Read Snow White and Rose Red Online

Authors: Patricia Wrede

Snow White and Rose Red (40 page)

“‘Twill return to Faerie when Hugh does, in his own shape once more,” John said, and his voice trembled with the force of his emotion.
Madini laughed. “That is to say, never. There’s no charm in all of Faerie to remedy so great a sundering.”
“Perhaps that’s why John came to us for help,” Rosamund put in.
“Rose!” the Widow said sharply. “Hold thy tongue!”
Madini’s head turned, and her lips curved into a thin, cruel smile. Before she could speak, Kelly’s voice rang out in triumph: “Fiat; fiat; fiat voluntas mea!”
Silence fell like a blanket over the garden, sudden and complete. No one moved. Madini’s eyes remained fixed on Rosamund; the Widow’s gesture of restraint hung half-completed in the air.
“What have you done, Ned?” Dee quavered after a moment.
“Fixed them like statues where they stand,” Kelly answered. His voice sounded breathless, as if he had been running. “Shall we go?”
“We cannot leave them like this!” Dee said, horrified.
“‘Twould be no more than they deserve,” Kelly retorted. “But ’twill not last above an hour, and so much will do them good, I think. ‘Tis but a foretaste of what awaits an you continue meddling, or attempt again to take my crystal,” he added, speaking directly to the motionless figures grouped around him.
“They can hear us?” Dee asked.
“Aye, and much good may it do them,” Kelly replied. “Come, John; let’s away before we’re found here. ‘Twould be unwise to give substance to the rumors that run so strong in Mortlak.”
“I’ll come,” Dee said, but he did not move to follow Kelly toward the garden gate. Instead he peered in fascination at John’s motionless face. “‘Tis truly amazing, Ned. I’d no idea you’d made such great advances in the crystal’s use.”
“‘Tis as well I did,” Kelly said. “Come away! We’ve much to do before—”
The roar of an angry bear drowned out the rest of the sentence. Dee and Kelly whirled to see Hugh racing toward them from behind the Widow’s cottage, his lips curled back from his strong yellow fangs and every hair in his coat standing on end. “Ned!” Dee cried. “Do something!”
 
CHAPTER · TWENTY-FOUR
 
“The dwarf tried to run, but the bear was already too close for him to get away. Trembling and in fear for his life, the dwarf said, ‘O bear, spare me and I will give you all these jewels!’ But the bear came on, and did not heed him. ‘You do not want to eat me!’ the dwarf said. ‘Why, I am too small to make even one good mouthful!’
“Still the bear came on, and now he was drawing very near. Then in desperation the wicked dwarf said, ‘See these two girls; they are young and plump and tender, not old and tough like me! Eat them, and let me go!’ But the bear did not listen. He struck a single blow with his paw, and the dwarf fell and lay still. ”
 
THE SIGHT OF A RAGING BEAR RAPIDLY APPROACHING them, just when they thought they had won through to safety, paralyzed both Dee and Kelly for a moment. They had both heard, and both discounted, the stories of a ghost-bear in the forest which had been circulating since Master Kirton’s ill-fated hunt. The unexpected appearance of a large, dangerous, and very angry animal identical to the whispered descriptions was more than enough to freeze them both as motionless as the victims of Kelly’s spell.
Kelly recovered first. Once again he raised the glowing crystal and shouted, “Fiat voluntas mea!”
Hugh stopped short, shaking his furry head as if there were a bee in his ear. Kelly, at once pleased that his spell had had some noticeable effect and disconcerted to find that the bear could still move, shouted once more, “Fiat!”
The bear’s only reaction was to lumber forward once more. In truth, Hugh had only been affected by the casting of the spell, and not the charm itself. The magic of the crystal remained his own; it could not touch him except through the tenuous link that informed him with waves of discomfort whenever the crystal was in use. He was close enough by then to see the motionless figures of John, Madini, and the Widow and her daughters, and though he had been growing more bearish with each spell Kelly cast, he retained enough human wit to connect the state of his friends with the two strangers and the strangely attractive globe they carried.
“Run, John!” Kelly said, suiting his own action to his words.
Dee caught at his companion’s arm, all but stopping the flight he had hardly begun. “But these people! What of them?”
“An we’re fortunate, the bear will take them instead of us,” Kelly said. Unable to free his arm from Dee’s grasp, he dragged the older man with him toward the Widow’s gate.
The bear broke into a lope as he passed by the living statues, intent on the crystal in Kelly’s hand. He caught up with the fleeing wizards as they reached the Widow’s rosebushes. With a roar that expressed all the anger, hurt, suffering, and confusion he had felt over the eleven months past, he reared back on his hind legs and swiped at Kelly with one powerful paw.
Kelly recoiled almost, but not quite, in time. The blow, which would have seriously injured him had it struck where the bear had aimed it, glanced off the arm that held the glowing crystal. Kelly’s grip was not strong enough to withstand such an unexpected shock. The crystal globe flew from his grasp, struck the gatepost, and shattered into a thousand fragments.
“No!” Kelly said, and his cry was echoed an instant later by Madini’s shriek of angry disappointment and exclamations of horror from John and the Widow. Then all four cries were drowned in a howl of pain from Hugh.
It was too much for Dee. The sight and sound of an angry bear rearing above him, having just attacked his friend, was more terrifying than anything his scholarly life had prepared him for. With a moan of fright, the dignified Doctor Dee hauled up the hem of his long black robes and ran through the Widow’s gate and down the road toward Mortlak, as fast as his legs could carry him. Kelly barely hesitated before following, one hand clutching his skullcap to keep it from falling off and the other holding his robe out of the way of his flying feet. The wizards were too intent on their own escape to notice Master Rodgers cowering behind the hedge, or to see him scramble to his feet and stumble after them, his only thought to put as much distance as he could between himself and the terrifying animal in the Widow’s garden.
The bear did not notice their departure. He was not, in fact, aware of anything but the pain of loss. He stood roaring in agony, while from the shining splinters of quartz around his feet a bright mist began to rise, turning his fur briefly golden in the sun and then dissipating in the warm fall air.
The remaining watchers were momentarily stunned into inactivity by Hugh’s loud, angry roaring. Blanche was the only one who moved. She had been facing the gate, and when she felt Kelly’s spell dissolve with the shattering of the crystal, she ran forward. She ignored Dee’s and Kelly’s rapid exit completely; she had eyes only for the bear. As she reached his side, she pulled the little jar of ointment from her pocket, broke the sealing layer of beeswax with her thumb, and dumped it unceremoniously over as much of Hugh as she could reach. The smell of roses and honey spread through the garden.
“Blanche, what dost thou?” the Widow cried tardily.
“All I could,” Blanche murmured, stepping back. “Pray Heaven this prove as potent as we hoped, Mother, for I do not think we’ll have another chance.”
No one answered; they were all too busy watching the bear. For an instant there seemed to be no change; then the glowing mist stopped spreading and began to thicken. Soon the bear was completely hidden in a dense, sweet-scented cloud the color of whipped honey, and his roaring subsided.
“What foolery’s this?” Madini said to no one in particular. She started to raise a hand, and John caught her arm.
“You’ll add nothing to this spell, for good or ill,” John told her, ignoring her furious glare. “Though I doubt not ‘twould be for ill, an I left you the choice.”
“Thy magic is not strong enough to stop me!” Madini said. She tried and failed to wrench free of John’s grasp.
“Belike not, but my arms are,” John responded with deceptive mildness. “And believe it when I say that, woman or no, Queen’s lady or no, I’ll strike you down where you stand if you make the smallest move to injure Hugh.”
“Thou‘rt a knave and a base-born villain!” Madini snarled. Every line of her body proclaimed her outrage and indignation at being stymied by such crude methods.
John’s expression did not change, but there was a sudden aura of danger about him that made even Madini pull away involuntarily. “I think this is no time or place to talk of that,” he said.
“Look!” said Rosamund, effectively distracting both the combatants.
Under other circumstances, Blanche’s carefully ensorcelled ointment might not have been strong enough to wrest Hugh’s power from the crystal where Dee and Kelly had half-unknowingly imprisoned it. With the crystal broken and the power floating free in the air around him, the spell had only to return the power to Hugh. This was not simple, but it was nonetheless the easier part of the task.
The glowing mist that surrounded the bear was thinning; his furry coat soaked it up like a lamp wick soaking up oil. Then it was gone, and the bear stood gazing at them with a puzzled look in his eyes.
Blanche’s shoulders sagged in disappointment. John let go of Madini’s arm and, after a moment’s pause to master his own chagrin, turned to the girl and said, “‘Twas a noble attempt, and no fault of thine that it did not prosper.”
“I would not say it did not prosper,” Hugh said. Everyone turned to look at him, and he ducked his shaggy head and scratched at it with one large paw.
“Thy voice is back!” Rosamund said. She did not add that his wits, too, seemed to have returned. Had Madini not been present she might have mentioned it, but she would not expose any of Hugh’s difficulties before a hostile stranger.
“True,” said the bear, sounding surprised. “I’d not realized. I meant only that I feel far more myself than I have since this began. Except—”
“Except what?” John said, frowning.
Hugh swiped at his ear again. “Except I itch,” he said. He lowered his paw, and a large piece of skin and fur came with it.
Blanche raised one hand to her mouth in horror, and John started forward with a wordless exclamation. Hugh shook his head violently, and bits of fur flew in all directions. John stopped short as his brother’s human head appeared beneath the grisly shreds that remained.
“I itch most vilely,” Hugh repeated, scratching at his left shoulder. Pieces of the bearskin began to drop away in chunks. John’s face lit with relief, and he started forward once again, only to be stopped by the Widow’s voice.
“I think this task is thy brother’s alone,” she said. She smiled shakily at John. “I doubt ‘twill take him long.”
In this the Widow was entirely correct; by the time she had finished speaking, a naked man with dark, wavy hair stood where the bear had been, studying his hands as though he had never seen such wondrous things before in all his life. The Widow blinked, then said with great presence of mind, “Rose! Go and bring out the brown blanket at once, lest Master Rimer’s brother catch a chill.”
“Yes, Mother,” Rosamund said. She darted into the cottage and was back an instant later with the first large square of cloth on which she could lay her hands (which happened to be a green blanket, somewhat smaller than the one her mother had wished her to use). Rosamund was rapidly recovering from the shock and surprise of recent events, and she did not want to miss any interesting developments. When she returned, Hugh and John were exchanging a heartfelt embrace of relief and joy.
Rosamund waited until John stepped back, then handed Hugh the blanket. Her eyes were dancing, and she dropped a careful curtsy as soon as her hands were free.
“I do appreciate your kindness,” Hugh said gravely. He draped the blanket carefully around his shoulders, and though it reached only to his knees he managed somehow to make it appear almost elegant and entirely natural. Then he turned and looked at Blanche. “And my gratitude to thee is beyond the power of words to tell,” he said, “and beyond the wealth of all the world to repay thee for.”

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