She was strangely beautiful. Too beautiful, he thought, to be mortal, despite her lack of color. Rather like a sketch before the pigment had been added, every shadow and contour perfectly defined but unfinished. There was a hardness to her lines, however, a certain set to her jaw and about her lower lip as well, which should have detracted from her beauty.
Somehow it didn’t matter. She was beautiful enough to make his heart lurch.
But was she even alive?
He could picture Fionnghuala Lynn’s falls alight with torches as the Merry People awaited his return. Iubdan would be anxious for news, and Bebo hardly less so. Eanrin needed to make a decision—either bear the woman back across the lake or leave her here.
“How can I bring a corpse into Rudiobus?” he whispered. “If corpse you are, that is.” He shook his head, setting his jaw. “No, I cannot do it. Death cannot come to Rudiob-AYIEE!”
The stranger’s hands had come up and clasped about his neck. He leapt to his feet, screaming as though bitten by a snake. If he’d been a cat, the fur on his tail would have stood on end. As it was, he lost his cap in a brief struggle to loosen her hold and danced several paces away.
“Dragon’s teeth!” he bellowed. “Dragon’s teeth and wings and tail! You nigh unto scared my whiskers off, woman!”
The mortal lay in a heap, supporting herself on her elbows, breathing now in rasping gasps that sounded as though they would tear her lungs to shreds. With an effort, she raised her face. Her eyes pierced Eanrin.
“Help me!” she gasped. Then, with a moan, she collapsed once more.
“Dragon’s teeth,” the poet swore again, his voice venomous. He approached on tentative feet, sniffing just in case some trace of a spell had escaped him before. The caorann tree waved its branches gently, as though trying to reassure him. But he knew better than to trust any of the trees in the Wood. They were deceitful devils when they got the chance, even the caorann on occasion.
Kneeling but hesitant to touch her again, he said, “Gentle lady, I thought you were dead.”
She was still but for the faintest rise and fall of her chest as she drew breath. Setting his jaw, Eanrin reached out and took her in his arms. She was so thin that he expected no difficulty in lifting her. To his surprise, she was far heavier than her size would indicate, and he struggled to stand upright. Yet she moaned piteously in her semiconscious state, her arms draped across his neck.
She smelled sweet to him suddenly. He put his nose into her hair and drew a long breath. All the prettiest scents of the world danced alluringly through his senses.
“I should put you down,” he whispered, but his arms would not obey. “I should leave you here. You’ll do me harm if I bear you in. I know you’ll do me harm!”
But his heart would not believe his head, and his arms clutched her close.
He heard the Black Dogs’ voices.
The darkness of their baying rolled across the Wood, dragging shadows with it, dousing lights. Eanrin turned, his face pale as a ghost’s, expecting to see their great bodies bearing down upon him, teeth flashing, eyes blazing.
Instead, he saw something far more dreadful.
He was a hound, but he was not black. Where he stood, the shadows of the trees drew back, and light fell in a bright aura upon his white-gold coat. Tall and slender, with a long, noble face, he stood on delicate feet and gazed at the poet from out of the Wood’s depths. He made no sound but took a single step forward.
Eanrin screamed.
In that instant, his decision was made, though he did not make it for himself. His feet moved in a surge of terror and, still clutching the woman tight, he sprang back across the borders into Rudiobus.
3
EANRIN STOOD ONCE MORE upon the banks of Gorm-Uisce. The Wood was behind him, but he felt the protections of Rudiobus all around, the boundaries set in place ages ago by Queen Bebo. Nevertheless, he stood scarcely breathing, his limbs all atremble. Then he squeezed his eyes tight shut and bowed his head. He would not think of it. He would not remember it! That vision was unbearable, unthinkable, and he would not allow himself to dwell upon it. Better to have seen the Black Dogs!
With a shudder that shook his whole body so that he nearly dropped his burden, he at last opened his eyes again. He found the woman gazing up at him, her face solemn and unreadable.
Eanrin’s mouth was dry, and his voice croaked when he spoke. “You’re safe now. I will take you to my king. Death may not come to Rudiobus, and neither will his Dogs.”
Wordlessly, she buried her face once more in his chest. Eanrin carried her, staggering to the water’s edge. Órfhlaith waited there, still tiny as a mayfly.
“Is she the victim?” the mare asked.
Eanrin nodded.
“Iubdan would wish to offer refuge. Put her on my back.”
Eanrin, for once in his life, obeyed without a word. The magic (if magic it must be called) worked again. When he stepped forward to put the woman on Órfhlaith’s back, their sizes altered without ever seeming to change. The woman did not shrink; Órfhlaith did not grow. Yet each fit the other perfectly.
Eanrin sprang up behind the woman and put his arms around her to keep her in place. The mare cantered smoothly back across the lake. Eanrin said nothing. His heart beat too fast, and his head still whirled with terror. Several times in his absentmindedness, he almost lost hold of the stranger and allowed her to slip into the water.
He knew what he had seen. He only wished to the Spheres Above that he had not! Perhaps he could forget. Perhaps he would not be forced to remember. . . .
At last Órfhlaith passed through Fionnghuala Lynn to where Iubdan, Bebo, Gleamdren, Glomar, and all the court of Rudiobus, having heard the awful voices of the Black Dogs, had gathered to discover the source of all the excitement. Queen Bebo’s delicate veil covered her hair and glinted in the torchlight, and she lightly held Iubdan’s arm.
“What have you there, poet?” demanded the king as soon as Eanrin and the mare appeared.
“A mortal,” said Eanrin, his voice subdued. He looked at the woman held before him and thought, What a fool I was to have thought otherwise. She is so obviously what she is. How could I have suspected a glamour?
When Eanrin seemed unwilling to tell his tale, Órfhlaith explained what she knew. As she spoke of the Black Dogs, a hush settled on the crowd, broken a moment later by a rush of excited babble, like birds chattering their morning chorus. Black Dogs! How tremendous! The stuff of one of Eanrin’s exotic tales! Meanwhile, Gleamdren stepped forward and put her hands up to help the woman off the mare’s back.
“Careful, darling,” said Eanrin hastily. “She might have died while crossing, and you shouldn’t be touching death.”
The stranger moaned before the words had quite left the poet’s mouth. Gleamdren gave Eanrin a withering glance and assisted the stranger to the ground, supporting her with gentle hands. The people of Rudiobus looked upon her and gasped.
“What a pretty creature!” said Queen Bebo, pressing a hand to her heart.
“And mortal?” exclaimed the king. “A princess of the Near World, perhaps. And pursued by the Black Dogs! Such a dreadful fate.”
“Especially for one so fair,” agreed his queen. All those gathered murmured their agreement. “Can she speak, Gleamdren? Can she tell us her story?”
Eanrin hopped off Órfhlaith but hung back. Ordinarily, he would have stepped forward and demanded his fair share of the attention. After all, the mortal was his find. But his limbs felt weak, and his stomach roiled with the too-near terror he had just experienced. It was all he could do to stay on his feet. When Bebo turned to him and repeated her question, he murmured only, “Not much. She said help me, or some such nonsense. That is all.”
Gleamdren gave him a quick glance. She had never known Eanrin so restrained. Her lips thinned. Then she turned and whispered tenderly to the stranger, “There, there. Can you talk, then?”
The stranger’s eyes, which had been half closed, suddenly o
pened wide. Colorless yet beautiful, they rolled as she struggled to take in all the assembled people, the laughing faces wearing unnatural expressions of concern. “Wh-where am I?” she cried in a voice rough with mortality. Then she moaned and buried her face in Gleamdren’s shoulder as though it was all too much to bear. “The Dogs . . .”
“Hymlumé’s light!” exclaimed Iubdan, his own dark eyes snapping with something between sympathy and anger. “How could those brutes chase this little mite? We must learn what goads them!”
“No,” said Bebo softly. “Not tonight, my Dark Man. Can you not see how close she is to fainting? The poor thing is spent. Let us allow her a sound night’s rest before we ply her with questions.”
“Aye, that is wise,” agreed her husband. “Lady Gleamdren, can you find accommodations for our guest?”
Gleamdren nodded. “I shall put her in my own bed. She’ll rest easy enough there and hear nothing of those monsters while she dreams.”
Eanrin gasped. All in a rush, his own fears vanished, and he stared at his lady, at the stranger, and back again. “Gleamdren, my sweet,” he said, stepping forward and putting a protective hand on her shoulder. “We don’t know anything about this creature. We don’t know what she might have done to provoke someone to set the Black Dogs on her. They don’t chase without reason, you know.”
But though the words spilled quickly from his tongue, no one paid him heed. Gleamdren shrugged off his hand and, with nothing more than a withering look, ignored him. She walked away with the king on one side and the queen on the other as she assisted the woman back through the caverns of Rudiobus. Glomar trailed behind, and all the rest of the court, sparing not so much as a glance for the crimson poet.
He found himself at last standing alone beside Fionnghuala Lynn with the king’s mare. He turned to Órfhlaith. “I tell you what, my friend, something about this puts my hair on end.”
She whuffled and shook her ears. “Do not mistrust Master Iubdan or his lady. Would they allow evil into Rudiobus?”
Eanrin did not hear. He watched the torchlight vanishing up the caverns, his heart sinking. The last thing in the world he wanted was to become tangled in some mortal’s affairs. But he had brought the creature into Rudiobus of his own free will. Whatever happened next, he could no longer extricate himself.
With a curse, he left Órfhlaith and the waterfall, sprinting after the crowd.
The colorless woman opened her eyes to the warm glow surrounding her. The room was full of gold. Gilding on the bedposts and walls, golden threads in the bed curtains, a gold frame surrounding a mirror of pure water—she closed her eyes again and turned away from that. The last thing she wanted to see was her own reflection.
When she raised her lids again, there was more gold. The gold of candlelight shining on the white-gold braid draped over the shoulder of a Rudioban maiden.
Flowing Gold.
“So. You’re awake.” Lady Gleamdren sat on a chair near the bedside, her eyes narrow, her arms crossed over her chest. “It’s about time.”
The colorless woman opened her mouth, but her throat was raw and she found it difficult to speak. Then she gasped, a tearing sound in her chest, and cried out, “The Dogs!” She sat up in the bed, her long hair falling about her shoulders like a shawl and partially covering her face. But one bright eye gazed out from between the limp strands. “The Black Dogs! Are they near?”
“Nice show, that,” said Gleamdren, twisting her lips. “I’d almost think you were truly frightened.”
The stranger blinked. As an afterthought she took another deep, shuddering breath. “How long have I slept?”
“Don’t give me that. You haven’t slept at all.”
The woman swallowed. The counterpane was heavy, and she pushed it back. Even it was quilted with golden thread on gold-spun cloths. “Who are you?” she asked the maid.
“Lady Gleamdrené Gormlaith. As if you didn’t know.”
A smile touched the woman’s mouth, tugging at its corners. “I did not know. But I am pleased to make your acquaintance.”
“Less pleased am I!” Gleamdren hopped up from her chair and strode to the bedside. “You’re wearing my nightdress. Did you know that?”
The woman looked down at the soft green gown embroidered at the neck with dark leaves and, sure enough, more gold. She said nothing but picked at the rich collar.
“And do you want to know why you’re wearing my nightdress?” Gleamdren persisted. “Because every glamour-dazzled fool in Rudiobus has gone and fallen in love with you. Every one of them! Do you think I’ve a single suitor left this night to think of me?” As she spoke, her hands touched her own face as though to assure herself that she was still as pretty as she’d always been. Her mouth formed a hard line as she brandished her fists the stranger’s way, and the woman drew back a little from her.
“My only choice,” Gleamdren continued, “was to offer you my bed and my gown. Display my sweet-natured heart, you know. At least then, when the novelty of you has worn off and you’re long gone from Rudiobus, my suitors will still remember the kindness of Gleamdren.”
The smile on the woman’s face grew, and in her eyes, fires danced. “I am sure rumor of Lady Gleamdrené Gormlaith already flies across the worlds. Rumor of her beauty and of her favor in the court of Iubdan.”
Gleamdren looked mollified. “Well, it’s all Eanrin’s verses, you know,” she said modestly. “They do have a way of getting about, his being Iubdan’s Chief Poet. Not that I give him the time of day, mind you. I’m not such a fool as that. You give a lad an inkling of favor, and suddenly he forgets all that undying passion of his! Best to string them along—but you distract me.”
“Indeed, such was not my intent.” The counterpane fell back as the woman slid her legs around and over the edge of the bed. “Did you have something more to say to me, Lady Gleamdrené?”
“I want you to kidnap me.”
“What did you say?”
“I want you to kidnap me.” Gleamdren set her jaw. “I’m not a fool, you know. I did not fall for your little glamour.”
The woman said nothing. She stared into the maid’s eyes, momentarily uncertain.
“I’m not the sort to fall in love,” Gleamdren continued in a most practical voice. “So it’s not in my nature to fall for glamours either. Not even a spell is going to make me love someone so unconditionally! No, when I saw you, I felt neither love nor pity for you, no more than that silly Eanrin did, I’m sure. But unlike Eanrin, I stop and think about things now and then. So when you were brought inside and even Bebo was taken in by your ‘great beauty’—though, I must say, I don’t see what’s so great about it. Even with enchantments, you’re far too scrawny to be beautiful—I thought to myself, ‘Who could possibly deceive even my queenly cousin?’ Not another Faerie, surely. Bebo is older than all of them. No enchantment of the Far World would get past her eye.
“Then I thought, well, what about a witch? Not a mortal witch, of course; those poor hags and silly sorceresses couldn’t begin to deceive even Eanrin, much less my cousin! Perhaps a Faerie witch, then. But even Vartera, the Witch Queen of Arpiar, couldn’t get past Queen Bebo’s protections. And she tried! Lumé love you, how she tried, so desperate to find the Flowing Gold was she! Everyone wants the Flowing Gold. And every gold-hungry witch and monster of the Far World has tried to take it at least once. But you . . .”
Gleamdren’s stream of prattle died away as she smiled knowingly upon the colorless woman. “You did what even Queen Vartera could not—you deceived Bebo. You wheedled your way into Rudiobus, extracted promises of safe haven from the king and queen. You are more than a mere goblin witch, aren’t you?”
“What, then,” the woman whispered, “am I?”
“A dragon.”
The candles all about the room flared, then sank on their wicks. The warm glow vanished, exchanged for a dull redness. Gleamdren and the stranger gazed at each other. And slowly the glamour unraveled.
Hri Sora
sat on the edge of Lady Gleamdren’s bed, clad in her soft green nightgown. Her skin was stretched too thin over her frame, and in places it broke, revealing cruel scales beneath. These were black with a red-hot iridescence that was painfully beautiful to behold.
“I thought as much,” said Gleamdren with a satisfied smirk. “You smelled burnt like a dragon, not dead like mortals do. So tell me, dragon, are you looking for the Flowing Gold too?”
“I am,” said Hri Sora. Her voice rasped between her sharp teeth.
“Of course you are. I know where it is; did you know that?”
“I did. And you will tell me.”
Gleamdren laughed outright. Her laugh was artificial, as though she’d forgotten long ago what a real laugh was supposed to sound like. She wiped one eye with her thumb and turned a smile upon the dragon. “Oh, honestly! Do you really think that’s how it’s going to work? I’m not about to just tell you a secret like that, older than the foundations of the world! You’re going to have to kidnap me.”
Hri Sora hissed and fire gleamed in her mouth. “Tell me what I want to know, and there will be no need for kidnapping.”
“What? And spoil all the fun? I think not! No, no, it’s much better that you steal me away to . . . wherever you live. I do hope there’s a good high tower there. It’s proper if you lock me in a high tower. That’s how these things are done.”
The dragon rose from the bed. Fire burned through her skin, and the green nightgown caught and smoldered at the neck and sleeves. “Tell me what I want to know.” The heat of her words melted the gilding on the bedposts, on the walls, on the mirror’s frame.
“No. Sorry. Kidnapping it must be.”
“Are you not afraid?”
“Why should I be afraid? I have scores of suitors, and they’ll all come to rescue me. Can you imagine how romantic that will be? Much more so than epic poetry. I’ve never been kidnapped before, but I’ve always rather liked the sound of it! So yes, why don’t you just spread your wings like a good dragon and carry me off?”