The Iron Dragon's Daughter

by Michael Swanwick

  "Yeah, she told me she had to do some ribbon-cutting," Jane said. "So?"

  "So you should've seen this elf she was with. Tall, dark glasses, silk suit, manicured nails—the whole nine yards." Salome shook her hand, as if to cool off her fingertips. "Hot stuff. In strictest confidence, mes cheris, I would not mind having a piece of him myself."

  "What are you saying? Gwen wouldn't be going out with some elf. She's Peter's girl."

  "Bullshit," Hebog said. "I saw them after the ceremony when they didn't think anybody was looking, and he put his hand on her ass. She liked it too."

  "They left together," Salome added.

  "I'm sure you're—"

  "Boogie at four o'clock," Hebog growled quietly. "And closing fast."

  Jane twisted in her seat and saw Grunt, smiling broadly, bearing down on them. "Shit!" she hissed between her teeth.

  "It's my darling, darling students! What an unexpected—nay, a delightful—surprise. Do you mind if I join you?"

  They scooched apart and, turning, Grunt placed his fat bottom between Salome and Jane. He spread his arms to either side and hugged their shoulders, pulling them against him. Hebog sat at the end of the bench, scowling darkly.

  "Now this is indeed a fortuitous encounter," Grunt said. "Yes, fortuitous indeed. You know, some children think of their teachers as purely locational phenomena. Educational apparati that disappear when the school day is done. Perhaps you believe that we retire to a line of freezers in the basement, eh? To awaken fresh and unspoiled in the morning." He laughed lightly. "Would that it were so easy. As your demiurge—and I assure you that insofar as you are concerned, I am nothing less—I am responsible not only for your mental growth but your spiritual and moral development as well. Your place and position in the larger world. My job does not end when you step out the door. Oh, no, no, no."

  Jane tried to focus on what he was saying. But his armpits stank and his dust-frosted wire rims gleamed in rather a sinister manner whenever he turned her way. He was hard to follow.

  "My every waking moment is spent focused on my students—yes, it is. I am constantly worrying about you. Let me give an example. Suppose that one of my children is not what she appears to be. Let us say that she is putting on a false front. Perhaps all her life is a sham and a deception. She is a fugitive from her rightful state, a horrid, nasty creature who does not belong in my nice class, where her mere presence threatens to corrupt her innocent, unsuspecting classmates."

  He was staring straight at Jane. Something moved behind the milky disks of glass and in a flash of horror she realized that whatever it was that crawled about there, it was not his eyes. "When such a thing happens, it is my job to rip off the mask of lies. To strip away the robes, bras, and girdles of deceit. To leave truth standing naked! trembling! exposed! and helpless in the sight of all."

  A thin, sour beeping arose from his wrist. Grunt looked down at his watch and touched a pip on its side. "Well. This has been pleasant, but I fear it's time I were on my way. Have fun, and remember: I have my eye on you." Through all his speech, his benevolent smile had never wavered.

  For a long moment nobody spoke. Then Salome broke into tears. "He doesn't know a thing," she said frantically. "He doesn't know a thing. Even if he does, what the hell business is it of his, I'd like to know?"

  "He's bluffing," Jane agreed. "I'm sure he's bluffing."

  "Well," Hebog said, "looks like the hudkin's not gonna show." He sighed and dug into his pocket. "I've still got a little left from the white crosses I moved last week. My treat?"

  "You're on," Jane said.

  She had no idea what Salome and Hebog thought was going on, and unless she wanted them to know all about her past and origins, she was in no position to ask. But coming so soon upon the child catcher's visit, Grunt's speech could have only one possible meaning. She wondered could the dragon protect her from two searches? Six? Surely not a dozen. Half his batteries were shot—Jane had yanked the worst of them and tossed them out back for the meryons to scavenge—and his alternator was ready to go. There were limits to his power.

  She couldn't focus on her own problems, though. Her mind jumped restlessly about, jerking wildly away from but always returning to the intolerable fact that Gwen was cheating on Peter.

  * * *

  Not everybody was invited to Gwen's midsummer barbecue at the Little Tavern on the Green. It only seemed that way. Students mingled with townies, teachers with local celebrities, technical staff and overdressed administrators from the television station with elves in casual togs that cost as much as a gwarchell might earn in a month. They mingled and separated, like so many beads of oil of different viscosities, always regrouping down the lawn with their own kinds. Jane felt like a mouse in a maze. Timidly she moved between shifting groups of strangers, in search of someone she knew.

  Trotter and Stinch came staggering in a four-legged walk across the greensward, arms about each other, shoulder pushing against shoulder. "Ratsnickle's looking for you," Stinch leered. Trotter smiled blissfully and said nothing.

  "Oh, please!" Jane made a face. "Tell him you didn't see me. Tell him I'm not here. I'm not up to coping with him just now."

  "I thought you two were friends. He told us you were close as close. Pals. Chumsy-wumsies." Trotter reached up to grab at the nub of Stinch's left horn and Stinch slapped the hand away. Their faces were gummy where they touched, as if they were melting together. "Said he made you—taught you everything you know, gave you a new name, molded you out of raw clay."

  Trotter reached around Stinch's neck and into a bulging shirt pocket. "Wanna see something really neat?"

  Coolly, Jane said, "I've seen that trick already. Stuffing a live frog in your mouth does not impress me."

  "Speaking of Ratsnickle—" Stinch began.

  "—here he comes now," Trotter finished for him.

  Without looking, because if they weren't lying and she met Ratsnickle's eyes she would be caught, Jane scuttled around a nearby clump of partiers. Using them for cover, she fled.

  Seconds later she ran across Hebog. He was one of a knot of uncomfortably overdressed dwarves that looked up angrily and dissolved on her approach. His face was flushed, his expression distraught. "Hello?" she said. "What's wrong?"

  Hebog ignored the question. "You seen Salome?" he asked and not waiting for an answer: "Doesn't matter. She's not going to want to talk with me anyway. Not after what I did to her."

  "What did you do?"

  He clenched his fist. "Doesn't matter."

  "Okay."

  "I said it doesn't matter!"

  "Okay, okay! I said okay, all right?"

  "Yeah, well. If you see her tell her I was looking for her." He turned and stumped away.

  Jane was still staring after him when a hand touched her elbow. She whirled. It was the pale man. A cigarette dangled from his mouth. He held an outsized cup of beer in one hand.

  The pale man looked alarmingly out of place in short pants. His knees were knobby and fish belly white; the sunlight seemed loath to touch them. "I put in your application for scholarship aid through the school secretary," he said. "It won't do any good."

  "What?" she said blankly.

  He took her arm and strolled her toward the shaded side of the tavern. White-dressed waiters shot through its doors, trays in hand, trailing steam. "How much Grammar do you have?" he asked.

  Jane shook her head. She had no idea what he was talking about.

  "It's the queen of sciences," he said testily, speaking around his cigarette. "You really ought to—well, never mind. Let me put it this way: There is a logic to the shapes of lives and relationships, and that logic is embedded in the stuff of existence. The lover does not awake one morning convinced he would rather be an engineer. The musician does not abandon her keyboard without regrets. The CEO does not surrender wealth. Or if he does, he will find it easier to give up everything, find a cave in the mountains and become a philosopher than to simply downscale his life-style. You s
ee? We are all of us living stories that on some deep level give us satisfaction. If we are unhappy with our stories, that is not enough to free us from them. We must find other stories that flow naturally from those we have been living."

  "So you're saying… that I'm living a story in which I don't get financial aid? Is that it?"

  He shook his head. "It's not you. The secretary is living a story in which she doesn't give you financial aid. It's a subtle distinction, but a crucial one. It gives you an out."

  "What do I have to do?"

  "You have to look at yourself through her eyes. She sees a troublemaker, a dilatory student, someone with 'potential'—whatever that might be—who is lazy, who will never apply herself, who neglects her studies, and on whom a scholarship would be wasted."

  "But I'm not like that!"

  "What does that matter? In her story that's who you are, and in her story your sort rarely changes. Occasionally, though, it happens. Your low qualities are channeled for low purposes. Strawwe used to be just like you before he snitched on his friends."

  "What? I wouldn't!"

  The pale man had smoked his cigarette down to the filter. He lit a new one from the coal, and ate the butt. "You'll have to weigh the alternatives. On the one hand it's an unpleasant story to live. Your former friends will despise you and they may even beat you. You won't respect yourself. On the other hand, people you like don't get scholarships. You can keep your own story or you can get a doctorate in alchemy. But you can't do both.

  "Think about it."

  His speech done, the pale man looked away. Somebody drifted between Jane and him. She took a step back. The masses of partiers shifted, and without having moved he was gone. Jane started after him, was shunted to one side by a waiter, and ducked between two trolls. She found herself by the tavern's front door. Not far away Grunt and Strawwe the proctor were deep in conversation. Strawwe looked up and nudged Grunt. They both stared directly at her.

  For an instant she stood frozen in their gaze. Then a strolling pair of Tylwyth Teg broke the circuit of vision, and she retreated into the tavern.

  The foyer was high-roofed with wooden beams. Two folding tables had been covered with white paper and set up with shallow plastic glasses and bottles of wine set in tubs of ice. The steward was absent from his post. Nobody was looking. Jane poured herself a glass of red.

  Then she noticed that somebody had left the door to the cloakroom open. She put down the glass and slipped inside. It was too hot for jackets, but a short line of purses sat dowdily on a shelf above the empty coatrack. She went through them almost reflexively—some coins, purple eye shadow, a Descartier watch—and stepped back into the foyer before the wine steward could return.

  She picked up the glass and raised it toward her lips.

  "No, dear." Gwen appeared at her side and firmly took the wineglass from her hand. Jane, flustered, began to apologize. But before she could manage a coherent word, Gwen said, "It's white wine with fish." She put the glass aside and poured a new one. Dipping the tip of her little finger, she flicked a drop onto the floor for the Goddess. "This is a white Caecuban. I think you'll like it. It's a little on the sweet side, and very crisp. Take a sip."

  Jane took a miserly mouthful. She'd never had wine before. It tasted awful. She nodded. "Very nice."

  "Isn't it? Come on, help me with the salmon. I'll show you how."

  The grills stood at the center of the green. The tavern's barbecue chef stood aside for Gwen, and she accepted a pair of tongs from him.

  After a quick look at the fish, Gwen laid down the tongs on the worktable and rolled up her sleeves. She cut a lime in half and squeezed its juice into a tub of softened butter. "Take this," she handed another to Jane, "and use the fine mesh of that grater to get the zest into the butter."

  Clumsily Jane complied. Tiny flecks of green flew scattering into the tub. "Perfect!" Gwen took up a spoon and vigorously stirred them in. "These two on the end are almost finished." She took plates from a nearby stack, slid the salmon smoothly on, handed them to Jane. "Take a good gob of butter and dab it right on the center of each fish. Doesn't that look lovely?"

  "Yes."

  Gwen seized a brush and began basting the line of salmon with the lime butter they'd just made. Her enjoyment of this simple act was manifest. It was so like her to do this, as everything, with enthusiasm and pleasure. Jane felt dull and lumpish beside her.

  "Gwen, dear." An expensive-looking elf with the pink-fleshed face of a purebred going to age, came up behind her and bent to kiss the side of her neck. Gwen raised her chin with pleasure. Jane felt her face freeze. "What a lovely dress."

  "Do you like it?" The dress was long and white and flowing, with a green sash about the waist that set off her hair perfectly. Gwen lifted her skirt slightly to either side and twirled about to show it off. "My little sister gave me it. Have you met Jane?"

  The elf took her hand, bowed low over it, and brushed her knuckles with his lips. It was such a courtly gesture that Jane had no idea what he was doing until it was done. "Enchanted."

  "Yeah," Jane said. "Me too."

  "Falcone is a theater designer," Gwen explained. "He did the bonfire at the edge of the green."

  "The thing that looks like a wooden wedding cake, you mean?"

  Falcone smiled in a way that indicated the bonfire was a trifle. "You have exquisite taste in dresses," he said. "Did you make it yourself?"

  "Naw. I stole it from Eulenspiegel's down to the mall."

  "You'll excuse us," Gwen said. She seized Jane's hand and hustled her away so fast Jane almost dislocated her arm. The barbecue chef, who had been waiting politely nearby, stood back to the grill.

  Gwen took Jane aside to a bench in the shadow of the tavern and sat her down. Her eyes flashed. "All right. What is it?" She waited and then in a gentler voice said, "You can tell me. Whatever it is." Jane shook her head and Gwen took both her hands in her own. "Nothing's that bad. Give."

  "It's you and… Peter."

  "Ah."

  "I don't understand how you can—" She was beginning to cry now. "—with other guys. I thought that you and Peter—" The tears overcame her then, and it was a while before she could manage, "I looked up to you guys! I thought you were perfect."

  For a long time Gwen did not speak. When she finally did, her expression was somber. She was as serious as Jane had ever seen her. "Jane, you don't have the right to ask for an explanation. Do you see that? You haven't earned it. But because you're so dear to me, and because I love you, I'll give you one anyway. But I'm only going to tell you the once. Understand?"

  Sniffling, she nodded.

  "I cut a deal. I'm going to die on Samhain. In exchange for that I get to live as full and complete a life as anyone in the year before. I'm living that life right now. A big part of it is my relationship with you, my friends, my classmates, everyone who's gathered here. But love, physical love, is a major part of life too.

  "Jane, I know you'll find this hard to accept, but you'll almost certainly have more than one lover in your life. Most women do. And each one of your lovers will provide you with different emotional and physical satisfactions. Each will give you something, however small, that the others can't. Should my share be less than yours? I enjoy my lovers—I won't pretend otherwise—but even if I didn't, they're still part of the deal. If I don't bring a full life to the wicker cage, the sacrifice can't go through, and I won't be accepted. I don't want that. I keep my promises."

  "But Peter—"

  "Peter knows everything. He might not be completely happy with some of my choices, but he understands. Peter is the bedrock of my existence. There's nobody else who could take his place, and he knows that too." She stroked Jane's hair. "Do you understand now?"

  "No," Jane said. "But I'll take your word for it."

  Spontaneously, Gwen hugged her. "I feel so much closer to you after this little talk. Isn't that funny? I feel as though you really were my baby sister." Then she began to giggle.

/>   "What's so funny?"

  "You. You were so jealous of Falcone."

  "I don't see anything terribly funny about that."

  "Falcone doesn't like girls, silly."

  Gwen's laughter was high and silvery, and after a second, Jane's joined hers.

  * * *

  She found Peter perched on a log at the bottom of the bonfire. Beside him was the straw Gwen which he was to fling atop the heap later in the evening, after she herself had hurled the torch that would set the entire structure ablaze. A minor lord of television stood nearby, blocking shots for the camera troll.

  "Hey, Jane. I'd've thought you'd be with Gwen."

  "She's autographing publicity photos now. Then she's going to lead the morris dancing."

  Atop a distant stage a group of duppies were playing ska. They leaped and pranced in time to the music, skinny black creatures with dreadlocks and red eyes. "Well, that's Gwen. Did she show you her feet? We went out to the Pavilion last night and she danced so hard they blistered. She wouldn't stop, I begged her, she just laughed. I couldn't keep up. My knees were buckling, I was dying. It was as if somebody had shot fifty thousand volts right up her spine. She kept on dancing until her slippers fell apart. That's all she lives for."

  "Excuse me." The television lord approached Jane. "Allow me to introduce myself. I am Avistaro. And you are—?"

  "Who, me? I'm nobody. I'm just a friend of Peter's." Avistaro waited politely. "Jane," she said at last. "Jane Alderberry."

  "Ah." He consulted his clipboard. "You don't belong in this shot, you know, Jane. No, no, I'm not asking you to leave, not just yet. But you should be aware that this conversation may have to be cut short." He smiled insincerely.

  "I was talking with Gwen," Jane said quietly when Avistaro had turned away. "She told me you knew all about her and those other guys."

  "I guess I do."

  "Oh, Peter. How awful for you."

  "It's worse for Gwen. She's going to die and I only have to lose—well. I don't see where I'm in any position to criticize her, you know?"