The Thinking Woman's Guide to Real Magic

by Emily Croy Barker

  Hirizjahkinis’s red boots were moving through the snow with swift determination.

  “Why didn’t you land in the courtyard?” Nora asked her.

  “Oh, Aruendiel’s protection spells are ridiculously strong!” Hirizjahkinis said. “It is almost a sign of timidity, don’t you think?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t say that,” Nora said, although, as always, she could not help but relish the élan of Hirizjahkinis’s pronouncements on Aruendiel. At the gate she thought again of Aruendiel’s injunction not to leave the castle. Not one step, he had said. But now he had authorized her leaving, had ordered her to leave.

  Sure enough, nothing terrible happened as she went through the gate. An Avaguri’s mount was tethered just outside the wall. Nora was reassured to see that Hirizjahkinis’s mount, unlike the one that Aruendiel had made, had a broad saddle with stirrup-like supports for the feet. Hirizjahkinis indicated that she should seat herself. Nora turned to Mrs. Toristel for a good-bye hug.

  “He wouldn’t send for you, not this way,” Mrs. Toristel hissed in Nora’s ear. “He’d come to fetch you himself. He wouldn’t trust even her—not with you.”

  Nora hugged Mrs. Toristel a little tighter and thought of black elves and how Mrs. Toristel had never liked Hirizjahkinis; what a shame she couldn’t be more tolerant of female magicians and people with darker skin. And yet what Mrs. Toristel had said about Aruendiel—that he would come himself—felt like the truth. She heard again the cold, angry seriousness in his voice when he had called Nora Ilissa’s prey and forbade her to leave the castle.

  Was there some mistake? That was definitely Aruendiel’s handwriting in the note, Nora thought, as she turned away from Mrs. Toristel and toward Hirizjahkinis. But Mrs. Toristel must have seen the confusion in her face.

  “I should send some supplies with you,” the housekeeper said loudly, catching Nora’s arm. “Some bacon, in case his lordship gets tired of the sausage.” She bobbed a slight curtsy toward Hirizjahkinis. “It won’t take but a few minutes, if you come back to the kitchen to help me, Nora.”

  “We are leaving now,” Hirizjahkinis said. She stepped toward them and took hold of Nora’s free wrist. All playfulness was gone from her voice. “We can’t waste any more time.”

  “What?” Instinctively, Nora tried to pull her wrist out of Hirizjahkinis’s grasp.

  Mrs. Toristel screamed. Loosing Nora’s arm, she sank down on her knees, her face like crumpled paper. Nora bent down to help her, but Hirizjahkinis jerked her away.

  “Hirizjahkinis? What the hell? Let me go!”

  “Please don’t struggle,” Hirizjahkinis said, grabbing Nora’s other wrist. “You’ll just tire yourself out, with nothing to show for it.” Her hands were like iron clamps. Nora kicked at her, hard, but the red boots feinted neatly. “Don’t be tiresome, Nora.”

  “This is Faitoren enchantment,” Nora said, kicking again—this time she connected with one of the red boots, and Hirizjahkinis grimaced. “Hirizjahkinis, listen to me. Ilissa has gotten to you—she’s tricked you. You don’t want to do this—not really.”

  “Oh, yes, I do,” Hirizjahkinis said, pulling Nora by the wrists toward the Avaguri’s mount. Nora scanned her dark face for signs of enchantment, submission to a foreign will, but she looked as wise, kind, and tough as ever. “Come on, sweet,” Hirizjahkinis added. “I don’t want to make things any harder for your friend than I have to.”

  “Mrs. Toristel? What have you done to her?” From the corner of her eye, Nora could see the housekeeper thrashing about in the snow. The sight energized her; with a mad twist, Nora pulled one wrist free.

  “Darling, I think I need a little help here,” Hirizjahkinis called.

  The Avaguri’s mount moved. It was not an Avaguri’s mount any longer. Its wings lifted—webbed and leathery, not feathered. It raised a long, toothy grin as friendly as a chain saw. Nora forgot to breathe, although her mouth was open.

  “Raclin, why don’t you take her now?” Hirizjahkinis said. “And—oh, what is this?”

  Blue fire had suddenly erupted underfoot, clutching at the red boots and the fur trim of Hirizjahkinis’s cloak. She clucked in annoyance, stamping her foot. The flames skirted Nora, but swarmed around Raclin’s clawed feet. He growled, raising one forelimb and shaking it. A spray of blue fire flew through the air and landed hissing in the snow, but it was not quenched; the flames streamed determinedly back toward Raclin.

  Aruendiel had not left his domain undefended. There was a new tension in the atmosphere, the throb of deep magic. From the direction of the forest came a savage howling.

  “Take her, I said,” Hirizjahkinis shouted, except that—it was all too clear now—she was not Hirizjahkinis. For a moment Nora wondered crazily if there had ever been a Hirizjahkinis. Then there was a blur of dark wings and blue fire, and she felt Raclin’s claws seize her from behind, digging into her arm and rib cage. He’s going to try to claw me to death again, she thought, and then her feet left the ground.

  “No!” Nora swung her legs, trying to wrench herself out of Raclin’s grasp, and for a glorious instant she felt his claws slip on her heavy cloak, but almost immediately he found a better grip under her armpit. She looked down. Mrs. Toristel was sitting up in the snow, her hand pressed to her chest—already too far away for Nora to make out her expression clearly. Nora leveled her gaze and found herself rising past the window of Aruendiel’s tower workshop, some four stories above the ground, and after that she could not bring herself to struggle anymore. With horrified fascination, she watched the castle roof and the snow-covered fields spin and dwindle beneath her dangling feet.

  She became aware that some sort of conversation was going on behind her—Raclin shrieking like broken machinery; a cool, sweet voice saying something musical and interminable in what Nora recognized, with heaviness in her heart, as the Faitoren tongue. She-who-had-pretended-to-be-Hirizjahkinis must be riding on Raclin’s back. She was trying to soothe Raclin, Nora decided after listening for a little while—perhaps something to do with the blue flames that were still licking around the edges of his wings, although unfortunately they seemed to be causing little real damage.

  “Ilissa!” Nora called over her shoulder.

  A delighted laugh. “Nora, dearest! You did know it was me, after all.”

  Too late, though. “Where are you taking me?” Now they were flying over forests—heading northeast, Nora guessed from the sun.

  “It’s going to be a lovely surpri—oh!” The air darkened around them; something whizzed past. A sound like rain hitting a metal roof. Raclin bellowed. The feathered shaft of an arrow was caught in the edge of his wing. Ilissa began speaking very fast in Faitoren, sounding angry.

  A flock of birds—they looked like starlings—wheeled innocently nearby. Then suddenly each bird slung itself again at Raclin, lean, sharp, faster than any starling could fly. The cloud of arrows hissed through the air, glinting in the sunlight. Steel tips, Nora thought—thank you, Aruendiel! She remembered how his sword had once bounced harmlessly off Raclin’s reptile hide, just as most of the arrows were doing now. But the creature’s skin must be thinner on the wings. A couple of hits in the right place could bring him down.

  A mixed blessing for me, Nora reflected, as another arrow punctured Raclin’s right wing, near the tip. They were at least a hundred feet in the air.

  The starlings were gathering again. Ilissa said something urgently to Raclin, who did a half twist in the air. He thrust Nora forward, holding her body between himself and the birds, and dived toward them. The arrows flashed, coming straight on, aiming so true that Nora saw them only as a sort of vibration in the air. Raclin, you coward, hiding behind me, she thought disjointedly, then closed her eyes.

  Something brushed her cheek, a feather’s kiss. She opened her eyes to find that the air was full of birds, flapping and swooping in a rather aimless fashion. Behind her, Ilissa laughed—a little shakily, Nora thought. “Ah, you see? I thought so. Aruendiel’s ready to spill Fai
toren blood, but not yours, Nora darling. So lucky we brought you with us today!”

  Chapter 41

  They flew for several hours. Nora had a faint hope that Raclin would burn up in a blue blaze—he kept screeching as though he might be in pain—but Ilissa kept crooning in Faitoren, and eventually the blue flames died away. By then, the light was fading. Below them, Raclin’s shadow stretched out huge and ominous against the reddening snow.

  But he’ll be human again as soon as the sun sets, Nora thought. I mean, Faitoren. And what happens to us then? Will we just fall out of the sky? It might be an opportunity to escape. But where would I go? The landscape below seemed to be empty of everything but an occasional bare tree.

  Suddenly, Raclin changed course slightly. After a minute, she saw that what she had taken for a tree’s long shadow was actually a framework of some kind. An Avaguri’s mount. Raclin landed next to it with a jolt. Nora staggered a little, her legs twitchy and numb after dangling unsupported for so long. A stout figure in a long fur cloak came toward them, stamping through the snow. There was just enough light left for Nora to see his face.

  She looked hard to make sure she was not mistaken. “Dorneng?” she said, disbelief tipping into anger.

  Dorneng gave a nervous laugh and stepped past Nora, evidently with the aim of helping Ilissa off Raclin’s back. But Ilissa was already picking her way past Raclin’s outstretched wing, her slender hands emerging from a froth of white fur to seize Nora’s.

  “Nora, you did wonderfully well,” she said warmly. “Dorneng, she came just like a lamb, almost no trouble at all, and on the way here, she saved us from one of Aruendiel’s spiteful little tricks.” Nora basked in a sudden glow of pride; then, horrified, she tried to slide her hand out of Ilissa’s clasp. Ilissa smiled beautifully at her and tightened her grip.

  Dorneng was looking worried. “So some of his defenses were still active? I thought I’d found ways to block all of them.”

  “Some of them, darling. Poor Raclin bore the brunt.” Ilissa cast sorrowful eyes at Raclin, who gave an explosive hiss, like the door of a subway train releasing. “But Dorneng, you did very well. I’m so grateful.”

  Ilissa’s smile was luminous in the twilight. Releasing Nora, she kissed Dorneng lightly on the lips, then shifted backward as he reached for her. If it was an evasive maneuver, she made it appear to be part of the lovely, continual dance of being Ilissa.

  “I must talk to you—privately,” Dorneng said to Ilissa, jerking his head toward Nora. “I have news.”

  “Good news?” Ilissa said invitingly.

  “It might be.” He took Ilissa by the arm. After what looked to Nora like a fractional second’s hesitation, she let him lead her away into the dimness, until all Nora could make out was the blue-white sheen of Ilissa’s fur robe and the low, somewhat urgent murmur of their voices.

  “Eeew,” Nora said aloud. Dorneng and Ilissa, that was a pairing she had never contemplated. And that Ilissa did not quite like to contemplate either, judging from appearances. Poor Ilissa, she thought with some glee, quite a comedown after Aruendiel.

  At her side, a man laughed. Nora spun around. “My mother’s paramour, you mean? It’s no worse than what I had to put up with in my bed, darling,” Raclin said. “All for the good of the Faitoren people.”

  It was too dark to see him clearly, and Nora was rather thankful for that. Because his voice, even when he was insulting her, was rich, confident, caressing, and she remembered now how much she used to love listening to it. “Sorry about that,” Nora said through clenched teeth. “Terrible misunderstanding on both sides. So why go to all this trouble to bring me back? I mean, look, you got rid of me once. You’re free.”

  “Oh, that’s not the point,” he said. “The point is, you shouldn’t have done what you did.”

  “You mean, run away because you tried to kill me?”

  “I didn’t try to kill you,” he said reasonably. “It was an accident, and you made it worse by panicking and falling down those stairs. So that was stupid, but what you did afterward—leaving, taking up with that man—that was unforgivable. Ilissa was beside herself.” Raclin laughed again, a little bitterly. “It would have been all right if you’d died,” he added, with the air of trying to find something agreeable to say. “My mother loves planning funerals almost as much as weddings.”

  “Is that why you kidnapped me?” Nora hated the way her voice shook. “So you can have my funeral?”

  Raclin made a tut-tutting sound, elaborately soothing. “I’m not going to hurt you. Unlike some men, I don’t murder my wives.”

  “Turning me into a marble statue—that wouldn’t count as murder?”

  “Ah, well, it was very wrong of you to try to take off my ring. It’s a symbol of your fidelity, your purity.” He went on, ignoring the rude noise that Nora had just made. “And the cripple—he should have known better than to turn me into stone.”

  “I liked you better that way,” Nora said, as Dorneng came crunching through the snow. He held a coil of rope in his gloved hand.

  “Your mother wants to talk to you,” he said shortly.

  “It’s a great pleasure to see you again, my dear,” Raclin said to Nora. He leaned down casually and put his lips on her mouth. For a moment, she had a maddening sense of déjà vu, a vivid recovery of those deep, endless kisses of Raclin’s that used to make her feel as though she might melt away down to her bones. She could taste the old sweetness. Pulling back, he laughed and said something in Faitoren—a joke, from the tone—and crunched away through the snow. Too late, Nora spat after him, trying to get the tang of something burned out of her mouth.

  Dorneng came closer, pushed her down into the snow. He began to wrap rope around her ankles. “I’m cold,” Nora said, but he did not answer. He conjured a silvery light—starlight, Nora guessed—and laboriously tied a knot. His bulldog jaw was clenched, giving him an obstinate, dissatisfied look. “Why are you helping her?” she whispered. “She’s only using you.”

  He gave a contemptuous grunt and went to work on binding her arms. He could have perfectly well tied the rope with magic—but then, Nora reflected, he would not have been able to grope her breasts. Sucking in her breath, she felt his fingers map her chest. “Has Ilissa actually slept with you?” she asked softly, “or is she just stringing you along?”

  “Shut your mouth,” Dorneng said. His free hand slapped her face, just hard enough to remind her who was the prisoner.

  “I thought so,” Nora said. “Get your hands off me, sheepfucker.” She twisted in his grip as he raised his hand again.

  “Enough of that, Dorneng.” Ilissa’s voice, silvery hard, from behind him.

  “I’m just tying her up, as you said.”

  “Thank you, darling.” She smiled at him. “I’ll look after her now. And now I think you’d better hurry, don’t you? So that no one’s alarmed by your absence.”

  “They don’t suspect anything,” Dorneng said, but he began to move toward the Avaguri’s mount. He gave Ilissa a sidelong, greedy look as he went. She blew him a kiss.

  The Avaguri’s wings started their slow cadence. Nora shivered in the gust of ice air as Dorneng took flight. “Well, thank you for making him stop,” she said to Ilissa.

  “You are still my daughter-in-law,” Ilissa said. “I cannot allow a wretch like that to manhandle my son’s wife. Now, do I need to tie up your hands, darling? Or can I trust you not to run away?”

  “Where would I go?” Nora asked.

  “I just don’t want you to do anything foolish. But you won’t, will you? You’re always so sweet, so reliable—at least when no one is filling your head with silly falsehoods. Of course I can trust you, isn’t that right, darling?”

  Nora nodded, felt a giddy rush of pleasure at the thought that Ilissa still trusted her, and then the prick of shame to have ever doubted someone so beautiful and gentle. How wonderful—but how typical!—of Ilissa to forgive such monstrous ingratitude. Nora let emotion flood through
her. Then, from another part of herself, high and free, she watched it slowly ebb and dry.

  Know your own secrets before Ilissa can steal them, Aruendiel had said. I miss Ilissa, she thought calmly, I miss how she made me feel: cherished, complete. That doesn’t mean I should trust her or believe anything she says, even if she can’t tell a lie.

  Nora pulled herself as straight as she could and shrugged off the rope. Then she reached inside her cloak to adjust the clothes that Dorneng had disarranged. It took her a little while. When she was finished, she wrapped the cloak around herself more tightly and finally looked up at Ilissa, her fists clenched in her lap.

  Help, Nora thought. Help. I’m Ilissa’s prisoner and I need help now.

  “I guess Aruendiel was wrong about one thing,” she said. “You can read and write. Like the note that you forged from him.”

  “Those little markings on paper?” Ilissa laughed incredulously. “Oh, darling, I don’t even know what it said. But you did, and that was all that mattered.”

  “Why did you kidnap me, Ilissa?” Nora asked. “Just so you can get back at Aruendiel?”

  “Do you really think Aruendiel cares anything about you, my dear?” Ilissa asked. She asked the question as though it were worthy of some consideration. “He hasn’t shown many signs of it, has he? In all this time, he’s never slept with you.”

  “My private life is none of your business,” Nora said. Had her months of uneasy celibacy left so obvious a mark? Or did Ilissa’s creepy intuition, the way she could so deftly find and manipulate one’s private fears and hopes, extend to literal mind reading?

  “Did he not even try to seduce you once?” Ilissa asked sympathetically. “Strange. He’s a man of strong passions, as I have reason to know. But perhaps you don’t appeal to him. You are no great beauty, after all. Not now.”

  No, not since Raclin had scarred Nora’s face. Not since Aruendiel removed the glamour that Ilissa had bestowed.