by Hiatt, Bill
Dad was still stuck on the phone, so I helped Mom clear the table and wash the dishes. Yeah, we had a dishwasher, but Mom actually liked doing the dishes by hand, and tonight I decided it was better to just let her do what she wanted to do. It’d be therapeutic, maybe.
I thought about using a little magic to calm her nerves, but under existing circumstances I was afraid to, so I settled for a hug. Then I took a little walk in the general direction of Stan’s house. Sure enough, he was walking over to see me. Normally, I would have taken him to my house, but with Mom already sensing King David within him, I just couldn’t take the chance. Instead we took a walk a couple of blocks over to the nearest park. Really it was a very small woodsy area with some pretty tall oaks around the perimeter, but it was a nice place to go think at times like this, and unless some guy was taking his girlfriend there, Stan and I would probably be all alone.
As luck would have it, we were alone. We sat down on one of the stone benches near the center. (Yeah, you’d think maybe having big hunks of stone in the middle of an area where kids play might not be the best idea, but hey, they looked classy!)
I was shaken to see how much my efforts to weld Stan and David together had decayed while we were in Annwn, and I set to work to reinforce them again.
“David was pretty well convinced that he might be able to break Alcina’s spell by praying over you. He really wanted out to give his idea a try, but I was kind of afraid to let him.”
“Good instinct,” I muttered as I worked. “Eventually, I think I can get the two of you fully integrated, but in the meantime, it might be dangerous to let him out. Even with his cooperation, it wasn’t easy to get you securely back in control the last time he emerged. He means well but doesn’t really know what he’s doing and can’t seem to be in proper sync with you without help. Besides, any number of things could go wrong while he’s out, especially if he loses connection with you like he did last time.”
Finally I had Stan back together, but the whole process had about the feeling of gluing an amputated limb back on. Well, actually my work was better than that, but I still didn’t feel satisfied with it.
Well, let’s see, if I couldn’t get Stan properly back together, when his past self was cooperating, how could I get Carla back together when Alcina would probably never cooperate and had the ability to put up much more of a fight than David could? I decided to leave that question, like so many others, for later.
Once Stan was about as fixed as he was going to get that night, he asked me what was wrong. We had been friends for so long that he did not need to be able to actually read my mind to tell what my general mood was. Since I couldn’t risk sharing the Carla/Eva situation with anyone else, I shared it with him.
He let me spill my guts for quite a while, and when I was finally done, he said, “I know this isn’t much comfort, but you were dealing with the Eva thing before. Maybe once you get used to it again—”
“Yeah, but to be honest, I was miserable then too. I guess I just have to hope…what’s that?” I could hear something like a distant whispering. Maybe now some guy was bringing his girl here.
“I don’t hear anything…oh, yes, I do!” said Stan quietly.
“Whispering?”
“Yes, but I can’t tell whether it is close to us or relatively far away.”
“Taliesin,” whispered the voice. I look at Stan, who nodded. He had heard my name too.
“Taliesin!” The voice still whispered, but it was becoming more insistent and felt louder, even though its actual volume remained the same. Stan and I began to search, and eventually we discovered that it was coming from one of the oaks. Yeah, never a dull moment in my life!
“I’m here,” I announced, feeling pretty silly for talking to a tree.
“Taliesin, you must come to me.”
“Who are you? Where are you?”
“I am Morgan, whom your friends have rudely barred from Santa Brígida. You have double-crossed me. I have Alcina despite you, but now you owe me a favor—and I intend to collect.”
Odd! I had been sure Morgan needed me only as a way of getting Alcina, but clearly something else was going on. For once, luck was with me, because now perhaps I could find out where Carla was.
“Morgan, you know I’m not just going to do your bidding. What assurance do I have that you won’t kill me, or that your sister won’t try to bewitch me again?”
“I offered you a tynged before. I am prepared to do the same again. Meet me at Goleta Beach tonight at midnight.”
“We need to have some tynged in place first, just to cover that meeting. We can work out the rest later, during the meeting.”
There was a long pause, but then the oak’s whispering began again. “Propose the oath.”
“Neither of us will harm the other in any way, physical or mental. Neither one of us will cast a spell on the other. Neither one of us will attempt to take the other prisoner. Neither one of us will bring anyone else to the meeting.” Stan started to protest, but I motioned for him to be quiet. “The tynged runs until the meeting ends, except that each of us will allow the other to depart after the meeting, making no attempt at harm or hindrance.”
“I swear to it.”
“As do it,” I responded. Weaving a proper tynged worked better face to face, but almost instantly I felt the spell snap into place, so I knew our efforts had been successful.
“Until midnight, then,” whispered the tree. After that the whispering ceased, and I could feel the power in the park dwindle to nothing. Morgan’s presence was gone.
“You shouldn’t have done that!” protested Stan. “Morgan never does anything that isn’t to her advantage. She can’t get at you in Santa Brígida, so she’s tricking you into leaving it.”
“At least we know our security arrangements are still working,” I said with a chuckle.
“This isn’t funny, Tal. You know you can’t trust her.”
“Yeah, but I need to take the chance. She obviously wants something more than just getting Alcina back. My only way to find out what she wants is to meet with her. Oh, and Stan…”
“Yes?” he asked, already suspicious.
“You can’t come, and you can’t tell anyone else. You have to promise me.” Stan looked ready to refuse. “You really have to,” I insisted. “If anyone else shows up, Morgan will probably take off, which would pretty much defeat the purpose. Promise not to come or tell anyone.”
“Oh, all right,” said Stan after a long pause. “But you better come back unharmed, Tal. I would never be able to forgive myself if I let something happen to you.”
“Nothing will happen. She can’t do a thing to me, remember?”
Glancing at my watch, I saw that it was already ten o’clock at night. I walked a still-nervous Stan back home, chuckling a little to myself, because I used to walk him home in the old days to keep bullies from beating him up. I’d hate to see what would happen to a bully who tried to beat up Stan now! I thought. It seemed hard to believe the number of changes in our lives between August and December.
I finally pried myself loose from Stan, made some excuses to my parents, climbed in the Prius, and headed for Goleta. Yeah, I was going to get there way before midnight, but that gave me a good opportunity to prepare. I hadn’t been to Goleta Beach in a long time, but it was a simple drive from Santa Brígida: south to I-101, west to the 217, west again to the Sandspit exit, and then over to Sandspit and down to the beach. Hell, I could have done it in my sleep. When I got there, I parked as far north, away from the beach, as I could, and I didn’t get out right away. Instead, I sung myself into the most highly spell-resistant state I could achieve, I morphed my eyes enough to give me night vision, and I sped myself up so that I could move as fast as Morgan. If Stan were there, he would have asked why I was doing all that if I was so sure the tynged would hold. Well, I wasn’t taking any chances. I would never have admitted it to him, but Stan was right—Morgan would not be having this meeting unless she thought sh
e could gain something from it. Tynged or no tynged, I was going to be careful.
When I was ready, I got out of the car and glanced around. I thought I remembered some kind of lighting in the parking lot area after dark, but I wasn’t seeing any sign of it now. Budget cuts, probably, and the beach was certainly closed this late, but the darkness did put me a little more on my guard. There was a little moonlight, but the moon was almost entirely covered by clouds, so it was a good thing I had given myself night visions. Looking north, I could see the glow of headlights from the 217, and with my heightened vision, I could make out the much closer row of palm trees on the north end of the beach. Everything looked normal so far.
Then I looked south and remembered just how big the beach was. To my left (east) was Goleta Beach County Park, with more palms and other trees, as well as a pier that started at the shoreline, just south of a seafood restaurant and a few other buildings, and jutted out into the ocean. As I scanned from left to right, I saw the various picnic grounds, volleyball courts, and other stuff like that; the beach was a fairly popular one, so whoever was in charge of it wanted to make it as attractive as possible to tourists and locals alike.
When most people think of beach, they think of sand, but Goleta Beach was sandy only near the water’s edge; the rest of it was as grassy as a regular park, with lots of trees, especially, but not exclusively, on the parking lot side. Some of the trees were big enough to hide behind, but I wasn’t seeing or feeling anything out of place. If I looked as far to the right as possible, I could just barely make out lights from UCSB, where Stan had the misadventure with a kelpie that nearly cost his his life. No obvious threat from that direction either, nor any sign of Morgan. No, wait—way down toward the pier, I could feel power building up. That had to be Morgan, but what was she doing with that kind of power? What purpose, within the scope of the tynged, could it serve?
What would Nurse Florence have advised me to do in this situation? Run like hell, probably. Well, I should get some credit for thinking about doing just that, and I really didn’t want to be overly impulsive, but damn, this could be a really good opportunity. I thought about Carla. True, I didn’t love her anymore. Apparently, I had never loved her. That didn’t mean, though, that I could just leave her to her fate. I had to risk whatever Morgan was planning in order to have a shot at figuring out how to rescue Carla.
I started walking in the general direction of the pier. Then I almost jumped when I heard Morgan’s voice coming from the opposite direction.
“Going somewhere? I thought we had a meeting,” said Morgan, almost playfully. I hadn’t felt her open a portal behind me, probably because I was so focused on the pier. Her pale skin gleamed in the moonlight, and the wind caused her black samite gown to rustle just slightly.
“And so we do. I thought you were over there, Morgan. Someone is using a lot of power.”
To my surprise, Morgan seemed thrown somewhat off-balance by that news, as if she had not been expecting it. “I just arrived, but yes, now I feel it too. Your water witches?”
“You know I couldn’t bring anyone with me, so if they were here, it would have to be the biggest coincidence in the history of the universe.” Morgan looked at me very intensely.
“If it is any one of your allies, it will tell me that you have somehow circumvented the tynged, and this meeting will be over.”
“I promise you I have nothing to do with whoever else is here, Morgan.”
Morgan’s eyes narrowed. “If you speak the truth, some third party may be trying to interfere in our affairs. We should investigate.”
“I’d suggest just moving our meeting somewhere else. Whoever or whatever is responsible doesn’t seem to be moving this way.”
Morgan laughed derisively. “And I thought you were brave! Well, if you won’t see what is happening, I certainly will.” With that she turned and started walking toward the pier.
Damn male ego! I should have left her to look into any third-party activities on her own, but the implication that I was a coward got to me, and I went along. Besides, she was still the only way I could find Carla.
As we approached, the power seemed steady, neither ebbing nor building, just…well, waiting was what it felt like, though what it was waiting for I couldn’t say. Using my enhanced sight, I spotted a figure walking out onto the pier, but I could not tell who it was. Like Morgan, the figure was dressed in black and had long, black hair, but beyond that I could not see enough at this distance. I probed at the figure with my mind, but whoever was there was strongly shielded. It was clearly another caster, and probably therefore the source of the power. If so, perhaps her appearance was coincidental. She continued to walk slowly out onto the dock, showing no interest in me and Morgan, if she even knew we were here.
Then I realized what was radiating so much power. It was a portal of some kind, but I had never seen one so big. Now that I was aware of it, I could see its faintly glowing outline. It centered on the pier, but it seemed to stretch for several yards in both directions from the pier, both above the water and below it. The woman on the pier was walking toward it, not purposefully, but almost like one hypnotized or possessed. Her steps seemed uncertain, but she never looked down, even though she came close to stumbling. She just kept her eyes straight ahead and took one halting step after another toward the portal. Within a minute she would step through it into whatever lay beyond.
If someone were trying to take her to some otherworld location against her will, then I should try to prevent that. I glanced over at Morgan, who seemed interested but not particularly alarmed.
“You were right, Taliesin. It seems whoever is at work tonight is here for someone else, not us.” She turned as if to walk away.
“I need to see what’s happening, Morgan. If you are no longer interested, just wait here, and I will rejoin you shortly.” Without waiting for her response, I bounded in the direction of the pier, yelling to the woman, who did not respond to the sound of my voice at all. There could be little question that she was under someone else’s control, and she was only seconds away from being snatched from the face of the earth. I stepped up my pace to faerie speed, and now I was only a few steps behind her.
Whatever lay beyond the portal, it was night there as well, and somewhere at sea, judging by the salt spray I could feel coming through. However, I couldn’t see much, even with enhanced vision. On the other side lay a moonless, starless night, but all I could see was darkness. Somehow the surface of the portal filtered away my night vision, leaving me effectively blind. The woman took another zombie-like step, and then I reached her, grabbed her, and spun her around. At my touch, she dissolved—a simple illusion, but I had fallen for it!
I knew I needed to get off that pier, but surprise caused me to hesitate just a second, and in that second a gigantic tentacle reached through the portal, grabbed me, and pulled me through. Almost the instant I felt myself passing into a different world, the portal winked out of existence, trapping me on the other side.
The one advantage to being on the other side of the portal was that I could now see what was going on better, but that advantage mattered little under the circumstances. The tentacle gripped me so tightly I could barely breathe, so tightly that trying to draw White Hilt was out of the question. The tentacle projected out of an ocean that was churning roughly, not so much from wind as from whatever lay beneath—probably a pretty good imitation of a 1950s B-movie giant octopus or squid would be my guess. In fact the ocean was practically bubbling with sea creatures, as if every living thing for several miles had been drawn to this point. I noticed more than a few shark fins and guessed that whoever had brought me here had also summoned all the sea life to make an escape more difficult. Looking further out, I saw the distant outline of an island, probably a pretty large one, though it was hard to tell from here.
“Don’t try to sing or spell cast,” said an all-too-familiar voice. I managed to twist my neck just enough to see Alcina riding a killer whale in my gene
ral direction. The masses of sea life parted to allow her through.
“Alcina, you are destroying your sister. By bringing you to the beach, she has broken the tynged. Perhaps if you let me go, there is still a chance that this breach will not fall upon her with its full force.”
Alcina threw back her head and laughed. “Lover, you couldn’t be more wrong. I haven’t set foot on your beach at all. Even if had, though, Morgan did not bring me. I was already at this very spot, ready to open a portal at midnight, when Morgan set up the meeting.”
Oops! Guess I should have proposed a different location. Goleta Beach did seem like a pretty odd pick, especially for someone unfamiliar with the area.
“Because I was already in this place, Morgan did not bring me. The tynged did not require her to disclose anyone who might already be at your beach, much less anyone who was in an otherworld that could connect by portal. Nor did the tynged require Morgan to tell you the truth once the meeting started, for that matter. And the tynged did not cover anything I might do on my own, only what Morgan might do. I could have my little friend crush you right now, and the tynged would not hurt a hair on Morgan’s head.”
Apparently I needed to hire a lawyer the next time I was setting up a tynged. Morgan had trapped me in a way I never anticipated.
“Where is Morgan?” I asked, trying to sound as if I didn’t really care. “I would have expected her to come gloat.”
Alcina smiled at that. “Oh, she will. She thought it best to stay behind for a few minutes and take care of your friends.”
“My friends? I brought no one.”
“Yes, like Morgan you brought no one. Morgan was aware that Stan was listening in. She imagined he would organize a little backup, even if you told him to stay away.”
“Alcina, she had better not hurt him or any of my other friends!” I tried to sound threatening, but it was pretty hard to carry off that effect when a gigantic octopus was just a few muscle twitches away from crushing me.
“My, such a shame that the tynged doesn’t say anything about what Morgan can do to anybody except you. I think she has been waiting for a long time to see if she could create a tidal wave. Now might be as good a time as any to find out for sure!”