Descent into the Depths of the Earth Read online

  It had been custom made for her—custom made with infinite care.

  Escalla turned and looked toward Jus. The man knelt beside the stream, carefully examining fallen autumn leaves in the mud. The faerie felt something akin to a tear well in her eye, even as she swelled her breast like a puffer fish about to burst.

  A blush spread from her eartips to her toes. Suddenly girlishly shy, she found herself unable to move or even speak. The necklace hung fluid and gleaming about her neck, while Jus artlessly managed to avoid watching her.

  Polk corked his jug and gave a loud, satisfied sigh. He had given his astonished mule a slug of whiskey, and the poor animal now stood with its knees knocking and its eyes staring into different dimensions of space and time. Turning, Polk saw Escalla’s necklace glistening about her alabaster throat.

  He creased his brows and exclaimed, “Jewels!” The teamster scratched his head with a noise like sandpaper. “Is that treasure?”

  “Oh, definitely.”

  Escalla floated quietly into the air, feeling a strange, numb sensation. She hovered indecisively for a long moment then tugged her skirt straight, took a deep breath, and flew over to the Justicar.

  He knelt, examining a fallen maple leaf, one of untold thousands that carpeted the banks of the forest stream. This particular leaf showed a tiny mark on the moist dirt that sheened its upper surface—a mark like a tiny footprint only a few inches long. Escalla landed softly on the mold nearby, her hands behind her back and her body swinging from side to side like an embarrassed child called up before her school.

  She cleared her throat. Jus contrived to carefully lever up the fallen maple leaf and examine the indentation left in the mud below. The footprint could not have been made by a creature any heavier than a modest house cat.

  Escalla took a step closer, and the sheer radiance of her blush made Jus look up into her coy smile. Looking at him from the corner of her eye, Escalla held her necklace stone in her hands.

  “It’s, aah, a beautiful necklace.”

  Jus knelt in the leaves before her, and Escalla cleared her throat.

  “It’s slowglass. It sees everything I do and filters it out the back in a fortnight’s time.” She blushed a deeper shade of cherry pink. “They’re called newlywed stones.”

  Jus bared his head, slipping Cinders down onto his shoulders and letting his unhelmeted head gleam in the light. Escalla ventured a little closer, suddenly feeling an urge to pat the velvet stubble of Jus’ skull. She instead bit her lip and smiled down into the fallen leaves.

  “This is just too too sweet!”

  Blinking, Jus looked at her from her tight little leggings up to the roots of her hair. “The necklace suits you.”

  “Well, it is gorgeous. It’s tailor made.” The girl half turned away, hugging herself and casting one eye back across her shoulder. “Jus, I can’t! This is, like, really expensive!”

  Looking a little confused, Jus sat back on his heels. Muscles moved under his shirt, making Escalla’s heart flutter in strange ways.

  Jus scratched thoughtfully at his chin and said, “It does look expensive, but if it’s what you want…”

  “Oh, oh, I want!” Escalla whirled, paled, blushed, and hid her face behind one hand. “I mean… it’s really appreciated. I know you think, well, that maybe I didn’t understand. I just wanted you to know…” Escalla bit her finger, struggling her thoughts past her embarrassment. “I just wanted you to know that, well, I’ve been thinking.” Her cheeks were aflame. Escalla pressed the backs of her hands against her face to cool them and felt a lump in her throat. “I’ve, ah, been thinking it through. I know that’s what you’d want me to do.” She felt her hands shake and hid them behind her back. “I mean, we have to be careful about all of this. It’s a change—not a bad change!—but it shifts everything into… well, you know… a new light.”

  Jus rubbed at his nose, his confusion growing. He raised one brow and asked, “What have you been thinking?”

  “Um, well, I’ve been thinking that it’s all right. You’ve sort of grown, I’ve sort of grown…” The girl swallowed. “I… I think it’s time.”

  Jus’ brows creased. “Time?”

  “Oh, I know what you’re saying!” Escalla whirled, all-of-a-passion. “I know size differences might seem a… well, you know, a bit of a problem! But, ah, I think there’s a spell somewhere that can help! You know, I could make myself a better scale. More able to, ah… to share… ah …” The girl suddenly blushed beet red and began prodding the tips of her index fingers together. “Well, it just opens up possibilities, but we can wait. We have to wait. We might just have to be patient. You know—for a while… until we find the means…”

  Sucking on a tooth, Jus crossed his legs, collected the faerie and arranged her on his knee. He hunched down to meet her eye in concern.

  “Escalla, are you all right?”

  “I’m fine!” The girl almost jumped out of her skin. “Just fine!”

  “Good.” Jus tilted his head to examine her as if she might be mad. “Escalla, what are you talking about?”

  Escalla felt the blood drain out of her whole body and go into storage somewhere on another plane. She wilted like a boiled lettuce as she stared at the Justicar.

  “You didn’t give me the necklace, did you?” Still mystified, Jus shook his head. Escalla felt her whole life sliding into a horrible pit of embarrassment. “You didn’t give me roses, and you didn’t give me the sweets either.”

  “Ah, no.” Jus scratched his head. A mind used to sifting tiny clues and solving crimes struggled with the events of the last five minutes. “What was all that about scale?”

  ““Nothing!” Escalla jumped to her feet in fright. “Nothing at all! It was—” The girl looked for something neat and glib to save her face. “It was wing scales! Like butterflies! I need to change my scales! Dust them off, polish them! And it will all take time!” The girl fluttered like a mad moth in a bottle. “Yep! Time! Which implies anticipation! Lots of anticipation, all working toward, ah, fruit. No, not fruit. Cherry picking!” The girl whirled and grabbed Jus by the armor. “No, not cherries! Bananas! Apples! Yes! Gotta have my wings ready by apple blossom time! Faerie tradition!”

  Suddenly Escalla stopped, stared at Jus, and leaned away. “You gave me none of those gifts?”

  “Nope.”

  “Not roses, not my favorite sweets, not this tailor made necklace just for me?”

  The Justicar spread his hands in innocence. “Escalla, really!”

  “Shhh!”The faerie’s face went blank. She lifted a hand for silence as horrible thoughts skittered through her mind.

  “It wasn’t you…” Sudden cold fear griped Escalla, and she whirled to stare around at the forest in fright.

  She fired off a battery of spells—an anti-scrying shield, then an illusion of herself and Jus still sitting talking by the stream. The girl grabbed Jus by the shirt and dragged him into a run, yanking him back toward the cart.

  “Run! Come on! Run!”

  She snatched her ice wand, Enid’s stun scroll, and her spellbooks all in a single mad second. Polk began wrenching his cart around to follow as she dragged Jus out across the stream. The girl took one look at the cart and fired a swarm of little magic bees that slashed the mule’s traces and cut them in two.

  “Polk, get on the mule and ride! Hurry!”

  “My cart!” Polk stared at the abandoned vehicle. “My cart!”

  “Lose it!” Escalla whacked the terrified mule across its rump. “Go!”

  With a bleat of fear, the mule sped into the trees, plunging Polk through a bramble bush. Jus backed away from the stream, his hand on his sword, trying to cover Polk and Escalla’s backs.

  “What is it? What’s there?”

  “Just run! Just do it!” Escalla felt tears of panic flood her eyes. “Come on, man. I don’t want to lose you!”

  The girl dragged Jus away, and he broke into a run. He led the way past Polk and the mule, twisting
sideways down a deep gully filled with leaves that helped cover their trail. They fled past fallen statues, past another giant’s skeleton, and sped out onto an old road with weeds jutting up between the cobblestones. Escalla danced in a cold fright, keeping her companions in the cover of the trees.

  They ran for a mile. Breathing hard, Jus stopped beneath a broken oak to look behind him. Nothing moved. The world seemed still. Escalla shot out of the skies, her eyes roaming in fright across the leaves.

  “Jus, if we get separated, meet me at the Hydra’s lair! Just wait! Wait as long as it takes!” She half tore out of his hands, surged forward, gave him a kiss, and broke away. “You’re my friends! I’m not losing you!”

  Something unseen flashed through the leaves high above. Escalla whirled, stabbed a spell into the treetops, and blasted a web across the trees. Something small and invisible struck the web, kicking and cursing. Escalla shot aside, invisible again. A line of golden bees hissed from midair to show her position as she passed. She blasted the branches and tops from trees, sending a cascade of debris tumbling through the forest.

  Something invisible hovered in the falling leaves—something that cursed and threw up a shield to ward away the debris. Stabbing upward from below came another spell, and another of Escalla’s webs hit something full force and plastered a struggling shape against an old dead tree.

  Leaves jerked as Escalla sped invisibly away—until a vast wall of fire suddenly thundered upward in her path. Escalla’s voice could be heard cursing, then cursing again as another fire wall blocked her escape off to one side. In a sudden flash, Escalla’s invisible body was somehow outlined in sparkling light as an unseen enemy neutralized Escalla’s camouflage.

  Jus was already running to her aid. He tackled the girl, balling himself about her as he leaped through the fire wall. Cinders’ pelt shielded them from the heat. Rolling to his feet, Jus released the girl. Breaking away, she sped hard and fast through the underbrush.

  “Jus, keep back!”

  A spell stabbed at her from above. Escalla rolled aside, but the magic had never been intended to hit her. Instead it lanced into the fern beneath, which instantly sprang into life and caught the girl about the waist. Struggling, Escalla became visible as she fired a shower of little missiles into the plants and blew them apart.

  She flung out a hand and scythed a spell into a patch of empty space. A female scream echoed in the woods, and a small form smashed into the autumn leaves, flickered, and instantly became visible.

  It was Escalla in mirror-image: small, lithe, blonde, and winged like a dragonfly. Dressed in white lace, the faerie had a face and hair that could have been Escalla’s own. With a vicious screech, the newcomer scrabbled to her feet and threw a killing glance at Escalla.

  Escalla hissed, whipped open her hands, and the blinding sizzle of a lethal spell flashed into life. The other faerie snarled at her, matching Escalla’s motion and wreathing herself in dancing electricity. The two girls were about to open fire, when a sudden imperious voice pealed out from above.

  “Enough!”

  It was a voice that hit with a tidal wave of matronly power. On the forest floor, the two young faeries jerked sullenly back as though struck a blow. Unused combat spells leaked off into the ground.

  “Escalla! Tielle! Cease this at once!”

  A regal presence shimmered into being above the two glaring girls. Lean and arrogant, blonde and beautiful, it was a female faerie dressed in icy splendor. Her body had a wild hauteur that almost stung the eye.

  Other figures shimmered into view—faeries, male and female, in hunting costumes and in gowns. Their fashions were exquisite, their faces arrogant. Here and there, tiny dragons buzzed and hovered at a faerie’s side.

  Looking stark in her black leathers, Escalla stood and coldly wiped the spell taint from her gloves. Standing proud and arrogant amidst her peers and keeping a good grip upon her battle wand, she stared at the magnificent woman floating above and gave her a look that dripped poisoned icicles.

  The woman looked down at Escalla as though examining a found beneath a log.

  “Hello, Escalla.”

  Escalla matched the woman gaze for gaze.

  “Hello, Mother.”

  It was a world where dreams had taken shape into reality, a place of strange colors and spaces that shone like alien stars. A titanic tree stump made an island, and above the island, the sky shimmered with little drifting points of light. A dark, cool pool stretched off into the distance. Wooden stepping blocks stretched off across the lake to other islands, far and near.

  The light-motes reflected in the water, showing the shapes of fish and giant water beetles far below. Bullfrogs pealed from the shadows, while nightingales flitted between strands of alien flowers. All about the pool, nature had been put into good order, arranged as a careful piece of art.

  It seemed to be night. The sky was dark and starry, and yet everything shone as clearly as in the light of day. Sitting sourly on a pillow at the center of a little isle, Escalla swatted at a nightingale as the stupid creature twittered by.

  The garden upon the tree stump isle had been sculpted perfectly. Plants had been shaped into tables, chairs and couches, all overlaid with silk brocades. A satyr daintily served tea and scones, while plates of food and flasks of wine stood gleaming in the light. Surrounded by dreamlike plenty, Jus, Polk, and even the mule all remained frozen in shock.

  The satyr bowed, proffering jam and cream. Escalla ignored the creature until it went away. Sitting alone with her knees hugged to her chin, the faerie kept her eyes carefully away from the scenery. She tossed a glance at the feast then turned away.

  “Don’t drink the wine,” she said without looking up, “and don’t eat the food.”

  Polk jerked his hand back, already reaching for a scone. “It’s enchanted?”

  “Polk, don’t drink the wine. Don’t touch it. Don’t sniff it. Don’t even touch the damned cork!” Escalla sat with her knees hunched beneath her chin. “Unless you’re a faerie, faerie wine’s instant suicide. Makes you drunk as a pickled thought-eater in seconds three.”

  “Oh!” Polk eyed the wine glass nearest him, half tempted to give it a try. “Really?”

  “The hangover comes about ten minutes later, Polk. Rumor says it’s like having a pair of exploding wolverines mating inside your skull.”

  Even Polk, inveterate drinker that he was, shrank away from the wine. “Wolverines?”

  “Yeah, especially the vintage sixty-three. Gives you violent tremors and convulsions in less time than it takes to scream.”

  Polk kept a distance between himself and the nearest plate of scones. “How about the food? Poison?”

  Escalla shrugged and said, “No.”

  “Should we eat it?”

  “No.”

  Blinking, Polk scratched his skull. “Why?”

  “Because we don’t want to give my mother any leverage!” Escalla sat back against a rock and tossed a pebble at a nightingale. “If she feeds you, she can ask for a favor in return. When she comes back, watch what you say. Don’t give her any information she can use.”

  “But she’s your mother!”

  “Killer amoebas have mothers, Polk. I’m not going to embrace any of those, either.”

  The faeries had opened a door in the empty air of the forest and had led Escalla and her companions into this eerie fantasy land. They now sat amid the songbirds and the frogs, surrounded by a ring of ghostly elf hounds that kept them trapped in an unwinking gaze.

  Jus reached into his belt pouch, brought out a chunk of hardtack and split it three ways between himself, Polk, and Escalla. At his side, Cinders lay nose to nose with an elf hound. The hell hound leaked sulphurous steam from his nostrils, and the elf hound bristled, bared its teeth, then broke into a vicious growl. The growl turned into a yelp of panic as Cinders’ spewed a jet of flame that scorched the elf hound’s back.

  Of all the travelers, Cinders was the only one with a grin.


  Funny!

  Kicking at the scenery, Escalla stood and paced, watched by a dozen elf hounds as she walked. She stood at the shore of the island and stared off across the dark, reflective pool.

  “They redecorated.”

  Jus joined her, sitting at her side, his hand resting too casually upon his sword and aware that the walls could have ears.

  “So this is the Seelie Court?”

  “Ha! They wish!” Escalla gave a flick of contempt. “This is just a pocket above the forest, a tiny alternative realm. Tons of places have them. Think of it as Flanaess plus one. It runs about, oh, a mile wide.” Escalla looked about. “The forest is still there. Any tree you find in here with an arch of branches is a gate to somewhere or other.”

  Jus weighed the information, still wondering just exactly where they were. He carefully scanned the starry sky, checking the constellations.

  “Does time move differently here?”

  “No, although on other planes it does.” Escalla used her hands to show her friends the horizons of the eerie faerie world. “This is just a citadel. Thirty faeries, three hundred servants, and a ton of these damned hounds.” Eyes narrowed, the girl carefully watched an elf hound that slunk watchfully nearby. “Try not to look straight at anything. Try to look past the surface. Most of it’s an illusion. You can get the knack of telling.” Escalla sounded sour. “Careful of the wildlife. Anything about the mass of a faerie probably is a faerie. No trout is a trout, no cat’s a cat. The bored ones can get pretty strange. Don’t stare, or they’ll try and get pushy.”

  “Hmph,” the Justicar grunted. “What if we’re attacked by one?”

  “Cut it fast and hard. Give it time to throw a spell, and you’re dog meat. But don’t do it. I’m almost out of spells.” The girl shrugged. “They have a dueling code—one on one fights are your own affair if you make it a formal challenge.”

  “Are they all magic-users?”

  “Yeah. All of them.”

  Jus rippled his finger tips along the hilt of his sword. “Should we try to bring in Enid and have her bust us out of here?”