The Thinking Woman's Guide to Real Magic

by Emily Croy Barker

  Nora thought frantically: If I hadn’t asked Aruendiel to take off that spell, if I’d kept the face Ilissa gave me, maybe he wouldn’t have found me so repulsive. Because Ilissa’s right, Aruendiel never showed any sign—only that one time. He’d rather be alone than sleep with me, she thought despairingly. If I were lovelier, like Ilissa—

  Careful, Nora told herself. Know your own secrets. All right, she thought sternly, I’m insecure about my looks. And yes, I’m jealous of Ilissa because Aruendiel was in love with her once. And maybe he still is, Nora thought, her heart wrung. Oh, hell, is it me or Ilissa thinking that?

  “I know you had an affair with him, years ago,” Nora said. “And then he dumped you to marry someone else. Quite humiliating.”

  “Oh, there are always two sides to these stories,” Ilissa said quickly. “Perhaps I was tiring of him. You know, he was a fine, passionate lover—well, you wouldn’t know. But I have had even better ones. Yes, far better. And in the end he showed his true colors. He broke off with me in the most crude and abusive way imaginable.”

  “Then you must be glad to be rid of him.”

  “Of course. He would not leave me alone, though. The trouble that man has caused me! All these years later, and he still hates me, still won’t leave me and my people in peace.”

  “Well, you also destroyed his marriage and killed him,” Nora pointed out.

  “I see he has told you all sorts of hateful things about me,” Ilissa said. “Yes, he was foolish enough to face me in combat, and he had the worst of it. I only defended myself. As for his wife—well, no one, least of all me, forced him to murder her.”

  There was something bracing about this conversation with Ilissa. Nora had never heard her speak so directly. “Dorneng must be a nice change for you. You don’t seem to have any trouble ordering him around.”

  “Dorneng. A sweet boy, really. So clever. He has been invaluable.”

  “He helped you escape, I see. And now what? Are you trying to start another war? Bring down Aruendiel for good?”

  “I wouldn’t mind that at all,” Ilissa said, smiling. “If the opportunity arises, I will take it. But what I really seek is peace and freedom for my brave, suffering people. We have been prisoners for too long! All we truly want is a place where we can live undisturbed, without walls, without hatred.”

  Another scheme for world domination, Nora was willing to bet. “And why do you need me?”

  “That is the best part, my dear. We are going to send you home again! Back to your own world. You’ll like that, won’t you? Poor thing, you’ve had such a hard time in this one.”

  “Mostly because of y—” Nora began to say, but broke off in a sudden yawn. All at once she was so exhausted she felt drunk. It was impossible to channel her thoughts properly; they flowed in every direction and disappeared.

  Her head dropped forward. After a moment, she sank down onto the ground, grateful to lie down and close her eyes. The deep snow cradled her body comfortingly in its strong grip, even as the chill sent a warning to her drowsing brain.

  I’ll freeze to death, she thought with some effort; I have to get up again.

  “Don’t worry, my dear, I’ll see that you’re warm. We want to keep you safe for now.” Ilissa’s silken voice waved above her like a bright banner. It was not entirely reassuring, but Nora could not stay awake long enough to remember why.

  * * *

  Nora opened her eyes to find herself in a small room with stone walls. Light trickled reluctantly through a high, wooden-barred window. It was very cold, although Nora was lying under a couple of blankets. Sloughing them off, she tried the wooden door, but was unsurprised to find it locked.

  A thought struck her, and quickly she searched through the folds of her skirt, the blankets she had slept in, and finally the straw on the floor of the cell, without finding what she sought. Discouraged, she wrapped a blanket around herself and tried to think of a plan. She tried working some magic, but she could neither break down the walls nor open the door. Perhaps because the walls were not real walls, the door was not actually a door, she thought, remembering what Aruendiel had said about Faitoren magic.

  She did manage to levitate herself enough to peer out the window, but all she could see was a snow-covered flatland. Here and there the skeletal trunks of stunted trees rose in clusters. She lowered herself to the floor and waited, shivering.

  Some hours later she heard movement outside. Then suddenly she was blinking in the explosive brilliance of unclouded sun on snow. The stone walls of her cell had disappeared, but now a silver chain led from Nora’s neck to Ilissa’s slim hand. Ilissa held it lightly but firmly, the way one holds the leash of a favorite small dog.

  Sunglasses, Nora thought, squinting painfully into the fierce white glare, what I wouldn’t do for a pair of sunglasses.

  “Here, darling.” Ilissa held out a pair of Ray-Bans. “You always have such good ideas,” she said approvingly.

  Nora took the glasses numbly and put them on. Ilissa slipped on a pair of her own, with big smoky lenses that emphasized the delicate planes of her face. She can read my mind, Nora thought. Did she do something to me while I was asleep? She found—

  “That nasty little braid of hair you were clutching—was it Aruendiel’s?”

  “Hirizjahkinis’s,” Nora said reluctantly. “Her token.”

  “I should have known. Such coarse hair. You had it hidden in your clothes, didn’t you? All the time we were talking last night, you were calling her. I’m disappointed, Nora. It was not very trusting of you.”

  “No, not really,” Nora agreed.

  “And you really believe that woman will answer your summons.” Ilissa looked at her with mocking pity.

  Nora shrugged. “I wouldn’t be surprised.”

  “If she manages to rescue Aruendiel, perhaps she will spare some time for you.”

  Nora felt her breath dwindle. “Where is he?”

  “Don’t worry, my sweet! He was still alive, at least when Dorneng left him.”

  “Where?”

  Ilissa only laughed. “You must be hungry.” She indicated a small lacquered table that had just appeared in the snow. A pair of roasted partridges roosted in a silver dish, mantled in a thick brown sauce.

  Until a minute ago, Nora had been famished. She had no interest in food now.

  “Just a bite?” Ilissa coaxed. “Perhaps something sweet?” The partridges were replaced by a satiny disk of dark chocolate cake, studded with fresh raspberries.

  Nora shook her head. “Where is Aruendiel?” she asked again.

  “You should eat something, my dear,” Ilissa said as a shadow passed overhead. Nora cringed, thinking of Raclin, but it was just the Avaguri’s mount. Dorneng landed, then stomped through the snow toward the two women.

  “We can leave now,” he said to Ilissa.

  “Already? Good.” Cake and table disappeared. “Come, Nora.” Ilissa tugged gently on the silver chain, smiling.

  Nora braced to resist, but once again she was dragged onto the Avaguri’s mount while her arms and legs were bound. Dorneng and Ilissa moved away to confer just out of earshot. Dorneng looked tense; Ilissa, assured and radiant, pressing some point that he seemed reluctant to accept. After a few minutes, they evidently reached some sort of resolution, and walked back to where Nora waited.

  Ilissa smiled at her as Dorneng took his seat on the Avaguri’s mount. “You’re going back to your world now, darling! I’ll see you again soon.” She leaned close to remove the chain from Nora’s throat and to adjust Nora’s wool cap, pulling it securely over her ears. Her warm fingers brushed Nora’s cheek, smelling of roses and cinnamon.

  For a moment, Nora wished fiercely that Ilissa was as good and kind as she made herself appear. She forced herself to look away. As the Avaguri’s mount rose, she watched Ilissa waving gracefully, and felt a crushing sense of loss and sorrow.

  Nora reminded herself that she was in deadly peril, and the burden lightened.

&nbs
p; Dorneng steered the Avaguri’s mount at a low altitude as though he were anxious to avoid scrutiny from afar. They were heading toward a thread of smoke in the bright western sky.

  “How long have you been working with Ilissa?” Nora asked. When Dorneng did not reply, she prompted him: “I’m assuming since sometime before you came to visit and almost turned me into a marble statue.”

  He shifted in his saddle. “That was a—she was giving me a proof of her good faith. She told me that I would be able to remove the ring that no one else could.”

  “For that, I almost wound up a statue?”

  “She didn’t say what would happen.”

  “Oh, she didn’t even hint?”

  Under his furs, Dorneng hunched his shoulders. “The transformation was supposed to be fast,” he said. “Painless. But Lord Aruendiel insisted on trying to slow it down, to stop it. Otherwise you wouldn’t even have known it was happening.”

  “I doubt that very strongly,” Nora said.

  Finally, they landed beside a small fire, burning sluggishly, surrounded by trampled snow—and then, a vastness of untrampled snow. Nora could see nothing else.

  But Dorneng was alert. He scrambled off the Avaguri’s mount and paced a wide circle around the fire. Occasionally he stopped and seemed to paw the air with a gloved hand. When he returned to the Avaguri’s mount, he looked excited, anxious. “Everything’s ready,” he announced, as though Nora would know what he was talking about. “They should be here shortly.”

  They were Ilissa and Raclin, presumably. “Ready for what?” she asked sharply, but Dorneng paid no attention. He scanned the empty sky, frowning, looking for Ilissa.

  Nora hazarded a guess: “Is there a door here to my world?”

  “Yes,” he said, with a suspicious look.

  “How do you go through it?”

  Another question that Dorneng refused to answer. He kept glancing at the sky as though willing Ilissa to appear. He made another circuit, now with the air of someone trying to distract himself.

  “Maybe they ran into trouble,” Nora said when he drifted close to her again.

  Dorneng bit his lip and eyed Nora speculatively. “She wants to kill you herself,” he said suddenly.

  “Kill me?” Nora repeated.

  “You married her son, right? She says she’s the only one entitled to kill a member of the Faitoren royal house. The problem is,” he added, with a harried expression, “we don’t have much time.”

  “What do you mean, kill me?” Nora tried to rinse the panic from her voice. “What does that have to do with the door to my world?”

  “I need you to hold it open. It could close at any time, unless I set a guard on it. So your blood needs to be spilled now.” He declared, as though to himself: “I don’t think I can wait.”

  “Oh, but I think you’d better,” Nora said quickly. “Ilissa will be very angry if you go against her wishes. You know what she’s like.”

  “She’ll be angrier if I let the door close,” he said. “It’s best to have a guardian.”

  Something stirred in Nora’s memory. I must wait, condemned for centuries long to guard this gate. The words engraved on a tombstone in a mountain graveyard. A spell, Aruendiel had speculated. Emmeline Anne, that was the name on the stone.

  “So this is one of those spells that’s powered by a dead person?” Nora asked incredulously. “You’re going to try to put me, my ghost, into a spell so that I can hold some stupid door open for you and Ilissa?” And the rest of the Faitoren, she realized. That was what Ilissa meant by a place where they could live undisturbed. Nora wondered if this meant her unsuspecting, unmagical world was in danger. Only if Ilissa didn’t get a TV show or a movie deal within a couple of weeks.

  Dorneng sighed. “I can’t wait for her,” he said, as though he had come to a decision. “She won’t mind that much. It’s not as though you were born royal.”

  Nora was dragged from her seat by invisible power. Inexorably she was hauled, pushed, rolled, pummeled through the snow. As she struggled in vain, Dorneng paced beside her, looking more relaxed now that he had made up his mind.

  “It will be quick. Not like the petrifaction spell. And when your blood is spilled in this world, and then your corpse is returned to your world, your ghost will haunt what’s in between,” he explained helpfully. “So the gate stays open.”

  “I won’t let you through!”

  He chortled. “You’ll do exactly as the spell commands you.”

  Oh, hell, Nora thought. Not how I’d planned to spend my afterlife. Aruendiel, where are you?

  “Aruendiel will be furious when he finds out what you and Ilissa have done,” she said aloud. “He’ll find you and kill you.”

  “I don’t think so,” Dorneng said. He chuckled again.

  In fact, she reflected, Aruendiel would also be furious with her, Nora, for being tricked by Dorneng, for not escaping, for not using the magic he had taught her. Think, she admonished herself. Think. There’s a fire right over there. I can borrow some of its power. I could burn these ropes right off, she thought. And damn, probably my clothes and most of my skin, too.

  They had stopped. This was the place where she would die. No more time left. Nora wriggled helplessly inside her bonds. Dorneng was fumbling under his furs. She heard the clank of glass as he produced a small stoppered bottle.

  “I want to save a little of your blood,” he explained.

  “Oh? What for?” Nora asked, buying time. “A souvenir?”

  “There may be some ancillary spells that I can use it for.” He reached under his fur cloak again. This time he drew out a dagger. He handled it with some pride, Nora thought. It had a silver handle inlaid with gold. Very pretty.

  He looked up at the sky one more time. “I don’t see her,” he said.

  “Probably because she’s too busy begging for mercy from Hirizjahkinis,” Nora said.

  “I doubt that very much,” Dorneng said, but he waited another minute. Then he leaned down and rolled Nora over onto her stomach. Standing astride her torso, he grasped a handful of her hair and yanked her head up from behind, much the way Aruendiel had held the ram at New Year’s. Dorneng’s grip was surprisingly strong.

  She saw the gleam of the blade from the corner of her eye. Then Dorneng paused as though to consider something.

  “These are new gloves,” he said thoughtfully. “They’ll be ruined.” Putting down the dagger, he pulled off his right glove with his teeth, then picked up the dagger again with his bare hand. The blade scratched her throat as he searched for the artery.

  She had never actually tried the spell before. But in her mind’s eye she could see it on the page of Vlonicl’s Magical Tactics, just past the beginning of the second chapter. “How to Roast Your Enemy Inside His Armor.” Here the enemy was wearing no armor, but the principle was the same. She hoped.

  The blade sketched a line of fire against her neck. She jerked back with a cry, thinking: It’s too late. He cut my throat.

  But Dorneng was screaming. He thrust his hand wildly into the air, as though to fling the dagger away, yet his fingers remained curled stubbornly around the handle. The air smelled like burned meat.

  Nora looked down. No blood on her cloak. A burn, not a cut. He’ll slash my throat anyway, she thought, if he keeps waving that blade around. She threw herself backward against Dorneng, and heard the muffled sound of breaking glass, then rolled off his body to one side.

  Dorneng sank hand and dagger into a rapidly melting snowdrift. His eyes were closed and he was swearing.

  Nora struggled against her ropes. She hadn’t realized how strong the spell was. She hadn’t expected it to cook his fingers—at least, not so quickly. Dorneng was now holding his blackened hand to his chest, and she could see the wondering rage in his face, the shock and fury that she had not only wounded him but tricked him, too.

  Grasping the dagger with his gloved hand, he wrenched it away from his injured one, then got to his feet. He had shredded h
er spell. The dagger was cool enough to touch now, cool enough to kill her with.

  Nora pushed herself backward, her eyes fixed on the blade. Dorneng took a step and stood over her. He was swaying, about to lunge. She braced herself.

  He shouted something. It took her a second to realize that he was shouting for help.

  Something round and white, like a balloon, hovered beside Dorneng’s head. No, not a balloon. She had the confused impression that he was clinging to a marble bust. Or it was clinging to him. The white thing touched his face, obscuring it.

  Dorneng’s cries halted. Then, with a spastic effort, he shoved the white thing away from his face with his good hand. The dagger dropped into the snow.

  “Help me!” he roared.

  “Why?” Nora dived for the dagger and managed to grab it with her bound hands. “You’re trying to kill me.”

  “Ice demon! You broke the bottle!”

  She began sawing at the ropes around her wrists, a complicated process that required her to hold the dagger as though she were about to stab herself. “Where’s Aruendiel, then?”

  “Help me!”

  “Where’s Aruendiel?”

  “Aruendiel? He’s—” Dorneng was craning his neck, trying to pull away from the white thing—the ice demon, apparently—but it was still holding him as close as a lover. Its head practically rested on his shoulder. “Maarikok—the keep—Ivory Marshes.”

  “Where’s that?” Nora demanded, but he only kept calling for help. “I can’t do anything right now,” she hissed. “You tied me up! Where’s Maarikok?”

  The blade frayed the last strand of rope, broke it. Nora’s hands were free. She went to work on the ropes on her ankles. As she hacked away, she registered from the corner of her eye that Dorneng was still struggling, the white head of the ice demon now pressed tightly against his face.

  When the rope finally gave, Nora stood up painfully and looked around. Dorneng had fallen to his knees. The ice demon had wound him into a tight embrace. He was quiet now. What does it do, kiss you to death? she wondered. There was something terrible about how limp and unresponsive his body seemed in the ice demon’s grasp.