by Jack Dann
The bony fingers released Deverish's sleeve, and he was free. With a wrenching effort he staggered forward and rejoined Panayotis and Wallaby. The priest's eyes followed him, but at a slightly wrong angle, and it was only then that he realized that the old man was blind.
As Deverish stumbled into the sunlight, Wallaby looked at him inquisitively.
"What was the old beggar whispering to you about just now?" he enquired, and then scowled as he saw Deverish's face. "You look white as a ghost, man. Have a swig of cognac, it'll do you good."
Deverish accepted numbly, noticing with clinical detachment as he raised the flask to his lips that his hands were trembling. His legs felt like jelly, but he followed Panayotis and Wallaby across the clearing, and it was only when they reached the edge of the copse of white spruce trees that he realized all the birds in the glen had fallen silent.
Wallaby was anxious to set out at once on foot for Thanatakis mountain and the lair of his quarry, but Panayotis dissuaded him.
"For such a trip you need pack animals, milord," he protested. "I have a cousin with a farm less than a kilometer away and I will go fetch mules and more supplies. While I am gone, rest here and eat so you will be strong for your journey."
Wallaby negligently tossed him a five hundred drachma note to pay his cousin, and the old Greek scampered off gleefully. Deverish had little desire to remain in such close proximity to the madman in the cave—he could still feel those dead, empty eyes fastened on him as if they could read his soul—but the experience had been so unsettling and had so jarred his already taut nerves that he could not have continued in any case, and now he eased himself gratefully to the ground at the foot of a birch, the tension gradually seeping from his body until he lay in a luxuriantly languid stupor in the dappled pool of shade beneath the tree. Wallaby lay stretched out beside him, gorging on a packed lunch of cold lamb, goat's cheese, olives and brandy, but Deverish had no appetite.
Panayotis returned within the hour, just as Deverish had begun to doze, leading on a tether two bony mules that appeared barely capable of supporting Deverish's weight, let alone Wallaby's twenty stone.
"My cousin let you keep these for two days, if you wish to stay overnight, but he say you should come back before sunset because the spirits of the old gods still walk the high hills at night and are sometimes thirsty for Christian blood." He crossed himself and then grimaced self-consciously. "My cousin is superstitious, of course, milord—he is just an uneducated man, he speaks no English."
Wallaby ignored the Greek's chatter but looked quizzically at the decrepit mules.
"Why have you brought only two animals?"
Panayotis' eyes shifted from Wallaby's and he shuffled his right foot nervously.
"Milord, it is impossible for me to go with you. You understand, there is the inn, I must be there in case other travelers come. . . ."
"The inn!" Wallaby roared, his face flaming, the cheeks puffing like twin blood sausages. "That flea-bitten hovel! Your only customers are a few pig farmers guzzling your foul pine-cone wine, and there are no travelers in this area except ourselves. You're our guide, man, albeit a paltry excuse for one at best." His voice dropped and he looked almost imploringly at Panayotis. "Without you we'll never find this place the priest spoke of. Surely you will not desert us now, just when we're so close to our goal?"
Panayotis was shamefaced. "Perhaps I can lead you to the foot of the mountain, milord, but no farther." The faintest edge of a whine tinged his voice. "From there you will have no trouble finding this place by the waterfall of which you speak. But I cannot go up the mountain with you."
Panayotis cast a quick fearful look over his shoulder at his holy man's cave, and Deverish realized with a surge of elation that the innkeeper had somehow picked up the old priest's apprehensions about their journey and was reluctant to be further involved. Deverish struggled lest his face register his joy, for this meant that at least he would be alone in the mountains with Wallaby.
He called Panayotis aside, cutting off Wallaby's sputtered protests over the guide's desertion, and spoke swiftly in colloquial Greek, striving to impart an earnest ring to his words.
"My dear Panayotis, I wish you would accompany us all the way up the mountain. My friend does not like to admit that he is no longer a young or agile man, and a climb like this could prove too much for him. With the two of us along the chances of any ill befalling him lessen appreciably."
He watched the Greek's face with wry amusement as servile respect for Wallaby struggled with superstitious awe of his cherished holy man in the cave. As Deverish had known, the latter conquered.
"It is impossible, Kyrios," he muttered miserably, looking down at his feet. "I do not know why you have come here, but I cannot accompany you beyond the foot of the mountain." He looked up anxiously. "Perhaps you can convince milord to call off this trip, since you feel he is not strong enough for it." His eyes brightened. "You come back to the tavern and I will prepare a fine meal with much wine and brandy. He forget about the mountain then, no?"
Deverish spoke with quiet sincerity. "No, Panayotis, I am afraid he will not forget. We must go on. I only pray he will not injure himself again, as he has in the past on mere piddling slopes. But you have done your best, and I am grateful for your presence on the initial stage of our journey."
As Panayotis dejectedly led the mules from the hermit's glen, Deverish reflected with fierce elation that it would come as no surprise to the old innkeeper when he returned alone.
The journey took the better part of the day, and when they finally reached the foot of Thanatakis mountain, Deverish was soaking with sweat. Wallaby's scarecrow mule had miraculously accommodated its rider's bulk, although the beast's belly sagged and nearly scraped the ground as they proceeded up the lowland slopes, luxuriantly carpeted with wild flowers, and reached the more rugged terrain leading to the Kanakatos mountain range. Unable to adjust comfortably to the jarring gait of his beast, Deverish had walked most of the way, and by the time they approached the mountain his feet were numb and his legs moved with the jerky, automation stride of a mechanical toy. The cool, pine-scented air was honeyed with bee song, and the countryside was a study in brilliant color, its blues and greens scraped fresh from a painter's palette, but Deverish stumbled on obliviously, anxious only to reach their destination and to be alone at last with Wallaby.
The climb had been uphill all the way, but never steeply, and it was difficult for Deverish to imagine they were really in the mountains unless he assayed a glance down into the valley and saw the cluster of rude cottages, in Panayotis' village, as if through the wrong end of a telescope, the inn itself a dollhouse study in miniature. Then Panayotis finally halted the party before a small gorge slashed into the barren face of the hillside. The sky was paling to rose and a breeze tinged with evening coolness lightly stirred the pines. The old Greek, anxious to depart, doffed his hat obsequiously to Wallaby.
"Whatever you search for, milord, I hope you find. I return now to the village to keep your rooms in readiness for your return." He glanced anxiously at Wallaby, who in fact had weathered the journey far better than Deverish and was now breathing in the cool air with greedy gulps, and added in humble benediction: "May God be with you both."
"Well, Deverish," Wallaby bellowed as the Greek departed, slapping his hands together in eager anticipation, "you're the unicorn expert. What now? Is he a nocturnal beastie, or shall we make camp and wait for morning?"
Deverish looked around him, at the empty gray crags thrusting desolate fingers into the darkening sky, and then let his eyes travel down past the rocky hillside, bare save for a few sparse pines, and on to the thickly forested valley below. Once Panayotis was well on his way there would be no other human being within miles of them, but this business was still best done at night.
"It's best we fortify ourselves with a light meal and proceed forthwith," Deverish told him. "I fear my expertise is less than you imagine, but once in the beast's territory I advi
se we strike quickly, lest he become alarmed by our presence."
"Good, good," Wallaby cried, "the sooner the better! This shall be a splendid hunt, my dear Deverish, a positively splendid hunt."
His eagerness dissolved abruptly, the beetling eyebrows knitted, and he scowled.
"If, of course, that holy man of Panayotis isn't just a lunatic amusing himself by inventing tales to send us traipsing down the garden path."
"My dear Marius," Deverish swiftly appeased him, "I can assure you the old priest knows this countryside as no one else, and claims with certitude to have seen such a beast. Wrong he may conceivably be, but of his sincerity there can be no doubt."
And thank God, Deverish added fervently to himself, that this tiresome child's charade shall soon be done for good and all.
His words served to rekindle Wallaby's enthusiasm, and they both wolfed a quick meal of goat's cheese and dates. Deverish's appetite had returned; the doubts and fears that inexplicably assailed him in the presence of the old hermit had dissolved like mountain mist the moment Panayotis departed and he was now exultant in anticipation of his final triumph.
As the sun passed below the pines and darkness settled gently over the peaks, Wallaby and Deverish tethered the mules, left behind the better part of their supplies, and proceeded through the gorge and up a hilly slope surmounted by a small clearing sentried by a solitary ring of stunted spruce trees. The carpet of grass in the glade had been beaten flat, obviously by the feet of living creatures, and was curiously free of wild flowers and weeds, as if cleared by the pruning hand of man. Deverish looked about uneasily for a moment, but nothing moved in the foliage, and the light of the full moon illuminated the hillside in photographic clarity.
Wallaby walked ahead gingerly, for all his bulk still nimble on his toes, clutching his Mauser.465 in both hands, while Deverish's own rifle remained slung negligently over one shoulder.
"Go softly now," Wallaby murmured, his eyes bright. "This is our quarry's terrain and one careless move may warn him off for good."
As they passed through the glade a faint murmuring broke the preternatural stillness, which Wallaby swiftly traced to a small stream meandering along the rocky hillside.
"You said the priest spoke of a waterfall," Wallaby whispered, and Deverish nodded contemptuously. It would be over soon now, but to fully savor his victory he must play the game out a bit longer.
They followed the stream for a few hundred more yards, as the whisper of running water rapidly swelled to a muted thunder. Deverish heard Wallaby's grunt of excitement ahead as they passed through a small grove of spruce trees and found themselves in another clearing facing on a steep ravine, where the stream ended in a foaming miniature white waterfall churning gently over a brief expanse of rocky hillside to form a tiny pool of clear crystal water.
Wallaby held Deverish back and scrutinized the area closely before scrabbling down the cliff side.
"Look!" he exclaimed, pointing at some imprints in the moist earth by the edge of the pool. "Hoofprints!"
Wallaby bent down to look closer, and his voice sang with excitement.
"Cloven hoofs! And no deer this far up! We've found him!"
Deverish held the rock he'd picked up as they passed through the gorge lovingly in his right hand, its roughly pitted surface sensuously caressing his palm.
"Deverish, my dear fellow," Wallaby cried exultantly, still on his knees, "you were right after all! I never should have doubted you." He turned his beaming face towards Deverish, as the younger man had hoped, and the eager, innocent child's eyes blinked only once as the rock struck down into his forehead, the jagged point splitting open the great ruddy face from hairline to the bridge of the nose, and exploding a slimy pudding of brain matter onto Deverish's hands. Wallaby died instantly, but Deverish was impelled to strike and strike again, until nothing remained of the face but a ripe pulp the color and consistency of the scooped innards of an autumn pumpkin. Finally, exhausted and alternately laughing and sobbing, Deverish rose to his feet and with considerable difficulty dragged the great body back across the clearing and to a steeper cliff face plunging into a black ravine at least three hundred feet deep, and at the bottom studded with needlelike crags.
He extracted Wallaby's billfold from the inside jacket pocket and rifled tenderly through the sheaf of bills, almost five thousand drachma, and another thousand back at the inn where he, as Wallaby's grief-stricken comrade, would soon have access to it.
Deverish tumbled the bloated body over the edge and listened with satisfaction to the seconds that elapsed before it landed with a soft plop on the rocks below. It was done.
Deverish turned, picked up his rucksack and rifle, and as an afterthought tossed Wallaby's gun over the edge of the ravine, sighing deeply as his lungs drew in the cool night air tinged with the clean, heady scent of pine. He looked out over the ravine for a long, final moment and was about to light a cheroot before returning to the rough camp at the foot of the gorge, when he experienced a disconcerting sensation of eyes fixed hotly on the back of his neck. It was absurd, of course, an obvious trick of nerves, but he turned and sighed with relief when he saw there was nothing.
Deverish was halfway back towards the gorge when he felt the same prickling sensation again. He swung around, annoyed at his ready indulgence of such fancies, and a scream gurgled silently in his throat. Less than five feet away a silver shadow gleamed in the moonlight, its contours indistinguishable save for two huge, luminous eyes looking imploringly into and through his, just as the old priest's had, and registering incomprehension tinged with a pity more terrifying than any accusation. Deverish jerked the rifle to his shoulder and convulsively snapped off three shots.
The creature made no sound but sank to its knees, dipping a slender spiral horn to the earth as if in salutation, or relief. Deverish covered his eyes with his hands, but when he finally stopped trembling and looked again, there was nothing on the ground before him; and when he staggered forward and closely scrutinized the spot where the thing had been, nothing remained but a tiny mound of silvery dust, which the breeze quickly snatched away in coruscating swirls that sparkled oddly in the moonlight.
Deverish returned, shaken, to the camp, the money in his pocket momentarily forgotten, as the wind grew in intensity and howled through the trees with manic frenzy before waning at midnight to a gentle breeze whispering through the forest like a sigh. Across Europe, in that summer of 1914, birds cried in the darkness, and new dreams crept into men's minds as old dreams died; while four hundred and twenty miles from the mountains of Thessaly, in the city of Sarajevo, the Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip passed a restless night loading and unloading his automatic pistol.
Introduction to Vonda N. Mclntyre's "Elfleda":
Vonda N. Mclntyre was trained as a geneticist, taking a BS degree from the University of Washington, but embarked on a writing career instead shortly after attending the famous Clarion Writer's Workshop. She first came to prominence in 1974, when her novelette "Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand," won the Nebula Award. By 1979, her novel Dreamsnake had won the Nebula and the Hugo Award, as well as selling to paperback for a high five-figure advance, and she had become one of the most popular, as well as one of the most critically-acclaimed, of all the "new" SF writers of the seventies. Her newest book is Fireflood and Other Stories, a collection. Her other books include a novel, The Exile Waiting, as well as an anthology she co-edited with Susan Janice Anderson, Aurora: Beyond Equality.
Here she uses her knowledge of genetics to tell a haunting and melancholy tale of those who are forever doomed to a strange and painful kind of exile. . . .
ELFLEDA
Vonda N. Mclntyre
I love her. And I envy her, because she is clever enough, defiant enough, to outwit our creators. Or most of them. She is not a true unicorn: many of us have human parts, and she is no exception. The reconnections are too complicated otherwise. Our brilliant possessors are not quite brilliant enough to integrate nerves dir
ectly from the brain.
So Elfleda is, as I am, almost entirely human from the hips up. Below that I am equine: a centaur. She is a unicorn, for her hooves are cloven, her tail is a lion's, and from her brow sprouts a thin straight spiral horn. Her silver forelock hides the pale scar at its base; the silver hair drifts down, growing from her shoulders and spine. Her coat is sleek and pale grey, and great dapples flow across her flanks. The hair on the tip of her tail is quite black. For a long time I thought some surgeon had made a mistake or played her a joke, but eventually I understood why this was done, as from afar I watched her twitching her long black-tipped tail like a cat. My body has no such artistic originality. I hate everything about me as much as I love everything about Elfleda.
She will talk to me from a distance; I think she pities me. When the masters come to our park she watches them, lashes her tail, and gallops away. Sometimes she favors them with a brief glimpse of her silver hide. Her inaccessibility makes her the most sought-after of us all. They follow after her, they call her, but only a few can touch or move her. She is the only one of us who can ever resist their will. Even this freedom was their creation; they are so powerful they can afford to play with the illusion of defiance.