Dockalfar (17 page)

Those that could whispered amongst themselves in hysterical undertones. Death was still in their midst and they had no wish to keep it there.

The woman had gone, she had left Death. They wanted no part of it. None of them had ever heard tell of assassins or Ciagenii, but they instinctively knew that what lay trapped with the claws of tree roots wrapped about its limbs was deadly and boded nothing but ill for innocent fairy folk. They wanted it gone. They wanted…and this was a new emotion for fairy kind…revenge for their losses. They did not know how to go about either course. They feared going near. To release or to kill. They muttered and argued, wringing slender hands. And finally the eldest, the two that had seen the most of the world and of life, were elected to creep out into the glade and deal with the dark intruder.

They clutched limbs, both of them, in trembling hands. They circled the still form and darted nervous glances into the foliage that concealed their brethren. They almost bolted back into the wood, at a movement of Death’s head as he observed them. They stood trembling under the quiet gaze, mesmerized by glittering sidhe eyes.

Death was a sidhe. They knew sidhe.

Knew the forest sidhe who dwelt in secrecy and hunted at night. Sidhe were not all bad. But there were some, who lived far away who were. They had heard rumors of those. But this one was more like the forest sidhe, earth colored and not overly tall.

One of the fairies lifted his limb like a club. The eyes kept staring, unflinching and the elder lost his nerve. The club dropped and he turned desperately to his accomplice who looked no more certain.

They both wanted so much to be gone from this place. They wanted to dance in far away groves.

The one bent suddenly and tore at the roots binding one arm. The other stared for a moment, then crouched to help loosen the wood. They could not quite unbend it, but they made the dirt under it give enough for the sidhe to wriggle his arm free. They jumped back as he did that, sprinting for the wood, trusting Death to free himself. The mass of them fled, scattering through the wood. Not one cared to wait and see what Death would do. It would be quite a long while before they invited another outsider to share in their dance.

~~~

She started awake with the thrill of a forest fowl. She was awkward and cramped between the roots of the twisted tree she rested under. It was a bad position for sleep. She looked out past the forest line. The sun drifted toward the horizon of hills. It turned the sky a muddy orange. After so long within the wood, it was refreshing to watch evening turn to night. What sunsets she had seen here in Elkhavah were spectacular, untainted by pollution and enhanced by the very magic of the land. And the land did have magic.

She could sense it underlying the earth, the thin veneer of bark on the tree she rested on, in the spring at which she had slacked her thirst. This world was vibrant with it.

Comfortable. It was an ancient magic, that was vast and well controlled. How the mindless earth could possess so much greater a power than what resided within her and remain calm and serene amazed her. She was afraid to even look for the faintly glowing aura that surrounded flowers and vegetation. Afraid that even such small dalliance would create the foundation from which she would loose herself.

The undergrowth to her left stirred. She drew a breath, dreading intrusion.

Branches snapped and something ungainly forced its way forward. Great amber eyes, framed by leaves and bramble, peered out at her. It paused, then thrust the whole of its sturdy, gray-furred body towards her.

The gulun kit bawled out its annoyance at having to track her down. It twitched its long ears and walked right up the length of her to plant its paws of her chest. Victoria laughed in delighted surprise. Flabbergasted that the cub had found her after her roundabout trek. She buried fingers in the deep plush of its fur and hugged it to her. Phoebe’s complaints turned to rather deafening purrs. There was no judgment in the gulun. No abhorrence or fear in what Victoria was now capable of. Merely glad acceptance of her company.

“What are we going to do, baby?” she breathed into soft fur. Phoebe, of course, had no answer. She only stretched her claws and demanded her belly scratched.

Victoria did so for a while, lulled by cat purrs and warmth. Slowly, she became aware of another presence. As the realization grew, the fine hairs on her arms prickled. It was a quiet sense of presence, calm and patient. Almost, it willed her to take note of it. Carefully, she searched the darkening forest. If it was Dusk, she would never see him if he wished otherwise. But her very awareness of the presence led her to the belief that it was not the assassin.

Then she directed her gaze upwards and saw her observer. Motionless, but not taking overmuch care to conceal herself, Aloe crouched on a sturdy limb. Her eyes were shadowed and the light of her soul tightly shuttered. Victoria could sense nothing of her. She blinked up at the sidhe, for a moment doubting her own vision.

“Aloe?”

The sidhe did not move. There was a wariness to her. A tension. Victoria drew a shaky breath, feeling herself the cause of the vigilance. She rubbed her cheek against Phoebe.

“You brought Phoebe back to me. Honestly, I’d almost forgotten her.”

The sidhe stared silently and Victoria got the impression she was being observed inwardly as well as outward.

Finally Aloe shifted and her critical gaze wondered from Victoria to the hills beyond the fringe of forest. “What did you do?”

“What?” Victoria was startled by the quiet seriousness of the voice.

“What have you been doing these last few days?”

“H-How do you mean?” she stuttered.

The sidhe shrugged gracefully.

“Altered weather patterns. Enough noise to call the dead from Annwn in the forest. The fairy folk fled to the far reaches… you’ve been busy.”

“Oh,” Victoria mouthed. “That. I-I’m sorry. Did I do all that? I wasn’t quite myself for a while, but I’m better now. I think. How did you know about it all?”

“How could I not? Your magic has no control. It blares like thunder clap.”

“I couldn’t help it. I didn’t even know I was doing it… not all of it. I wasn’t sure about the storm. It seemed a little coincidental. It was so easy, it just swept me away. You’ve got to help me! You said you would.”

The sidhe held up a hand to quell her rising hysteria. “Calm. I said I knew those who could. You’ve got it under control now. Hardly a peep out of you. You’ll do all right. I just was not certain for a bit how to take you. Your magic is strange. I’ve never met a sorceress with so much power and so little control. I don’t know if you are entirely safe.”

“Sorceress? Is that what I am?”

Aloe shrugged. “Maybe. Do you have a human term you prefer?”

Victoria shook her head. “How do I do these things? Where did I get this power?”

“Human magic. I suppose it comes from human realms. I’m not an expert on your kind, Victoria. Ashara is. Talk with her.”

“Who is Ashara?”

“Lady of the Liosalfar. Very wise. Very powerful. She’s been to your mortal land many times. The Liosalfar live past the Hollow Hills. It was where I was taking you before you disappeared.”

“Disappeared? It was Dusk. He took me away against my will.”

“The Ciagenii? The Father will not be pleased to know ‘That’ was under his hill. What did you do with him?”

Victoria shook her head, not wanting to get into that particular subject. “I evaded him. He’s probably still out there looking for me.”

“Evaded? You are talented. Well, if he is looking, we had better not dally here.”

“It’s almost night,” Victoria reminded the sidhe. “Should we travel in the dark? Truth to tell, I’m very tired.”

“I’d rather risk the hills in darkness than the forest with a Ciagenii on the prowl. And this one does seem to be persistent. I’d also not wish to inflict ourselves on more of the hill sidhe if he insists on invading their domain in search of you. Unspeakably rude, you know. But what laws ever extended to Ciagenii anyway?”

“All right.” Victoria put Phoebe down and climbed stiffly to her feet. She was uncomfortable on the subject of Dusk, but vaguely curious to find out something more of the elusive assassin.

“Is it magic he uses, to totally shield himself? I could never see the inner light that everything else here has.”

Aloe leaped down from her perch and cast Victoria a skeptical glance. “He has no magic. No Ciagenii does. You see no soul-light because he has no soul. He’s a running dog. A creature that belongs to another. His soul was taken from him at birth and sold whatever lord bid the most to have a Ciagenii all of his own.”

“His mother sold him?” Victoria gaped.

“It’s the way. Ciagenii are… rare. Sought after. Your personal pest is probably one of five or six in the whole of Elkhavah. They are born with an inner knowledge, a reflexive sense, if you will, to know the one mortal weakness of every living creature. There is nothing alive that a Ciagenii cannot kill. What you have after you, my human companion is very, very deadly.”

“So they sell them. They take their souls?”

“Would you have a slave that could kill you in the blink of an eye and not have the ultimate control over him? Believe me, betrayal to the one who holds your soul is unthinkable.”

~~~

There was dancing. It was slow and surreal. Alex spun in ever widening circles with his arms around Leanan’s slender waist, her hands about his neck.

Her skirts whipped about his legs, her tiny bare feet soundless on the marble floors.

Other couples danced about them, graceful and almost studied in their movements.

The fairy musicians followed the ever wandering court as it danced. Their eyes were mournful and jealous. The court had no care. The drink and the night and the smell of incense chased conscious thought far away. There was only the eyes of the one you danced with, and the flickering of torch light on endless columns and the fog that tangled about their ankles. They danced in silence, no conversation or laughter. Nothing but the pure strains of music and the soft swish of material or the silky rasp of flesh against flesh.

There was nothing more. Nothing beyond the night. Nothing beyond the enchantment of the sidhe. The dance went on for eternity.

~~~

They traveled the night away and all of the next day. Victoria found strength somewhere. She and Aloe talked very little. But it was a comfortable silence.

Companionable. They walked, and Aloe hunted for Phoebe’s meals as well as their own. She showed Victoria where to look for tasty roots and how to call up a tidy cook fire when no wood or tender was available. It was a small magic, little more than calling forth the tiny dancing lights. Victoria delighted in it. It did not strain the fabric of her personality. She made fire flicker on the tip of her finger like a child with a new toy. Aloe looked on patiently. It was the first act of skill she had used her power on. The other things had come naturally, or as the result of emotional outbreak. She’d had no more control than she did over her breath. She could slow it, or even pause in it for a while, but she could not stop it. The fire was a concentrated effort. It was a discipline. And in the concentration and discipline, she found control.

“If you can’t control magic,” Aloe said to her once, “then it controls you. The more magic, the more control, or what happened to you happens. You loose yourself. We all have experiences with things like that, when we first learn to harness power. Just not so blatant.”

Victoria was perfectly happy. She now knew that what dwelled inside her could be tamed. It was a matter of learning how. She asked the sidhe to teach her something else, and after some thought, Aloe told her how to go about shielding her inner-self. Protecting the sensitive core of her soul. Aloe bade her try and see her own soul light and hard as she attempted, Victoria could not.

“You have to learn to construct a shield. A purely mental wall around your will and your soul. Shielding is easy. It’s reflexive once you get the hang of it.”

So she worked at the shield inside herself. Found it difficult to construct at first, found that drawing power and directing it inwards more complicated than affecting some outside subject. Her initial attempts were inept and Aloe easily wormed her way past the haphazard shields. Each time she did, she pointed out the misconstruction and Victoria shored up that portion of her faulty wall. Finally she had a combination of tactics that Aloe declared adequate if ungainly. She was amazed at the strength of the gawky shield.

They worked on perfecting and polishing it for most of their walk southward across the Hallow Hills.

Everyone should have a shield, she was told. Otherwise they might easily fall prey to some superior power and find their selves intruded upon. There were too many powers, Aloe said darkly, that were only too happy to enslave minions by a sheer drowning of one soul lit by a vastly superior one.

“But,” Victoria argued, “the soul is not a physical thing, or even mental. It’s an essence. How can you overpower an essence? A mind, a will, that I can see, but a soul?”

“A soul is your center,” the sidhe instructed her. “Yes, it is a body’s essence, but it is also a center of power. It is your soul that draws the power of magic. It is your soul that anchors you to a place…but not always to a body. If your soul is powerful enough it will cure almost any ill of flesh. Sidhe have the strongest souls in Elkhavah, that’s why we’re immortal. For a human, your soul is blinding. Here you might live forever.”

Victoria stared at her in shock.

“No. That’s not how it works in my world. Your body ages, you get old and die and your soul goes onward without it.”

Aloe sniffed. “Weak-souled creatures. Without a body there is nothing for a soul. It will either cure the one it resides in or find another.”

“Reincarnation? That’s not only a sidhe opinion. Some humans believe in that too. I don’t. I believe in God, and a heaven where our souls will retreat too when we die.”

“Heaven? I’ve heard of your human heaven. And your human Book of your human God. What does it say of us, this book?”