Rogue's Pawn

by Jeffe Kennedy

  It seemed to please the Brownies to be making magic. In the stories, their ability to accomplish work like this was magical in and of itself, as I recalled, so in theory they ought to be able to make Loden Pillows forever, without my adding anything more. Then they’d have a business enterprise beside sacrificing pages to fire. I’d also modified the spell so that the light glowed in three levels of brightness—might as well have flexibility in our lighting design.

  As the Loden Pillows piled up, Larch called in runners to distribute the light-up cushions back to the camp. Darling, as self-appointed quality tester, pounced repeatedly on the pillows, bouncing them from soft to bright to brightest and off again, which, together with the light flashes from the pillow-creators, created an almost disco effect that oddly complemented the brisk harmonies of the faerie song.

  And faerie singing it was. Just as the stories had it. Luminous, with nearly inaudible harmonies. Birdsong, the roaring of bears and the insistent buzz of cicadas wound through in complex counterpoints. It was beautiful, compelling and profoundly disturbing. I found myself falling into a trancelike state, compulsively repeating the melodies and rhythms in my mind.

  Until I came back to myself with an abrupt shake. Like when you were falling asleep, just sliding into dream images and your foot went off the step and boom! you startled awake. Common thinking was that it was probably a kind of brainstem reboot. That your brain was in danger of shutting down completely, rather than just into sleep mode.

  Interesting that the faerie song had that hypnotic effect on the human brain.

  When this happened, revulsion would seize and sicken me, taking me back to the state of my early training days. Post-traumatic stress, no doubt. Too bad I’d never learned any clinical psychology. With great effort, I concentrated on hearing their songs only as uncanny music. Though, as with Rogue’s haunting offers, the potential to slide under its influence continued to nibble at my less-than-firm state of mind. Really I needed to get away from it. A problem, since I had nowhere to go.

  The revelry outside the tent rose as the sun set, though the general feel of the camp seemed more sedate than last night. Our runners reported favorable reactions to the Loden Pillows, with orders placed for specific colors and shapes. After the first few Brownie-delivery-boys returned, I spotted Larch and Dragonfly in deep conference. When I wondered about it, one of Dragonfly’s wingless cohorts chirped that they were setting up a supply tent.

  “What for?” I asked.

  “Why, to house all the stuff.”

  Curious—and seizing the impetus to leave the tent, I ventured outside for the second time that day. This time I’d move farther than the grassy space in front. My breast twinged and I tamped down the fear. Get a grip. You are stronger than this.

  Soft evening filled the sky, in dusky hues that reminded me of Rogue’s lily. Diabolical lily, I reminded myself. The air carried a bit of moisture from the waterfall, mixing with the scent of flowers and fruit. No cooking smells. Where did Dragonfly get her endless supply of the snack trays that sustained me? Who had cooked the dinner last night?

  It felt good to be out of the crowded tent. I probably shouldn’t be hiding. Yes, I had been working, doing productive things, but it was also an excuse to brood, holed up like a frightened cat under the bed. No one had said I couldn’t walk around outside.

  I did, however, keep a wary eye out for Falcon as I circled my tent. The dappled glow of pillow-illumination colored nearby tents, some flashing rhythmically to the eerie faerie chants. All we needed was John Travolta in a white suit to complete the look. Maybe the three-light level concept wasn’t such a great one. Who knew the Bee Gees’ nasal falsetto harmonies were evocative of faerie song?

  Dragonfly and Larch stood in the open area behind my kaleidoscope tent, supervising the erection of another cream-colored tent. She snapped out orders, a mini-Napoleon, and he watched gravely as poles were sunk into the ground. Their apparent minions worked with meek and ferocious speed.

  “Be quick there,” Dragonfly squealed, rapping one of the knee-high guys with a stick, “or Her Lady Majesty Sorceress will turn you into a toad!”

  “Oh?” I said behind her.

  Which was a bad idea, since she wheeled around, managing to slap Larch in the face with one wing and nearly overbalancing herself. I stopped her spluttering with a raised hand.

  “Be careful what you threaten in my name, Dragonfly.” Crystal tears welled up in her eyes, but I drew on the coldness Scourge had instilled in me to steady my resolve. “So, Larch—why do I need a supply tent?”

  “Tributes, my lady.” He indicated a pile of wooden boxes, cloth, even a basket of fruit. “And we’ll need to create more pillows to keep up with demand. Already we’ve converted nearly a third of the extant pillows in the camp. I’ve arranged to import silk and stuffing from a nearby tribe.”

  “Tribe?”

  “Of The People.”

  Interesting that the word translated in my head as tribe, not group or town or city. “Okay, so this stuff—” I indicated the pile, “—is in return for our Loden Pillows?”

  “Just so.”

  Right, because otherwise they’d be gifts and would create obligation. I was getting the hang of this.

  “I don’t suppose anyone sent one of those magic chamber pots?” I asked. To blank response. Ah well, a girl could hope. “Maybe we could just move the pillow-factory into this tent?”

  “We should have several tents, my lady sorceress,” Dragonfly piped up again. “Lord Falcon has five and you’re at least as important as he is, if not more.”

  “Okay, really, do not repeat that one ever again.” I could just imagine Falcon’s response to that. I doubt he’d be interested in my excuse that I didn’t know how to control Dragonfly’s mouth. “But, fine, however many tents you two can arrange is fine—with no threats. If you all could move Santa’s workshop into the annex, I can have my own space again?”

  My word, their command. Dragonfly and Larch moved the pillow works immediately, returning my tent to blissful emptiness, punctuated by a select few softly glowing pillows in jewel tones of emerald, sapphire and ruby. I could even see the carpet laid over the grass, woven in similar tapestry hues, velvety plush squishing between my toes. Dragonfly was hanging about, a sullen set to her piquant lips. I was about to put her to work on setting me up with a bath of some sort when we heard from Falcon.

  Larch escorted the messenger in. The page—not of the Brownie variety, but rather taller and less colorful—bowed deeply. I tried to look regal. However that looked.

  “Lord Falcon thanks Lady Sorceress Gwynn for the excellent lights and offers this tribute in return.” He held out a small wooden box.

  Probably had a viper in it. I took it judiciously, holding it with the very tips of my fingers.

  “Further, Lord Falcon, General of the Most High Command, informs Lady Sorceress Gwynn to be ready to ride at first light—” wow, an actual external demarcation of time. For my benefit only? I didn’t think so, “—to engage in a most glorious Battle with the Enemy!”

  Dragonfly began clapping hands while jumping up and down like a squealing pogo stick. I thanked the messenger and glanced at Larch, who then escorted the page back out, pressing some token into his hand. Finally—someone to handle the tipping. If I hadn’t just hired Larch, I’d give him a raise. Though since I had no idea what I was paying him, I might already have done so.

  I turned to Dragonfly to ask if a bath could be arranged when Darling sank one claw delicately into my ankle.

  “Ouch!” I yelped. “Bad kitty!”

  Darling lashed his tail, then firmly sent an image of himself in battle armor.

  “Oh, right. I forgot you. Sorry. Bad me.” I set down the box from Falcon and picked up Darling, holding him cradled in my arms, nuzzling his belly fur with my nose. He licked my forehe
ad. Then sent me the picture again. “Yes, yes—okay. Dragonfly, can I take a bath somehow?”

  “In a tub of water?”

  “That’s how it’s generally done, yes. Unless you can offer me a shower.”

  “All of the girls have been bathing in the pond, my lady sorceress.”

  I sighed. “And probably no big, brass tub in the tribute pile, I suppose?”

  She shook her head gravely.

  “Ah, well, sponge bath it is. Off with you then.” At least the magic kept my hair from looking grimy, but my scalp was starting to itch something fierce. I squelched the image of lice.

  Darling wriggled impatiently in my arms, so I set him down on my workbench, the drying lily drifting upside down over his head. I thought he might bat at it and was ready to stop him, but he only gazed at it. Then he showed me a picture of Rogue looking disappointed and sad, gazing out a window at a misty landscape.

  “Don’t give me that,” I answered. “I don’t like being manipulated. I’ve had my fill of it just lately. Now—show me exactly what you want. Something practical, please, that might actually protect you in battle.”

  He licked the side of one paw, considering. I waited. The image he gave me finally showed him in a metal collar with spikes and an attached breastplate. A helmet covered his kitty head, graced with a giant purple ostrich feather.

  “No plume—it’ll make you a target. How about this?”

  I imagined the helmet with a short bristle of mottled brown feathers.

  He replaced them with vivid yellow.

  “No, yellow is even more visible.”

  I replaced the yellow with his original purple, in a zebra pattern. “The broken pattern should help camouflage you—harder for the eye to see. At least, I assume whoever we’re fighting has eyes that work like ours.”

  We agreed on the image—now I just needed some raw material. My teachers said I ought to be able to conjure things from nothing, but I couldn’t get the laws of thermodynamics out of my head. Conservation of mass. I just couldn’t believe in mass created from nothing. And unfortunately, this magic business came down to what I believed was possible. Too bad I’d dispatched Dragonfly. And eliminated all extraneous pillows. I’d have to go to the tribute pile for material myself. Not a big deal. Or it shouldn’t be. Still, it was full dark out there and I…dammit, I felt too frightened.

  My new life, where I was now really afraid of the dark and what it held.

  While I dithered and Darling washed a paw, my eyes fell on the supposed tribute from Falcon. I laid a finger on it but felt nothing unusual. No tingle that living things seem to give off; no feral sexual buzz that marked Rogue’s work; no light shock, like from a faulty outlet that I was beginning to associate with other enchanted objects.

  “What do you think—is it safe to open?” I asked Darling, who was engaged in full ear-washing now and ignored me. “A lot of help you are. I should call you Unfamiliar.”

  Without pausing in his washing, he sent me another picture of him in the armor.

  “Yes, yes, yes—patience is a virtue, you know.”

  I turned the little box so it would open away from me and Darling, and not toward anything important. I lifted the hinged lid with the tips of my fingers still, much as I would open a container in the lab that could potentially spew toxic substances.

  Nothing came out, so I walked out a few paces and circled to see from a distance what lay inside. My hand had crept up to my throat. I made myself lower it.

  In the box, jewels shimmered in the soft pillow light, maybe a topaz-y color. The problem with colored light was you didn’t get good color resolution on other objects. The gems seemed inert, so I walked up slowly, watching them with close attention, mental feelers out for anything untoward. It was a necklace of stones. Small, like a choker. No, wait—a collar.

  What was with these people and their collars?

  “Oh, ha-ha,” I said, and reached out to snap the lid shut. Darling stopped me with a curious chirrup. “No, we can’t use that—it might be a bad idea.”

  Darling pictured me twirling around, wearing the jeweled collar, fluttering and flirting, petting it with my fingertips.

  “Oh yeah—that’s me. Like I would ever wear anything from Falcon, much less something that implies I’m his tame pet.”

  Never again.

  “No, I don’t want to keep it for myself, but I’m worried there’s some kind of trap in it. We should use something else.”

  Darling patted it with his paw and meowed demandingly.

  “You don’t get to insist. You’re the Unfamiliar and I’m the Ever-So-Powerful Lady Sorceress. Remember who you’re talking to.”

  Darling rumbled a purr and bent down to delicately lick the collar. Then pictured the collar and helmet with shining topazes on them.

  “You don’t think there could be a hidden trap?”

  Darling chirruped, adding more topazes to the image.

  “Well, I guess this is your culture and you know it better than I do.”

  Darling purred agreement.

  “Okay, if you’re sure. Now this last image—is that your final answer?”

  He sent the same picture again, which I took as a yes.

  “You don’t think the amber of the topazes is a little much with the purple short-plume? No? Fine.”

  It only took a moment for the breast plate, spiked collar and little helmet to appear, studded with smaller versions of the topaz stones. I’d used the collar as it sat in the wooden box and allowed Darling’s armor to manifest in its place, along with a wish for protection and a wash of the cleaning ideas I’d been using on the food and water. It would have been easier to manifest it on him, the way he so clearly pictured it, but I wanted to be sure I didn’t fuse it to his fur or something else horrible. Fortunately I seemed to be fine with expansion and contraction of mass, conveniently bending that aspect of thermodynamics. And here my advisor had despaired of my tendency to cherry-pick the neurophysiology theories I liked best. Shows him.

  “Hold still,” I had to remind Darling as I buckled the straps. “Stop preening around. There—got it!”

  Immediately Darling dropped from the workbench and trotted across the room to leap onto my vanity. He pranced in delight in front of the mirror, examining himself from all angles, the golden topazes gleaming, the purple ruff spiked with a matching golden zebra mottling. He cocked a gimlet eye at me and sent me a picture of himself ten times taller, grabbing little soldier figures in his sharp teeth and claws, flinging them about like dolls.

  I hummed the tune of “Scotland the Brave,” and Darling danced in place to the war beat of the song. Snatches of the lyrics ran through my mind, with all the bold hearts, nodding plumes, death and gore.

  I shivered at Darling’s enthusiasm. Hopefully he understood he was only a small cat in reality. He was truly my only friend here. I reached out to pet him, but he huffed at me and sprang down, heading out to show off his outfit.

  “Don’t you want me to take it off, so you can sleep?” I called after him.

  But he slipped out the tent flaps and I was alone again.

  You are without friends. Rogue’s voice echoed in my head. So I was.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The Promontory of Magic

  When Dragonfly woke me an hour before dawn, I stumbled to my clothing trunks and stood there in a bleary haze.

  Two things hit me.

  I had not dreamed about Rogue. Oh yeah—go, Powerful Sorceress Gwynn!

  I had completely forgotten to take care of my own “uniform.” Not so swift.

  I didn’t like to contemplate Falcon’s reaction if I showed up without one. He’d probably order me squeezed into some manga fanatic’s idea of a battle-maiden sex-slave.

  No, a magic gown I had p
romised—a magic-seeming gown I would deliver.

  Not at my best in the mornings, especially when the supposed dawn looks pretty much the same as night—glowing pillows do not make for perky morning light—I wasted several minutes thinking about how to make one of my gowns look magical and special. Then the obvious solution hit me. I pulled out the box with my Ann Taylor dress and heels. The cold sponge bath left a great deal to be desired, but sliding on the black silk panties instead of the stupid linen long-johns things? Sheer heaven.

  Zipping up the dress felt like attaching my own skin again. Another piece of my psyche settled into place. Whether Blackbird was right and the material itself held magic, or the magic was just in the confidence of wearing something I’d picked out on my own and bought with money I knew I’d earned, a sense of rightness settled over me.

  I brushed my hair out and left it loose—seemed more sorceress-y that way—and “did” my makeup as I would for a normal work day. Only I was going to battle, not the university. Oh wait, not that different after all. I chuckled at myself, pleased that my mental tone sounded more firm this morning. Not filled with the uneasy dread of night.

  The morning lingered chilly and misty, so I pulled on a cream velvet cloak—and quickly changed it to black. Then to deep red, so I wouldn’t look too funereal. Magic was also handy for wardrobe accessorizing.

  Larch stood between the blazing torches that still flanked the entrance to my tent, holding the reins of a horse. The same horse I had ridden here, so she must be officially my horse now. She shone creamy white in the flickering light. I sighed to see that now the mare had been decorated with plumes and bells more suited to a parade than a battle.

  “What’s her name?” I asked Larch.

  He shrugged.

  I scratched the white forehead under her silky forelock and she snuffled sweet hay-breath at me. I tried to dip into her mind for images. A feeling of running and grazing, mixed in a muscular joy. She was pleased to see me again.