Extraordinary (32 page)

Phoebe looked directly at Mallory, who was expressionless.

“I did say aloud that I was ordinary,” said Phoebe, as much to Mallory as to the queen. “At that moment in time, when I said it, it felt true. But what I think and feel changes, and simply saying something out loud doesn't make it correct. The bigger truth, as I stand here now, is that I don't know. Also, I'm just barely an adult. Even if I'm ordinary today, will I be tomorrow?”

“This is sophistry,” said the queen sharply. “You are either ordinary now, or you are not. That is all that matters.”

But Phoebe answered, “What happens if I drink this poison, but I am not in fact ordinary? What happens to you if I die, but the condition of the bargain remains unfulfilled?”

There was silence.

“That is the risk we take,” said the queen finally. “That you die uselessly, the earth does not accept the sacrifice, and so we die also.” She paused. “It is a risk we
must
take, however. We have no choice. Nor do you, not anymore.”

Slowly, deliberately, ceremonially, she extended the chalice to Phoebe. “Will you drink willingly?” she said. “Or shall we force you?”

Phoebe fisted her hands, feeling her nails dig into her palms. “My ancestor Mayer never meant this to happen. He wanted so much for his family, and for himself. But he never meant to harm you and your people.”

Some kind of emotion moved behind the queen's eyes. She nodded. “I know. It was my mistake too. I was young. I misunderstood the balancing of powers and the risk, and I did not really understand humans, either. I acted rashly. It was pride.”

Phoebe found herself shaking her head. “No, it wasn't pride. Or not only that. You wanted to help Mayer. And he believed you were all-powerful. Which you were not.” She cleared her throat. “There's no sense in blaming anyone. He was needy. You were generous. And—and also . . .” She paused, but the words were there in her throat and they wanted to come out. “Also, there was love.”

Suddenly the king was at the queen's back. She leaned on him. Her hands trembled, so that the chalice shook. “Yes,” said the queen. There was the strangest look in her eyes now, as she stared at Phoebe. “There was love. You—I am surprised that you know this.”

“Ordinary or extraordinary,” said Phoebe, “I can recognize love.”

She watched as the king reached around the queen, holding her, supporting her outstretched arms. Then she looked down, gathering herself; she had no business being moved by the queen and king. No business thinking that they reminded her of her parents. She had a point to make, and she knew at last what it was. One point. Or plea, really.

“But now here we are,” said Phoebe. “Facing each other. And there's no love here, or anywhere, anymore. There's just force and threats and coercion and lies and death. How did we get here, when we started with love? Can you tell me?”

Renewed silence. Like a large shadow, the manticore slipped into place, padding on his lion's feet to stand, tautly, between Mallory and the queen, between Mallory and the chalice.

The queen's hands on the chalice trembled. She said, “I ask one last time, Phoebe Rothschild. Will you drink willingly?”

Phoebe closed her eyes. When she opened them, it was to look at Mallory.

“Answer her,” said Mallory desperately. “Phoebe, you must reply! Will you drink willingly or be forced?”

And now, at last, Phoebe had her answer.

“Not willingly.” She was grateful for the acoustics that made her sound stronger than she was. “I'm not willing and I won't say that I am. I want to live. But,” she added quickly, “you don't need force, either.” On impulse, she swiveled to face the multitude of faeries. She lifted her chin and scanned their faces. “Since your queen says that there isn't any other way, I'll take her word for it, and I will do this. Unwillingly. But I'll do it to save your lives and the lives of my mother and my friend. And we'll hope it works. We all know it might not.”

The faeries stood as if frozen.

“One last thing,” Phoebe said. “Thank you. Thank you, all of you, for what you have unwittingly sacrificed for my family, for so many years.” She inclined her head; a slow, respectful gesture.

Then she turned back to the queen and king. She didn't look at Benjamin; she couldn't bear to. She knew she needed to be swift or her decision would falter. She reached out and peeled the chalice away from the queen's oddly tight grip.

The chalice was indeed heavy.

Quick, now. Quick.

Phoebe raised the chalice to her lips.

“No!” cried Mallory. She leaped forward, and the manticore was a half second behind her. But he wasn't fast enough to stop her. She knocked the chalice from Phoebe's hands. It spun up into the air, rotating madly and spilling its contents. As it fell to the earth and broke, the manticore pinned Mallory to the ground. From beneath him, she shouted, “She's not ordinary! If she ever was, that's over. She's grown into herself and she just showed us who she is now. Don't you understand? Killing her won't save us. It's useless. We have to die.” The stones took her words and amplified them sevenfold. They reverberated from stone to stone.

“We don't know that,” snarled the manticore. “We have to try—and she's willing now—”

Then they weren't the only ones shouting; other voices joined theirs in a ferocious babble of noise and rage and panic and fear. The fey broke rank, crowding in tightly, and Phoebe, who had almost been knocked off her feet when Mallory attacked, somehow managed to stagger upright to find that, weirdly, no one was even looking at her right now, so divided were they. She scanned frantically for Benjamin—there he was, held fast by one of the furry guards, but the two others were in each other's faces, while around them the rest of the fey—

“Peace!”

Instantly, all noise and all movement ceased.

It was the king, and Phoebe realized that this was the first time she had heard him say anything at all. The antlered man strode to the center of the stone circle. He raised his arms high in a motion that was half command, half plea, and after a minute or two, it caused the near-mob of faeries to step back and reassemble, albeit more raggedly and with some grumbling. Then he turned back toward his wife, returning all attention to her.

The queen stood alone, small and shrunken. She waved one hand almost absently toward the manticore. “Let her up.”

Reluctantly, the manticore moved aside. Mallory scrambled to her knees and then her feet. She was breathing heavily, her eyes were huge in her face, and her mouth was drawn into a severe, determined line. She didn't look at Phoebe.

But Phoebe looked at her. She kept looking, even as she felt two arms come tightly around her from behind and realized that Benjamin had slipped away from his captors. She leaned back against him. His chest was thudding, thudding.

The queen looked out on her people. “It is clear to me now that Phoebe is—is very much a descendant of Mayer Rothschild. Therefore she shall not die, for her death would not help us.”

“Mayer tricked us,” said the manticore bitterly. “He knew—he knew!—that there would never be an ordinary child of his line.”

His sister narrowed her eyes at him. “How could he know that? He couldn't read the future. And besides, it's clear he had no such automatic pride. He believed he needed help to have extraordinary sons, didn't he?”

“Somehow he knew.”

“No,” said the queen quietly, “he did not know. Perhaps he hoped. Or perhaps—rare though truly extraordinary may be—there is no such thing as simply ordinary. Or perhaps there is always the capability of becoming extraordinary, buried inside any ordinary being. Perhaps, ironically, we were the ones to force Phoebe Rothschild to bloom. I do not know. It does not matter. It was my mistake. Now I must pay for it.”

“We all must pay,” said the manticore.

“Yes,” said Mallory. “We must die. I suggest that we bear our fate with the same dignity and grace and generosity we have just been shown.” Now she looked directly at Phoebe. Slowly, gravely, she stepped forward. Then she inclined her head to Phoebe. Formally. Respectfully.

It was the very same gesture that Phoebe had used minutes before as she faced the fey.

Phoebe stood still in Benjamin's arms. She felt that if she moved, if she even breathed, her heart would shatter.

The fey were motionless as well, watching the two girls.

Finally, Phoebe nodded back.

Then, into the rippling pool of silence, the queen said, “Before we accept death, it comes to me that there is one last possibility. There is another sacrifice to the earth that might work. Phoebe Rothschild has by her example, and her talk of love, made me see it.”

“No,” said the antlered man. He spoke directly, forcefully, to his wife.

She looked at him for a long, long moment, and then tilted her head in query. “You knew this? All this time?”

He made a noncommittal move with his shoulders.

“Husband,” she said gently, and held out her hands to him, palms up. He shook his head, but she kept her hands out, not withdrawing them even when he turned his back on her.

The queen and king were ignoring all the watchers, behaving as if they were in private. Her hands, outstretched. His back, turned. An invisible thread of awareness running palpably between them.

Phoebe had once more a sense of recognition. They were a couple, as her parents were a couple. They needed very few words to understand each other.

Benjamin cupped one hand around his mouth and whispered into Phoebe's ear. “What's going on?”

Phoebe shrugged.

All the tension was back in Benjamin's body. “They can't have you, Pheeb.”

She twisted slightly to whisper back. “Don't worry. That's over. This is something else. I don't know what.”

“Maybe. Let's get out of here anyway.”

Phoebe shook her head. She knew that she would not leave unless asked to do so. As a Rothschild, she belonged here at this moment, even if she didn't understand what was happening.

“We stay,” she whispered to Benjamin. “We witness.”

She heard him sigh. Then he squeezed her shoulder.

The queen was now approaching the king. Each step was almost beyond her strength. But she reached him at last, and as she did so he turned and faced her, and then suddenly he dropped to his knees and embraced her. He was so tall, and she so small, that in this position their heads were nearly level. Their foreheads rested on each other's. Their eyes were closed. He clutched her so tightly the sinews stood out on his arms. The queen's hands cupped the back of his neck and then ran gently over his head and the base of his antlers, before coming to rest on each side of his face.

“Don't ask this of me,” he said.

“It must be you,” she said.

He drew back and looked into her face. And then, finally, he nodded.

“Thank you, my love,” the queen said. She drew away, and he let her go.

The queen addressed the group. “When I made the bargain with Mayer Rothschild, I used my body as the channel to take power and direct it elsewhere. It has come to me that I may be able to use my body to return that power.” She paused. “The earth requires a sacrifice. It shall be me. It shall be now. And the sacrifice shall be offered with love.”

Phoebe caught her breath in shock. For the briefest moment the queen glanced at her. Then she looked out again on her people.

“I do not know if this will save us. I do not know if my sacrifice will be acceptable. But it is the other way that Phoebe Rothschild asked about. The loving way. It is the only possibility I can think of, and the king, my husband, who it seems thought of it long ago, agrees that it may work. It is our last hope. And it is my responsibility, and only mine.”

In the stunned silence that followed, Mallory was the first to speak. “No,” she said. “No!”

The queen turned to her. “Child, hush. It must be. Surely you can see it.”

Mallory was now on her knees. Her eyes were wild. She glanced at the manticore as if for support. But he shook his head.

“My queen,” he said. “We honor you. We respect your decision. I know I speak for all.”

“Indeed, I am sure you do,” said the queen drily.

A strange sound began, a low and mournful ululation, a music that was composed of pure sound. There were no words while the music swelled high and full. Then, after a while, the pan's flute wound itself into the music, twisting round it, filling the air with haunting, frightening beauty.

Phoebe leaned back into Benjamin and felt him lean into her as well. Dread filled her. Dread—and awe. Together, they watched as the queen stood with her head bowed. The music filled the air and the torches flared brightly against the dark.

Dancing began around the queen. It was slow, and formal, and caught Phoebe in the throat with its intricacy and beauty.

Benjamin whispered to Phoebe, “Should we leave now?”

Again she shook her head.

He said, surprising her, “Should we dance?”

Phoebe hesitated. She looked at Mallory, who was not dancing. Mallory, who stood beside the king, both of them still. All of the others, including the manticore, danced.

Phoebe thought of her ancestor Mayer, dancing.

“No,” she said. “We're visitors. Not participants. We should just—witness.”

Time hung suspended while the flute played and the faeries danced. It could have been ten minutes, or ten hours. But at length the strange music ceased and silence filled the dark stone circle once more.