Our revenants will draw sustenance through the weakened boundaries on their own—and trust me, they have no wish to pass on to the unseen world."

  Revenants? What does she mean by that? Eleanor heard Alison's footsteps on the floor, coming towards the kitchen, and bent studiously over her mending. It was one of Carolyn's tennis dresses; she'd caught the hem and it needed putting up again, so it was a legitimate task.

  "What are you doing, Ellie?"

  Eleanor looked up, and held out her hands. It was obvious that she was holding a garment that wasn't her own—she didn't own anything white. Only those with leisure, whose work was all done by servants, could have white clothing. It was a fact of poverty that Eleanor had come to learn.

  "Ah." Alison nodded in satisfaction. "Yes, that will be needed tomorrow. I trust you have dinner well in han
d?"

  Eleanor nodded. She did—thanks to cleverly putting together things that could be made well in advance. The only things left were the new peas and new potatoes on the stove.

  "We'll be eating early, then we'll be going up to Longacre Park for the evening." Alison smirked. "Put supper forward to six. I trust you can keep yourself out of mischief while we're gone."

  "Yes ma'am," Eleanor mumbled, dropping her head so that Alison wouldn't see her expression.

  If the girls had had their way, they'd have gone up to the Manor in ballgowns, and Eleanor would happily have let them make that faux pas—but their mother was watching, and chose their gowns herself. "Slightly more elegant than your fine afternoon gowns, my dears, but not evening dress. If we had been invited to dinner instead of a card-party, it would have been appropriate, but otherwise, no." They looked stunning, Lauralee in mauve silk, Carolyn in blue.