The Warlock Enraged

5

As they came into the town, Cordelia gave a happy little sigh. “Tis so nice that the nasty old sorcerer knows we come toward him!”

“Oh, indeed yes,” Rod muttered. “This way, he can have a wonderful reception all ready for us! Why do you like it, dear? Because you can fly?”

“Oh, aye!”

“I dislike disguise, Papa,” Geoffrey explained.

Rod gave his son a measuring stare. “Yes, I suppose you would—even when you see it’s necessary.”

“As ‘tis, I know,” the little boy sighed. “Yet doth it trouble me, Papa.”

“I understand.” Rod frowned. “What bothers me, is trying to figure out how Alfar saw through our disguises.”

The family walked on in brooding silence—for a few seconds. Then Gwen said, “ ‘Tis widely known that the High Warlock doth have a wife, and four bairns—and that one is a lass, and the other three lads.”

Rod scowled. “What are you suggesting—that they had their illusionist attack every family who came North?” His gaze wandered. “Of course, I suppose there aren’t that many families coming North… and the kids’ ages are pretty much a matter of public record…”

“It doth seem unlikely,” Gwen admitted.

“And therefore must be seriously considered. But we would have heard about it, wouldn’t we? Monsters, attacking families…”

“Not if the witch and her monsters won out,” Geoffrey pointed out.

“But no sooner would they have attacked, than the witch would have seen the families had no magical powers!” Cordelia protested. “Surely she would then have called off her monsters.”

Geoffrey’s eyes turned to steel. “She would not—if she wished to be certain no word reached the King.”

“That does seem to be their strategy,” Rod agreed.

“But—to kill bairns?” Cordelia gasped.

“They are not nice people,” Rod grated.

The children were silent for a few minutes, digesting an unpleasant realization. Finally, Gregory pointed out, “We do not know that, Papa.”

“No, but I wouldn’t put it past them. Still, it does seem a little extravagant.”

“Mayhap they did post sentries,” Geoffrey suggested.

Rod nodded. “Yes, well, that’s the most likely way—but what kind of sentries? I mean, we haven’t seen any soldiers standing around in Alfar’s livery. So his sentries must be disguised, if he has them. And I suppose they’d have to know what we looked like…”

“Eh, no!” Magnus cried, grabbing Rod’s wrist. “They need only be…”

“Telepaths!” Rod knocked his forehead with the heel of his hand. “Of course! Just station mind readers on each of the main roads—and maybe even out in the pastures, if you’re the suspicious type—and they’d be almost impossible to spot! They could be anybody—the farmer who passes in his cart, the varlet in the kitchens, the merchant and his draymen…”

The children looked around them, suddenly alert.

“…and they’d be almost impossible to spot,” Rod finished, “since all they have to do is sit there, with their minds wide open for every stray thought!”

“We could have masked our minds,” Geoffrey mused.

“Yes, but we didn’t.” Rod shook his head. “Besides, it’s not as easy as it sounds. You’re all beginning to get pretty good at it…” He caught Gwen’s glance. “…every time you’re doing something you don’t want Mama and me to know about.”

The children exchanged quick, guilty glances.

“Of course, Mama and I are getting even better at probing behind the masks,” Rod went on, “so I suppose it’s very good training for all of us. In fact… that might not be a bad idea.” He flashed a grin at each of them. “Start poking around inside minds here and there, kids.”

Instantly, all four faces turned blank, their eyes losing focus.

“No, no! Not now! I mean, if they have been listening to us, they’ll have heard us, and just wiped their minds and started thinking disguise thoughts! You’ve got to catch them when they’re not ready, take them by surprise. Listen and probe for them whenever you just happen to think of it, at odd moments.”

“But will they not always be masked to us, Papa?” Cordelia protested.

“Not when they’re trying to listen to your thoughts,” Rod explained. “They can’t do both at the same time—mask and listen. You’ve tried it yourselves—you know.”

This time, the glance the kids exchanged was startled—and worried. Just how much did Daddy know, that they didn’t know he knew?

“Try to catch them unaware,” Rod urged.

The children sighed philosophically.

“I know, I know,” Rod growled, “this unpredictable Daddy! First he tells you to do it, then he tells you not to! So balance it—sometimes you do it, and sometimes you don’t.” He looked up. “Gee, that’s a nice looking horse, up there. I think I’ll steal it.”

The children gasped with shock, and looked—and gave their father a look of disgust. “Thou canst not steal him, Papa,” Gregory said sternly. “He is already thine.”

“Makes it more convenient that way, doesn’t it?” Under his breath, Rod muttered, “Nice of you to come ahead to meet us, Old Iron. How about I ride you, on the next leg of the trip?”

“Motion sickness, Rod?”

But it was Gwen and Cordelia who rode, at least as far as the inn, and the innkeeper was very obliging—once Rod caught his attention.

It wasn’t easy. Rod left the family at the door and stepped inside, bracing himself for an unpleasant scene. He saw a tall, wiry man with a stained apron tied around his waist, setting a double handful of mugs on a table and collecting coppers from the diners. As he turned away from the table, his gaze fell on Rod. “Be off with you,” he ordered, but he didn’t even stop turning. “We’ve no alms to give.” By the time he finished the sentence, he was facing the kitchen again, and had started walking.

“I’ve got money!” Rod called.

The man kept on walking.

Rod dodged around him and leaped into his path, shoving his purse under the innkeeper’s nose and yanking it open. The man stopped, frowning. Slowly, his eyes focused on the purse.

Rod shook a few coins out onto his palm. “See? Silver. The real thing.”

The innkeeper scowled at the coins as though they were vermin. Then his expression lightened to musing, and he pinched up one of the coins, held it in front of his nose to stare at it as though it were some new variety of bug, then methodically set it between his teeth and bit.

Rod couldn’t resist. “Hors d’oeuvres?”

“ ‘Tis silver.” The innkeeper seemed puzzled.

“Genuine,” Rod agreed.

The man focused on Rod. “What of it?”

Rod just stared at him for a second. “We’d like something to eat.”

“We?” The innkeeper turned his head from side to side, inspecting the walls and corners.

“My wife and children,” Rod explained. “I didn’t think you’d want us inside.”

The innkeeper thought that one over for a while, then nodded, frowning. Rod wondered how the man ever managed to make a profit. Finally, the innkeeper spoke. “Wise.” He kept nodding. “Wise.” Then he focused on Rod again. “And what food dost thou wish?”

“Oh, we’re not choosy. A big bowl of stew, a plateful of sausage, a couple of loaves of bread, a pitcher of milk, and a pitcher of ale should do us. Oh, and of course, six empty bowls. And six spoons.”

The innkeeper nodded judiciously. “Stew, sausage, bread, milk, and ale.” He turned away, still nodding. “Stew, sausage, bread, milk, and ale.” He headed for the kitchens, repeating the formula again and again.

Rod watched him go, shaking his head. Then he turned away to find Gwen and the kids.

He found them sitting under an old, wide oak tree with a huge spread of leaves. “Will they have us, husband?” Gwen didn’t really sound as though she cared.

“Oh, yeah.” Rod folded a leg under him and sat down beside her, leaning back against the trunk. “He was very obliging, once he tasted our silver and found out it wasn’t pewter.”

“What troubles thee, then?”

“Frankly, my dear, he didn’t really give a d—” Rod glanced at the eager faces around him, and finished, “…darn.”

“Assuredly, Tudor doth lack in gallantry,” said a large man, walking into the inn with a companion.

“Aye; it doth pain me to say it, but our noble Earl hath ever been clutch-fisted,” answered his companion. “This sorcerer Alfar, now—all one doth hear of him, doth confirm his generosity.”

They passed on into the inn. Rod sat frozen, staring into space.

Magnus put it into words for him. “Do they speak against their own lord?”

“They do,” Gwen whispered, eyes huge.

“And in public!” Rod was flabbergasted. “I mean, peasants have spoken against their rulers before—but never out in the open, where a spy might overhear them. For all they know, we could be…” He ran out of words.

“Yet the lord would have to be greatly wicked, for his own folk to complain of him!” Cordelia cried. “Could they break faith with him so easily?”

“Not ordinarily,” Rod said grimly. “But we didn’t come up here because things were normal.”

A maid came ambling up to them, bearing a tray of food.

Her face was smudged, and her apron was greasy—from the scullery, Rod guessed. He braced himself for the contempt he’d grown used to from the peasants, and reminded himself that everybody had to have somebody they could look down on. Maybe that was what they really needed tinkers for.

But the maid only held the tray down where they could reach it, shaking her head and marvelling, “Tinkers! Why doth the master spare good food for tinkers?”

Rod took a plate warily, and sniffed at it. A delighted grin spread over his face. “Hey! It is good!”

“May I?” Magnus sat still, with his hands in his lap. So did the other children, but their eyes fairly devoured the tray.

“Why… certes.” The scullery maid seemed surprised by their politeness.

Magnus seized a bowl. “May I?” Cordelia cried, and the younger two chorused, “May I?” after her.

“Certes,” the wench said, blinking, and three little hands snatched at bowls.

Rod handed the plate to Gwen and lifted down a huge bowl of stew, then the pitchers. “Take your cups, children.” Gwen scooped up the remaining two flagons, and the spoons.

The kitchen wench straightened, letting one edge of the tray fall. A furrow wrinkled between her eyebrows. “Strange tinkers ye be.”

She was trying to think, Rod realized—and she’d have been trying very hard, if some mental lethargy hadn’t prevented her. “Still wondering why your master is serving us more than kitchen scraps?”

Enlightenment crept over her face. “Aye. That is what I be thinking.”

“Best of reasons,” Rod assured her. “We paid in silver.”

She lifted her head slowly, mouth opening into a round. “Oh. Aye, I see.” And she turned away, still nodding, as she began to amble back to the kitchen.

“Why doth she not ask how mere tinkers came by silver money, Papa?” Magnus watched her go.

“I expect she’ll think that one up just as she gets to the kitchen…”

“Why is she so slow, Papa?” Cordelia seemed concerned.

Rod shook his head. “Not just her, honey. That’s what the innkeeper was like, too.” He gazed after the scullery maid, frowning.

Two men in brocaded surcoats with grayed temples strolled past them toward the inn door. “Nay, but our Earl doth seek to rule all our trade,” the one protested. “Mark my words, ere long he will tell to us which goods we may not sell, for that he doth grant patents on them to those merchants who toady to him.”

“Aye, and will belike tax the half of our profit,” the other agreed, but he spoke without heat, almost without caring.

They passed on into the inn, leaving Rod rigid in their wake. “That is the most blatant lie I’ve heard since I came here! Earl Tudor is so laissez-faire-minded, you’d almost think he just doesn’t care!”

“Folk will believe any rumor,” Gwen offered.

“Yeah, but businessmen check them out—and those two were merchants. If they stray too far from the facts, they go bankrupt.”

A string of donkeys plodded into the innyard, heads hanging low, weary from their heavy packs. Their drovers bawled the last few orders at them, as the inn’s hostlers strolled past the Gallowglass family toward the donkeys, chatting. “They say the sorcerer Alfar is a fair-minded man.”

“Aye, and generous withal. Those who come under his sway, I hear, need never be anxious for food or drink.”

The first shook his head, sadly. “Our Earl Tudor doth care little for the poor folk.”

“Are they crazy?” Rod hissed. “Tudor is practically a welfare state!”

“ ‘Tis e’en as thou dost say,” the second mused. “Yet at the least, our Earl doth not tax his peasants into rags and naught for fare but bread and water, as Duke Romanov doth.”

“Oh, come on, now!” Rod fumed. “Nobody ever claimed Romanov was a walking charity—but at least he realizes the peasants can’t produce if they’re starving.”

But Gregory had a faraway look in his eyes. “Papa—I mislike the feel of their minds.”

Gwen stopped ladling stew and gazed off into space. She nodded, slowly. “There is summat there…” Then her eyes widened. “Husband—it doth press on me, within mine head!”

Instantly, the children all gazed off into space.

“Hey!” Rod barked in alarm. He clapped his hands and snapped, “Wake up! If there is something messing with people’s minds here, it could be dangerous!”

They all started, blinking, then focused on their father. “Tis as Mama doth say, Papa,” Magnus reported. “Something doth press upon the minds of all the people here—and at ours, too. Only, with us, it cannot enter.”

“Then it knows all it really needs to know about us, doesn’t it?” Rod growled. He frowned, and shrugged. “On the other hand, it already did. Here, I’ve got to have a feel of this.”

It wasn’t as easy for him as it was for Gwen and the kids. They’d grown up with extrasensory power; they could read minds as easily as they listened for birdsongs. But Rod’s dormant powers had just been unlocked three years ago. He had to close his eyes, concentrating on the image of a blank, gray wall, letting his thoughts die down, and cease. Then, when other people’s thoughts had begun to come into his mind, he could open his eyes again, and see while he mind read.

But he didn’t have to look about him this time. He could feel it, before he even heard another person’s thoughts. When he did, he realized that the thoughts resonated perfectly with the pressure-current. It was a flowing wave, rocking, soothing, lulling; but modulated on that lethargic mental massage was a feeling of vague unease and suspicion—and riding within that modulation, as a sort of harmonic, was the central conviction that the sorcerer Alfar could make all things right.

Rod opened his eyes, to find his whole family staring at him—and for the first time on this trip, fear shadowed the children’s faces.

Rage hit, hot and strong. Rod’s whole nervous system flamed with it, and his hands twitched, aching for the throat of whatever it was that had threatened his children.

“Nay, husband.” Gwen reached out and caught his hand. “We need thy wisdom now, not thy mayhem.”

He resented her touch; it pushed his anger higher. But he heeded her words, and concentrated on the feel of that beloved hand, whose caresses had brought him so much of comfort and delight. He let it anchor him, remembering how his rage had made him do foolhardy things, how his wrath had played into the hands of the enemy. He took slow, deep breaths, trying to remember that he was really more dangerous when he was calm, trying to regain the harmony of his emotions. He concentrated on his shoulders, relaxing them deliberately, then his back, then his upper arms, then his forearms, then his hands. Anger wouldn’t help anybody now; anger would only destroy—everything but the enemy. He shivered as he felt the rage loosen, and drain away; then he swallowed, and closed his eyes, nodding. “I’m… all right, now. Thanks, darling. Just… be careful about grabbing me when I’m like that, okay?”

“I will, my lord.” She released him, but held his gaze with her own.

“Okay.” He took a deep breath, and looked up at the children. “You know what hypnosis is.”

“Aye, Papa.” They stared at him, round-eyed.

“Well, that’s what we’re facing.” Rod’s lips drew back into a thin, tight line. “Somebody’s sending out a mental broadcast that’s putting everybody’s conscious minds asleep. This whole town is in the early stages of mass hypnosis.”

The children stared, appalled.

Rod nodded. “Someone, or something, up there, is a heck of a lot more powerful a projective telepath, than we’ve ever dreamed of.”

“But it hath not the feel of a person’s mind, my lord!” Gwen protested. “Oh, aye, the thoughts themselves do—but that lulling, that pressure that doth soothe into mindlessness—‘tis only power, without a mind to engender it!”

Rod had a brief, lurid memory of the genetically altered chimpanzee he’d had to fight some years ago. Actually, it was its power he’d had to fight; the poor beast had no mind of its own. The futurians, who were continually trying to conquer Gramarye, had just used it as a converter, transforming minute currents of electricity into psionic power-blasts that could stun a whole army. When they’d finally found the chimp, it had been one of the ugliest, most obscene things he’d ever seen—and one of the most pitiable. Rod shuddered, and looked into his wife’s eyes. “I don’t know what it is—but I don’t like the climate. Come on—eat up, and let’s go.”

They turned back to their food, with relief. But after a bit, Cordelia looked up. “Not hungry, Papa.”

“I know the feeling,” Rod growled, “but you will be. Choke down at least one bowlful, will you?” He turned to Gwen. “Let’s take the bread and sausage along.”

She nodded, and began to wrap the food in his handkerchief.

Rod turned back to his children—and frowned. There was something wrong, some flaw in their disguise…

Then he found it. “Don’t forget to bicker a little, children. It’s not normal, to go through a whole lunch without being naughty.”

They passed the last house at the edge of the village. Rod muttered, “Not yet, kids. Another hundred yards; then we’re safe.”

For a moment, Geoffrey looked as though he were going to protest. Then he squared his shoulders like his siblings, gritted his teeth, and plowed on for another three hundred feet. Then Rod stopped. “Okay. Now!”

With one voice, the whole family expelled a huge sigh of relief. Cordelia began to tremble. “Papa—‘tis horrid!”

Gwen reached to catch her up, but Rod beat her to it. He swept the little girl into his arms, stopping her shuddering with a bear hug. “I know, I know, baby. But be brave—there’ll be worse than this, before we’re done with Alfar.” Or he’s done with us; the thought fleeted through his mind, but he helped it fleet on out; a father whose children could read minds couldn’t afford defeatist thinking. Talk about thought control… Rod cast an appealing glance over Cordelia’s shoulder, at Gwen. “Don’t you think it’s time for you folks to go home now?”

Gwen’s chin finned and lifted. Below her, three smaller chins repeated the movement. “Nay, my lord,” she said firmly. “Tis eerie, and doth make one’s flesh to creep—yet for us, there is, as yet, no greater danger than we saw last night, and thou mayest yet have need of our magics.”

“I can’t deny that last part,” Rod sighed, “and I suppose you’re right—that village may have been nasty, but it wasn’t any more dangerous than it was last night. Okay—we go on as a family.”

The boys broke into broad smiles, and Cordelia sat up in Rod’s arms and clapped her hands together. Rod set her down, set his fists on his hips, and surveyed his children with a stern eye. “You do realize what’s going on back there, don’t you?”

They all nodded, and Magnus said, “Aye, Papa.” Geoffrey explained, “Alfar doth prepare the town for conquest.”

Rod nodded, his gaze on his second son. “How will he take them?”

The boy shrugged. “In peace. He will march in, and they will acclaim him as their friend and master, and bow to him—and all of this without a ever a drop of blood shed.”

There was a definite note of admiration in his voice. Rod shook his head. “Good analysis—but be careful, son. Don’t start thinking that ability implies goodness.”

“Oh, nay, Papa! Ne’er could I think so! He is a worthy enemy—but that’s just to say, he would not be worthy an he were not able; but he would not be an enemy were he not evil.”

Rod took a deep breath and stilled, with his mouth open, before he said, “We-e-e-ll… there are enemies who might not be really evil—they’d just be trying to get the same thing you’re trying to get.”

But Geoffrey shook his head firmly. “Nay, Papa. Such be rivals, not enemies.”

Rod stilled with his mouth open again. Then he shrugged. “Okay—as long as you make the distinction.” He took a deep breath, looking around at his family. “So. I think we’ve got a better idea, now, about how Alfar works. First he takes over most of the population with long-range hypnosis. Then he sends his minions in to intimidate anybody who didn’t hypnotize easily.”

“There be such, Papa?” Cordelia asked in surprise.

Rod nodded. “Oh, yes, dear. That particular kind of magic isn’t exactly foolproof; there’ll always be a few people who aren’t terribly open to letting somebody else take over their minds—I hope.”

“And there be those who will not bow to him from fear, either,” Geoffrey said stoutly.

“Oh, yes. And if any of those happen to be knights, or lords, and march against him with their men-at-arms—by the time they get to Alfar, he’ll have most of the soldiers convinced they don’t want to win.”

“Aye. Tis the way of it.” Geoffrey looked up at his father with a glow of pride.

“Thanks, son.” Rod smiled, amused. “Just adding things up.” Then his smile faded. “But what the heck kind of projective telepath does he have, that can reach out over a hundred miles to hypnotize a whole village?”

They set up camp, with trenches for beds and pine boughs for mattresses. The kids rolled up in their blankets, and were instantly asleep—at least, as far as Rod could see.

He didn’t trust them. “What child is this who, laid to rest, sleeps?” he asked Gwen.

She gazed off into space for a moment, listening with her mind. He decided to try it, himself, so he closed his eyes and blanked his mind, envying the ease with which she did it. After a few seconds, he began to hear the children’s low, excited, mental conversation. He rolled his eyes up in exasperation and started to get up—but Gwen caught his arm. “Nay, my lord. Let them speak with one another, I prithee; ‘twill lull them to sleep.”

“Well…” Rod glanced back at her.

“Yet what will lull us?” she murmured.

He stared down at her, drinking in her beauty. Her femininity hit him with physical force, and he dropped back down beside her, one arm spread out in return invitation. “I’m sure I’ll think of something, dear—but it takes some creativity, when the kids are watching.”

She turned her head to the side, watching him out of the corners of her eyes. “Their lids are closed.”

“But not their minds.” Rod pressed a finger over her lips. “Hush up, temptress, or I’ll put you back in your teapot.”

“And what wilt thou do with me, once thou hast me there?” she purred, nestling up against him.

The contact sent a current coursing through him. His breath hissed in. “I said a teapot, not a pumpkin shell!” He reached out to caress her gently, and it was her turn to gasp. He breathed into her ear, “Just wait till they fall asleep…”

“Beshrew me! But they have only now waked from several hours’ rest!” Gwen gazed up at him forlornly. “Hmm!” Rod frowned. “Hadn’t thought of that…”

“Aye di me!” Gwen sighed, snuggling a little closer. “E’en so, the comfort of thy presence will aid me greatly, my lord.”

“Fine—now that you’ve made sure I won’t sleep!”

“Yet must not a husbandman be ever vigilant?” she murmured.

“Yeah—waiting for my chance!” He rested his cheek against her head. “Now I know why they call you a witch…”

“Papa-a-a-a!”

Rod waked instantly; there’d been tears in that little voice. He opened his eyes and saw Gregory leaning over him clutching his arm, shaking him. “Papa, Papa!” Tears were running down the little boy’s cheeks. Rod reached up an arm to snake around him and pull him down, cradling him against his side. The little body stayed stiff, resisting comfort. Rod crooned, “What’s the matter, little fella? Bad dream?”

Gregory gulped, and nodded.

“What was it about?”

“Nasty man,” Gregory sniffled.

“Nasty?” For some reason, Rod was suddenly on his guard. “What was he doing?”

“He did creep upon us.” Gregory looked up at his father, eyes wide. “Creeping up, to hurl things at us.”

Rod stared into his eyes for a second, then began to pat his back gently. “Don’t worry about it. Even if the nasty man did sneak up on us, your brothers and sister would gang up on him before he could do much damage.” He smiled, and saw a tentative, quivering lift at the comers of Gregory’s mouth. He tousled the boy’s hair and turned to look at his wife. He saw a large pair of eyes staring back at him. “Kind of thought you’d wake up, if one of the kids had a problem.”

“I did hear him,” Gwen said softly. “I did see his dream. And, my lord…”

Rod couldn’t help feeling that being on his guard was just the thing for the occasion. “What’s wrong?”

“Gregory’s mind would not conjure up so mild a phantasm, nor one so threatening.”

The tension was building inside Rod. Anger began to boil up under it. Rod tried to hold it down, reminding himself that he and Gwen could probably handle any attempt to hurt them. But the mere thought that anyone would dare to attack his children, to plant nightmares in their sleeping minds…!

Magnus, Cordelia, and Geoffrey suddenly sat bolt-upright. “Papa,” Cordelia gasped, “what dost thou?”

“Is it that bad already? I’m trying to hold my temper.”

“Thou dost amazingly.” Magnus blinked the sleep out of his eyes and leaned closer, on hands and knees, to peer at his father. “In truth, thou dost amazingly. I would never guess thy rage, to look at thee. Papa, what…”

The night seemed to thicken a few feet away from the children. Something hazy appeared, coalesced, hardened, and shot to earth, slamming into the ground a few feet from Magnus’s hand. His head snapped around; he stared at a six-inch rock. Cordelia’s gaze was riveted to it, too, in horror; but Geoffrey leaped to his feet. “Ambush!”

The night thickened again, just over Magnus’s head. Something hazy appeared…

… and began to coalesce…

“Heads up!” Rod dove for his son. His shoulder knocked Magnus sprawling, and a foot-thick rock crashed down, grazing Rod’s hip. He bellowed with pain—and anger at the monster who dared attack his children. His full rage cut loose.

“Ware!” Magnus cried. The children were already looking up, as their father had bade them, so they saw the rocks materializing—two, three, all plummeting to earth as they became real.

“Dodge ball!” Magnus shouted. Instantly, he and his brothers and sister were bounding and bobbing back and forth, Cordelia weaving an aerial dance that would’ve given a computer tracker a blown fuse, the boys appearing and disappearing here, there, yonder, like signal lights in a storm. Through their flickering pavane, Magnus called in suppressed rage, “Art thou hurted, Papa?”

“Nothing that a little murder won’t cure,” Rod yelled back. “Children—seek! Discover and destroy!”

The children seemed to focus more sharply, and stayed visible for longer intervals.

Gwen was on her feet, still, her eyes warily probing the night above them.

Then Geoffrey hopped to his left, just as a small boulder materialized right where his chest had been.

Rod stood rigid with horror. If the boy hadn’t happened to jump aside, just at that instant… “Somebody’s trying to teleport rocks into the kids’ bodies!”

“ ‘Twould be instant death.” Gwen’s face was pale, but taut with promised mayhem.

Rod stood tree-still, his eyes wide open; but the night blurred around him into a formless void as his mind opened, seeking…

Cordelia seized her broomstick and shot up into the sky. For a moment, all three boys disappeared. Then Magnus reappeared, far across the meadow, dimly seen in the moonlight. He disappeared again just as Geoffrey reappeared ten feet away, twenty feet in the air. Air shot outward with a pistol-crack, inward with firecracker-pop. The meadow resounded with reports, like miniature machine gun fire. Geoffrey disappeared with a dull boom, and a treetop nearby swayed with a bullwhip-crack as Gregory appeared in the topmost limbs.

And stones kept falling, all over the meadow.

“Husband!” Gwen’s voice was taut. “This enemy will mark us, too, ere long.”

That jolted Rod. “I suppose so—if he doesn’t just pick on little kids. Better split up.”

Gwen seized her broomstick and disappeared into the dark sky.

That left Rod feeling like a sitting duck. He supposed he would be able to float up into the sky himself, if he just thought about it—but he’d never done it, and didn’t want to have to pay attention to trying to keep himself up while he was trying to find and annihilate an enemy. Capture, he reminded himself—capture, if you can.

But he hoped he’d find he couldn’t.

Magnus appeared ten feet away, shaking his head. “He doth cloak his thoughts well, Papa. I cannot…” Suddenly, his eyes lost focus. Geoffrey’s laugh caroled over the meadow, clear and filled with glee. Magnus disappeared with a pistol-crack. Rod leaped for Fess’s back and shot across the meadow, a living missile with a double warhead.

He was just in time to see Geoffrey and Magnus shoot up out of the trees, carrying a young man stretched like a tug-of-war rope between them. He struggled and cursed, kicking and whiplashing about with his legs and torso, but the boys stretched his arms tight, laughing with delight, and pulling with far more strength than their little bodies could account for.

The young man shut his mouth, and glared at Magnus.

Foreboding struck, and Rod sprang from Fess’s back in a flying tackle.

He smacked into the young man’s legs so hard they bruised his shoulder. Above him, the warlock yowled in pain.

Then it was daytime, suddenly full noon. The glare stung Rod’s eyes, and he squinted against it. He could make out fern leaves closely packed above, and a huge lizardlike monstrosity staring at them from five feet away. Then its mouth lolled open in a needle-fanged grin, and it waddled toward them with amazing speed. Panic clawed its way up Rod’s throat, and he almost let go to snatch out his knife—but the enemy warlock panicked first.

It was night again, total night. No, that was moonlight, wasn’t it? And it showed Rod water, endless waves heaving below him. One reached up to slap at his heels, and its impact travelled on up to hit his stomach with chilling dread. He could just picture himself falling, sinking beneath those undulating fluid hills, rising to thrash about in panic, clawing for land, for wood, for something that floated… Instinctively, he tightened his hug on the ankles.

Then sunlight seared his eyes, the sunlight of dawn, and bitter cold stabbed his lungs. Beyond the legs he clung to, the world spread out below him like a map, an immensity of green. Jagged rocks stabbed up, only a few yards below his heels. It had to be a mountain peak, somewhere on the mainland.

Darkness again, blackness—but not quite total, for moonlight filtered through a high, grated window, showing him blocks of granite that dripped with moisture, and niter webbing the high corners of the cramped chamber. Huge rusty staples held iron chains to the walls. A skeleton lounged in the fetters at the end of a pair of those chains. Another held a thick-bodied man with a bushy black beard. His brocade doublet was torn and crusted with dried blood, and a grimy bandage wrapped his head. He stared at them in total amazement. Then relief flooded his face, and his mouth opened…

Limbo. Nothingness. Total void.

There wasn’t any light, but there wasn’t any darkness, either—just a gray, formless nothingness. Rod felt an instant conviction that he wasn’t seeing with his eyes—especially when colors began to twist through the void in writhing streaks, and a hiss of white noise murmured in the distance. They floated, adrift, and the body in Rod’s arms suddenly began to writhe and heave again. A nasal voice cursed, “Thou vile recreants! I will rend thee, I will tear thee! Monstrous, perverse beasts, who…”

Geoffrey cried out, “Abandon!”

Suddenly Rod was hugging nothing; the legs were gone. He stared blankly at the space where they’d been. Then panic surged up within him, and he flailed about, trying to grasp something solid, anything, the old primate fear of falling skewering his innards.

Then a small hand caught his, and Geoffrey’s voice cried, “Gregory! Art there, lad? Hold thou, and pull!”

Gentle breeze kissed Rod’s cheek, and the scents of pine and meadow grass filled his head with a sweetness he didn’t remember them ever having, before. Moonlight showed him the meadow where they’d camped, and Gwen darting forward, to throw her arms about him—and the two boys who clung to him. “Oh, my lord! My bairns! Oh, thou naughty lads, to throw thyselves into such danger! Praise Heaven thou’rt home!”

Cordelia was hugging Rod’s neck hard enough to gag him, head pressed against his and sobbing, “Papa! I feared we had lost thee!”

Rod wrapped his arms around her, grateful to have something solid to hold on to. He looked up to see Geoffrey peeking at him over Gwen’s shoulder. Rod nodded. “I don’t know how you did it, son—but you did.”