The Crusading Wizard

CHAPTER 2

Balkis tensed beneath that touch, but a melodious voice said, “Fear not, little one. You have the aura of dryad-magic all about you, and that is reason enough to take you to our hearts.”

Balkis mewed her thanks as she looked up into a brown and resin-painted face beneath a crown of green needles, and knew that wherever she roamed, she would always be home.

The Allustrian tree-spirits made much of her, petting her and crooning to her and watching her playas they trailed their branches temptingly for her to pounce at and miss, and sometimes catch. When she grew hungry, they showed her where small creatures burrowed, termites that might eat of their wood. At night, by herself, she found the mice. The forest was also filled with scents that frightened her, but she stayed near the trees and knew they would protect her. In fact, the tree-spirits taught her to climb up to their limbs for safety-then gently and with much reassurance and coaxing, taught her to climb down again.

At last, though, one dryad sighed and told her sisters, “She is not meant to be our pet, no matter how much we enjoy it.”

“True, Sister Pine,” another said. “She is more than she seems.”

They all knew what.

“Come, then, little one,” said Fir, “follow my needles.” She trailed a branch along the ground, and pounce by pounce Balkis followed.

“Here, little one, come here,” Cedar called, and her needles took up at the limit of Fir’s reach.

Thus they led her, tree by tree, deeper and deeper into the wood, until the boughs opened out into a broad clearing. In its center stood a cottage with a thatched roof. Half the clearing was a vegetable garden, and a gray-haired woman plied her hoe there, in wooden shoes and long woolen skirts with a blouse of homespun.

“There is only one human word you need know,” the last dryad told Balkis, “and that is ‘Mama.’ ” Then she touched the little cat on her forehead and intoned,

A wave of dizziness passed through Balkis. She shook it off and moved forward tentatively—but how clumsy she suddenly seemed! Looking down, she was appalled to see fat little arms where her legs should have been, and chubby hands instead of paws!

“Do not let it fret you, little sister,” the dryad said, voice tender with sympathy. “You shall become used to it quickly, and be as deft and agile as ever you were.”

Balkis mewed protest—but it came out as a wail.

In the garden, the old woman looked up in surprise and concern.

“Go now to that woman,” the dryad said. “She will surely give you comfort and nurturing, for never has she had a child of her own, though dearly she has wished for one.” She gave the baby a pat on the rump.

Confused and awkward, Balkis crawled from the underbrush toward the garden, crying.

The old woman dropped her hoe and came running. She found an eighteen-month-old baby with a golden blanket wrapped about her hips and torso, crawling toward her-for of course, at a year and a half a cat is fairly grown, but a human is still a baby.

“Oh, you poor little thing!” the old woman cried, and knelt down, holding out her arms.

Balkis looked up, blinking, and if the tilt of the eyes in that pale little face seemed odd to the old woman, she certainly did not say so. The rosebud mouth opened and spoke a single word: “Mama?”

The old woman’s heart turned within her, making her all the more greedy to pick up the child and cradle it in her arms. “No, alas, I’m not your mother, pretty babe, but I shall find out who is. Come, come back to my cottage now, and I shall feed you warm milk and soft bread until my husband comes home. He shall spread the word throughout the wood and find your mother for you.”

Old Ludwig was as delighted as his Greta to see the baby. Still, he dutifully went from cottage to cottage among the widespread, loose-knit community of forest dwellers, asking who had lost a girl-child. None had, and he and his wife exulted. Sooner or later, they knew, her parents would come looking for her, though they had heard of children being taken to the forest and abandoned. They kept her and hoped, and Greta held her to her heart. “I shall call you Leisel,” she told the child.

But the little girl shook her head, her mouth firming with stubbornness, and spoke her second word: “Balkis.”

Greta stared in surprise, then gave a laugh of pure delight. “Even so, if that is your true name. Balkis you shall always be.”

The true parents never came, of course, and as she grew older, Greta and Ludwig ceased to think of her as a foundling and thought of her only as their daughter. At first she only mewed in answer to their fond chatter, and they found it endearing. When she could walk, though, she sometimes strolled into the forest in the early morning or evening to talk with the trees, and old Greta, watching her face, could have sworn she heard the firs and pines reply.

It was a year before Balkis happened to look out the doorway and see some kittens tumbling at play in the yard. She yearned to be with them, to be mock-fighting, though she knew she was too old for such things, a grown cat fit to have kittens of her own—but hard on the heels of the thought came an immense desire to snuggle a little body against her own, to feel its little nose nuzzling …

“Balkis?”

She looked up and saw Greta looking about, concerned. “Balkis, where are you?” she called.

“Here, Mama,” Balkis answered, but heard only mewing from her own throat. Startled, she looked down at her feet, and saw hind legs and paws. The fur was tan, the color of the homespun gown Greta had made for her.

“Balkis!” Greta called, worried. “Come out of hiding, child! Don’t make me fret!”

“But I’m right here, Mama,” Balkis protested. She heard only mewing again, and dropped down to all four feet, heart thudding in fright. “Mama, help me!”

“Oh, out of the way, silly cat!” Greta flapped her apron. “Shoo! I must find my child!” She ran out into the yard, calling, “Balkis! Where are you, dear?”

Finally Balkis realized that the old woman saw only a cat, that she had indeed changed back into the shape she had worn for so long. She sprang to the side and, in the shadows, thought fiercely of her human shape, of chubby legs and small bare feet …

She looked down at her forepaws and saw hands.

With a sigh of relief, she ran toddling out the back door and around the cottage, calling, “Mamamamamamamama!”

“Balkis! There you are!” Greta came running and swept her up into an embrace. “Oh, you had me so worried, child! Never go outdoors without me! Never do that again!”

Balkis clung, trembling, and resolved that she never would “do that again”—at least, not where Greta might see her, or when she might worry.

Now that she had discovered she could change into a cat at will, though, she did, now and then-but only alone in her room at night, or when Greta allowed her to go into the under-brush to search for berries. Balkis found that a cat could go under the bushes and find the fruits that others never saw.

As she grew past five she began to think about the stories the old woman told her at bedtime—not only about the tales themselves, but what they showed as evil or frightening. Some of the stories were meant to scare, she realized—to make silly little children learn to be wary of dangerous things. The brother and sister who were abandoned in the forest and found a house of gingerbread where a witch lived, demonstrated what happened to children who wandered away into the trees—and the wolf who gobbled up the grandmother then donned her nightgown and bonnet to decoy the little girl in the red hood into coming close enough to catch, showed Balkis not to talk to strangers. But who were the wicked ones? Witches and wolves, night-walking spirits and fairy horses that could change themselves into men! Things of magic were evil and dangerous, wild animals were unpredictable and frightening.

What, then, would be a magical child who could change herself into a cat?

The mere thought of frightening Greta threw Balkis into a panic; she threw herself on her foster mother and wept bitterly, and when Greta stroked her hair and asked what had upset her so, Balkis only shook her head and wept harder. In the night, she dreamed of Greta and Ludwig staring at her in shock, then backing away, making signs to ward off evil and fleeing from the cottage. Balkis woke screaming, and it took Greta half an hour of rocking and murmuring before the child could sleep again.

So, though Balkis could not resist the temptation to go for a night’s prowl now and then, she was very careful never to change where anyone could see her.

Now and again one of the monks from the monastery came by—the abbot thought of the forest-dwellers as part of his flock, and wished to be sure their souls were healthy. Greta and Ludwig walked long miles to hear Mass every Sunday, so they thought it only fitting that one of the monks should walk long miles to visit them now and then. He would talk with them and tell them the news of the world, then read from the Bible—the Old Testament, which they rarely heard in church. When first he did, Balkis was curious, so he taught her how to make the sounds the letters showed. Instantly, she felt consumed by a veritable hunger for the Book herself, and the stories the monk never had time to read. Ludwig and Greta had an old family Bible, an heirloom they kept more as a charm than as a source of knowledge, since, being peasants, they had never learned to read. Balkis, though, pored over the pages in the evenings, sounding out the letters until the words began to make sense, and thus learned another sort of magic.

When she was fourteen, her body began to change in a different way, and Greta had to teach her how women cope with their monthly difficulties. Soon after, the full moon summoned Balkis to change into a cat and go for a night’s prowl—but she had no sooner leapt from the window when an unfamiliar sensation swept over her body, a prickling and tickling that nearly drove her crazy. She opened her mouth to mew in distress, but the sound that came out was loud and raucous, a yowling that she knew well from the cats in the barnyard. She sprang back through the window and changed to her human form, then sat on her bed, shaken and wary.

She had seen cats go into heat, of course, had heard them yowling for a tom to come and assuage their distress. She had watched them couple, but hadn’t thought much of it. The next time it happened, though, she watched quite closely, and came away shaken, bound and determined that no such thing would ever happen to her. She was very careful about her timing after that, and if by chance she mistook and felt the craving in her cat-body, she transformed herself back into a girl on the instant. The craving was still there, of course, but was only a shadow of a cat’s compulsion.

She kept studying the nearby cats though, and saw how having a litter too early stunted a cat’s growth, saw how too many litters too close together wore them out. In fact, Balkis saw one mother cat die when her kittens were only a few weeks old, and afterward she adopted them and cared for them with a fierce devotion. She knew what it was to be an orphan kitten herself, and dependent on the whims of strangers.

Greta and Ludwig were pleased to see her compassion, but Ludwig told her sadly, “We can’t afford to care for all the kittens in every litter every cat has, child. I can’t chop and sell enough wood, and your mother can’t raise enough vegetables in her little garden, even with all the help you give her.”

“Don’t worry, Papa. I shall tell the cats how to find their own homes and fend for themselves,” Balkis said.

Ludwig smiled indulgently, not to say adoringly, and left her to her kittens. He was quite surprised when the cats really did wander away as soon as they were grown, not to come back. He couldn’t know that a cat he had only rarely seen—and never the same color twice—had taught them at night how to hunt in the forest, then with more-than-feline intelligence had led them away to rich hunting grounds when they were grown. He would have been delighted, though, if he had known.

So Ludwig and Greta tolerated Balkis’ hobby of raising orphaned kittens, and their house was seldom without a litter somewhere about the yard, or even indoors in the cellar in winter. They took it as a sign of Balkis’ good heart-her positive passion for lost kittens, her untiring efforts to help the old couple in their chores, even chopping wood to lighten Ludwig’s labors. They only thanked Heaven for such a willing and devoted daughter to brighten their latter years-and never noticed that she was truly, genuinely beautiful, for she had always been beautiful to them.

For her part, Balkis too thanked Heaven every night for such loving and gentle foster parents, and whenever she went into the woods, she thanked the dryads for having led her to them.

The town of Qushan in northwestern Persia lay white in the simmering heat of early afternoon. All was quiet, for most of the people were indoors, dozing away the heat of the day. A few men sat in the shade by the pool in the garden by the mosque, discussing the Koran. All else lay quiet. The people would rise when the worst of the heat was over and work till the sun sank.

On this particular day, though, they would not have the chance.

There was no warning but the rumble of hooves, a rumble that grew into thunder. The men in the garden ran to the western edge of the town to see what was making the noise. They saw a long dark line of horsemen racing toward them.

They ran, shouting, to waken their fellow citizens and bid them hide or take up arms. Sleepy men came stumbling from their houses carrying scythes, flails, here and there a sword.

Then the horsemen fell upon them.

They galloped down every street of the town, screaming with blood lust and loosing a volley of arrows from their short recurved bows.

Half the townsmen fell, transfixed by arrows. The lucky ones died. The rest screamed as spears pierced their chests or bellies, or howled with rage as they swung their own weapons at the invaders—but the horsemen dropped their bows and drew broad-bladed, curved scimitars. They struck and struck again. The streets ran with blood.

When all the men had fallen, the invaders rode among them, seeking the wounded among the dead bodies. When they found one that still moved, they struck with lance or sword. Finally, sure that they had left none of the men of the town alive, they burst into the houses and dragged out the women and children. The barbarians set the townsfolk to digging graves as a way of learning what happened to those who dared defy them.

They didn’t notice the one body that wormed its way, little by little, back into a house. There the young man found cloth to bandage his shoulder, then stole out the back door and into the granary, where he lay buried in grain until nightfall. When all was dark, he crept out, steeled himself against the wails of mourning, tried to ignore the wreckage and the sounds of pillaging and revelry inside the mosque, and ran off into the night to bear warning to the next village, that they might warn all others, perhaps even send word to the Caliph in Baghdad.

The Caliph’s audience chamber was spacious, airy, and cool, while the land baked outside under the afternoon sun—but a fair quantity of its dust had come in with the messenger, who knelt at the foot of the Peacock Throne.

“Your pardon, O Shining One,” he said. “Your forgiveness for the vile news this lowly one—”

“Be done with your apologies!” the Caliph snapped. “It is not my custom to punish the messenger for the news he brings—but I will punish you sorely if you do not tell it forthwith!”

The messenger raised his head to speak. “O Sun of Wisdom, barbarians have ridden through the passes in the western mountains and fallen upon your village of Qushan, in the shadow of the foothills! They have slain all the men and enslaved the women and children, they have looted and defiled the mosque and set up an altar with two heathen idols that guard a pile of cinders! There they rest, turning their horses out to graze the crops that were ripening in the fields, while more and more of their kind come pouring through the passes! Those who have seen them fear that they will march against your cities, that they may even threaten Baghdad!”

The Caliph sat glowering at the man, who shrank back, bowing his head, heart beating wildly until at last the ruler nodded brusquely and said, “I thank you for bringing this news so faithfully. Go now.” He turned his eyes to the captain of the guard. “See that he is given rest and refreshment.”

The messenger stammered. “I—I thank Your—”

“Praise Allah, not me. Go.”

The messenger went.

The Caliph sat with head bowed, face thunderous. His vizier, Ali ben Oran, approached him warily. “O Light of Wisdom, we must shield your people from these monstrous horsemen!”

At last Caliph Suleiman raised his head. “We must indeed. More, we must beat them back from the lands they have already taken. Call up my generals and all of their armies.”

The vizier gestured to an attendant, who turned, bowed, and ran.

“Send out agents,” Suleiman told the vizier, “and summon my wizards. Tell the one to spy and the other to scry, that we may learn who these invaders are, whence they come, and why.”

Ali bowed. “O Lord, it shall be done.”

When Balkis was fifteen in human terms, Ludwig died, and Greta seemed to fade even as she followed his coffin to the churchyard. Balkis walked beside her, grieving herself, but even more concerned about her foster mother. When they came back to the cottage, Greta gave a sigh that seemed to send her soul with it after Ludwig’s and sat down in a way that plainly said there was no point in ever getting up again.

Balkis was past concern now, and well into fear. She had been orphaned once, and had no wish to suffer it again. She bustled about the cottage, lighting the fire and swinging the kettle over it to heat, fetching a lap robe and tucking it about Greta’s knees. The old woman looked up at her with a smile in which some trace of life revived and said, “Bless you, child.”

That was the way of it for the next half year-Balkis doing the housework and gardening, while Greta sat and prayed and told herself over and over again the stories she knew from the Bible—the ones she had learned by heart, from so many years of Sunday church—and gained comfort from them, comfort and reassurance that she would be with Ludwig again in Heaven. She yearned to be with him so ardently that she faded day by day, and would have gone much sooner to the Heaven for which she ardently longed had it not been for Balkis’ love calling her back every evening. Together they would sit by the fire, Balkis reading the parts of the Bible that Greta had never heard, and the old woman would smile and bask in the care of the child she had reared.

But even Balkis’ love could not hold her for long in the world of the living, and when the snow was melting and the first greening showed in twigs returning to life, Greta parted from it, and died in her chair by the fire with her hands on her Bible and a smile of utter peace on her lips. Balkis followed her coffin to the churchyard with only friends to support her now.

At the funeral, she noticed the speculative glances of the young men, and shuddered. Afterward, they called frequently, properly accompanied by mothers or sisters, to chat with Balkis and relieve her grief—but she noticed their gazes roaming the cottage, calculating its worth and the price of its furnishings, and she knew that their interest was not solely in the beauty of her face or the sweetness of her form. Nonetheless, she was glad of their company, for the little cottage was lonely indeed with neither Ludwig nor Greta there to embrace or to fuss over.

Accordingly, when April had taken the chill of winter from the land, and May sent flowers and warmth, she buried her most treasured mementoes of her foster parents in a wooden box beneath the roots of an oak, asked the tree to guard it for her, dressed in a brown traveling dress, walked into the forest, and changed into a cat.

She stood a moment, rigid with foreboding, but the aching, craving, and tickling did not come. Relieved, she set off deep and deeper into the wood, hurrying, but wary of wolves, wildcats, and bears, hoping she could find the wise woman of whom everyone whispered before her cat-body might go into heat.

She found the cottage after four days, far deeper in the woods than she, or most folks, ever went. The little house stood in a small clearing, grass kept short by half a dozen grazing sheep. It was decorated with carvings that tugged faintly at a memory she hadn’t known she’d had, and painted the green of new growth, with the decorations in pastels and the door and shutters sun-bright yellow.

Balkis watched from the shadows for several hours, until a woman came out to tend an herb garden. There were only a few streaks of gray in her black hair; she was still buxom and handsome, not at all the witch Balkis had pictured, clad not in black embroidered with arcane symbols, but in ordinary, everyday blouse and skirt of homespun cloth, with the wooden shoes of a peasant on her feet. The only thing special about her attire was a pendant of glittering crystal, worn about her neck on a silver chain. She hummed as she worked, and Balkis recognized the tune with a shock—it was a hymn!

The wise woman took a few herbs back into the hut with her and shut the door. Reassured by her appearance, Balkis changed back into human form, but still stood among the trees, trying to pluck up her courage to go knock on the door. Just as she was feeling that she would be horribly rude and intrusive to do so, the door opened and the woman stepped forth again, this time with a black shawl over her white blouse and gray skirt. “Whoever you are, you might as well come out and stop bothering me with your lurking!”

Balkis stared in amazement, then took a faltering step.

Instantly the woman’s eyes focused on that slight movement. “That’s right, come forward, now. No need to hang back. You’ve nothing to fear, no matter what you’ve heard about me—if you mean no harm, that is.”

“I mean none.” Balkis stepped forth into the sunlight. “In fact, I seek protection from harm.”

“Don’t they all!” the woman said, with a sardonic smile. “Well then, come in, lass, and tell me your troubles.” She turned on her heel and went back inside, leaving the door wide.

Balkis took a deep breath, plucked up her nerve, and followed.

Inside, the cottage was every bit as attractive as outside. It was all one room, perhaps thirty feet by twenty, with a fireplace against one wall and a bed across from it, a square table and two chairs between. A padded chair stood by the hearth in one inglenook, a low table beside it with a candlestick. There were windows in each inglenook, too, and to either side of the doorway and in the wall by the bed, with horn instead of glass—all a lonely woman could afford, surely, and even that was luxury. Each window wore damask curtains with a bright floral pattern, and the floor boasted an actual carpet with a similar motif. The walls were plastered and whitewashed. Against the far wall, across from the door, stood a long table with ceiling-high shelves, filled with jars with strange names painted on them, such as Wortroot, Umber, and Nightshade. From the rafters over the table hung bunches of dried herbs, lavender and thyme and savory among them.

Balkis stared. Could these be the stuff of witchcraft? Surely not! Some were as likely to be spices for cooking as others were poisonous—but none were strange or arcane.

“I am Idris.” The wise woman seemed severe, but her eye glinted with pleasure at having company. “Who are you, lass?”

“I—I am Balkis, ma’am.” “An odd name.” Idris frowned. “Come from a foreign land, have you?”

Balkis stared. That, just from a name? “I … I have a memory of such a journey, when I was very young—but I’ve been raised in Allustria since before I could walk.”

“Allustrian enough, I warrant.” Idris frowned and came closer, reaching out to touch Balkis’ hair. Balkis steeled herself against the stranger’s nearness.

“Don’t be silly, I won’t hurt you,” Idris said impatiently. “You’ve the aura of magic about you, child. How did you come by it?”

Balkis stared. “I didn’t know …”

“Did you not?” Idris frowned at the puzzle, then shrugged it off. “Enough. You haven’t walked deep into the woods and braved the dangers of wolf and bear for idle chat. What is your errand?”

“I … I seek a potion to keep me from going into heat.”

“Into heat?” Idris stared. “Odd choice of words for it. Well, there’s nothing we can do about that, child—we feel the warmth and the tickling every month whether we will or no. The only cure for it would play havoc with your innards, and might keep you from ever having a baby. You wouldn’t want that, now, would you?”

“Oh, no! And that kind of heat I can withstand easily enough …”

“That kind?” Idris frowned. “What other kind is there?”

“The … the kind a cat feels,” Balkis stammered.

Idris’ gaze sharpened. “How would you know what a cat feels?” When she saw Balkis hesitate, she cajoled, “Come now, child, I can’t help you if I don’t know what troubles you. If you feel you can’t trust me, why, begone with you! But if you truly want my help, then truth you must tell, and all of it!”

“You’ll think me mad,” Balkis warned. “I’ll have to show you.”

“Show, then.” Idris seemed mightily puzzled.

Balkis took a deep breath, hoped Idris could take it in stride, and changed into a cat.