Anthology 1: The Far Corners Page 2

  The General glared, tried to speak, coughed again. I did make out the one word 'why.'

  "Because I'm tired," I said. "I'm tired of wars, tired of killing, tired of dodging blows from those who would kill me. If I can buy a couple of years of peace with a lie, then so far as I can judge it's a small price to pay."

  I brought up my fetch's hands, waggled her fingers. The General's ornate House dagger flew into her right hand.

  "There, that does it," she said. "You're dead, General. Nothing but bones. I'll note that I gave your remains a hasty but marginally dignified burial. It'll say so in my report, and we both know official Kingdom field reports never lie."

  My decoy smiled. She lifted her wand, and it flickered, and the General's failing pest shield was rewoven, and his failing nightsight spell was rekindled. His weapons sailed back to land at his feet.

  "A gift from the Kingdom, General," I said. "The last. And woefully insufficient. But I can't waste any more effort on dead soldiers or old wars, now can I?"

  He just stared. The bugs and the crocks and the mudsharks sang on, unheeding.

  I tugged at fetch-spells. She waved, and snapped her fingers, and vanished.

  The General stared, open-mouthed. "Damned sorcerers," he said, and he spat. "Crazy, the lot of you."

  He stooped, gathered his arsenal. Then he turned, took two steps, stopped and turned again. For a long time he peered about into the swamp, seeing the towering cypresses and the twisted knotwoods and the moldering sump-canes he'd taken exile among. Something like a weary smile caught his face.

  He threw a single, quick salute into the night.

  Then he was gone.

  Peace still holds, in the Kingdom, and three long years gone by. There are times I dare to wonder if, at last, this fragile peace might mature, might grow strong, might endure. There are those who attribute this peace to the fledgling Regency's wisdom and statecraft.

  Wisdom and statecraft.

  Hell.

  Two of us, at least, know better.

  The Harper at Sea

  by Frank Tuttle

  "I am a luckless vagabond,

  bereft of land or country,

  unchained, unbound, by love or law,

  unhomed till Death does take me."

  Jere let the last note go sour. Then he dropped his roadharp in his lap, put his chin in his palms, and stared scowling out over the White Sea. The Sea stared back, wide and blue and calm, its lonely beauty marred only by Jere, his raft, and his gaggle of water-barrels.

  Jere's raft -- indeed, it was a raft, sturdily but crudely fashioned and rudely but adequately provisioned -- bobbed gently, making soft slurping noises as it rode one gentle swell after another. The raft's trailing flotilla of barrels bumped and sloshed, caught in a tattered fishing net that kept the barrels from scattering and allowed Jere to reel in fresh ones with ease. The larger pitch-sealed casks contained fresh water, dark and tasting of pitch, but safe and plentiful. The smaller casks, much to Jere's horror, had produced nothing thus far but a pair of shriveled soofa-fruits and dozens upon hundreds of broken, crumbling Tirlish oat-cakes. They aren't even good oat-cakes, fumed Jere, if indeed there is such a thing. They certainly weren't baked by Tirls, who at least know how to brown the crust.

  Jere reached into his pocket, withdrew an oat-cake, took a nibble, and cast the wretched thing into the sea. "Ought to give the kraken a stomach-ache," he muttered. "Maybe they'll think everything Tirlish tastes this foul, harpers included."

  His roadharp began to sound loud, frantic G-minors, the harpish word for danger. Jere snatched up his roadharp, rose, and backed away from the edge of the raft. I had to say "kraken," Jere thought, heart racing. I just had to say it out loud.

  Something wet struck him squarely in the back of his head. Jere threw himself face-down and flat on the raft and shook his head to dislodge the soggy mass in his hair.

  Water splashed, and a woman laughed.

  Jere turned his head, came eye-to-eye with the same once-bitten oat-cake he'd just thrown into the sea, and shushed his roadharp.

  The woman laughed again.

  *Merfolk.* The word leapt unbidden into Jere's mind, and in an instant of wonder Jere realized his harp had spoken, not in its usual Harpish, but in Kingdom.

  *Merfolk,* came the word again. And, *mind thy tongue.*

  Jere rolled onto his back and lifted his head and there she was, her chin resting on her hands, her elbows on the raft, her smile widening at Jere's round-eyed stare. The mermaid -- and mermaid she must be, Jere decided, from a glance at the empty Sea -- looked human. Her hair was long and thick and black; Jere marveled at how it dried instantly upon leaving the water, even becoming loose and full in the brief troughs between swells. Her skin was smooth, and golden-brown, and decidedly lacking in scales; her eyes were large and green, set wide below long dark lashes. Jere stared. Her face, her hair, those big green eyes -- they were familiar, somehow. If not for his harp's warning, Jere knew he might have blurted out something like "Haven't we met before?" As if she'd understand, Jere thought. Merfolk use signs to communicate, on those rare occasions they communicate at all.

  "You dropped your lunch," said the mermaid, in clear, unaccented Kingdom.

  Jere's harp made a soft strum of caution.

  "So I did," said Jere, after a moment. "How clumsy of me."

  The mermaid's teeth were white and sharp. "I took no offense," she said. "But I thought it polite to return it. Wouldn't want friend kraken to fall ill, now would we?"

  Jere blanched. "Forgive me," he said, scrambling to his feet. "I spoke in rashness and fatigue. I fear Tirlish harpers make poor sailors." Jere bowed.

  The mermaid laughed. Her voice was merry and gentle -- a singer's voice, Jere thought. Strong, yet measured. A mezzo-soprano, no doubt. Jere took some solace in that, though his ease was tempered with the legendary ferocity of the White Sea merfolk.

  "I am Jere the Harper," he said, rising from his bow, and shaking his head to clear it of images of the mermaid on a mage-lit stage. "I sail for Finnipolis."

  The mermaid lifted a narrow eyebrow. "Greetings, Jere the Harper," she said. "What an odd approach to sailing you Harpers take. No sail, no rudder, no lines, no oars -- why, one might think you were merely clinging to a scrap of a raft, lost and adrift on the wide White Sea."

  Jere sighed. "Perhaps 'sailing' was a bit of an exaggeration, Lady," he said.

  The mermaid cocked her head. "You may call me Keena," she said. "Keena of Clan Screel."

  Jere bowed again. "Honor to your Clan," he said. "I hope my craft is not intruding upon your waters."

  "It is," said the mermaid. "But most of the Clan looked and laughed and swam away."

  Jere laughed, and smoothed his hair. "And yet you did not," he said, smiling ruefully. "One wonders why."

  Keena smiled back. "Swim away?" she said. "How could I? A lone landwalker perched on a tiny raft, flinging pastries at kraken when he isn't pacing or singing long, sad songs to the gulls and the sky -- who could just swim away?" Keena moved her hands from beneath her chin and gripped the edges of the raft. "You have a story to tell, Harper," she said. "Grant me the boon of a telling. And who knows -- if your tale is a worthy one, perhaps I will grant you a boon in return."

  Jere opened his mouth to agree just as Keena pulled herself from the water and onto the raft.

  In at least three languages Jere knew, a euphemism for "foolish, provocative behavior" was the phrase "gawking at mermaids." While merfolk often went unclothed, Jere knew that land-folk who took undue note of this practice often went without heads, or at least without the use of their limbs until the bones were knitted.

  Keena, though, was clothed. Clothed in a long golden gown that neither dripped nor clung -- a gown that spun itself whole out of the air as the mermaid emerged from the water.

  "Welcome, um, aboard," said Jere. What, he wondered, does one say to mermaid who might also be spellweavers? "My flotsam is your flotsam."

  Keena t
hrew back her hair and stood before him. Jere couldn't resist a quick glance down at her feet -- and feet she had, bare and pink, but wholly human.

  "Mind your manners," said the mermaid, before Jere could look away. Then she smiled at his panicked expression and plopped easily down, her hands around her knees. "Now sit, Harper," she said. "Sit, and tell Keena the mermaid how you came to be here, aboard this raft, in her corner of the Sea."

  Jere took a deep breath, buttoned his shirt, and sat. "Like so many epic tragedies," he said, with a grin, "it all started with a wedding."

  Keena laughed, and Jere with her, though his harp made faint pleas for caution.

  "A Royal wedding, no less," said Jere. "Duke Hovet, Lord of Finnipolis, is to be wed, and he chose me, a humble Tirlish road-harper of mild and humble renown, to sing and play that day."

  "An honor," said Keena.

  "Oh, yes," said Jere. "An honor, and more. You see, it is the custom for the harper who plays a Royal wedding to remain on as Harper to the Court. And, as Harper, I would have taken Royal apartments, a stipend, a position on the Council of Arts." Jere shook his head. "Instead, here I am, Jere afloat, Gods know how many miles from Finnipolis, and it six days before Duke Hovet's grand wedding."

  Keena lost her smile. The wind blew her gown and her hair, and her eyes met Jere's, and . . . such a lovely shade of green, Jere thought. Like Aegallean jade, or a windswept field of Highland winter-grass.

  Jere's roadharp made an ugly jangle of minor notes.

  Jere felt his face flush. "I left for Finnipolis as soon as the Duke's letter reached me. At Mollinace, I booked passage aboard a Morat shallows-sloop," he said, staring at the raft's bleached timbers. "The Bonkey, she was, bound direct for Finnipolis. Her master and crew seemed good enough. Right up until the time they dragged a sack over my head as I slept and cast me into the Sea."

  Jere felt Keena's eyes upon him. Merfolk glamor, or spell-weaver's charm -- no wonder the sailors fear these folk so.

  "And this raft?" said Keena. "Was it in your pocket, with the oat-cakes?"

  Jere chuckled. "Hardly, Lady. Hardly. The raft was alongside the Bonkey; I merely fell onto it, where I lay in a swoon until the sun rose." Jere rubbed the lump on the back of his head. "And then I awoke, to find myself adrift. Complete with water and these wretched oat-cakes and my purse and belongings. They didn't want to kill me, you see, or even rob me. No, they'd been hired to put me out to sea for a while. Long enough for the Duke's wedding to commence, I suspect."

  "Ah," said Keena. "Treachery vile. A rival harper, perhaps, eager to assume your mantle as Harper to the Court?"

  "Who else?" said Jere. "He's probably introducing himself to the Duke this very moment. 'Oh my,' he's probably saying. 'Your Grace has a wedding in six days and still no sign of that upstart Tirl?' And then friend harper will shake his head and mutter something about Tirls and wine-barrels and the Duke will snicker and before the day is out someone else's boots will be under my bloody bed."

  Jere paused, fists clenched. Keena lifted an eyebrow, after a moment.

  "You seem rather more concerned about your loss of a position at Court than about your current predicament," she said. "Lost at sea is not something most landwalkers endure with such serenity."

  Jere shrugged. "My esteemed benefactor either knows that the raft will drift to shore well before my provisions run out, or he arranged for another ship to pick me up," he said. "Murdering a harper and risking the Guild's displeasure and the Curse of Arphon -- well, it just isn't done." Jere frowned. "At least," he added, "it isn't done often."

  Jere spread his hands and risked the mermaid's gaze. "And that is the tale of Jere the Harper and his raft upon the Sea," he said. "I wish I could say the tale ends with Jere's triumphant entry into the Duke's Court on the eve of the wedding, and the comeuppance of that scheming rival harper, and the customary inclusion of the phrase 'happily ever after,' but I fear that this is not to be."

  Keena shook her head. "Happily ever after," she said. "Surely, Harper, many tales end in happily ever after, and not just the tale of Jere at Court."

  Jere heard his roadharp lend faint echoes to the mermaid's words.

  Oh, shut up, he shouted silently at his harp. It ignored him, and played on.

  Jere sighed and ran his fingers through his salt-stiffened brown hair. "I suppose so," he said. "But -- telling truth, Lady, my tale nearly ended one chilly night last winter. I almost froze to death. There was a rain, and it soaked me, and turned to sleet. Couldn't get a fire to start. Remember that night, old wood?" asked Jere, with a glance aside at his roadharp. "On that miserable bluff above the River Flood?"

  Jere's roadharp strummed a soft affirmative.

  Jere sighed. "I thought they'd not find me until Spring," he said. "There I'd be, eyes pecked out, flint in hand, looking rather pathetic, I fear. Frozen to the dirt, purse empty, with naught but a Harper's cloak to bury me beneath. But the Duke's invitation changed all that," he said. "A roof. Hot meals. Baths. Fine clothes. A distinct lack of banditry. All on a regular basis. Is that too much to ask?"

  Jere felt Keena's smile fall away.

  "Tell me this, Jere the Harper," she said. "Is it not true that harpers may only take the name Bard by singing a certain number of new songs?"

  Jere looked away. "It is true," he said, softly. "Thirty songs. Ten songs of magic, ten songs of love, ten songs of power."

  "And is it not also true," said the mermaid, "that a certain Tirlish harper once vowed to take the name Bard? And has this upstart Tirl not already sung two new songs of magic?"

  Jere's harp sounded the peculiar sudden silence that signaled awe among its kind.

  Jere looked up at Keena, his brow furrowing in concentration. "Merfolk do not speak Kingdom," he said. "And how could anyone, merfolk or no, know of my Vow --"

  The mermaid smiled, and the air about her blurred, and her hair shortened, her eyes turned blue, and her gown became a Throffish goodwoman's threadbare blouse and oft-patched pleated skirt.

  "I know you," said Jere. "We've met!" His harp made frantic shushing noises. "On the road, beyond Cyrella. Just outside a despicable little tavern called the Goat's Gather." Jere snapped his fingers. "You said your name was Venda! You gave me a pie!"

  Blue eyes twinkled. "You remember my name," said the Throffish woman. "How sweet. And yes, of course I remember Cyrella -- you stood up to that lout with the fur coat and the axe," she said. "You called him -- what was it? The foul-smelling, inbred get of a hill-troll and a buzzard. And then you pushed him, and a donkey kicked him, and he slid down a ditch into a creek."

  Jere stared. "And who might you be today, Lady?" he said. "If I might be so bold as to inquire."

  "I am both Venda and Keena," she said, with a shrug. "Both are names I have used before, names as good as any. But if you prefer, you may use the name First Bard Arphon gave me when we met. He insisted upon calling me Lyric."

  As she spoke, the Throffish woman vanished, replaced by a slanting shaft of golden glow that rang faintly with the strains of far-off music.

  Jere dropped instantly to his right knee in a long, low Harper's bow.

  "Lyric, Muse of Bards!" he said, in a hush. "I have no words."

  "That would be a rare event," said a voice from within the glow. Then it faded, leaving Keena the mermaid standing before Jere. "I am no more Muse than mermaid," she said. "But I learned long ago not to argue semantics with Bards and Bards-in-training. You lot will always abandon reason for rhyme, so if Muse you name me then Muse I'll be."

  Jere rose, heart pounding. Lyric, Muse of Bards, he thought. Here with me!

  "But I am no Bard," he said, more in amazement to himself than in question to Lyric. His intended renunciation of his secret vow to become bard stung him suddenly, and he blanched. "I am perhaps not even long to be called Harper, except to the Court of the Duke."

  "Nevertheless," said Lyric, "when you spoke your Vow, that night of your sixteenth birthday, I heard." She smiled, and a soft l
ight shone in her eyes. "Have you forgotten that night, Harper? Did you not feel me standing there beside you?"

  Jere closed his eyes. Hadn't there been a soft sigh of wind, a rustle in the leaves, a far-off cry of a night bird that called out as if in answer?

  "Yes," he said. "I felt you at my side, then." When, he wondered, did I forget?

  Lyric shimmered, became the Throffish girl Venda, and took a step forward. "I never left, you know," she said. "So few take the Vow, now. So few of these seek out even one song, let alone two."

  Let alone thirty, thought Jere. His face reddened as guilt rose up like bile in his throat.

  "Feel no shame, Harper," said Lyric, now as a mermaid. "Feel no shame. You vowed only to try. You vowed only to give what strength you had. If the years weigh too heavy -- if the nights grow too cold -- well, I bear no malice to those who never take the name Bard. It is enough, for them, that they undertook the journey -- not that they took the name."

  "But --"

  "No," said Lyric. "Listen. You remember the Vow of Arphon, and the vow you spoke," she said. "But do you not recall the vow I made to Harpers and Bards alike, after Arphon made his vow to me?"

  "I do," said Jere. "You vowed your words, when ours failed us, and your music, when our own was silent, and your wrath, when our blood was spilled."

  "As I said, Bards are notorious for choosing rhyme over reason. I also vowed to give you songs to listen to, when you wearied of hearing your own. For is that not the greatest danger to you, Harper? That of growing weary of the art itself? Of losing your love of music that once burned in your blood like a gentle form of madness?"

  Jere hung his head.