Senrid

  Down in the vast, silent throne room, the old crown nicknamed Six-Stix sat atop a black-haired head, the crown gleaming in the winter light with its own majesty. The black hair was mine, and there was definitely no majesty about me.

  This was the dull part of being a princess, having to do Clair’s open court while she was sick. Not that ‘court’ meant much in Mearsies Heili, because there aren’t any courtiers. ‘Interviews’ would be more accurate, but the old words were used out of habit.

  However, we weren’t exactly piling up people for interviews. The weather kept even petitioners from wanting to travel, for below us the roads were shiny and dangerous with ice from this early storm. But duty required me to sit there, in case anyone did come.

  There was nothing to do but eat and read. My favorite things to do alone are reading, drawing, writing, and eating. The order of those changes around a lot, but right now it was too cold for writing, and that stupid throne—handsome carvings, old and impressive, but completely uncomfortable, especially if you are short—was impossible for writing or drawing.

  So. I had a copy of an old record, an empty mug that used to be filled with hot chocolate, and on my lap half a big slab of chocolate pie, but from time to time I stared moodily at the light from the high windows inching its way along the glistening walls.

  Far too much time to go.

  While I sat in wintry stillness high on the cloud city above Mount Marcus, those who walked in the forest below found it equally quiet. The air was so cold a person couldn’t even smell the trees. Sniffing hurt the nose.

  Most of the girls were snug in our underground hideout. The outside was even too cold—and too dry—for Diana and Dhana respectively. No one wanted to be in the frigid air, but we felt the need to patrol, for we knew that the Chwahir might think this a perfect opportunity to try something nasty. We’re kids, so we’re targets for anyone who wants my land and thinks kids are too weak and stupid to defend it, Clair had said not long after I came to this world—and wow, had her words proved true!

  So, patrol duty. And, after a whole summer of being stuck indoors unless everyone left together, Faline had convinced Clair that she could take her turn. Kwenz and Jilo’s nasty trick—pinching Faline—earlier in the summer had scared us all, but nothing had come of it since Faline’s surprising reappearance, and Clair had told Faline a couple weeks before the storm hit that she could do her patrols again.

  Poor Faline! It figured that when she was finally back in the rotation, it was in time for rotten weather.

  So today was her turn, and she tried to make it as quick as possible; all the routes that lead in and out of Kwenz’s Shadowland underneath the cloud city to the east of Mount Marcus had to be snooped for signs of Kwenz’s scouts and spies.

  Cold bothered her much less than being alone did. It was hard to have fun alone, and Faline was a firm believer in turning all chores into fun. Time whirled by faster that way, which meant a person was likely to take longer, and thus do a better job. (Or so her reasoning went.)

  But no one had wanted to come out with her, not in that weather. Underneath the piles of white snow lay ice from the first night’s storm and freeze.

  She trudged along as quickly as she could, which wasn’t all that fast. The ice was too treacherous for racing. Her Yxubarec background (living on high clouds in cold air) kept her from minding the weather too much, but nobody likes slipping and falling on ice.

  So she was delighted to spot someone else in the forest, ahead on the pathway she’d chosen. She hid, an automatic reaction, and peeked. The someone was not a Chwahir, and he was a kid—two things in his favor—shorter than Christoph, blond hair, and ordinary clothes. A Mearsiean? Lost, perchance? Well, that was part of patrol duty, helping lost travelers.

  “Hi,” she called, stepping out where she could be seen.

  The boy turned quickly. He grinned at her. She liked that grin at once. It was the kind that seemed on the verge of a laugh. “Hi yourself,” he said—in Mearsiean, but with an accent.

  “Lost? Need directions? Looking for someone?” she asked, then realized that he hadn’t seemed surprised to see her.

  He shrugged. “Wandering.”

  “Garbacious weather’t’wander in,” Faline said cheerily, hoping that Clair’s world-traveling cousin Puddlenose and his pal Christoph—wherever they were—hadn’t got stuck in this kind of weather, or had managed to find shelter (preferably not in a jail for being slackers, practical jokers, and prone to snappy answers at the wrong people, like pompous border officials) if they had.

  “It is,” the boy said. “But company keeps me from noticing so much.”

  “Same here,” Faline exclaimed. “I’m stuck on patrol. Lookin’ for Kwenz’s slobs, which you aren’t one, I can tell—”

  “Never,” the kid said, with his almost-laugh grin.

  “—so if you got nowhere else to go, why not come along with me? I know the whole forest, and when you wanna leave I can point you in the right direction.”

  The boy opened a hand. “What’s your name? I’m Senrid.”

  “Faline Sherwood.”

  “Glad to meet you.” Again the quick grin, almost a laugh.

  Faline grinned back. “Well, then, this way.”

  Senrid seemed to be perfectly content to follow along where she led. As they walked they talked, Senrid mostly asking questions and Faline answering happily. Strangers were rare enough in the forest—strange kids, anyway, and when they did come along, it mostly fell to others to do the explaining. Faline thoroughly enjoyed being Senrid’s guide. Remembering her experience with poor lonely Kyale, who seemed to want to talk about herself, Faline made an effort to talk about the kinds of things she thought another kid would like to hear.

  She was especially pleased when she made him laugh. Her description of Prince Jonnicake of Elchnudaeb caused the first snicker. He really seemed to appreciate her artistry in insults when describing villains; and at his encouragement she talked more about the Chwahir, and why they had a centuries-long grudge against Mearsieans.

  “So what you say,” he commented finally, “is that tangling with the Chwahir has gotten you involved in world affairs?”

  By that time they were at the Lake, dangling their bare feet in the water, which was pleasantly warm, and sent up clouds of iridescent steam. None of the Lake beings had shown up, and the water looked placid and empty.

  Faline wrinkled her nose. “I don’t know why we got mixed up in world events, as you call ‘em. I call ‘em nasty messes.” She looked up, expecting a laugh.

  Senrid gave her an appreciative smile.

  Faline continued. “CJ thinks it’s bad luck—’luck’ is something from another world, you see. Puddlenose thinks it’s happenstance—that’s Clair’s cousin. He’s an itchfoot. Never stays in one place long. Clair says there aren’t any happenstances, not when it comes to people wanting power. That is, the only accidents are to the people who get caught in the way—and if they resist, they get swept along, like sticks at the edge of the river.”

  Senrid drew in a long breath. “She said that, did she?”

  Faline shrugged, looking down at the placid waters of the Lake. Weird, that the beings stayed away—maybe they felt cold after all? Except the water was warm! Faline mentally shrugged it off, as she did any question she couldn’t answer, and said, “Hey, you want to meet the girls in person? Much more fun than hearing about them!”

  Senrid hesitated. “Well, if your queen is sick—”

  “Oh, she’s safely upstairs in the white castle. You won’t disturb her.” Faline pointed to the mountain visible through the trees. They stood in silence, Senrid gazing up at the white palace, iridescent in the winter sun above the vaporous magic-bound cloud that crowned the mountain.

  “What is that made of?” he asked, shading his eyes with his hand. “It’s not any stone that I’ve ever seen.”

  “We don’t know. Only that it’s really, really old. Older than records, by far. And rare,
so we’ve been told. Seshe thinks it goes all the way back to the days of Old Sartor, but some people think we’re being show offs for saying that, so we usually don’t.” She grinned. “Except when I do. Like I just did.”

  Senrid uttered a soft, low whistle, still gazing upward. “And…is that a city? On a cloud?”

  “Yep. Something some old mages did. On account of those stinkacious Chwahir I mentioned, who are stuck below, living under the shadow. Not that it stopped them from playing, as Clair’s cousin Puddlenose says, the most popular of all Chwahir games: What’s yours is mine. Their ancestors, I mean. As well as the ones now.”

  “That must have taken some mighty spell-casting,” he said. “And more to keep it there.”

  Faline shrugged. “I dunno. You can ask Clair. She’s the one with the magic—her and CJ. And poor ol’ CJ is stuck up there throne-warmin’ so you won’t get to meet her either, unless you want to go upstairs.”

  “No, that’s all right,” he said. “Why don’t we meet your other friends, and then you can come and meet my family.”

  She was vaguely surprised. His family? She’d thought he was an itchfoot. But she was too excited about showing off the Junky and the gang to think about it further. “Okay,” she said.

  “Okay,” he repeated, pronouncing the word with a slight hesitation. Experimentally.

  “It’s another of CJ’s words,” she said. “She brought over some good ones! Good foods, too. Like tacos.”

  As she spoke, Faline led the way to the Junky. Why not? True, not many people outside of us girls had seen our underground hideout, but some had. Faline thought: CJ and Clair brought visitors, the most recent being Devon, the Earth kid who now lived in Imar. As long as the visitor wasn’t a Chwahir, or a grownup, who could object?

  And admiration was obvious on his round face. Faline grinned, pleased to show off something she knew was really great.

  “… and so we call it the Junky—from Junkyard. That was CJ’s idea,” she explained as they walked down the tunnel—after he appreciated the cleverness with which the entrance was hidden inside the ancient lightning-blasted tree. “Grown up nosers who might hear us say ‘Let’s go to the underground hideout’ would probably want to search for it, but who cares what a ‘junkyard’ is?”

  So saying, she led him into the main room. Senrid sniffed appreciatively at the air, which always smelled good to us girls, like loam and pine and the lingering scents of good food. It was the smell of home.

  Faline gestured proudly at the tunnel to the rooms below, at the bookcases, and the Mural, explaining how everyone had worked together, lovingly recording each ghastly, repulsive detail of the loathsome, arrogant Queen Glotulae and her obnoxious son Jonnicake. As she explained how the disgusting duo were making the surrounding people faint from the stunning garishness of their outfits (those two were the only people I’ve ever met who wore every fashion—all in the same outfit), she saw Senrid looking puzzled, and for a time she pointed at the various details, laughing so hard by the end she could scarcely talk. “S-s-s-eee, it never fails to cheer us on the gloomiest day,” she exclaimed finally. “Never! Clair’s-s-s-says the world can never’s-s-seem so b-b-bad when it has such silly people in it!”

  She turned to her guest, who smiled politely, and Faline gave up. “Maybe you have to know them.”

  Senrid opened his hand, a gesture she couldn’t interpret, but it didn’t seem unfriendly. He looked around slowly and appreciatively, his eyes lingering longest on the root-veined ceiling. “What sort of magical ward protects this dwelling?”

  “I dunno. Clair sees to all that.” Faline twiddled her fingers. “And CJ helps.”

  Seshe wandered in from the kitchen, a cup of fresh cocoa in one hand and a book in the other. “I thought I heard some snickering,” she said, looking with question at the newcomer.

  Faline introduced the two. Seshe nodded, her smile shy, then she vanished down the lower tunnel in the direction of her room, her long hair swinging against her skirts.

  Noises came from below; Sherry, Gwen, Dhana, and Irene were playing some kind of game. Faline took Senrid down a level, explaining how a lot of the rooms had two entrances and exits, one rope and one tunnel. The four girls looked up from their game, gave Senrid a polite look or greeting, then their attention snapped right back to their play. Diana sat on a hassock watching, dark braids flung back as she polished her knife collection.

  Senrid’s gaze lingered on Diana’s treasures from past adventures. Diana noticed, and she looked him over with faint interest, though there was no expression in her dark eyes.

  After the tour Faline remembered that he had wanted to go someplace. “Well, that’s it.”

  “Thank you for showing me,” Senrid said politely as he led the way back up the tunnel. And after he gave the place one last look-round, he walked out, and paused, his face expectant.

  She was hungry, and would have been glad to let him go his way so she could stay and eat, but he seemed to be waiting. She recalled that he’d said something about his family, and she was trying to be a conscientious representative for her country, so she grabbed her sturdiest coat, belted it on, and followed, hoping they didn’t live far.

  The air outside was even colder. Blue light from the westering sun gave no warmth at all as it filtered through the trees. The two kids began walking, Senrid once more asking all kinds of questions. Did Mearsies Heili have an army? No? What kind of protections?

  “That’s Clair’s stuff,” Faline said. “Hafta ask her. Or CJ. That reminds me. Wanna hear about ol’ Six-Stix bein’ lost, thanks to a slime-arooni named Tzydes? That time, see, he was at the head of these baglio sapheads from Norsunder who tentacled in, and Clair and Puddlenose ended up going clear up north, almost to the top of the world, where they have this old, old magic city…”

  By the time she’d finished that story, they had nearly reached the No Man’s Land between the forest and the Shadowland and Wesset North at the far point of the triangle. Dark was almost on them.

  Surprised, Faline said, “Hey! Where we goin’? There isn’t anyone lives here, not in a straight line all the way to the ocean.”

  “Really? I wish you hadn’t asked me that,” Senrid said. “This day has been fun.”

  “So?” Faline was now completely confused.

  In the darkness, Senrid’s smile hadn’t diminished. “In fact I wish you hadn’t ruined my plans, Faline.”

  “Your plans?”

  “Reuniting Vasande Leror and Marloven Hess. You have to die for interfering—”

  “What?”

  “A custom in our country with the force of law,” Senrid explained.

  “Fine for you,” Faline squawked, “but it’s not any custom here, and we’re in my country!” She stamped. “MH!”

  “Out of MH and into MH,” Senrid said, as though offering her a joke. By now he knew how much Faline loved jokes.

  “Huh?”

  He explained the coincidence of initials.

  She didn’t laugh. Instead, she whirled around, head down, and started to run. Senrid caught up in two steps, reached for her wrist, and performed the one spell he’d allowed himself in a white magic country—the transfer spell.

  TWO

  They appeared in a room of stone walls and floor, and Faline recovered first from the transfer-effects. She looked around quickly for a way to escape. The room was small, lit by glowglobes, containing a few pieces of darkwood furniture. The windows were narrow, through which she glimpsed torch-lit towers and high, sentry-patrolled stone walls. It was a Destination room, closely guarded to prevent unwanted arrivals or departures.

  And it was deep inside an enormous castle.

  Senrid still had hold of her wrist. His face was pale, his eyes glazed the way that CJ’s or Clair’s often were after a very long transfer, especially a double one.

  She yanked her hand away, startling Senrid. With grim thoroughness she wiped her wrist off, shook her fingers toward the floor, then stomped vigor
ously on the touch-cooties.

  Senrid watched all this in silence, then gave her a sarcastic look. “You whites are all the same. Friends until you lose. Now you’re the Righteous and Noble Hero, just like that.” He snapped his fingers. “Hypocritical.”

  “But you weren’t being friendly, you were just lying to set me up for a nasty trap. Who’s the hypocrite?”

  Senrid grinned. “I didn’t lie—”

  “Senrid!”

  The sudden, loud voice made Faline jump. Senrid’s head turned sharply.

  “Uncle! You interrupted me—”

  “I meant to. Once you’ve secured your prisoner, no need to fraternize further. Remember that. It shows a tendency toward weakness, and you’ll never be able to rule if you are weak.”

  “Yes, Uncle.”

  “Otherwise, very commendable.” The harsh voice was patronizing now.

  Faline stared, already hating the speaker. The man was tall, or seemed tall, with brown hair and eyes. His expression was a combination of arrogance and sneer that reminded Faline of Shnit Sonscarna, King of the Chwahir—which intensified her dislike.

  Senrid said in an obedient voice, “Very well, Uncle.” And once again he grabbed Faline’s wrist and transferred.

  This time the transfer magic lasted scarce moments.

  They appeared in a very dark, close-smelling environment. She recognized that smell immediately: stone-enclosed air seldom open to the outside, usually found in dungeons.

  Senrid dropped Faline’s hand. “You have to stay here.”

  “You are a lying, rotten, garbanzo gnerg of a bonehead and a disgusting pigfat, you know,” Faline stated, crossing her arms.

  “A pigfat? I don’t think I am, though I’m not sure what it is.” Senrid snapped a tiny zaplight into being. “Another of CJ’s words?” It was clear from face and voice that he was enjoying her conversation. He offered apologetically, “A clean death won’t be that bad—”