Children of Enchantment (22 page)

The black-garbed figure crouched like a spider before a blazing hearth, her hands extended over the flames. He could hear
the wind howl around the building, but in the warm chamber, the storm seemed far away. He stepped forward. “You know who I
am.”

She turned, and for a moment he thought he saw dark scales on the flesh of her hands before they disappeared beneath her garments.
“Who would not know the heir of all Meriga?”

“I do not know you, lady.”

She laughed, a hoarse, painful laugh. “You are the first to call me that in an age, Prince. You have your father’s courtesy,
if not his face.” And she laughed longer, as if that struck her even funnier.

“Have you a name?”

“1 had two names,” she said, “once, long ago.”

“And now?”

“I am Nydia, and this dark place is my home.” Her arms extended in a wide sweep and the veils across her face moved.

He caught a glimpse of something which did not look quite human.

“Thank you for your hospitality.” Roderic inclined his head.

She laughed again, and the flesh crawled at his neck.

“Well you may thank me, Prince, and well you will pay.”

He frowned. “Pay?”

“Never mind,” she rasped. She raised her arms, and this time, he did see her hands. Where fingers should be, three curved
digits ended in long claws. The flesh was dark and scaled, and he drew back involuntarily and shuddered. As he recoiled, she
clapped her two hideous claws together, and the slight-figured girl appeared in the door. Even as Roderic turned, the witch
beckoned, and the girl, her head still lowered, hurried to the witch’s side. One slender white hand emerged from the shapeless
garment, and the witch made an impatient gesture, gripping the girl’s fabric-covered forearm instead of the bare hand. Roderic
narrowed his eyes as the witch muttered something he could not understand. A chill rippled through the room, and gooseflesh
prickled his arms and neck. He opened his mouth and found his movements constricted and slow, as if time had lengthened. His
clothes dried on his back, and where the fabric had been ripped in the storm, it mended in an instant. The moment seemed to
condense, collapse somehow, into an ordinary pace.

“What sort of payment do you want?”

“Sit. Eat. Refresh yourself.” She indicated a table set with two goblets and bowls of late spring berries and autumn nuts.

“What’s happening to Barran?”

“His needs are well met.”

“I’m going back to get him.” He turned to leave.

“Not yet, Prince.”

Again he heard that low croon and his hand suddenly felt frozen, as though all the heat had been leached from the flesh, and
he pulled back from the doorknob, just in time, as it glowed white with heat. He flinched. “What manner of woman are you?”

“I am not a woman at all,” she hissed again. “And you will leave only when you have agreed to my terms.”

“What terms?”

“Not yet. Sit and eat.”

He was across the room in three strides and seized her by the throat. The flesh was soft and felt like sponge through the
fabric, and he grabbed her with all his strength. She threw back her veils and his grip faltered as he stared at the horror
before him. Her face was inhuman. Her eyes were hooded and yellow like a reptile’s, the pupils long, black slits. She had
no nose, only a pointed snout and long, yellow teeth, dripping saliva. Her flesh was scaled and black, reflected green in
the firelight. He dropped his hands as a wave of nausea rose in his throat.

“Since you insist, Prince, we will discuss it now.”

She moved off and covered her face again. He again heard the curious click beneath her skirts and realized it must be her
feet against the floor.

“What do you want?”

“You will marry my daughter.”

Automatically, Roderic’s eyes fell on the girl standing nearly motionless before the hearth. “What?”

“Yes,” she hissed. “If you want to leave here alive.”

“You cannot hold me.”

“Can I not?”

He tried to draw a breath to answer her and a wall of flame engulfed him where he stood. The fire licked his boots and singed
his hair. In another instant, it was gone, leaving only the stink of burned hair.

“Do not doubt my power, Prince. It is as real as the heat of the flames.”

“But I cannot marry your daughter.”

“Why not?”

“The woman I marry must be—“

“Of highest birth, of bluest blood.”

Roderic nodded.

“My daughter is all that.”

“I cannot marry her.”

“You fear she resembles me, perhaps. Well. Let me lay that fear to rest.” She turned to the girl standing so quietly beside
her. “Roderic, Prince of Meriga, this is my daughter, Annandale.”

The figure came forward into the firelight, still swathed in her shapeless rags. Roderic caught at her arm and pushed the
hood away from her face. He drew his breath as she raised her eyes to his. He knew her, then, as the girl in the wood.

At first glance, she did not strike him as beautiful.

And then, as the firelight flickered across her features, he realized that she was more than beautiful, that her beauty defied
every description he could conceive. He was Prince and soldier, not poet, and his father’s court attracted many beautiful
women. But there was always some flaw, some aspect that was not perfect, and therefore gave character or charm or counterpoint
to the face. But in this girl’s face, as she looked up at him, with eyes of deep and vivid blue, there was no flaw. Her face
drew him in as he looked upon it and seemed to grow more beautiful the more he stared. It was in some way indescribably balanced,
as if this face were the pattern from which all others are drawn, as if all other faces were only endless variations of this
one.

He felt some reverberation in his flesh where he touched her echo up his arm and spread throughout his body like a warm breeze
in his blood, even as he watched a blush creep up her throat.

Annandale felt the heat rising in her cheeks. Modesty might have made her drop her gaze, but curiosity had the better of her.
She stared, unabashed, into the eyes of the young Prince. How, she wondered, could anyone think him Abelard’s son? Surely
they saw the leanness in his frame, the long muscles curving smoothly over narrower shoulders than the king possessed. His
face was thinner, too, the cheekbones less well defined, the nose straight and tipped at the end, nothing like Abelard’s hawklike
beak. And even his coloring—green eyes and light brown hair—suggested another sire than the King.

But the set of his shoulders was like the King’s and the arrogance of his lifted brow like him as well. His mouth was curved
in an expression of both disbelief and disgust, as though the thought of touching her turned his innards. With something like
desperation, she glanced at her mother, knowing even as she did so that the thickness of her mother’s veils barred any kind
of wordless reassurance.

She swallowed hard and looked back up at Roderic. This was the man she had been born for, and he was looking at her as if
she were a rotten piece of offal flung from the rudest kitchen. Fear shuddered through her. What would her mother condemn
her to?

“Lord Prince.” Her voice was like a bell, and he knew immediately that she was indeed the girl in the wood who had taken the
child the lycat had injured. What had happened to that child?

Roderic lifted his eyes away from Annandale’s face to stare at her mother. “She’s a witch just as you are. I can take her,
but I can’t marry her.”

“Then let me show you what you will wreak upon your father’s land.” The witch drew back from the fire and indicated its depths.

As his mind reeled in automatic denial, he saw himself, held hostage by the witch’s magic, unable to move or break her spells.
He saw Brand and Phineas order frantic searches, all come to nothing. He saw the Congress and the Mutens and the Harleyriders
rise in rebellion. He saw a country torn apart, bleeding and vulnerable, split into a hundred different regions. He saw a
great army rise and sweep Meriga before it like a dry leaf in a wind. He saw soldiers with dead men’s eyes march across the
land, and even the Harleyriders fled in terror before them. He saw children spitted and women torn and men die slow and sickening
deaths. On the enemy’s shields they bore a device of a triangle with a sidelong crescent like curved horns at the top. He
saw his brothers die in a last disastrous battle, Phineas forced to serve Amanander, his sisters raped and skinned. And Annandale—this
girl who stood before him, so small and vulnerable and somehow pure—he saw Amanander thrust himself upon her white, fragile
body, and nausea rose in Roderic’s throat.

He looked at the witch. “Is this about Amanander?”

“Already he sows chaos across the kingdom, leaving a random, scattered harvest for you to reap. All these things will happen
if you do not leave here. Like a beast bringing death in the night, it comes, seeking to crush all Meriga in its jaws. Even
now, it stirs; the birth pangs are well along. The time is not of my choosing. Fourteen nights ago, Amanander came to the
doors of this tower, seeking entrance. He came with four companions, dark riders all, five men, one purpose.”

“Amanander came here? For the girl?”

“He came looking for me, but if he had found my daughter, he would have taken her if he could. I have little strength left.
The years have weakened me; my own time nears—I can protect her no longer. The only chance you have to prevail against it
is to take Annandale, marry her, and keep her as safe as possible.”

“Where did he go?”

“West. West to Alexander. And, he hopes, to succor. Listen to me, Prince,” the witch hissed. “I seek to save your realm. Far
more’s at work here than you will ever know.”

He looked down at the girl, who stood perfectly still. “Are you one of her enchantments?”

“She is as you see her.”

“What word have you to give me that I can trust?”

“Go to Phineas. And he will tell you that you must marry her, and that you must keep her safe—guard her with everything you
have, Prince, for she is your father’s hope and the Magic’s key.”

“Phineas? How do you know Phineas?”

“You cannot begin to imagine how much I know.”

“You will let me go?”

“As long as you take my daughter.”

“And Barran?”

She shrugged. “What use have I for him? See for yourself.” She pointed to the door behind him.

Barran stood leaning against the door frame. His face had color in it, and he seemed weak, but both his legs were whole.

“Barran!”

“Roderic.”

“Your leg?”

“My leg’s fine.”

“The bone was shattered—I saw it myself.”

For answer, he shrugged. “You must be wrong, Roderic. I don’t remember.”

Roderic looked back at the witch. “More enchantment.”

“You know nothing of enchantment, Prince.”

“I’ll take the girl. I can give you no other promises. And we will ride now.”

“Roderic,” said Barran, “the storm’s still bad.”

“We ride now.” Roderic looked down at the daughter. “We go to Minnis, lady. We have no time to pack your tricks.”

Annandale broke away from his grasp. This was too much. This boy—this man—he didn’t understand yet what was at stake. She
had felt the evil come knocking when Amanander had stood before the door, and the thought of leaving the safety of her mother’s
side terrified her more than she could stand. She sank to her knees before her mother. “Mother— no, don’t make me leave you.
Please, he doesn’t know—he doesn’t understand. He doesn’t know how to keep me safe. Don’t make me go with him—“

Nydia pulled back with something that sounded like a snarl. “Your time has come.” Nydia shook away her daughter’s reaching
hand impatiently. “Tell Phineas I have discharged my pledge-bond to the King. Go, child—my part in this is over. I want no
more to do with it. My price is paid.”

Annandale gasped, a deep sobbing breath that caught in her throat, and Roderic softened unexpectedly. Whatever machinations
had taken place between the witch and his father, this girl seemed as innocent as he, and the witch’s claim that Amanander
would have any interest in the girl was enough to make him determined to get answers. And if the only way to get them was
from Phineas, so be it. “Come.” He pulled her to her feet and propelled her past the witch. “Now.”

She stumbled beside him, tears streaming down her cheeks, stopping to glance behind, as though she didn’t quite believe even
as it happened that her mother would send her away. At the bottom of the wide steps, the horses stood as they had been left,
but they, too, were dry. “Open the doors,” Roderic ordered Barran.

Annandale bolted from his grasp. “Mother!” She stared up at the figure which crouched at the top of the steps like a fat spider,
her arm stretched out in supplication.

Roderic extended his hand to draw her away, when Nydia spoke once more, and in the faltering voice, Roderic heard what could
only be sobs. “Child, you know this is not of my choosing. Look for me in your heart—the bond between us can be broken only
by death.”

“Promise me, Mother.” Annandale’s voice broke over the last word. “Promise you will not use the Magic against yourself—“

“My time is finished, daughter. Let me go in peace.”

Stricken, Annandale stared at the figure above her. “Promise me!”

“How can I raise my hand against myself, child? Don’t you think I, of all people, have learned that the will of the One is
not to be gainsaid?”

There was a silence, and finally, Annandale turned away. Once outside, Roderic lifted her up and placed her on his saddle.
He swung onto the horse behind her. “Now which way?” he asked less to Barran than to himself.

The girl before him roused with a soft sigh of resignation, and so deep a pang went through Roderic, he frowned, wondering
why he should feel her pain as if it were his. “Minnis is this way,” said Annandale. She shrank against Roderic’s chest as
they once more rode into the forest.

“Stay close and go slowly,” Roderic said. The sleet had softened into a light rain, but night was falling. The sky was dark
and the wind cold. Annandale put her hand upon the reins and guided the beast through the darkening forest, and the falling
rain, back to the walls of Minnis Saul.