Ozark Fantasy - Twelve Fair Kingdoms Part 8

"They consumed your energies, child," our Granny Hazelbide had said, sitting beside me and holding my icy hands in her warm ones, and every now and then letting a spoonful of water trickle one drop at a time down my throat. "Sucked 'em right up like a pack of babies at the teat; and they'll do it every time."

I'd asked her with my eyes, because I couldn't talk-how long?

And she'd shaken her head."This first time, sweet Responsible, sweet child? No way of telling, just no way atall. What you're doing, lying there on a cross of ice and fire mingled... oh yes, child, I know! I've never been through what you're bearing, praise the Twelve Corners, but I do know! ... what you're doing there is renewing yourself. It may take days and it may take weeks and there's not a blessed thing anyone can do to help you. But there's one good thing-each time it will be shorter. As you get older, and stronger, and more experienced at this yourself... why, you'll get to where you don't mind them any more than a pack of babes!"

A spasm had racked me, all my muscles flickering under my skin, and she'd sat there calm as a boulder, it not being one of the times when she felt expected to cluck and fuss and dither. She'd sat there eleven days, and when it was over she told me I'd done well.

"A short time, for your first time," Granny had said. "That speaks well for the future, child." They hated me, one and all, did the Magicians of Rank-though they no more understood why than the Yallerhound would have. Nor why they should have felt compelled to come at my call, me no more than a little pigtailed girl; nor why they couldn't get up and go home, but had to sit and listen to my p.r.o.nouncements, as if I had a rank and they had none; nor why their voices left them if they tried to speak upon the subject, ever. It was a mystery, and one that they weren't privy to, and there weren't supposed to be any mysteries they weren't privy to. They were, after all, the Magicians of Rank.

So, if one of them could do me a little hurt... just a small hurt, you understand, just a plaster for their aching egos... I was in fact surprised that they'd chanced the cavecat, it might have really hurt me; and I could be sure I'd been watched every minute in the crystal that Lincoln Parradyne Smith kept in his magic-chest. He must of been very confident he could reach me in time if I couldn't manage by myself, or he never would of risked it. The Yallerhound, on the other hand, was just funny. It couldn't hurt me even if it wanted to, which it didn't, short of falling on me by accident off a Castle roof, or something of the kind.

"The Yallerhound," I said aloud, which delighted it and set it humming up and down a nineteen-tone scale that was awful beyond all imagining, "is a harmless creature. However, it weighs almost one hundred pounds and a bit, and it eats more than a half-grown Mule, and it will never, never stop licking you."

We would of made a pretty sight, Sterling and me and my saddlebags, and the Yallerhound riding behind me licking my neck and my hair as we flew by. Not to mention the fact that, given the magic I was supposed to be able to perform, we would of had to drop like a stone. A Mule couldn't carry that much weight, even if it was precious cargo instead of stupid beast. I had to make up my mind what to do with the thing.

I could simply leave it here, a "gift" to the Castle, and claim I had no idea where it had come from-which was, in a sense, true. They'd never forgive me, and they'd probably shut it up in the stables to die of heartbreak and the conviction that it had done something wrong-but I could do that.

I could claim that their Magicians had sicced the silly thing on me, and gain a few points that way, since they wouldn't be able to prove that they hadn't. But the results for the innocent Yallerhound would be the same, if I left it behind.

I could buy another Mule to carry it and take it with me-thus guaranteeing that I'd look like a fool and be greeted like one at every Castle left on my itinerary. Or I could try to do something with more flair to it, and maybe some justice. Like send it back to its Granny, O! True, I shouldn't be able to do that. True, she'd know that I had. But she couldn't tell on me without telling what she'd done, and what she'd done was a pure disgrace. Therefore! "My pretty Yallerhound," I said, frantically ducking the purple tongue and encountering it all the same, "do you know what I think? I think you should go right back to where you came froml Poor Granny Golightly has got no Yallerhound to love her, and I'll bet she's dirty as seven little boys dividing up syrup in August. She undoubtedly, indubitably needs a Yallerhound to look after her, don't you think?"

Its eyes got wide and its tongue paused long enough for me to wipe my face off once. It had just enough brain to know I was talking about it, as well as to it. I tapped it on its nose, gently, and I scratched it on its hairy stomach, gently, and I set to work.

Crystals were not my style, but I didn't need one. I had no trouble finding my lady Golightly in my mirror. She slept curled like a scrawny baby in a high bed on the third floor of Castle Clark, under a thick red comforter stuffed with squawker feathers, and a smile of innocent bliss upon her face.

I dumped the Yallerhound right on top of the smile.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

I sat in the library at Castle Motley, drinking coffee so strong you could of stood a spoon up in it easy, still weak-kneed from the recent shenanigans but pleased that I'd arrived here without any unbecoming incidents. Sterling had flown across the narrow channel to Mizzurah with nary a wobble, no more creatures of any size or description had joined me as I flew, and if there was an adventure headed at me for this station on the Quest it had yet to arrive. And I was willing to wait.

We were even having a pleasant conversation-something I'd been missing for quite a while now. Me and my host, Halbreth Nicholas Smith the 12th, and the lady of his Castle, Diamond of Motley. Just the three of us. There was a small informal supper planned for the evening, I'd been told, and a hunt breakfast the next morning, but no great to-do's. That suited me; I had another slice of fresh hot bread with blazonberry jam, braced myself against the coffee, and relaxed.

Diamond of Motley was a placid woman, gone stout and not the least bothered by it, with her red hair wound around her head in a coronet of thick braids that was about as becoming as measles but otherwise perfectly suitable. She had eleven children and an unshakable serenity; just looking at her rested me. Hearing her say that she and hers were looking forward to the Jubilee delighted me."Diamond of Motley," I said, "that does me good! It's a great occasion for Ozark, and it should be looked forward to. I've not heard much talk along that line since I left Bright.w.a.ter.""You've been where now, Responsible?" her husband asked me."McDaniels, Clark, Airy, Guthrie, and Parson.""A shame you had to miss Castle Smith," said Diamond. "Who'd of thought there was still a cavecat left on Oklahomah?""I wouldn't," I told her. "But I learned.""Well, Smith's gain is our loss," said Halbreth Nicholas, gallant as you please, "you're here the sooner. Think you missed anything in

particular there?"

I looked at him, not sure what he meant, and he was tamping down his pipe and staring into it like he was looking for omens.

"According to a rumor as came this way," he said carefully, still eyeing the tobacco, "Smith wasn't expecting you anyhow... it's going round that there was a note sent asking you not to come."

Ah, the close-mouthed Smiths; this would be their doing. Gabble, gabble, gabble, all the time.

"As it happened, that's true," I said. "They sent me a letter."

"Signed by?"

"Dorothy of Smith-the oldest."

Halbreth Nicholas lit his pipe and took a long draught. He was a Smith himself, and head of this Castle only because there'd been no Motley sons in the last generation. If my memory served me right,

he'd be the second cousin of the bl.u.s.terer that filled the same role at Castle Smith.

"She say why?" he asked me.

"They claimed a family crisis."

"Hmmph," He blew a fine smoke ring, and he watched it rise, and he said no more. Which was only to be expected. I wanted to say something comforting about everybody having relatives they'd as soon they didn't have to own up to, but that kind of thing was the proper remark for a Granny, not a Castle daughter, and I held my peace.

Diamond of Motley was not so inhibited-after all, it wasn't herrelatives. She asked me straight out, leaning over to pour me more coffee and push the jam dish closer to my plate: "Does it make you suspicious of them, child?"

"You know what's been going on at Castle Bright.w.a.ter," I said.

"Been on all the comsets. Soured milk, smashed mirrors, kidnapped

babies, and such truck. Everybody's heard all about it by now.""Well," I said, "it's one of those which comes first the squawker or the egg things, to my mind. If Castle Smith is guilty of all this mischief, then telling me not to stop by their door makes them look guiltier. On the other hand, if you're guilty, doing something like that tips your hand so plain and easy that you can't imagine anyone with half a brain doing it; that makes them look as innocent as the babe kidnapped. On the other hand, if you were guilty and wanted to look innocent, doing something so outrageous as that would be a canny move. It goes round and round."

"So it does," she said, "and what's your own opinion?"

The question put me in a very awkward position. There sat her husband, him a Smith by birth and close kin to those at Castle Smith this minute, and she asked me such a thing? She was a typical six,

and properly named, and her husband stepped into the breach and saved me neatly.

"Shame on you, darlin'," he told her, "putting the young woman on

the spot like that. How can she say right in front of me and under my own roof that she suspects my close kin of treason against the Confederation? At least let her finish with her food before you throw her into a bog like that!"

"Oh," she said, "you know, I didn't think?"

"I'm sure you didn't," he observed, and he touched her cheek

gently. It was clear he doted on her, and that was nice. "But you must try, now and again."

Then he surprised me.

"Would you like to know what I think?" he asked abruptly.

"Indeed I would. If you're willing to say."

"I am," he said. "Delldon Mallard the 2nd, for all he's my cousin,

and his three brothers with him, never have had sense enough to pound sand in a rat hole. They're ornery enough to do the kind of foolishness that's been coming down, that's a point against them; and they're silly enough not to see that they're surrounded on all sides by Families loyal to the Confederation, and would be well advised to run with the pack at least until the Jubilee gives us all a chance to see how the land lies. But, and nevertheless, I don't think they could of carried it off this long without making some fool mistake that would of given them away-that's a point for them. And furthermore, Granny Gableframe's at Castle Smith, and I don't believe she'd put up with it for a minute, nor do I believe they could put it past her. Now that, my dear, is what I think."

"And so thought the Clarks," I said, nodding my head. "Including Granny Golightly."

"Wicked old lady, that one!" put in Diamond of Motley.

"Downright wicked!"

"Grannys aren't wicked, Diamond," said her husband firmly.

"They're just contrary, and it's expected of them. She's a tad worse than some of the others, might could be... but she has an image to live up to."

"And," I concluded, "so think I. I don't believe Castle Smith is in this."

"And the others?" They asked me together, right in chorus.

"The McDaniels and the Clarks, not a chance of it," I said. "As for the Airys, you know how they are, I don't know where they get it from. The Guthries and the Parsons, from what I can tell and the tales they're spinning, are bent on carving up one another and the poor Purdys along with them. If they've thought of the Confederation in the last two months, I'll be surprised, and the Jubilee? If they don't want to go, they just won't. And everything you said of the Smiths applies to the Purdys... if they were playing these tricks they'd of betrayed themselves early, early on."

"And us, my dear?"

I smiled at him, and had some more coffee. "I just got here," I said.

"Suppose you tell me how you feel about these things."

"It won't take long."

"All the better."

"Mizzurah is a mighty small continent, and it's right off the port bow, if you'll allow the figure, of Arkansaw and all that feuding and carrying on. We've got the Wommacks and the Travellers on our flanks, and a h.e.l.l of a lot of ocean-beg your pardon, ladies-all around, and n.o.body but Castle Lewis to rely on should all of the others decide to move in on us. Guthries, Parsons, Purdys, Wommacks, and Travellers, that is. They have us cut off completely from Marktwain and Oklahomah."

"Which means?"

"Which means we're in an interesting position, if you like interesting, but a chancy one. You'll find the Lewises as strong for the Confederation as the Airys, though a mite less drivelly about it, and they'd stand firm in any crisis; but they're even smaller than we are, they couldn't hold out a week. And we couldn't defend them.

Therefore, I tell you quite frankly, Responsible of Bright.w.a.ter, that

Castle Motley stands for the Confederation of Continents, and does so openly-but you can't count on us for anything dramatic."

He was right, if unromantic. Mizzurah was the smallest of the six

continents, and it sat all alone in the middle of the oceans with its three great neighbors hemming it on all sides. Castle Motley was in no position to make rash promises.

"But you'll be at the Jubilee?" I asked him, hoping.

"We'll be there," he a.s.sured me. "You heard my wife; her and the children, they're looking forward to it, and a lot of our staff. It's a rare chance when we can get away and see something besides our own Castle yard. We plan to leave very shortly, as a matter of fact, because we're going by water everywhere we can-no Mules for my household, thank you, except flat on the solid ground, and no more of 'em then than's absolutely required. But we can't offer you anything else but our presence, and no daring political moves-you might as well know that."

I wondered if he knew anything that I didn't, and couldn't see what