Dragon's Teeth Page 41

  He stood over her broodingly while he in his turn fought slumber, and touched her face gently. “Well—” he whispered, holding off torpor far deeper and heavier than hers could ever be—while she was mortal. “You are not aware to hear, so I may say what I will and you cannot forbid. Dream; sleep and dream—I shall see you safe—my only love.”

  And he took his place beside her, to lie motionless until night should come again.

  This was originally for a Susan Shwartz anthology, Sisters of Fantasy 2.

  Wet Wings

  Mercedes Lackey

  Katherine watched avidly, chin cradled in her old, arthritic hands, as the chrysalis heaved, and writhed, and finally split up the back. The crinkled, sodden wings of the butterfly emerged first, followed by the bloated body. She breathed a sigh of wonder, as she always did, and the butterfly tried to flap its useless wings in alarm as it caught her movement.

  “Silly thing,” she chided it affectionately. “You know you can’t fly with wet wings!” Then she exerted a little of her magic; just a little, brushing the butterfly with a spark of calm that jumped from her trembling index finger to its quivering antenna.

  The butterfly, soothed, went back to its real job, pumping the fluid from its body into the veins of its wings, unfurling them into their full glory. It was not a particularly rare butterfly, certainly not an endangered one; nothing but a common Buckeye, a butterfly so ordinary that no one even commented on seeing them when she was a child. But Katherine had always found the markings exquisite, and she had used this species and the Sulfurs more often than any other to carry her magic.

  Magic. That was a word hard to find written anymore. No one approved of magic these days. Strange that in a country that gave the Church of Gaia equal rights with the Catholic Church, no one believed in magic.

  But magic was not “correct.” It was not given equally to all, nor could it be given equally to all. And that which could not be made equal, must be destroyed . . . .

  “We always knew that there would be repression and a burning time again,” she told the butterfly, as its wings unfolded a little more. “But we never thought that the ones behind the repression would come from our own ranks.”

  Perhaps she should have realized it would happen. So many people had come to her over the years, drawn by the magic in her books, demanding to be taught. Some had the talent and the will; most had only delusions. How they had cursed her when she told them the truth! They had wanted to be like the heroes and heroines of her stories; special, powerful.

  She remembered them all; the boy she had told, regretfully, that his “telepathy” was only observation and the ability to read body-language. The girl whose “psychic attacks” had been caused by potassium imbalances. The would-be “bardic mage” who had nothing other than a facility to delude himself. And the many who could not tell a tale, because they would not let themselves see the tales all around them. They were neither powerful nor special, at least not in terms either of the power of magic, nor the magic of storytelling. More often than not, they would go to someone else, demanding to be taught, unwilling to hear the truth.

  Eventually, they found someone; in one of the many movements that sprouted on the fringes like parasitic mushrooms. She, like the other mages of her time, had simply shaken her head and sighed for them. But what she had not reckoned on, nor had anyone else, was that these movements had gained strength and a life of their own—and had gone political.

  Somehow, although the process had been so gradual she had never noticed when it had become unstoppable, those who cherished their delusions began to legislate some of those delusions. “Politically correct” they called it—and some of the things they had done she had welcomed, seeing them as the harbingers of more freedom, not less.

  But they had gone from the reasonable to the unreasoning; from demanding and getting a removal of sexism to a denial of sexuality and the differences that should have been celebrated. From legislating the humane treatment of animals to making the possession of any animal or animal product without licenses and yearly inspections a crime. Fewer people bothered with owning a pet these days—no, not a pet, an “Animal Companion,” and one did not “own” it, one “nurtured” it. Not when inspectors had the right to come into your home, day or night, to make certain that you were giving your Animal Companion all the rights to which it was entitled. And the rarer the animal, the more onerous the conditions . . . .

  “That wouldn’t suit you, would it, Horace?” she asked the young crow perched over the window. Horace was completely illegal; there was no way she could have gotten a license for him. She lived in an apartment, not on a farm; she could never give him the four-acre “hunting preserve” he required. Never mind that he had come to her, lured by her magic, and that he was free to come and go through her window, hunting and exercising at will. He also came and went with her little spell packets, providing her with eyes on the world where she could not go, and bringing back the cocoons and chrysalises that she used for her butterfly-magics.

  She shook her head, and sighed. They had sucked all the juice of life out of the world, that was what they had done. Outside, the gray overcast day mirrored the gray sameness of the world they had created. There were no bright colors anymore to draw the eye, only pastels. No passion, no fire, nothing to arouse any kind of emotions. They had decreed that everyone must be equal, and no one must be offended, ever. And they had begun the burning and the banning . . . .

  She had become alarmed when the burning and banning started; she knew that her own world was doomed when it reached things like “Hansel and Gretel”—banned, not because there was a witch in it, but because the witch was evil, and that might offend witches. She had known that her own work was doomed when a book that had been lauded for its portrayal of a young gay hero was banned because the young gay hero was unhappy and suicidal. She had not even bothered to argue. She simply announced her retirement, and went into seclusion, pouring all her energies into the magic of her butterflies.

  From the first moment of spring to the last of autumn, Horace brought her caterpillars and cocoons. When the young butterflies emerged, she gave them each a special burden and sent them out into the world again.

  Wonder. Imagination. Joy. Diversity. Some she sent out to wake the gifts of magic in others. Some she sent to wake simple stubborn will.

  Discontent. Rebellion. She sowed her seeds, here in this tiny apartment, of what she hoped would be the next revolution. She would not be here to see it—but the day would come, she hoped, when those who were different and special would no longer be willing or content with sameness and equality at the expense of diversity.

  Her door buzzer sounded, jarring her out of her reverie.

  She got up, stiffly, and went to the intercom. But the face there was that of her old friend Piet, the “Environmental Engineer” of the apartment building, and he wore an expression of despair.

  “Kathy, the Psi-cops are coming for you,” he said, quickly, casting a look over his shoulder to see if there was anyone listening. “They made me let them in—”

  The screen darkened abruptly.

  Oh, gods—She had been so careful! But—in a way, she had expected it. She had been a world-renowned fantasy writer; she had made no secret of her knowledge of real-world magics. The Psi-cops had not made any spectacular arrests lately. Possibly they were running out of victims; she should have known they would start looking at peoples’ pasts.

  She glanced around at the apartment reflexively—

  No. There was no hope. There were too many things she had that were contraband. The shelves full of books, the feathers and bones she used in her magics, the freezer full of meat that she shared with Horace and his predecessors, the wool blankets—

  For that matter, they could arrest her on the basis of her jewelry alone, the fetish necklaces she carved and made, the medicine wheels and shields, and the prayer feathers. She was not Native American; she had no right to make these things even
for private use.

  And she knew what would happen to her. The Psi-cops would take her away, confiscate all her property, and “re-educate” her.

  Drugged, brainwashed, wired and probed. There would be nothing left of her when they finished. They had “re-educated” Jim three years ago, and when he came out, everything, even his magic and his ability to tell a story, was gone. He had not even had the opportunity to gift it to someone else; they had simply crushed it. He had committed suicide less than a week after his release.

  She had a few more minutes at most, before they zapped the lock on her door and broke in. She had to save something, anything!

  Then her eyes lighted on the butterfly, his wings fully unfurled and waving gently, and she knew what she would do.

  First, she freed Horace. He flew off, squawking indignantly at being sent out into the overcast sky. But there was no other choice; if they found him, they would probably cage him up and send him to a forest preserve somewhere. He did not know how to find food in a wilderness—let him at least stay here in the city, where he knew how to steal food from birdfeeders, and where the best dumpsters were.

  Then she cupped her hands around the butterfly, and gathered all of her magic. All of it this time; a great burden for one tiny insect, but there was no choice.

  Songs and tales, magic and wonder; power, vision, will, strength—She breathed them into the butterfly’s wings, and he trembled as the magic swirled around him, in a vortex of sparkling mist.

  Pride. Poetry. Determination. Love. Hope—

  She heard them at the door, banging on it, ordering her to open in the name of the Equal State. She ignored them. There was at least a minute or so left.

  The gift of words. The gift of difference—

  Finally she took her hands away, spent and exhausted, and feeling as empty as an old paper sack. The butterfly waved his wings, and though she could no longer see it, she knew that a drift of sparkling power followed the movements.

  There was a whine behind her as the Psi-cops zapped the lock.

  She opened the window, coaxed the butterfly onto her hand, and put him outside. An errant ray of sunshine broke through the overcast, gilding him with a glory that mirrored the magic he carried.

  “Go,” she breathed. “Find someone worthy.”

  He spread his wings, tested the breeze, and lifted off her hand, to be carried away.

  And she turned, full of dignity and empty of all else, to face her enemies.

  Here is the first Valdemar short story I ever did, largely because I hate to waste a good story idea on something as small as a short story! This first appeared in the anthology, Horse Fantastic.

  Stolen Silver

  Mercedes Lackey

  Silver stamped restively as another horse on the picket-line shifted and blundered into his hindquarters. Alberich clucked to quiet him and patted the stallion’s neck; the beast swung his head about to blow softly into the young Captain’s hair. Alberich smiled a little, thinking wistfully that the stallion was perhaps the only creature in the entire camp that felt anything like friendship for him.

  And possibly the only creature that isn’t waiting for me to fail.

  Amazingly gentle, for a stallion, Silver had caused no problems either in combat or here, on the picket-line. Which was just as well, for if he had, Alberich would have had him gelded or traded off for a more tractable mount, gift of the Voice of Vkandis Sunlord or no. Alberich had enough troubles without worrying about the behavior of his beast.

  He wasn’t sure where the graceful creature had come from; Shin’a’in-bred, they’d told him. Chosen for him out of a string of animals “liberated from the enemy.” Which meant war booty, from one of the constant conflicts along the borders. Silver hadn’t come from one of the bandit nests, that was sure—the only beasts the bandits owned were as disreputable as their owners. Horses “liberated” from the bandits usually weren’t worth keeping. Silver probably came from Menmellith via Rethwellan; the King was rumored to have some kind of connection with the horse-breeding, blood-thirsty Shin’a’in nomads.

  Whatever; when Alberich lost his faithful old Smoke a few weeks ago he hadn’t expected to get anything better than the obstinate, intractable gelding he’d taken from its bandit-owner.

  But fate ruled otherwise; the Voice chose to “honor” him with a superior replacement along with his commission, the letter that accompanied the paper pointing out that Silver was the perfect mount for a Captain of light cavalry. It was also more evidence of favoritism from above, with the implication that he had earned that favoritism outside of performance in the field. Not a gift that was likely to increase his popularity with some of the men under his command, and a beast that was going to make him pretty damned conspicuous in any encounter with the enemy.

  Plus one that’s an unlucky color. Those witchy-Heralds of Valdemar ride white horses, and the blue-eyed beasts may be witches too, for all I know.

  The horse nuzzled him again, showing as sweet a temper as any lady’s mare. He scratched its nose, and it sighed with content; he wished he could be as contented. Things had been bad enough before getting this commission. Now—

  There was an uneasy, prickly sensation between his shoulder-blades as he went back to brushing his new mount down. He glanced over his shoulder, to intercept the glare of Leftenant Herdahl; the man dropped his gaze and brushed his horse’s flank vigorously, but not quickly enough to prevent Alberich from seeing the hate and anger in the hot blue eyes.

  The Voice had done Alberich no favors in rewarding him with the Captaincy and this prize mount, passing over Herdahl and Klaus, both his seniors in years of service, if not in experience. Neither of them had expected that he would be promoted over their heads; during the week’s wait for word to come from Headquarters, they had saved their rivalry for each other.

  Too bad they didn’t murder each other, he thought resentfully, then suppressed the rest of the thought. It was said that some of the priests of Vkandis could pluck the thoughts from a man’s head. It could have been thoughts like that one that had led to Herdahl’s being passed over for promotion. But it could also be that this was a test, a way of flinging the ambitious young Leftenant Alberich into deep water, to see if he would survive the experience. If he did, well and good; he was of suitable material to continue to advance, perhaps even to the rank of Commander. If he did not—well, that was too bad. If his ambition undid him, then he wasn’t fit enough for the post.

  That was the way of things, in the armies of Karse. You rose by watching your back, and (if the occasion arose) sticking careful knives into the backs of your less-cautious fellows, and insuring other enemies took the punishment. All the while, the priests of the Sunlord, who were the ones who were truly in charge, watched and smiled and dispensed favors and punishments with the same dispassionate aloofness displayed by the One God.

  But Alberich had given a good account of himself along the border, at the corner where Karse met Menmellith and the witch-nation Valdemar, in the campaign against the bandits there. He’d earned his rank, he told himself once again, as Silver stamped and shifted his weight beneath the strokes of Alberich’s brush. The spring sun burned down on his head, hotter than he expected without the breeze to cool him.

  There was no reason to feel as if he’d cheated to get where he was. He’d led more successful sorties against the bandits in his first year in the field than the other two had achieved in their entire careers together. He’d cleared more territory than anyone of Leftenant rank ever had in that space of time—and when Captain Anberg had met with one too many arrows, the men had seemed willing that the Voice chose him over the other two candidates.

  It had been the policy of late to permit the brigands to flourish, provided they confined their attentions to Valdemar and the Menmellith peasantry and left the inhabitants of Karse unmolested. A stupid policy, in Alberich’s opinion; you couldn’t trust bandits, that was the whole reason why they became bandits in the first place. If the
y could be trusted, they’d be in the army themselves, or in the Temple Guard, or even have turned mercenary. He’d seen the danger back when he was a youngster in the Academy, in his first tactics classes. He’d even said as much to one of his teachers—phrased as a question, of course—and had been ignored.

  But as Alberich had predicted, there had been trouble from the brigands, once they began to multiply; problems that escalated past the point where they were useful. With complete disregard for the unwritten agreements between them and Karse, they struck everyone, and when they finally began attacking villages, the authorities deemed it time they were disposed of.

  Alberich had just finished cavalry training as an officer when the troubles broke out; he’d spent most of his young life in the Karsite military schools. The ultimate authority was in the hands of the Voices, of course; the highest anyone not of the priesthood could expect to rise was to Commander. But officers were never taken from the ranks; many of the rank-and-file were conscripts, and although it was never openly stated, the Voices did not trust their continued loyalty if they were given power.

  Alberich, and many others like him, had been selected at the age of thirteen by a Voice sent every year to search out young male children, strong of body and quick of mind, to school into officers.

  Alberich had both those qualities, developing expertise in many weapons with an ease that was the envy of his classmates, picking up his lessons in academic subjects with what seemed to be equal ease.

  It wasn’t ease; it was the fact that Alberich studied long and hard, knowing that there was no way for the bastard son of a tavern whore to advance in Karse except in the army. There was no place for him to go, no way to get into a trade, no hope for any but the most menial of jobs. The Voices didn’t care about a man’s parentage once he was chosen as an officer, they cared only about his abilities and whether or not he would use them in service to his God and country. It was a lonely life, though—his mother had loved and cared for him to the best of her abilities, and he’d had friends among the other children of similar circumstances. When he came to the Academy, he had no friends, and his mother was not permitted to contact him, lest she “distract him,” or “contaminate his purity of purpose.” Alberich had never seen her again, but both of them had known this was the only way for him to live a better life than she had.