Snow White and Rose Red (33 page)
Read Snow White and Rose Red Online
Authors: Patricia Wrede
By mid-July, the slow mill wheels of authority had begun to move. A small, sly man was summoned to a long, bare room on the third floor of a wooden house near the edge of London. A heavyset man with brown hair and a look of solid, middle-class respectability waited there.
The smaller man was prompt; he entered the room with his cloth cap in one hand and said doubtfully, “Master Rodgers?”
“I own the name,” the heavyset man said, waving the newcomer to a joint-stool beside the table. “And you will be Charles Sledd.”
“That I am, sir.” Sledd ran his tongue nervously over his lips. “You’ve a job for me to do?”
Rodgers did not reply at once. His superiors’ instructions notwithstanding, he continued to have grave misgivings about embarking on an investigation of Doctor Dee, who received visits from courtiers such as Lord Russell, Sir Phillip Sydney, Lord Walsingham, and even from the Queen herself. He had, however, delayed matters as long as he dared. “I have,” he said. “You’re to go to Mortlak. There’s talk of foul sorcery in the town, and ‘tis like that Doctor Dee’s work is the occasion of it. Come near him by some ruse, but remember: you’re to look and come away, no more.”
“As you say, sir,” Sledd replied, nodding respectfully. When he raised his head, there was a glint in his eyes. “And the wage, sir?”
Rodgers threw a small cloth bag, tied at the neck with a piece of string, across the table. It landed with a muffled clinking. “There’s for you to begin; more will follow, an the word you bring back suits us.”
The bag vanished into the recesses of Sledd’s clothing. “Thank you, sir; I’ll do my best.”
“‘Twere best you did,” Rodgers said dryly, and the small man left.
John Rimer did not return to the Widow’s cottage for nearly a week. Rosamund, who had become accustomed to frequent visits, was first angry and then troubled by his absence. Her mother was not so strongly affected, though the Widow cast occasional frowning glances down the road toward Mortlak when she thought no one was looking. Blanche’s mind was almost completely taken up in reworking yet again the spell she hoped would disenchant Hugh; she commented fretfully that she could use John’s assistance, but otherwise seemed untouched by his truancy.
This attitude did not endear Blanche to her sister, and the atmosphere in the cottage had become unusually tense by the time John finally came walking up the road from the village.
“Where hast thou been?” Rosamund demanded as he entered the cottage. Her voice mingled with Blanche‘s, who said at the same instant, “What news of Hugh?”
“Girls!” the Widow said sharply.
John bowed to the Widow and gave Blanche and Rosamund his most charming smile. “Good morrow, Mistresses. I hope I find you well?”
“Well!” Rosamund said indignantly. “Is that all—”
“Rose!” the Widow said even more sharply than before. Rosamund bit her lip but did not continue. The Widow eyed her daughters sternly until she was sure there would be no further unseemly behavior, then turned an equally severe expression on her visitor. “As for thee, Master Rimer, thou needst not try to cozen me. What is it thou dost want?”
“A favor,” John admitted, “and one I’m loath to ask, but that I can find no other way to do it.”
“What is it, and why art thou so unwilling to speak of it?” the Widow asked warily.
John looked at Blanche and Rosamund. “You said some time ago that soon you’d visit Faerie to collect your herbs. Do you still intend it?”
“We’d planned to go tomorrow, or the day after if the weather’s poor,” Blanche said.
“Then this is what I’d ask of you: to take a message with you into Faerie and leave it behind you there.”
“No!” the Widow protested.
“I do not ask this lightly,” John said. He looked at Rosamund and Blanche again, and then away. “I cannot go to Faerie and seek out the folk who have bedeviled Dee and Kelly. You can visit Faerie, but the search that’s needed is beyond the power of mortal visitors. Yet I still have friends who’d help if they but knew my need, or so I hope. It seems the sole solution. Will you take my message into Faerie?”
“I will not have it,” the Widow said firmly, before Rosamund or Blanche could so much as nod. “‘Tis dangerous enough to tempt witch-hunters; wouldst have my girls chance Faerie’s anger too?”
“Nay, Mistress Arden, that I’d never ask,” John said reassuringly. “‘Tis why I’ve spent these last three days in crafting what I hope to send. Look here.”
John reached into his purse and with a little difficulty drew out a grey, lumpy-looking, fist-sized rock. “This must be carried through the Faerie border and dropped on the other side, no more. The passage will upset the outer spell that holds this hollow shell together; within an hour, ‘twill fall apart. The enchantment inside carries my message, and once free will seek out one who’ll listen. There’ll be naught left that can be used to trace how it was done.”
The Widow looked at Rosamund’s determined expression and Blanche’s hopeful one, and sighed. “Thou‘rt sure?” she asked John.
“I am.”
“And I’ve no need to ask if you are willing,” the Widow said to the girls, and sighed again. “Very well. An I forbade it, ‘tis likely Rose would steal that lump and do it against both our wills.”
John hesitated, then set the rock on the table. “I’ll see you tomorrow, when ‘tis done,” he said. “Afterward I may not visit, lest I bring upon you the very attention I’ve tried to avoid.”
“That’s no matter,” Rosamund said quickly. “We’ll hang the house with rowan boughs and wear hawthorn in our kerchiefs. You’ve no need to forswear our company.”
“I know that you have knowledge enough to guard yourselves from Faerie,” John said gently. “But no man’s proof against mistakes. ‘Tis better that your knowledge be unneeded.”
“What of thy brother?” Blanche said. “How shall we have word of him, and how he fares?”
“‘Twere best that thou forget him for a time,” John answered. “We’ll send word when we’re certain it will not bring harm with it. ”
“Thou mayest think it ‘best,’ but ‘tis impossible,” Blanche said, and her eyes filled with unshed tears. “If we’re willing to chance Faerie notice—”
“If harm should come to thee or to thy family because of Hugh and me, we’d sorrow for it all our lives,” John said soberly.
Rosamund swallowed the indignant comment she had been about to make, and looked at her mother. “What sayest thou to this, Mother?” she asked.
“I think John’s wise, and generous,” the Widow answered. “Still, he’ll be welcome here, whenever he comes. ‘Tis his to judge when that should be.”
“And we’re to have no say in this at all?” Rosamund said in the tones of one who knows the argument is lost. “How can we be of help to Hugh, if we see neither him nor John?”
John sighed. “There’s naught more can be done before I’ve had word from Faerie. Will it content you if I promise to seek your aid as soon as we have need of it?”
Rosamund was far from content, but neither she nor Blanche could persuade John to change his mind. The Widow refused to be drawn into the argument, and at last the girls were forced to accept his decision.
The following day, everything went as planned. Rosamund and Blanche carried the rock into Faerie and left it at the foot of a beech tree, then went on to gather herbs. Rosamund was almost unhappy that things had gone so smoothly; for all their mother’s protests, there seemed to be nothing dangerous about crossing into Faerie and dropping a rock. She wanted to pass by the spot on their way home, to see whether John’s spell had worked, but Blanche overrode her, and the girls returned home by a different route.
CHAPTER ·TWENTY
“Some time later, the mother sent the girls to town to buy needles and pins and thread for sewing. On their way, they crossed a meadow, and as they walked they saw a large eagle circling in the air above them. Suddenly it dove toward the ground, and the girls heard a cry of terror. They ran toward it and saw that the dwarf was once again in trouble; the eagle had seized him and was about to carry him off. ”
THE MESSAGE ROSAMUND AND BLANCHE TOOK INTO Faerie brought quick results. Two days after the girls made their expedition, John was walking through a stand of beeches in the forest when something fell out of one of the trees, knocking his hat off. John looked up; seeing nothing, he bent to retrieve his hat. The missile was still lodged firmly in the brim. John stared at it, then said casually, “Thou mayest show thyself, Robin. Or wouldst thou have me believe that chestnut burrs have begun to grow on beeches?”
High in the air, branches rustled. A moment later a wiry youth slid down the trunk of one of the beech trees. He wore a loose green jerkin and brown hose that fit him like a second skin. He tossed his head to shake an unruly shock of black hair from in front of his eyes, and grinned at John. “I see thou thinkest thyself a clever one. ”
“I never said so,” John answered, but he smiled in spite of himself. “‘Tis good to see thee, Robin.”
“Maybe ‘tis so for thee; I’ll wait to judge till I’ve heard thy designs. ”
“Thou hadst my message, then?”
“Oh, aye, I had it, for all it told me. Thou hast a niggardly way with a tale, John,” Robin said in a complaining tone.
“Why, did I not say I had need of thee?” John said innocently. “I knew curiosity would bring thee, if naught else did.”
“Thinkest thou so little of my friendship, then?” Robin said indignantly. “Base rascal! I am insulted.” He tilted his sharp chin upward in a display of displeasure that was immediately spoiled by his having to toss his hair out of his eyes once more. “Insulted,” he repeated. “Aye, and wounded too.” He shot John a sly, mischievous look. “Thou must make reparation for it!”
“Oh, indeed,” John said with an exaggerated bow. “What dost thou demand?”
“A well-told tale, complete in all its parts,” Robin said promptly.
“That thou mayest have, and welcome,” John answered. “Save only that thou repeat it not in Faerie. The tale itself will tell thee why.”
Robin folded his arms and leaned back against the mottled bark of one of the trees. “I am all attention.”
Settling himself in a similar position, John gave his friend a full account of the nine months which had passed since his voluntary exile from Faerie. Robin interrupted frequently with questions, observations, and wry remarks, until at last John commanded him to hold his peace until the tale was told. Robin shrugged, his eyes dancing wickedly, but he did not interrupt again.
“Well?” John said when he finished. “What dost thou make of it?”
“Am I now permitted to speak?” Robin said with wide-eyed innocence. “I was not certain.”
“Play not the fool,” John said. “This matter’s grave, to me at least, and I’ve no stomach for thy games.”
“So I see,” Robin said. “But I cannot change my nature. What wouldst thou?”
“I’d have the loan of thy eyes and ears,” John answered, taking the question at face value. “Tell me what’s toward at court, and the how and why of this Faerie meddling with the human wizards and their crystal.”
“I can bore the ears from thy head with gossip of the court,” Robin said, “but I can tell thee little of the matter that chiefly interests thee. These days there’s little talk of mortals or the mortal world, and none that touches thee or thy unfortunate brother. The Queen likes it not.”
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