Spindle (Two Monarchies Sequence Book 1) (6 page)

There were a few minutes of silent waiting, while Poly tentatively reached out to the puppy again and Luck traced the sigil on the door thoughtfully. Then a shuffling and clanking of locks announced the arrival of the proprietor, who cracked the door open just enough to display a scowl.

“Wot?”

“Spells,” said Luck, just as much to the point. “I want one. A long distance Journey spell with the capacity for two. And your dog. I want to buy it.”

Poly looked suspiciously at Luck, but not so suspiciously as the proprietor.

“Wot d’you want the mongrel for?”

“My wife likes it,” said Luck, unblinking. “It’s her birthday.”

The proprietor sent a doubtful look in Poly’s direction and she gave him a wide, sunny smile in return. She didn’t know what Luck was up to, but if it meant that she would have the puppy it was worth going along with. She cuddled it closer, aware of the man’s eyes on her, and the puppy took this opportunity to lick her face thoroughly.

“Why should I sell you my dog?”

“Because I’ll give you a gold covey for it,” said Luck reasonably. “And another for the travel spell,
if
it’s a good one.”

The proprietor glared at them both suspiciously for another long moment, but at last grudgingly nodded, as if he were doing them a great favour. Poly had to bite the inside of her cheek to check the laugh that wanted to come out. She didn’t know what a covey was, but if it was gold it was worth far more than a draggled little puppy, no matter how wildly prices had inflated in three hundred years. The proprietor of this particular establishment must have been more than passingly familiar with the principle that what sounded too good to be true probably
was
, because he kept one, suspicious eye on Luck as he ushered him into the dingy hall. Poly smiled blandly and stayed where she was; and the man, with a last
dubious glance at her, followed Luck.

It was peaceful, if somewhat dirty, in the alley. Poly, who wasn’t really used to grimy little alleys, looked around with some interest, absent-mindedly patting the puppy. There were odd little scuffling noises from the other side of one wall, but since it seemed likely that this was a perfectly normal occurrence for disreputable back alleys, Poly didn’t allow herself to be frightened.

When she turned her attention back to her new puppy, Poly found that it was thoughtfully chewing on the stiff front point of her bodice. She sighed and gently disengaged its mouth, careful to avoid catching the tiny white teeth in a stray thread, and found that it had chewed a small hole right through the bodice.

“What a nasty little piece of mischief you are,” she told it. She found that she was rubbing the arm that had come into contact with the puppy’s lead and stopped herself with a frown. The skin of her arm was unblemished, and it was only when she wasn’t thinking about it particularly that she seemed to feel the burning cold arc across her skin again. She had been around enough magic to know that the residual burn wasn’t necessarily a pertinent development; but she thought, with a small, sour smile, that it might be just as well to get Luck to untie the puppy when it came right down to it. Let him have a taste of his own medicine.

Poly was still meditating on that particular idea with no small amount of satisfaction when Luck returned and surprised her at it. She scrambled to her feet, hastily arranging her expression into something less obviously bloodthirsty, but Luck gave her a clear, green look anyway.

He wiggled a rolled scroll at her and said: “Come along, Poly. Untie the dog: he’ll change his mind in a minute.”

Poly opened her mouth to protest, but Luck was already halfway back down the alley. She sighed to herself. Of
course
Luck would get out of it.

She set her teeth and yanked at the slipknot, flinching away when the thin rope slithered to the cobbles– a normal, harmless piece of string. Poly gazed at her unhurt fingers for a moment and then picked up the end of the string again, feeling silly. The puppy, pulled up mid-frolic, yapped shrilly and raced in a bumbling circle.

Poly giggled, but said: “Save your energy. You’ll need it.”

Luck had already disappeared, which meant more running. Poly huffed out a breath and tugged the puppy into an unenthusiastic trot, hoping that Luck would be in sight when she reached the next intersection. Colliding with a warm body just around the corner, she thought for a relieved second that Luck had made another of his sudden, inexplicable stops.

Unfortunately, the face that was looking down at her was dashingly bearded and completely unfamiliar.

“Hello darling,” said the stranger.

Poly recognised the tone in one cold blink, and the level calculation of the devastating smile in another. There were a hundred courtiers just like him on any given day at the castle, surrounding Persephone with their practised smiles and carefully concealed motives.

This was one of the carefully dashing ones that liked to steal kisses in the stairwells, and his hands were already on her shoulders. Poly kicked him in the shins and wrenched her shoulders away, ready to run when she could. The puppy was growling; a low, guttural sound that didn’t match its diminutive size, but heroically refrained from either tangling her ankles in its lead or snapping ridiculously at the stranger’s heels.

The smile hadn’t gone from the stranger’s face, which worried Poly slightly. What worried her more, however, was that he had moved to block her way, and that five other men had unaccountably segued from the brickwork around them. Last time something like this happened, she had only escaped because Gwyn had found her, and because everyone knew that you didn’t gainsay Gwyn and his very large, very sharp hoe. Where was Luck?

The stranger sauntered toward her again, still with the faint smile on his face, and Poly found that she had been backed neatly against an unyielding brick wall. When had that happened? She had a moment’s sick recollection of the impact, and the stranger swinging her by the forearms, ostensibly to lessen the force. It was more likely that he’d done it to propel her into the street behind him, where he would more easily be able to box her in. That meant he’d been waiting for her– or perhaps for Luck.

“That wasn’t very nice, darling,” said the stranger. He stood too close, amused at her stiff discomfort, and cupped one cheek in his palm, caressing it with his thumb. “You’re a mite stiff and old fashioned, but that’s a fine gown. I’m sure you’ve got some pretty flim-flams tucked away in those big pockets of yours. Out with ‘em.”

The puppy, Poly was absolutely determined not to part with. On the other hand, she was just as little inclined to be robbed of her mother’s books. She tugged on the puppy’s string unobtrusively, trying to hide it in her skirts, but it had stopped growling and was frantically whining instead, pulling with such force on the lead that it had almost freed itself from the collar.

“And the dog,” said the stranger softly, his smile warm while his eyes were cold.

Ah. It wasn’t about her after all. Whatever Luck had recognised in this little puppy, someone else had also recognised. There was an unfamiliar hum buzzing through her head, and Poly found that her hair had begun a slow, whispering movement around her shoulders.

“You’d better let me go now,” she told the man, pleased to find her voice clear and steady. Strands of her hair were already snaking up and over her shoulder, and as she watched a few tendrils coiled around his wrist.

The stranger saw it too, with a curious, half-cocked smile, and said over his shoulder: “I think she likes me, boys.”

It was because of this remark that Poly didn’t feel sorry for him when he began to scream.

She thought, distantly, that her hair must be tightening around his wrist quite nastily; but she had a feeling that it was also doing something else–that she was
making
it do something else–that wasn’t quite nice.

“Make it stop!” he gasped. “Lady, mercy!”

Poly hesitated, and in her hesitation was lost. She saw the dirty gleam of light on a blade just as the man slashed desperately at the coil of hair around his wrist. A shaft of agony and loss pierced through her, tearing a scream from her throat. It was a short, staccato sound, and before it had time to echo against the surrounding buildings there was a warm, golden presence between herself and the stranger.

Luck’s voice said, in sharp, icy fragments: “Did you
cut. Her. Hair?
”

Poly, choking on fiercely suppressed sobs, clutched at his arm and sent the stranger a murderous glare.

He wasn’t looking at her. His eyes, very wide and wary, were fixed on Luck. Poly couldn’t see Luck’s eyes, but she knew that by now they would be eddying molten gold if the searing heat of magic at present emanating from him was anything to judge by.

“Your pardon,” said the stranger, and he said the words carefully, dropping them delicately into the air like an artist tinting paint with small, perfect drops of colour. The other men had already melted away into the back streets. “I mistook the lady for someone else.”

“Give her the hair,” said Luck, still very softly.

The stranger did so, and Poly saw on his wrist deep, bleeding punctures that certainly hadn’t been there before. Had she done that?

She took the limp hank of hair with cold fingers and tucked it away in her pocket, where it curled around something confusingly wooden and curved. Poly uncomprehendingly felt the outline of it with her fingers. It was a spindle. She released it, and a whisper of thought slipped away.

Distantly she heard Luck say: “You can go now,” and saw the stranger slip away, his desire for haste fighting against his habitual swagger to produce an uneven quickstep.

Someone said: “Poly.”

Poly looked at Luck blankly, static buzzing in her ears. She could feel the shorn lock of hair in a thin strand of pure ice from the hair tip to her toes, and gradually became aware that the tingle of warmth in her hand was because Luck was holding it.

She blinked, and Luck said: “Oh, you
are
in there. Hold the dog, Poly. Things are going to get blurry.”

Chapter Four

Luck led her by the hand through a vague oil-painting of scenery that seemed to smear the lines of the town’s dingy grey with the fresh green of grass and the vague outline of a mountain.

Poly only remembered four steps, but when Luck dropped her hand and said: “I think that’s about it for me,” the town was nowhere in sight, and a mountain had sprung up behind them.

Poly, still trance-like, wondered if it was possible that she had walked through walls and perhaps a mountain as well. She was dimly aware that the thought wasn’t carrying the weight it should carry, but the aching loss of that single hank of hair was still dragging at her mind with leaden fingers.

Someone was digging through her pocket and she murmured a protest, then there were fingers in her hair and Luck’s face swam into view again. He was plaiting the cut piece of hair back into the rest, strands of gold glowing momentarily and then fading to black as the hair re-joined. Poly closed her eyes, feeling the comfortable warmth seep into her numb limbs, and when she opened them the world was in focus once again.

“You disappeared,” said Luck. “Don’t do it again. People notice and try to take advantage.”

“I didn’t disappear,” Poly told him wearily. She was beginning to
feel
as though she’d walked through a mountain. “You ran too fast, and those men were
waiting
for us.”

“Huh,” said Luck, cocking his head. “Were they, though?”

His eyes lost focus, and Poly, wanting to catch him while she still could, asked: “Did we walk through a mountain?”

“You need to take better care of your hair,” advised Luck, his gaze narrowed for a brief moment. “Binding your magic into it was reasonably clever, but it has its drawbacks.”

“Luck.” Poly waited until he was looking at her, and said very clearly: “I do
not
have magic. Any magic in my hair is from you.”

Luck observed her in unblinking silence, said, “Huh,” again, and promptly lost interest in her. Poly thought, wearily, that he still didn’t believe her.

She found that she was still clutching the puppy to her chest, and put it down gently on the grass. Luck was lost in his own thoughts–and, for a wonder, standing still–so Poly had time to observe her surroundings a little more precisely. Her observation brought her to the conclusion that Luck was planning on stopping for the day. Hard by the mountain, set against a rocky outcrop, was a wooden three-sided arbour with a roof that was old but serviceable, and a crude, well-used stone fireplace.

Rest for the weary traveller, or a trap? wondered the sceptical side of Poly’s mind, but she wandered toward the shelter anyway. Behind it, and very far in the distance was a mountain range, scraggled and uneven against horizon– the one they had walked through, if Poly’s memory served her correctly.

From the frame of the shelter she could see a wide, gently sloping plain that gradually curved up to the base of another range; this one much closer and higher. Above it, Poly fancied that she saw a reddish haze.

Luck’s voice said, too close to her ear: “What are you looking at?”

Poly twitched herself away in annoyance, rubbing her ear. “The horizon is orange.”

“Sunset. You can untie the dog now, Poly.”

“It can’t be sunset: I can still see both the lower suns.”

Luck looked vaguely puzzled. “Can you? Huh. It seems later than that.”

It struck Poly that he was slightly unsteady on his feet, and she would have felt sorry for him if he hadn’t added: “Unleash the dog, Poly.”

“I don’t want to,” she said bluntly, remembering the cold burn of the thin rope when she first touched it.

A thoughtful, gold-edged gaze was levelled at her. “Poly, you’re being difficult again.”

“No, I’m not. If you want the dog unleashed, do it yourself.”

“I see that diplomatic processes have broken down again. Poly, that lead is a very powerful antimagic spell.”

“Antimagic magic doesn’t make sense,” said Poly, trying to be exasperated with him. Luck had begun to sway on his feet, a fixed look on his face, and she didn’t particularly want to feel sorry for him. “It’d eat itself.”

Luck blinked rapidly. “That’s a good point. Why doesn’t it eat itself? Magic...antimagic...there must be a buffer. Poly, unleash the dog.”

Luck was right, Poly thought crossly. Diplomatic processes
had
broken down. In fact, if they broke down any further, Luck was going to find himself with a black eye.

“Why don’t you do it?” she demanded at last.

“I told you. Antimagic magic that doesn’t eat itself. It’s set to attack the person who uncollars the dog.”

“And you don’t want to be attacked,” nodded Poly.

“No.”

“Luck, I don’t want to be attacked either.”

“It only eats magic,” said Luck, with a very clear, green look. “You should be fine, shouldn’t you?”

Oh, very clever
, thought Poly bitterly.
Hoist with my own petard
. Aloud, she said: “
Fine
.”

The puppy was busily chasing its tail in a corner of the shelter, but when she emitted a short, sharp whistle, it cocked its ears and galloped joyfully toward her, trailing its lead.

There was nowhere to sit except in the dirt, so Poly pushed aside the thought that this was her only clean dress (in fact, her only dress of
any
kind) and sat down cross-legged to receive the puppy’s eager attentions. Luck was watching closely, she was sure, despite the fact that he seemed to be teasing out stray threads of magic from his cuff while swaying slightly on the balls of his feet. She had to resist the urge to hunch her shoulders against his attention.

The collar was laughably easy to unhook, but the puppy sat very still for the operation anyway, gazing up at her with strangely anxious eyes as she released it. The collar promptly slithered from the puppy’s neck to the ground, slipping free of the metal clasp on the lead. The lead itself hung innocently from her fingers.

Luck said: “Huh. That was underwhelming. You can let it go now, Poly.”

“No, I can’t,” said Poly quietly. The lead was sticking to her hand in a nasty, icy way that suggested frostbite, and the iron clasp at the end of it had begun to sway gently although her hand was still.

“Of course you can.” Luck’s voice was compelling, his eyes swimming with gold, but the magic swirling around him was the wrong colour. Poly wondered what had gone wrong. “Let it go, Poly. You don’t have any magic, you told me so.”

The hint of suggestion mingled with the fact that Poly
knew
she hadn’t any magic probably would have worked if the clasp hadn’t chosen that moment to rise, snake-like, and begin a slow, achingly cold spiral around her wrist. After that it was hard to be convinced of anything but pain and cold.

Poly heard her own breath, ragged and too fast in an attempt not to cry, and thought despairingly:
It should eat itself. Why doesn’t it eat itself?

Then the pain faded, a curl of iron etched on her skin fully to the elbow, and Poly was able to catch her breath, confused and relieved all at once. She climbed to her feet mechanically, still clutching the puppy.

“What do you know, it
did
eat itself,” said Luck, his voice agreeably surprised.

Poly inspected the silvery spiral on her arm, reminding herself to
breathe
, and above all, not to hit Luck.

“What happened to my arm?”

“I think it might have gotten cross-threaded.”

Luck seized her arm, jerking her unexpectedly closer, and followed the curling trail of iron with one finger, his head cocked.

“Why did it stop?” Poly asked uneasily. She had a horrible feeling that if it started again, it wouldn’t stop.

Luck gave a sudden, gleeful chuckle. “I don’t know. Oh, I like this!”

“Will it start again?”

“No. I told you, it’s cross-threaded.”

“I don’t know what that means!”

“Don’t be cross, Poly, it makes you scowl.”

Poly took a brief moment to count to ten. Then, very politely, she asked: “Will the mark go away?”

“There
must
still be some curse left,” said Luck, his eyes very bright. He was talking to himself. “Huh. I was right. That’s very, very sneaky.”

“What’s sneaky?”

“Dog!” said Luck suddenly. “Where is it?”

Poly considered refusing to tell him until he answered at least one of her questions satisfactorily, but she had the idea that Luck would simply refuse to understand her. She silently hefted the hand that held the puppy up to Luck’s notice, then sat down again wearily to observe events.

That did attract Luck’s attention.

“Don’t sit down, Poly,” he said. “We’ve got work to do.”

“If it can’t be done sitting down, it can wait,” she told him grimly. Taking advantage of the change in its position, the puppy launched itself gleefully at her face, its tail madly wagging.

“Hallo, darling,” she said, acknowledging the small whines of joy with a light tousling of its floppy ears.

-hallo, hallo, hallo!-

Poly froze for a bare second, and her fingers were seized in needle-sharp milk-teeth.

-haha! mine! hahaha!-

“Stop it wriggling,” complained Luck, watching the dog with disfavour. Poly looked up at him a little blindly, surprised that he hadn’t heard.

-don’t want him to hear-
said the muddy little voice.
-you smell pretty-

-Oh. Thank you?-
Poly thought, and found that she was fighting back giggles.
-I’m Poly. What’s your name?-

-polly. polleeee-

-Yes-
Poly said patiently, as the diminutive tail whipped furiously back and forth.
-Poly. That’s me. But who are you?-

-onepiece. have food?-
It sounded hopeful, and the oscillation of its tail, if possible, only increased.

“He wants something to eat,” she told Luck.

He directed an accusing look at Onepiece, then turned it on Poly. “Don’t get attached to it.”

“Why not?”

“It’s not a dog, you know.”

“It
looks
like a dog,” Poly pointed out. Onepiece–if that really was his name–didn’t even faintly smack of magic. She told Luck so, by way of a clincher, and he clicked his tongue thoughtfully.

“Huh. It doesn’t, does it?” Luck blinked twice, rapidly, and then Poly saw his eyes begin to sparkle, which worried her. “Do you want to know why not?”

Poly, resigned to finding out why whether or not she really wanted to be told, asked: “Why not?”

“I think it’s because you’re touching it,” said Luck, his eyes deep green with interest and a fascinated curl to his lips. “I’m glad I met you, Poly: you’re far more interesting than I thought you would be.”

Poly said ironically: “Thank you
so
much”; but Luck wasn’t listening anymore. He was muttering to himself, running an absent hand through his dishevelled hair, and though his magic was still brownish and his eyes tired, he seemed to vibrate with furious energy.

“Antimagic magic that eats itself, and a tangle of magic that disappears in half a heartbeat,” he said, bright-eyed. “It’s all connected and probably a trap, but now we have an antimagic arm that shouldn’t be a problem. Is it the dog or the spell?”

There was a tentative presence in Poly’s mind once again.

-who talking to?-

-Himself, I think-
said Poly, with more amusement than ire. Even if he
had
been talking to her, she wouldn’t have been much the wiser.

-oh-
The puppy seemed to gaze critically at Luck, and then offered:

-swollen brain?-

-Most likely-
Poly said dryly. She briefly listened to Luck argue with himself, then asked Onepiece:
-What are you?-

-dog!-
said the tiny animal, fiercely.
-dog!-

Well, that answered
that
question, thought Poly, intrigued to find that Luck was correct. Onepiece, whatever he was, was certainly not a real dog.

-What happened to you, darling?-

Poly was startled to realise that she could hear a small sniffle in her mind through Onepiece’s audible whine.

-found me and chained me with burning cold. then forgot until I saw you. sparklyPoly and I remembered-

-What did you remember?-

He buried his nose in his paws.
-me. remembered me-

Poly, chilled and sick, cuddled him fiercely, eliciting a childish giggle in her mind and a profusion of face-licking.

-Poor darling-
she said.
-How old are you?-

Onepiece shook his ears and gave the equivalent of a mental shrug.