One
Winter Fair
It was high winter and beyond the town the world lay under a blanket of white. Wiz and Moira stood outside the outer gate of the castle and looked down the long sloping High Street to the scene beyond.
“Oh Wiz! Look at the fresh snow! Isn’t it beautiful?”
“If you say so,” Wiz Zumwalt told his wife. “I’m a California boy and this isn’t my style.”
“Oh you just don’t like snow.”
“It’s not that I don’t like snow. But I hate slush.”
“Still,” Moira said firmly, “it’s beautiful.”
Wiz reached out and circled her waist with his arm. “You’re beautiful.”
Even an objective observer—which Wiz most definitely was not—would have agreed. Moira was wearing a heavy cloak of dark green wool lined and trimmed with dark fur. Her red hair, sparkled by diamond drops of melted snowflakes, hung down over the collar. The cold brought roses to her pale cheeks and her green eyes were bright under lashes the color of brushed copper.
He had loved her from the first moment he had seen her, but that had been a magic spell. What had grown between them since then needed no spells.
She clung to him for an instant and then broke away. “Oh, come on,” she said breathlessly, “I want to see my domain.”
Wiz sketched a mock bow. “Lead on, Your Majesty.”
Moira struck a regal pose. “Not until tomorrow. After Our coronation you may address Us as Your Majesty. Meanwhile you may give Us your arm.”
Ever since the fair committee had announced its choice, it had been a joke between them. When the fair officially opened tomorrow Moira would be crowned with holly and mistletoe and proclaimed Winter Queen to reign over the fair. Normally the queen was one of the women of the town, but this year the townsfolk had chosen Moira. If the truth be known this was due to a deadlock between the two logical candidates, but Wiz and Moira had chosen to ignore the politics and concentrate on the honor.
“What? You don’t want the rest of me?”
Moira opened her green eyes wide and gave him one of her patented ten-thousand-volt looks. “There are other parts of you that are useful,” she said, “but let us leave that for later.” Side by side they started down the icy street toward the fair.
The Wizards’ Keep stood on a great bluff that jutted up at the joining of two rivers. The town known simply as the Capital trailed down the sloping back of the rock to the flatlands below. From where they stood they could see over the roofs and walls of the Capital down to the fairgrounds.
Two days ago the water meadows beside the rivers had been as plain and white as the fields beyond. Now, as if by magic, a city had sprung up. Brightly colored canopies spilled carelessly against the fields of white. Along the dark river, boats lay ashore. Here and there campfires burned against the midwinter’s chill and everywhere people bustled like ants, erecting tents and stalls, unloading and setting up to display their wares.
Merchants had come from all over the human lands to trade at the Winter Fair. Wizards, townsfolk, farmers and villagers for miles around came to buy, barter, gossip and just gawk at the spectacle.
“Have you ever seen the like?” Moira asked excitedly.
“In my world we call them trade shows,” Wiz said. “Remind me to tell you about Comdex some time.”
Side by side they strolled down the Capital’s main street, greeting townsfolk and acknowledging greetings. Thanks to his magic, Wiz was a member of the Council of the North, the wizards who ruled and watched over the human lands. With his combination of magic and computer programming he was perhaps the mightiest of the Mighty who sat upon the Council. But most of the hellos were for Moira. Before they met she had been a hedge witch in a village near the borders of the Wild Wood, sharing the lives of the villagers, healing, advising and helping them in their day-to-day concerns. Her magical ability would never be above moderate, but she had a warmth and genuine liking for people that none of the Mighty could match.
There were few enough folk out as they made their way down the cobbled streets. The cold kept as many who could stay inside and as it was midmorning most of the residents were hard at work. Wiz could hear the ring of a blacksmith s anvil carried from some side street in the frosty air. From another street came the steady rhythmic clanging of a coppersmith beating out a vessel on a stake. The women of the Capital liked to do their marketing early and anyone who had free time and didn’t mind the cold would be down at the water meadows watching the fair go up.
Wiz and Moira were perhaps halfway through the town when Moira slowed and clutched Wiz’s arm more tightly. Wiz turned to look at her and saw she had gone white, making her freckles stand out starkly against her skin.
“Darling are you all right?”
“Fine,” Moira gasped. “Be fine. Just let me sit for a minute.”
Wiz guided his wife to a wooden bench by a nearby doorstep. She sank down on it and leaned forward until her head was nearly between her knees. She gasped for breath a couple of times and then held the air in. Wiz stood with his hand on her shoulder, feeling helpless.
“Can you make it back all right?”
“I do not want to go back,” Moira said, staring at her toes. “I will be all right and we can go on.”
“Nuts. You’re going back to the castle.”
Moira breathed deeply again and straightened up. Wiz could see the color coming back to her cheeks.
“I am fine,” she said in a stronger voice. “It was just a momentary dizziness.”
“You’re trying to do too much and you know you haven’t been feeling well. You need to slow down, or at least let Bronwyn have a look at you.”
She smiled up at him and patted his hand. “I will. After the fair, I promise.”
Wiz started to protest, then smiled back. “Why is it I never seem to win these arguments?”
Moira’s smile grew even brighter and she squeezed his hand in hers. “Because I am always right.”
###
Cold. Black, bitter, eternal cold and forever-frozen silence. They lay heaped where they fell, as they would lie until the primal forces of weather and earth moved them. Some had lived once, others had lived never. Immaterial. Now the living were as lifeless as the never-living, all mixed together in the dark and endless, freezing cold.
Somewhere in the chill mass a thing stirred.
###
As they got lower into town more people appeared on the street, all going in the same direction. By the time they reached the main gate at the foot of the bluff they were part of a small crowd.
The fair started just outside the gate. The road was lined with a double row of booths and pavilions in various stages of erection. Behind those rows Wiz could glimpse other tents, all brightly colored, all erected without the least regard for the appearance of their neighbors, yet all of them swirling together into an oddly harmonious whole.
The place was a cheerful babble of excited voices chattering, calling, crying wares, and shouting. Here, there was a cheer as a pavilion was raised to its full height, followed immediately by a groan as the center pole slipped on the frozen earth and the tent billowed to the ground again. There, children chased one another between the tents and through the crowds, shrieking their excitement. Over yonder a horse whinnied and a bull bellowed. Somewhere else musicians played on pipe and drum and tambourine. From the river bank came the chant of boatmen pulling in unison to bring then-boat ashore.
The frosty air was rich with the smell of roasting chestnuts and mulled spiced wine. It smelled of horses and people, garlic and new leather. Of faraway places and pine smoke. It was a wonderful odor and Wiz drank it in eagerly as they let the crowd carry them along.
###
Ice film strained and cracked from motion where no motion should be. Another jerk, and another and another until the ice flaked away from what had once been a human hand. The skeletal fingers convulsed and tightened to form a parody of a fist.
###
“Wiz look out!” Moira’s words brought him out of his reverie as her hand on his bicep guided him away from a large and uninviting mud puddle. Every morning fresh straw and tanbark was spread to keep mud from fairgoers’ boots, but in short order it was trampled, crushed and dragged into the slushy dirt.
Moira’s eyes were laughing. “I believe the expression is ‘wake up and die right’.”
“Sorry,” he mumbled. “I got distracted” Moira’s smile and resigned sigh told him she was all too familiar with her husband’s absent-mindedness. Looking at her like that he was reminded once again of how much he loved her. “Let’s go check out the jeweler’s row,” he suggested. “Perhaps they will have something fit for a queen.”
Moira inclined her head regally. “Very well. You may proceed Us to guard Us from the mud.”
###
Rocks shifted, clods of frozen earth fell free and the once-living sat erect in his icy grave. The misshapen head turned neither right nor left but the eyelids lifted on still-frozen eyeballs. Moving in uncoordinated jerks and broad swipes it began to clear the rest of the rubble from its form.
A massive wound left the brain half-exposed to the freezing air, but scraps and shards began to return. Of true consciousness there was none, nor soul nor spirit, nor coherent memories. But there were reflexes, and skills learned long and well at very fundamental levels. For the animating intelligence that was sufficient.
###
There was snow drifted against the windows, but the room in the Wizards’ Keep was warm and cozy. A wood fire crackled and danced in the stone fireplace, perfuming the air with cedar. With its carved furniture of dark oak, stone walls, and diamond-paned windows, the place looked positively medieval. With its overflowing litter of scrolls, wooden tablets, and a large crystal ball on a stand, it looked like a magician’s study. With the letters of glowing fire hanging above the two occupied worktables, the remains of sandwiches beneath the “displays,” the pot of industrial-strength tea in a corner and the flowcharts scrawled in charcoal on one whitewashed wall, it looked like a programmer’s workroom. In fact it was both, and the effect managed to be oddly harmonious in spite of the contrasts.
Wiz’s desk was deserted, but Danny and Jerry were hard at work. Actually Danny was surfing the Internet and Jerry was just doodling, but they were both doing it with the fierce concentration which is the hallmark of a good programmer and the bane of a good programmer’s Significant Other.
“Going to the fair tomorrow?” the younger, slighter, man asked over his shoulder when he reached a pausing place.
Jerry Andrews shrugged his massive shoulders. He was a big man and if he was somewhat soft, he was definitely not fat. “I dunno. Hadn’t really thought about it.”
Danny spun his chair around and grinned. “That’s the advantage of having lads. You gotta think about things like the fair.”
“I’m not sure I see that as an advantage,” Jerry said slowly. “If Malkin were here I’m sure she’d want to go.” He paused. “But then that’s why Malkin’s not here. It’s bad enough having to return the stuff she’s lifted and make explanations here and in town. At the fair . . .” He shuddered.
“Yeah. At least June keeps Ian out of trouble rather than encouraging him. Just wait until you have kids.”
“That may be quite a wait,” Jerry said dryly. “Malkin and I have talked about it and we’re not sure we will.”
Danny just smirked.
“Oh, speaking of kids,” Jerry said, “take a look at this, will you?”
Danny got up and crossed over to look at the work on Jerry’s “screen”—actually a glowing rectangle of fiery letters floating in the air above his desk.
“It’s something kind of silly, really,” Jerry went on, “but I wanted to see what would happen. Anyway, Ian’s birthday is coming up and I thought maybe I could adapt it into something for him.”
Danny frowned.
“It’s a screen saver. Here, let me.”
Jerry gestured with the mouse, clicked twice (producing two squeaks from the rodentlike demon) and sat back. After a few seconds a fluffy, pink mechanical rabbit wearing sunglasses and beating a bass drum marched back and forth through the lines of code.
“Pretty neat,” Danny agreed, watching the bunny rub out the letters with its passage. Then the rabbit hopped down off the worktable and made for the door, still banging his drum. It was out the door and down the corridor before either programmer could react. It had almost reached the corner when Jerry reached the door and gestured at the runaway bunny. It disappeared with a soft pop.
“I didn’t expect that.”
“Yeah. It just kept going, and going, and . . .”
Jerry shot his colleague a dirty look. “You and Wiz.”
“Sorry, it was too good to pass up. Anyway, you’re gonna need a way to keep that rabbit within bounds.”
Jerry rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I’ve got just the solution.”
###
The frozen thing tottered erect. Now the half-crushed head swiveled left and right in a ghastly parody of a hunting dog seeking a scent. Finding what it sought, it jerked and stumbled off down an unlit corridor half-choked with rubble.
###
The fair would not open officially until tomorrow morning. But many of the booths were set up and operating. It was already possible to buy things from the early-arriving merchants and Moira managed quite a regal progress, except when she forgot herself and gave way to bright-eyed excitement. Wiz wished he was walking beside her to watch. But it was faster pushing through the throng single-file.
They were barely three-quarters of the way along the main way when someone came up behind them. Wiz turned and saw Malus, one of his fellow members of the Council of the North. Besides the staff of a wizard and the blue robe of the Mighty, the pudgy wizard also wore the green sash of a fair warden. He was not young and not light and the combination of age and the effort to catch up with them had him red-faced and puffing.
“How is it going Malus?”
Malus sketched a bow to the pair of them. “Ah, good morrow, My Lord, My Lady. Well enough. Well enough.” He paused to wipe a film of sweat from his bald pate. “Someone tried to set up a trained dragon show down by the corrals. Horses cannot stand the smell, you know, and it just would not have been suitable. Not suitable at all. But we have him on the other side of the grounds now. Oh, and when your turn comes, keep a close eye on Mother Charisong’s booth—the tawdry orange-and-green one, you know? She swears not, but I think some of her love charms have compulsion spells on them. Not that I could find any, you understand, but I have my suspicions.”
“Oh, Mother Charisong’s not a bad sort,” Moira said. “She used to come through my village every year or two.” She frowned slightly. “She’s not malicious at all, but I think she is a bit of a romantic and the idea of instant undying love would appeal to her.”
“I’ll keep an eye on her,” Wiz promised. “Anything else?”
It was Malus’ turn to frown. “Well, I was not going to mention it just now, but since you ask I am having a little problem with one of the spells in the new magic. To brighten and dim magical lights, you know. The demon is not doing what it is supposed to. I have been over and over the code and I can’t seem to find the problem. Do you suppose you . . .”
“I’d be happy to. I’ll be back at the castle in a couple of day-tenths. Could you bring it by then?”
“Thank you, My Lord. Two day-tenths it is. Enjoy the fair. Good day, My Lady.” With that he wandered off.
Moira looked after him, eyes sparkling with laughter. “He is a dear, isn’t he?”
“Yeah, but I wish he was a little more logical when it comes to programming.”
Moira shrugged. It was an old discussion. While anyone could use a spell written with Wiz’s magic compiler, creating them required the same knack for logical thinking and organization it takes to be a programmer in any language. Traditional magic did not build up spells a statement at a time and so relied on other qualities, notably memory, intuition and courage. It was hard to be good at both the old and new magics, and as one of the Mighty and a member of the Council of the North, Malus was very good at the traditional magic.
“He has an eye for chicanery though,” Moira said. “Perhaps I had better have a word with Mother Charisong before you or one of the other fair wardens has to take official notice.”
At least one journeyman wizard was always on duty among those overseeing the fair to guard against magical trickery. It was not required that the Mighty take a turn as fair wardens, still less that the members of the Council do so, but many of them did.
“Want me to come along?”
“It would be best if you escorted me there and then went off on another errand while Mother Charisong and I talked of old times.”
“Thus implying a threat without having to make it.” Wiz nodded.
Moira’s green eyes grew wide and innocent. “Why no, My Lord. How can you think I would threaten a poor old woman? We will merely have a quiet gossip.”
Wiz put his arm around his wife’s waist. “Which will make the point without having to say a word. Darling, did I ever tell you you are brilliant?”
Moira cocked a burnished copper eyebrow. “Only by comparison.”
###
“Hey, Danny,” Jerry called, “watch this.”
Two mouse clicks, two mouse squeaks, and the rabbit with the bass drum was back on Jerrys desk. It marched up and down, beating the drum and getting closer to the table’s edge with each pass.
As the rabbit reached the edge of the table, a green tentacle curled out of the “screen,” wrapped around the rabbit’s throat and jerked it back into the system, cutting the rabbit off in mid-beat.
“Crude,” Danny said, “but effective.”
###
Deep in the Wild Wood, the sun was also shining. The weak winter rays slanted through the multi-paned windows of the great hall at Heart’s Ease, throwing diamond-shaped patterns on the table. Two women stood beside it, studying a curiously carved casket. Both of them were tall and slender, but the younger one with raven-dark hair was slightly taller than the older woman with the prematurely white hair.
“Now watch closely,” Shiara the Silver said to her pupil. Working by touch, because she was blind, she selected a lock pick from the assortment that lay on the table. “You must keep the tension on the mechanism,” she said as she smoothly manipulated the lock. Two heads, one silver-white and the other black with russet highlights, bent over the chest. “Past the first ward. Then past the second ward.”
Malkin, sometime thief on the Dragon Marches and now lady to Jerry Andrews of the Wizards’ Keep, nodded.
“And then the tumbler slips like so,” Shiara said. “Now you try it.”
Malkin bent to it with a will. In seconds the lock clicked and the dark-haired woman straightened up in triumph. Then her face froze, her eyes widened, her features contorted and she let out a thunderous sneeze.
“Had it been real, the blow tube would have been filled with something more lethal than pepper,” Shiara said mildly.
“You didn’t say anything about that,” Malkin protested, sneezing again.
The silver-haired woman smiled. “The lesson is never to trust a lock—or the person who tells you how to pick it.”
Malkin grunted.
“Well, that is enough for now,” Shiara told her pupil. “Your fingers are getting stiff from the cold and it is best we rest for a bit.”
“I can go on,” Malkin said stubbornly.
The older woman put her hand on the younger one’s shoulder. “Of course you can. But there is no need and it is best not to force such things without need. Now come and have some hot spiced cider.”
“How did you know?” Malkin asked as they settled in to high-backed chairs before the fire in the great fireplace.
“Hmm?” Shiara said into her mug. “About your fingers? Why, I could hear them. You were slowing down on simple operations.”
If Shiara was blind she still had her ears, her hands, her brains and her memories. Malkin was in the presence of a master burglar and she knew it.
She used no magic, of course. Although Shiara had been a sorceress of high skill, the accident that had ended her career as the Council’s master thief had left her so sensitive to magic that its very presence hurt her. That was why she lived in a magically “dead” zone deep in the Wild Wood, away from other people and their everyday magics. It was why Hearts Ease itself, from stone tower to attached hall to outbuildings to surrounding stockade, had been built completely without resort to magic.
“It is kind of you to teach me, Lady,” Malkin said as she warmed her hands on the mug of fragrant cider.
“It is my pleasure. There is not much human company here in the Wild Wood in wintertime.”
Although she didn’t mention it, Shiara was also doing Wiz a favor. Wiz wanted to get Malkin out of town during the fair. The multitude of booths and merchants was just too tempting for someone of Malkin’s proclivities.
Calling Malkin a thief was like saying Don Vito Corleone was a little dishonest, or Dr. Jekyll had his moody days. Malkin was that rare combination of aptitude, dedication and intelligence that marks a true adept at any art. In her case it just happened to be the art of separating people from their property.
For Malkin, stealing wasn’t just a job and it was more than an adventure. It was business, pleasure and a way of life all rolled into one. She was as dedicated to it as a medieval monk was to his calling—a comparison which would have surprised Jerry, considering her distinctly unmonklike proclivities in other areas.
“You have a powerful talent,” Shiara went on. “In some ways too much talent.”
Malkin made a noncommittal noise and raised the steaming beaker to her lips.
“I doubt you have ever been seriously challenged in your skill. So far you have been able to rely on your natural abilities blindly, without having to learn the other requirements of your calling.”
“Such as?”
“Patience. Forethought. Perhaps a little humility.”
Malkin smiled. “As you say, I’ve done well enough.”
“But will you do well enough if you face something that really tests you?”
The younger woman sighed and set the beaker of cider on the table. “Like as not I’ll never find out. Little enough opportunity I’m like to have for a great test. Things are much changed from your day, Lady.”
“Indeed they are,” Shiara agreed. “And very much for the better.”
Humans had little magic in those not-so-long-gone days when Shiara the Silver and her mate Cormac the Golden had plied their trade. The pair had relied more on stealth and cunning than Cormac’s skill with a sword or Shiara’s abilities as a wizardess to purloin especially dangerous pieces of magic for the Council of the North. It had been the last of these quests which had cost Cormac his life and left Shiara blind and allergic to magic of any kind.
“Still, you should strive to perfect your art.” And be careful what you wish for, the blind woman thought, for you may get it.
###
“Hey, Danny, I’ve got a new wrinkle for the screen saver. Take a look.” Two quick mouse clicks and the bunny appeared.
This time the rabbit didn’t have its drum. Instead it was wearing crossed bandoleers and carrying what looked like the mother of all assault weapons. Its pink ears poked out of folds in a camouflage scarf tied around its head pirate-fashion.
“Uh-oh,” Danny said. “This looks serious.”
As the rabbit approached the edge of the desk, the green tentacle reached out to grab it. The rabbit whirled and ripped off a burst with its machine gun/grenade launcher. Chunks of tentacle and ichor flew everywhere and most of the screen disintegrated under the force of the blast.
Danny and Jerry dived under the table and nearly butted heads.
Suddenly it was quiet again. The room reeked of powder smoke and plaster dust but there was no more shooting. Danny sneaked a peek over the edge of the table. There was nothing left of the screen but an occasional letter or two. The pink bunny in the boonie rag blew the smoke from the end of the gun barrel, surveyed the damage, hopped down off the table and disappeared out the door.
Danny crawled the rest of the way out from under the table. “What did you call that thing again?”
Jerry coughed and brushed the dust off his tunic as he stood up. “Uh, a screen saver.”
“Well it didn’t save it, it blew it all to hell.”
“Yeah. I guess it needs a little more work.”
Danny could only nod.