Thorn Boy and Other Dreams of Dark Desire (15 page)

Jadrin shook
his head fiercely, sick with fear at what his drunken father might
have come out with.

‘
He
thinks you can clear his debt for him. He says you have magical
powers, so great, so potent, that you can even spin straw into
gold.’

Jadrin could
not stifle a surprised bark of laughter. ‘What?’

‘
Use
your magic, boy! Spin your father’s way out of debt, as he claims
you can. Spin this, all this, to gold!’ His face creased into a
caustic grin, Galbion Floom gestured eloquently at the straw by
their feet.

To spin straw
into gold? Jadrin was left alone, the door firmly locked behind
him. How could his father do this to him? he wondered with helpless
dismay. Was this the education he had promised? Did Skimblaze
really think his son was the possessor of supernatural powers? No,
Jadrin decided. He suspected that Skimblaze had merely sent him to
the king, hoping (perhaps sure?) that Ashalan would be content with
his beauty alone.Surely, all this business with the straw and the
spinning wheel was some dark joke on Ashalan’s part, so that when
Jadrin could not complete the task some other, more tangible, form
of payment would be demanded. This much was obvious to Jadrin, who
had little knowledge of the ways of men and their desires. The
spinning wheel stood in a diminishing pool of sunlight, its wheel
gently rocking as if moved by an unseen hand. Jadrin reached out
and touched it. He shook his head and sat down on the bed to
wait.

Night fell.
Nobody came to his door and silver fronds of moonlight came to
replace those of the sinking sun, falling over the floor, over the
skeletal form of the spinning wheel, onto Jadrin’s bed. The boy
sighed, stood up and walked around the room. In a corner, he found
bread and cheese laid upon a low table, next to a jug of red wine.
He found a lamp and a tinderbox. Lighting the lamp, he took some
wine and began to eat the bread and cheese. For comfort, he removed
from its bag the quartz Amberina had given to him and stared at the
sharp lilac points of it, the hollow in its centre that shivered
with the brightest threads. ‘Straw into gold indeed!’ he thought.
‘No-one, nothing, can do that. Oh Amberina, if only you were here
now.’ Dismally, he breathed on the stone, thinking of Amberina
prancing, colt-like, beside the Fleercut; free as freedom itself.
He felt so alone. Straw into gold...

A shadow fell
over him. Something obscured the moonlight from the window,
something that also caused the lamplight to flicker and dim. Jadrin
looked up.

‘
Faithless boy! I can do that!’ said a voice.

Jadrin
squinted at the cobwebby ledge. A spirit was crouching there,
almost featureless within a smoky veil. It hopped from the window
ledge to the floor, leaving a trail of sparkling dust in the air
behind it.

Jadrin had
seen spirits before. He was not afraid. ‘You can spin straw into
gold?’ He indicated the forlorn-looking spinning wheel across the
room.

‘
But of
course... For a price.’

Jadrin
inspected the quartz warily. Had his contemplation of it summoned
the spirit? He knew the potential power of crystals. Obviously,
this particular one possessed powers he and his sister had been
unaware of. ‘A price. Such as?’

The spirit
cavorted around in front of him for a moment, emitting blushes of
colour that made Jadrin’s eyes ache. ‘Something precious,’ it
said.

Jadrin held
out the quartz. ‘This is all I have.’

The spirit
glowed pink. ‘No! Something more precious that that.’

‘
Name
it.’

‘
I want
a kiss. A kiss from your warm, warm lips. A taste of life.’ The
spirit chittered and glowed and spun until the whole room was lit
up like a firework display.

‘
Oh, is
that all?’ Jadrin replied guardedly, well aware of how the very
life could be sucked from a person under the guise of a
kiss.

‘
Just
that. Nothing more. Oh, you think badly of me. You fear I will harm
you. I won’t! I won’t!’ Its voice took on a sly tone. ‘The king
will ask for more, believe me.’

Jadrin
considered for a moment, looking from the quartz to the wavering
form of the spirit. He felt he had little to lose. ‘Very well,’ he
said. ‘Maybe, if you can do this thing, the king will be content
with gold alone, and I can go home again. It will be a fine joke,
in fact. Go ahead.’

‘
After
you sleep,’ the spirit said.

‘
As you
wish.’ Still suspicious, Jadrin went over to the narrow bed and lay
down upon it. After a few moments, his eyes became heavy and sleep
crept upon him, but not before it seemed, behind his closed lids,
the whole room became radiant as if with the lustre of
gold.

In the grey
before the dawn, the spirit woke him up. Beyond its pale, gauzy
body, Jadrin could see a glittering, unbelievable heap of coins
piled upon the floor around the spinning wheel. ‘Now for my price,’
said the spirit, in a low, chilling voice.

Jadrin offered
up his mouth for the cold, cold touch of bodiless lips, dry as
paper yet wet as grave-slime. He gasped, fighting for breath. In a
moment, the spirit leapt, triumphant, into the air, whirled around
a few times and vanished with a pop. Jadrin lay dazed upon the bed
until the morning truly came.

First, it was
Galbion Floom who looked in at the peephole of the door. Jadrin
heard a gasp, then running footsteps. Soon, there was a babble
beyond the door and it was thrown wide, many brightly dressed
people bursting into the room, all talking at once. Jadrin sat up
on the bed yawning. A tall young man with golden hair shouldered
his way through the chattering crowd and stared, wide-eyed, at the
heaps of gold. ‘What is this?’ he demanded.

‘
Look
sire!’ Floom spluttered. ‘The scoundrel Skimblaze spoke the truth
for once. The boy can spin straw into gold!’

Ashalan, king
of Ashbrilim, reluctantly tore his gaze away from the shining heaps
of coins and saw, for the first, the shining thing upon the narrow
bed, whose radiance easily eclipsed that of the treasure.

‘
Indeed
he did,’ the king agreed, but in a strange and guarded tone. He
strode forward. ‘Miller’s son, I am most impressed by what I have
seen. Surprised too, for I thought it was you yourself that
Skimblaze had in mind to pay the debt he owed me. I did not, for
one moment, really believe you could accomplish this
magic.’

Jadrin
thought, ‘And neither did I’ but considered it wiser to remain
silent.

Ashalan eyed
the gold once more. ‘However,’ he said. ‘Beauty does not deceive
me, neither do I always trust the evidence of my own eyes. This may
well be a fairy gold that turns to leaves within hours, or perhaps
a single spell that you and your father have worked out between
you. No, I must have more proof.’ He strode to the door. His
cronies shrank back, allowing him to speak with his secretary.
‘Bring more straw!’ Ashalan ordered and left the room without a
backward glance.

Jadrin was in
despair. Now the lonely chamber was piled high with bursting bales
of straw, the spinning wheel nearly lost amongst it. All day, he
sat on the bed with his chin in his hands, staring miserably at the
straw. At nightfall, he took out the quartz from its bag, but
without hope that he could be so fortunate twice. However, within
an instant of his forming the thought, the spirit returned, once
more nonchalant about the task in hand. ‘And what price this time?’
Jadrin enquired wearily.

‘
Well,
that is simple. Merely this: to sleep in your arms,’ it
replied.

‘
Just
that?’ Jadrin asked.

‘
Just
that,’ the spirit answered.

By morning,
the room was full of gold once more and Jadrin awoke feeling as
drugged and chilled as if he’d spent the night under several feet
of snow. He had not sensed the spirit beside him, neither did he
see it leave.

To Jadrin, it
seemed that Ashalan’s greed was only whipped into further frenzy
when he caught sight of the supposed fruits of the boy’s night’s
work. ‘Once more,’ he decided (without much consideration) ‘One
more night of this and, I promise you, you shall never see this
room again. No more spinning. It is too incredible, this talent of
yours. Tomorrow, I shall make you a gentleman of the court. You
shall have apartments of your own within the palace, whatever you
require...’

Jadrin thought
Ashalan had already had ten times as much gold as Skimblaze could
have owed him. No doubt he wants to keep me around to make further
use of my magical abilities later on, he thought cynically, for not
once while he was speaking did Ashalan’s eyes stray from the gold
to Jadrin himself.

By dusk,
hardly even able to find a space within the room in which to sit,
Jadrin was desperate to call up the spirit again. Punctual, it
materialised upon the windowsill as usual, preening its slim,
glowing features with languid paws.

‘
Well,
as you see,’ Jadrin began, gesturing round the room, ‘I begin to
doubt whether you could ever spin enough gold to satisfy
him.’

The spirit
made a nonchalant gesture. ‘Hmm. It would seem that way... Do you
want to remain here at court, Jadrin?’

Jadrin shook
his head. ‘No, not really, but I can hardly go against the wishes
of the king, can I?’

‘
Even
after he has used you in this way?’

Jadrin paused
for a moment to think. ‘I have no choice. I doubt if my father
would welcome me back if I ran away and where else could I go?’

‘
Oh, you
are a foolish boy!’ the spirit cried, as if glad of the fact,
hopping to the floor, dancing in the pale rays of the moon. ‘And do
you wish for me to spin?’

‘
If you
will first tell me the price this time.’

For a moment,
poised as if at the brink of ultimate triumph, the shivery being
glided from bale to bale, appearing to be seriously contemplating
the matter.

‘
Mmm,’
it murmured at length. ‘I predict that, should I complete this task
for you, the king will make you a celebrity of the
court...’

‘
This
much has been promised me, yes,’ Jadrin interrupted, somewhat
impatiently.

‘
After a
while,’ the spirit continued, unperturbed, ‘Ashalan shall actually
let himself see you. He is not a great lover of women. Perhaps this
was why your father sent you here instead of your
sister.’

‘
She is
too young,’ Jadrin said, wondering at the same time how the spirit
knew so much of his circumstances.

The spirit
shook its head. ‘You are wrong. Where the lusts of the powerful are
concerned, no creature is too young!’

Jadrin could
sense in the spirit’s words its great scorn of humankind,
Ashalankind in particular.

‘
What is
your price, then?’ he asked irritably.

‘
The
king will come to desire you,’ it answered. ‘I expect he will fight
it for he is afraid of love and mistrusts beautiful things, but my
price is that should do your best to encourage him and, when the
time comes, submit to his desires. On the night that you go to his
bed, you will allow me to enter your soul...’

‘
For
what purpose?’ Jadrin cried, aghast at all he had heard.

‘
That is
not your concern.’

‘
But
what will happen to me?’

‘
You
will not be harmed. You will remember nothing. Agree now: yes or
no? I can hear my brethren calling me from the starshine. I have
little time to linger here.’

‘
One
thing you must tell me,’ Jadrin said quickly, half standing up. ‘Do
you intend to do the king harm?’

The spirit
glowed a bright, aching white, intense as the heart of a star. ‘And
what do you care of that?’ it asked.

Jadrin
shrugged. ‘I don’t feel I can be part of a plot to harm anyone. It
is wrong.’

The spirit
spat out a stream of green sparks, which made the air smell of
sulphur. ‘Jadrin, he will have you and use you, as he does with all
whom he desires. You are nothing to him. He would kill you as soon
as look at you if you displease him. My purpose is not your concern
and you must put it from your mind. I dare say, when the time
comes, you’ll welcome what will happen. If you are afraid that I
will kill him, then fear no more. I will not, but there are things
that must be done and you will help me do them.’

Then the
spinning wheel began to turn, throwing off sparks of a hundred
colours, like fireworks, and thundering like a galloping horse.
‘Yes or no, miller’s son? In the morning, if there is no more gold,
you risk Ashalan taking your life to sate his monstrous greed. His
moods change like clouds. He is mad and you are at risk.’ The wheel
spun and sang. ‘Yes or no?’

Jadrin hung
his head. His eyes felt hot with shame. ‘Yes,’ he said, and,
looking up, added, ‘Do it. Make the gold. I will do as you
ask.’

In the
morning, the great heavy door to the room was flung wide and golden
coins spilled out around Ashalan’s feet as he stood at the
threshold. Golden light suffused his face, his long, braided hair
and Jadrin, sitting on his bed, considered that there was a certain
innocence playing around the king’s features. He is like a child
presented with a new toy, Jadrin thought.

‘
Boy,
you are a true magician!’ Ashalan exclaimed, and ordered that all
the gold should be taken to his treasury, which lay deep beneath
the palace. As for Jadrin, he was led bewildered into the sunlit
courtyard, where all the colourful ladies and gentlemen of the
court cheered him and threw down petals to land on his hair and
clothes. Jadrin held the piece of quartz tightly in its velvet bag
and could not speak. He could only think of the bargain he had made
and when it must come to fruition.