The Magic Kingdom Of Landover - The Magic Kingdom of Landover VOL II Part 24
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The Magic Kingdom of Landover VOL II Part 24

"Do as she asks, Nightshade. Let her pass."

The witch stopped, as still as death. Willow looked around quickly, seeing nothing but the trees and misty gloom.

Then Edgewood Dirk stepped into view from one side, easing sinuously through the heavy brush, silver coat immaculate, black tail twitching slightly. He jumped up on the remains of a fallen tree and blinked sleepily.

"Let her pass," he repeated softly.

Nightshade stiffened. "Edgewood Dirk. Who gave you permission to come into the Deep Fell? Who gave you the right?"

"Cats need no permission or grant of right," Dirk replied. "Really, you should know better. Cats go where they wish-always have."

Nightshade was livid. "Get out of here!"

Dirk yawned and stretched. "Shortly. But first you must let the Queen pass."

"I will not give up ... !"

"Save your breath, Witch of the Deep Fell." A hint of weary disdain crept into the cat's voice. "The Queen and her baby will pass into Landover. The fairies have decided, and there is nothing more to say about it. If you are unhappy with their decision, why don't you take it up with them?"

Nightshade shot a withering look at Willow, then turned to face the cat. "The fairies cannot tell me what to do!"

"Of course they can," Edgewood Dirk said reasonably. "I have just done so for them. Stop fussing about this. The matter is settled. Now step aside."

"The child is mine!"

Dirk gave one paw a short, swift lick and straightened. "Nightshade," he addressed her softly. "Would you challenge me?"

There was a long pause as witch and prism cat faced each other in the half light of the Deep Fell. "Because if you would," Dirk continued, "you must surely know that even if I fail, another will be sent to take my place, and another, and so forth. Fairies are very stubborn creatures. You, of all people, should know."

Nightshade did not move. When she spoke, there was astonishment in her voice. "Why are they doing this? Why do they care so about his child?"

Edgewood Dirk blinked. "That," he purred softly, "is a good question." He rose, stretched, and sat back down again. "I grow anxious for my morning nap. I have given this matter enough of my time. Let the Queen and the child pass. Now."

Nightshade shook her head slowly, a denial of something she could not articulate. For an instant Willow was certain that she intended to lash out at Dirk, that she would fight the prism cat with every ounce of strength and every bit of magic she possessed.

But instead she turned to Willow and said softly, "I will never forgive this. Never. Tell the play-King."

Then she disappeared into the gloom, a wraith simply fading away into the shadows. The baby woke, stirring in its mother's arms, blinking sleepily. Willow glanced down into the cloak's deep folds. She cooed softly to her child. When she looked up again, Edgewood Dirk was gone as well. Had he been with her all the way? The fairies had sent him once again, it appeared, although with the prism cat you could never be entirely certain. He had saved her life in any case. Or more to the point, saved her child. Why? Nightshade's question, still unanswered. What was it about this child that mattered so to everyone?

Cradling the baby in her arms, she began to walk on once again.

It was nearing midmorning by the time Ben Holiday reached the country just south of the Deep Fell. He would never have gotten there that fast if Strabo had not offered to trade him a ride for possession of the Tangle Box. The dragon had wanted the box from the first, but Ben had refused to give it up, not convinced that it should be in anyone's possession but his own.

"Let me have it, Holiday," the dragon had argued. "I will keep it in a place no one can reach, in a fire pit deep within the Wastelands where no one goes."

"But why would you want it at all?" Ben asked. "What would you do with it?"

The dragon had flown back from his assault on the demons. They were alone in the center of the meadow. Horris Kew slumped on the ground some yards away. Questor Thews and Abernathy had not yet reached them.

The dragon's voice was wistful. "I would take it out and look at it from time to time. A dragon covets treasures and hoards precious things. It is all we have left from our old life-all I have left, now that I am alone." Strabo's horned head dipped close. "I would keep it hidden where it could never be found. I would keep it just for me."

Ben had interrupted the conversation long enough to intervene between a sodden, angry Abernathy, who had just come rushing up, and a terrified Horris Kew, and assisted by Questor Thews had restored some small measure of peace between them. The conjurer had saved their lives, after all, he reminded his much-distressed scribe. He went on then to dismiss Kallendbor and his army, exacting an oath from the Lord of Rhyndweir to appear before him in one week's time for an accounting of his actions. He ordered his Guard to disperse those people who had come looking for mind's eye crystals and found a great deal more than they had bargained for, back to wherever it was they had come from.

Then he remembered Willow. He went immediately to the Landsview and found her just as she was climbing free of the Deep Fell. Nightshade's domain, he thought in horror, and no place for the sylph. He was thinking of Nightshade's parting words to him. He was thinking what the witch might do to Willow if she were given half a chance.

It was a two-day ride to the Deep Fell-far too long under the circumstances. So he struck a bargain with Strabo. A ride to the Deep Fell and back in exchange for the Tangle Box, if the dragon promised that no one else would ever set eyes on it and no one, including the dragon, would ever attempt to open it. Strabo agreed. He extended his firm and unbreakable promise. He gave his dragon's oath. It was enough, Questor Thews whispered in a short aside. A dragon's word was his bond.

So off Ben went aboard Strabo, winging through the storm winds and rain, finally passing out of black clouds and into blue skies. The sun shone anew on the land, spilling golden light across the grasslands and hills running north, cutting a swath of brightness through the fading dark.

"She is there, Holiday," the dragon called back when they grew close, its sharp eyes finding the sylph much quicker than Ben's.

They swooped down onto the crest of a hill, a scattering of woods running right and left. Willow appeared from across a meadow of wildflowers and Bonnie Blues, and Ben ran to meet her, heedless of everything else. She called to him, her face radiant, tears coming into her eyes once more.

He raced up to her and abruptly stopped, the bundle in her arms a fragile barrier between them. What was she carrying? "Are you all right?" he asked, anxious to be reassured that she was well, eager just to hear her voice.

"Yes, Ben," she answered. "And you?"

He nodded, smiling. "I love you, Willow," he said.

He could see her throat constrict. "Come see our child," she whispered.

He came forward a step, closing the small distance between them, expectation and disbelief racing through him. It was too quick, he thought. It was not yet time. She had not even looked pregnant. How could she have given birth so fast?

The questions vanished in the afterglow of her smile. "The baby?" he said, and she nodded.

She parted the folds of her cloak so he could see. He bent down and peered inside.

A pair of dazzling green eyes stared boldly back.

BESTSELLER.

The interviewer sipped a pineapple-strawberry smoothie in the living room of Harold Kraft's palatial Diamond Head home and looked out across the vast expanse of lanai and swimming pool to the only slightly vaster expanse of the Pacific Ocean. It was late afternoon, and the sun was easing westward toward the flat line of the horizon, the gradual change in the light promising yet another incredibly beautiful Hawaiian sunset. The granite floors of the living room and lanai glittered as if inlaid with flecks of gold, the stone ending at the pool, one of those knife-edge affairs that dropped into a spillover as if falling all the way to the ocean. A Jacuzzi bubbled invitingly at one end of the lanai. A bar and cooking area dominated the other end, complete with hollow coconut shells used for tropical drinks at the frequent parties the author gave.

The home was conservatively valued at fifteen million, although the price of real estate is always subject to what the market will bear and its measure is not an objective exercise. Homes around it had sold for ten million and up and lacked both the extensive grounds and the unrestricted view that took in most of Honolulu. Bare land went for five million in this neighborhood. The numbers were unimaginable for most people. The interviewer lived in Seattle in a home he had bought fifteen years ago for somewhat less than what Harold Kraft earned in a month.

Kraft wandered in from his study where he had gone to answer a private phone call, leaving the interviewer to sip his perfectly mixed drink and admire the view. He strolled over to the bar with a brief apology for taking so long, fixed himself an iced tea, crossed the room to the couch where the interviewer was patiently waiting, and sat down again. He was tall and slender with graying hair and a Vandyke beard, and he moved like a long, slow, elegant cat. He wore silk slacks and shirt and hand-tooled leather sandals. His tanned face was aquiline, and his sandy eyes were penetrating. There were rumors of reconstructive surgery and a rigorous training regimen, but that was fairly commonplace with the rich and famous.

"Good news," he announced with a smile. "Since you're here, I can share it with you. Paramount just bought rights to Wizard Wizard. Two million dollars outright. They want Sean Connery for the title role, Tom Cruise for the part of the Prince. What do you think?"

The interviewer smiled appreciatively. "I think you're two million dollars richer. Congratulations."

Kraft gave him a short bow. "Wait until the merchandising kicks in. That's where the real money is."

"Do you write your books with an eye toward movie sales?" the interviewer pressed. He wasn't getting nearly enough out of Kraft to satisfy either himself or his magazine. Kraft had published three books in two years and dominated the bestseller lists for most of that time, selling more than five million copies in hardcover. But that was practically all anyone knew about him. For all his notoriety and success, he was still very much a mystery. He claimed to be in exile, but he wouldn't say from where. He claimed to be a political refugee.

"I write to be read," the author replied pointedly. "What happens after that is up to the consumer. Sure, I want to make money. But mostly I want to be happy."

The interviewer frowned. "That sounds a bit ..."

"Disingenuous? I suppose it does. But I've done a lot of things and been a lot of places, and I don't have much to show for any of it. What I have is myself, and my writing is an extension of myself. It is very hard to separate the two, you know. A writer doesn't just punch a clock and go home at the end of the day. He carries his work around with him, always thinking about it, always polishing it up like the family silver. If you're not satisfied with it, you have to live with your dissatisfaction. That's why I want to be happy about what I do. More important to be happy than to be rich."

"Doesn't hurt to be both," the interviewer pointed out. "You've had an amazing string of successes. Do you ever think about what it was like before you were published?"

Kraft smiled. "All the time. But I sense an attempt at an end run. I have to remind you that try though you might, you won't get me to talk about my earlier life. Ground rules for this interview, right?"

"So you've said, but my readers are quite curious about you. You must know that."

"I do. I appreciate the interest."

"But you still won't discuss anything about yourself before you were published?"

"I made a promise not to."

"A promise to whom?"

"A promise to some people. That's all I intend to say."

"Then let's discuss your characters and try coming into your life through the back door, so to speak." The interviewer harbored hopes of publishing a book himself one day. He fancied himself very clever with words. "Are they based on real people from your old life? For instance, the misguided King of your magic land, his inept court wizard, and the snappish dog who serves as his scribe?"

Kraft nodded slowly. "Yes, they exist."

"How about your protagonist, the renegade wizard who saves the day in each book? Is there some of you in him?"

Kraft cleared his throat modestly. "A bit."

The interviewer paused, sensing he was finally getting somewhere. "Have you ever dabbled in magic? You know, played at conjuring spells and the like? Has that been a part of your life?"

Harold Kraft was lost in thought for a moment. When he came back from wherever he had been, his face turned serious. "I'll tell you what," he said. "I'm going to make an exception to my rule of never talking about my past and tell you something. There was a time when I did play about with magic. Small stuff, really-nothing serious. Except that once I did stumble quite inadvertently on something that turned out to be very dangerous indeed. My own life as well as those of others was threatened. I survived that scare, but I made a promise to certain people that I would never use ... that is, dabble, in magic again. I never have."

"So the magic in your books, the conjuring and the invocations of spells and the like, has some basis in real life?"

"Some, yes."

"And the tales you weave, those spellbinding stories of monsters and elves, of mythical creatures and wizards like your protagonist-do these have a basis in real life as well?"

Kraft slowly raised and then lowered one eyebrow. "A writer writes what he knows. Life experience enters in. It usually takes a different form than the reality, but it is always there."

The interviewer nodded solemnly. Had he learned anything from this exchange? He wasn't sure. It was all rather vague. Like Harold Kraft. He covered his confusion by checking the tiny tape recorder sitting on the coffee table. Still spinning. "Would it be fair to say that the adventures you write about in some way mirror your own life?" he tried again.

"It would be both fair and accurate, yes."

"How?"

Kraft smiled. "You must use your imagination."

The interviewer smiled back, trying not to grit his teeth. "Do you have other stories left to tell, Mr. Kraft?"

"Harold, please," the author insisted with a quick wave of his hand. "Three hours together in the journalistic trenches entitles us to conclude our conversation on a first-name basis. And to answer your question, yes. I have other stories to tell and some time left to tell them, I hope. I'm working on one now. Raptor's Spell Raptor's Spell is the title. Would you like to see the cover?" is the title. Would you like to see the cover?"

"Very much."

They rose and walked from the living room down a short hall to the study, which served primarily as Kraft's office. Word processors and printers sat at various desks, and books and paper were piled all over the place. Framed book covers hung on the walls. A koa-wood desk dominated the center of the room. From the stacks of writing on the top of this desk, Kraft produced a colored photo and handed it over to the interviewer.

The photo showed a bird that was all black save for a crown of white feathers. The bird was in the act of swooping down on a malevolent being that resembled a mass of thistles. Lightning streaked from the bird's extended claws. Dark things fled into a woods at the bird's approach.

The interviewer studied the photo for a moment. "Very dramatic. Is the bird representative of someone from your earlier life?"

Horris Kew, who now called himself Harold Kraft, nodded solemnly. "Alas, poor Biggar, I knew him well," he intoned with a dramatic flourish.

And gave the photo a nostalgic kiss.

WITCHES' BREW

To Lisa.

For always being there.

To Jill.

Because you must never give up on yourself.

All children, except one, grow up. They soon know that they will grow up, and the way Wendy knew was this. One day when she was two years old she was playing in a garden, and she plucked another flower and ran with it to her mother. I suppose she must have looked rather delightful, for Mrs. Darling put her hand to her heart and cried, "Oh, why can't you remain like this for ever!" This was all that passed between them on the subject, but henceforth Wendy knew that she must grow up. You always know after you are two. Two is the beginning of the end.

-J. M. Barrie, Peter Pan Peter Pan

CONTENTS.

Mistaya Rydall of Marnhull Haltwhistle Spell Cast Challenge Seduction Bumbershoot Graum Wythe Redux What You See Ardsheal Nightshade's Tale Juggernaut Dragon Sight Wurm Poggwydd Concealments Specter Dog Dreams Venom Holiday Heart Specimen