The Monsters of Stephen Enchanter (33 page)

“The Blue Lady wants us to be delayed and damaged when we arrive,” he explained.  “We need to keep going for as long as we can, and hopefully take her by surprise.”

That night, it rained.

Early in the evening, clouds had gathered thick and obstructive overhead, blocking any guiding light from the stars.  Unwilling to move on in such gloom—or to take the chance of one of them mistaking water for land in the dark, and stepping into an impossibly deep puddle—the company stopped for the night.  They shared out a little food from the farmhouse and their earlier travels—kept dry and safe on Noble Steed’s back—and settled down to sleep.

Stephen had barely closed his eyes when something cold and wet struck his nose.  He grumbled and pulled up his hood, but soon the rain was falling steadily, seeping through the holes in his clothing and waking Youngster and Craggy.  So it was that the company spent a cold, miserable night huddled together trying to sleep.

By Craggy’s estimation, they had now traveled nearly half the distance to the Blue Lady’s cave.  That meant that they could arrive before nightfall the next day, if they hurried and met no major obstacles.

“Maybe we should take part of the morning to sleep, if we have so much time,” Youngster suggested, turning his face toward the sky.  “I think it’s stopped raining.”

“I think you’re right,” Stephen agreed, “but I don’t dare hesitate longer, lest it rain anymore and our way become impassible.  Look at the puddles.”

“It’s hard not to look at them; they’re everywhere.”

The puddles were, indeed, everywhere.  Every few steps, rivulets of rainwater had collected into shallow pools that weren’t shallow at all, but stretched down miles and contained all manner of creatures.  When Stephen peered at a raindrop poised on the edge of a leaf, a giant, round eye stared back at him.  He shuddered, and turned his attention to Youngster, who was speaking.

“We’ll have to leave Noble Steed,” he was saying.  “I don’t think she understands the nature of these pools—or their inherent danger.  She’s nervous, but I don’t think she knows why.”

“Noble Steed is an extremely intelligent horse,” Stephen proclaimed faithfully.

“In which case we ought to be doubly careful with her safety,” said Youngster.  “Do we have any rope, anything with which we might lead her?”

“Not unless you have some tucked in your pocket . . . and I have no desire to sacrifice any more of my robe.  But you’re right; we need to guide her.  I’ll walk on one side of Noble Steed and lead her.  You walk on the other, to catch the dangers I miss.”  He patted Noble Steed.  “You’ll walk with me, won’t you, Noble Steed?  You won’t run off or run against my will?”

Noble Steed tossed her mane haughtily.

“It’s like Youngster said,” Stephen assured her.  “We’re not doubting you or impugning your brilliance; we’re trying to keep you safe because we care about you.  We’d be devastated if you were harmed.”

This outrageous flattery placated Noble Steed, and she sidled up to Stephen, allowing him to place one hand on her neck so as to guide her.  Stephen retrieved his shovel for use as a walking stick.

The company began forward, but their progress was slow.  They constantly had to circumnavigate puddles and narrow streams of running water, forcing Noble Steed to jump mincingly when there was insufficient room to go around.  Noble Steed was unhappy with these constant changes in path; she couldn’t comprehend why her master continually took the longer path, when there was a clear way straight ahead.  Once or twice she nudged him, and couldn’t understand why he shouted in fear as he stumbled near a puddle.  It was just water, tasty and fresh, and she knew he wasn’t afraid of water.  What was wrong with him?

At last, she decided to show him that there was nothing wrong or scary about water.  She pretended to walk obediently then, when he was distracted, bolted forward, jumped, and slammed her right front hoof into a puddle of water—

—into it and down, deep down—what was going on?—and then there was just pain, and panic, and something horrible, teeth ripping at her leg.

“Get her out of there!” Stephen shouted, dashing forward, leaping over the offending puddle to haul at Noble Steed.  She was struggling, eyes rolling, refusing to calm down, refusing to listen to his voice, bucking, often nearly knocking him into a nearby pool.  Craggy and Youngster ran after Stephen helping him, grabbing at Noble Steed.

Then Noble Steed rallied, hauling herself back, lifting her leg from the water—or the remains of her leg.  The back half was completely eaten away, tendons devoured, entire chunks missing.  She would never use it again.

Noble Steed sensed her master’s horror and screamed again, knocking Stephen aside, stumbling backward—and landing in another pool, one of her back legs sinking.  She fell sideways and something cracked loudly—her other back leg had shattered under her sudden weight.

“Noble Steed!” Stephen called helplessly.  There was something heavy in his hands.  How?  He had somehow not dropped the shovel when running to help Noble Steed, and now he stared at its heavy iron blade.

“I’ll do it,” Craggy offered, holding out his hand, but Stephen fended him off.

“She’s my horse,” he said.  He swung the blade back and brought the flat heavily against Noble Steed’s skull.  She slumped, back leg still in the pool.  Stephen drew his knife, knelt by her head, patted it once, then slit the neck and watch her lifeblood slip away.

“Help me push her the rest of the way into the water,” he instructed Craggy and Youngster, not looking at either of them.  “She’s too heavy for me on my own.”

Without a word, they stepped forward and relieved Noble Steed of her luggage, then shoved and maneuvered until she sank out of view, down into the depths of a puddle two feet wide.

They walked on.

“She was a good horse,” Youngster said at last.  “She was incredibly loyal, too.”

“And no doubt Tinkerfingers was a good brother, and loyal too,” Stephen snapped back.

“That was uncalled for!”

“Yes; it was.  So be quiet.”

Craggy stepped wordlessly between them and they each looked away, ashamed.

Despite his injuries, Craggy was the strongest of the company, and kept them striding forth at a solid pace—much more solid a pace, it must be added, than had been achieved with Noble Steed.  So quickly did they travel, that when Craggy called a halt around five o’clock, he said they had gone the full fifty-five miles.

“I wonder where the cave is,” said Youngster.  “I don’t see it.”

“We might not have gone in a perfectly straight lines,” Stephen replied, “and who can say the accuracy of the Blue Lady’s instructions.”

“Sleep now,” Craggy instructed.  “We shall find her in the morning.”

“Sleep where?” Youngster wondered.  “There’s hardly any dry ground, and I don’t fancy rolling over in my sleep and waking up halfway down a shark’s gullet.”

Craggy pointed up to the boughs of a pine tree.

Stephen sighed.  This was going to be one stiff and uncomfortable night.

“I don’t fancy falling out of a tree, either,” said Youngster.  “We’d better take watches.”

“‘Will you walk into my parlor?’ said the Spider to the Fly”

—Mary Howitt

Sunlight struck Stephen’s closed eyelids far too early the next morning and he groaned, wondering what on earth had compelled him to choose a bed near an easterly window—and such a wretchedly uncomfortable one, too.  He groaned again and rolled over, reaching for his pillow—only to slip off the edge and fall—

Youngster’s hand snagged his robes and hauled him against the trunk of the tree.  “You idiot!” Youngster hissed.  “Are you trying to kill yourself?”

“I was asleep,” Stephen snipped back, grumpily.  Adrenaline and a close call with a twenty-foot drop and a very short stop was not how he liked to begin his mornings.  “I don’t often sleep in trees.”

“I noticed!  You were too busy being obliviously asleep to know, but this is the tenth time I’ve saved your skin this watch.  You will keep trying to roll!  It’s a good thing Craggy warned me about your sleeping habits, or you’d have fallen to your death hours ago.”

“Then thank you—for your care, not for your sarcasm.  Speaking of Craggy—where is he?”

“Scouting.  He woke up about half-an-hour ago, and I told him that I thought I’d spotted the cave.  Look, I’ll show you.”

Youngster climbed to a higher branch and pointed out through its pineneedles, apparently at nothing.  Stephen squinted for a long time, but nothing took any particular form, aside from that of ubiquitous land.

“You must have better eyes than I do,” he admitted.  “I can’t see any cave.”

“It helps that I had nothing else to do—except keep you from rolling—during my watch.  I watched the sun come up from this branch, and changing light throws perspective on things.  Do you want any breakfast?  Craggy and I have already eaten.”

Stephen gnawed on a chunk of the increasingly stale farmhouse bread and cheese, and waited for Craggy’s return.  There wasn’t much food left; they hadn’t had a chance to hunt, or stop by another town or farm, and Stephen suspected they had lost a good portion of their supplies in Noble Steed’s death throes.

Then again, they might not have opportunity to eat what little remained, after confronting the Blue Lady.

Craggy returned forty minutes later, his usual stoic expression betraying nothing.

“Any luck?” Stephen called down.  Then, on second thought, continued, “Although I’m not sure if finding the Blue Lady is good luck or bad.”

“How’s the land?  Still soaked?” Youngster added.

“I found the cave,” said Craggy.  “The way is passable.”

The way was indeed passable, and easily so.  Most of the water had soaked into the thirsty ground, so that their path was muddy, but not actively dangerous.  Only twice did they have to leap over puddles; the rest of the way—a mile or so—was clear.

Craggy led them to a grassy knoll, hunched over to guard the entrance to a small, dark cave.  The way was worn stone, carved by the passage of water..

“I’m impressed that you spotted this from so far away,” Stephen told Youngster.

“Now that I see it,” replied he, “so am I.  But at the time, it seemed perfectly natural that I would; the difference between the darkness of the entrance and the brightness of the grass shimmered and stuck out in my mind.  It makes me think that the Blue Lady knows exactly where we are, and utilizes her magic to return the favor.”

“Thanks,” mumbled Stephen, staring at the dark entrance.  The Blue Lady was waiting for them.  It was not a comforting thought.

“Torches,” said Youngster.  “We’d better make torches.”

“Everything’s wet.”

“They we’ll make smoky torches—unless you can enchant a stick to glow?”

Stephen shook his head.  “Torches,” he said.

“Torches.”

They spent several minutes searching for suitable sticks, then for something to wrap around them to burn.  In the end, they cannibalized yet more of Stephen’s robes—which now fell only to his knees; he’d better get new ones soon, or he’d be arrested for not showing enchanter’s colors.  After some trial and error, Craggy managed to catch a spark on the material’s edge . . . which quickly extinguished.  Then another.  And another.

“Oh!” Stephen exclaimed.  “I forgot; I fireproofed the material.  One moment; I’ll remove the enchantment.  Try it now.  And don’t you roll your eyes at me, Youngster!”

Youngster laugh, a strange sound in that gloomy morning, and the company suddenly became aware of where they were, and outside whose cave.

“Let’s go,” Craggy whispered, when the first torch was lit—he held a second and third in reserve.  “These may not last long.”

“And I don’t want to sacrifice any more of my robe than I absolutely must,” Stephen agreed.  He took the torch from Craggy and stepped into the cave.

“No, wait a minute,” whispered Youngster.  “Let’s leave the food out here—and any extra luggage.  We’ll need to be as light and quick as we can, and if we don’t make it back soon, we won’t need any of the rest, anyway.”

“You could have put that more cheerfully,” Stephen grumbled, but he unloaded his share before returning to the cave.

The cave was narrow but smooth, and sloped steadily downward.  There were no pitfalls or forks or dead ends; this passage had not been naturally formed; someone had directed the force of the water that had carved it.

No prizes for guessing who.

After perhaps ten minutes of walking, the path opened out into an enormous cavern, water-smoothed and faintly glowing with some natural bioluminescence.  Filling the cavern’s base, beginning at the end of the path, lay an enormous pool, diamond clear and faintly green.  It might have been shallow enough to wade or fifty feet deep; it was impossible to tell, with such incredibly translucent water.  It was not, however, bottomless; Stephen could see the bottom quite easily, in fact.  Like the water—or because of the water—or the water because of it—it was greenish, but also with hints of beige.  Also like the water, it was intensely, eerily beautiful. 

There was not a fish to be seen.

Upon the lake something moved, and there was a twinkling light, harsh and artificial next to the pale glow of the cavern.  A lantern!  Someone was poling a ferry across the cavern, heading directly toward the companions.  The poling figure was strange and hunched, not at all like the Blue Lady.  Its head was covered in a dark hood and it slumped so that its face was shadowed and only flickers of its horrible, wrinkled countenance flashed in the lamplight.

No, not wrinkled; scarred.

“Is it just me,” Stephen muttered, his voice booming across the cavern and echoing back to him, “or is that Letitia?”

“Letitia’s dead; the Blue Lady killed her,” said Youngster, but he was staring at the figure and his voice was unsure.  “That’s not her; it can’t be.  It looks like a—”

“A witch,” said Stephen.  And, indeed, for the first time, Letitia looked every inch the wicked witch of fairytale.

The witch poled the rest of the way to shore and threw back her hood, revealing luxurious blond hair.  “Get in,” said she, “and I’ll ferry you across to the Land of the Soon-to-be-Dead.”

“But you’re dead!” Youngster exclaimed.

“Not yet,” said the witch.

“We saw your head!  We held your head!  You are definitely dead.  What are you—illusion?  Lich?”

“That head wasn’t mine,” cackled the witch.  “It was a ruse, designed to attract your attention, to distract you, to push you into premature grief that you might be easier prey . . . and as a joke, of course.  The Blue Lady has a wonderful sense of humor, and loves jokes.  She searched the land until she found a girl who looked enough like me, after death, to convince you.”

“You’re working for her,” said Stephen.  “For the Blue Lady.”

“For the Fairy Queen, actually—but through her, yes, for the Blue Lady.  It’s a temporary arrangement, but not a bad one.”

“Traitor!” Youngster cried.  “How could you betray us like this—first to the Fairy Queen and then the Blue Lady?”

“Quite easily, actually,” the witch replied coolly, “when the alternative was losing my life.  I’m very attached to my life, and intend to stay that way.  Better yet, when I bring your heads back to the Fairy Queen, she will reward me generously for my service.  She will grant me permanent glamour, and anything and everything else that I desire—and my desires are far beyond what you poor fools can imagine.”

“You’re worse than the witch who was your mistress,” Youngster snarled.  “You have no heart at all!”

The witch inclined her head with a smile.

“What will you do after you have your glamour and heartless heart’s desire?” Stephen asked.  “Live as a witch?  Find a cabin in the woods, like your old mistress?  Move in with Robin?  Chase the Green Man or someone more inhuman still?”

“I shall live as I see fit,” said the witch, “and how I see fit is none of your concern.  Get in the boat; the Blue Lady is coming, and you’d be fools to arrive after she has.  She does not look kindly upon latecomers and being made to wait, and will increase the agony of your deaths tenfold for the insult.”

They got in.

Under their extra weight, the ferry rode low in the water.  Stephen peered over the edge, looking for the infinite depth and peculiar creatures that had hitherto proclaimed the Blue Lady’s presence, but saw none of it.  With temerity that startled him, Stephen trailed his fingers in the water, feeling it.  It felt cold but beautifully clean, and came up utterly clear when he cupped it in his palms, to taste.

“The Blue Lady likes her privacy,” said the witch, noticing he made observations, “and despises competition when it comes to meals.”

“Good thing you count as neither company nor rivalry,” noted Youngster.  “Which would make you . . . nothing at all.”

“You are three men going willingly to your deaths, preparing to be eaten by a pitiless monster,” retorted the witch.  “Which would make you . . .”

“Brave,” finished Craggy.

The witch snorted, but offered no further rebuttal.  She continued poling, until the ferry bumped against their destination—a small island in the center of the pool.  No, not quite an island; its surface rose only to about an inch below the water, so that no part of it was dry or inaccessible to the Blue Lady.

“Get out,” said the witch.

Built incongruously on the island was a sagging house.  It was large and wooden and sturdily built, but hopelessly waterlogged and stinking of rot.  There were no proper windows, only holes hacked in the side, and the door was so warped and bloated by water that it stuck outside its frame, unable to fit inside.  The witch motioned them into the house.

“Make yourselves comfortable,” she instructed, in a parody of hospitality.  Without waiting for them to obey, she turned away to work at a fire in a raised hearth, some two feet above the watery floor.  The witch lifted a long spoon from its hook and began stirring something hot and foul smelling in an enormous old cauldron.

Like the rest of the island, the floor of the house was coated in about an inch of water, except for one far corner, where the floor plunged away, so deep that Stephen could not see the bottom despite the clarity of the water.  Indeed, he had the uncomfortable feeling that it might have no bottom.

In accordance with the fairy Snork’s legend, the walls of the house were covered in cages.  The cages were small and golden and very elegantly and delicately built, but Stephen could feel the magic on them, strong magic, magic that would render the cages indestructible against all mundane means.  Stephen experimentally twitched the magic—or tried to.  It repulsed his careful touch with a violent shock—a warning from its creator: touch not, lest you be destroyed.