The Nimble Man (A Novel of the Menagerie) (39 page)

All of the worlds in existence would now be as they were
meant
to be. To Morrigan, her deeds were not cruel, but a mercy. She was not
destroying benevolence and beauty, but shattering the illusion that they
existed at all. She was setting things right.

The Nimble Man had once been denied. Now her destiny was
entwined with his, and all would be as it should be. The Nimble Man would be
free.

All strength left her and she collapsed to her knees, her
heart near to bursting with bliss.

And inside that portal, The Nimble Man moved closer to this
world.

Conan Doyle straightened his jacket and brushed ashes from
his sleeve, then stepped over the charred corpses of a trio of Corca Duibhne. He
closed the heavy oak door behind him and then glanced around the foyer of the
brownstone.

He was home.

The Night People came from the parlor, several of them
trying to squeeze through the door at once, clambering over one another to get
at him like dogs on a fox hunt. Others appeared in the corridor that led to the
kitchen, their clothes and faces smeared with blood, one of them holding a
chunk of meat in his hand, two bones jutting from its end. Conan Doyle
recognized them as the ulna and radius, splintered. It was the lower arm of a
human being.

Others appeared on the grand staircase. Two, then a third. A
fourth hung from the light fixture above.

There were eleven of twelve of them, all told.

Conan Doyle lifted his chin, nostrils flaring, and stood
waiting for them to come. He narrowed his gaze and thought again of war. Not merely
the Twilight Wars, but others as well, the conflicts that devastated Europe,
that took his brother and his son, that crushed the hearts of so many mothers
and fathers and young brides. So much of his early life had been spent in the
exercise of his imagination and of his intellect. He respected the mind and the
heart, the use of reason. But even then, he had known that there came a time
when the basest nature of his enemies would prevail, and the time for reason
was over.

"This is my home," he said, biting off each word
with grinding teeth. "And I want you out!"

The Corca Duibhne raced at him, their claws scoring the wood
floor. Some of them capered like beasts, others swaggered in their leather,
modeling themselves after the darker impulses of mankind. Yet they were all
nothing more than cruel, stupid animals.

Conan Doyle threw his head back, summoned the magick up
inside himself and felt it surge into him as though he had been struck by
lightning. A blue mist spilled from his eyes like tears of azure steam. The
Corca Duibhne from the parlor were almost upon him. With a twist of his wrist,
he laid his hand out toward him, palm upward, and a spell rolled off of his
fingers. He barked a phrase in Macedonian, and the floor erupted beneath them. The
slats of the wood floor became roots that reached up and twined around their
ankles. Shoots split off from the roots and sunk into the Night People's flesh,
and their bodies began to change. To harden. Bark formed upon their skin, and
they screamed as tiny branches grew out from their flesh, sprouting leaves.

They made ugly trees, those four, rooted there in the foyer.

"
Caedo tui frater
," Conan Doyle sneered as
he turner toward the trio rushing in from the kitchen. He drew a gob of phlegm
up from his throat and spat it at them. It hit the ground not far from the
nearest of them and a red line snaked from that yellow spittle across the
floor, touching the creature's foot.

It turned on the others with obscene savagery, claws raking
another Corca Duibhne's face, slashing its eyes, which burst with a splash of
acidic fluid that scored the floor. The red lines on the floor touched the
other two as well, and soon they were ripping one another apart, fang and claw,
shredding flesh and clothing in a widening spatter of their own blood.

The trio on the stairs paused, hesitating now. They were
capable of speech, but in battle and in fear, they rarely spoke. Now the
rearmost among them took a step backward, and the others noticed and began to
retreat as well.

"
To haptikos Medusa
," Conan Doyle muttered.

He widened his eyes and felt the blue mist that swirled
there pour from within him. It furrowed the air and shot toward them, enveloped
them, and when it dissipated, they were only statues. Frozen stone.

Only the one hanging from the light fixture remained. He
stared up at it with disdain. It clung there, eyes closed, praying he did not
see it. Conan Doyle ignored it, starting for the stairs.

On the second floor landing he saw the mad Fey twins, Fenris
and Dagris, waiting for him.

Conan Doyle started up toward them.

The twins drew swords from scabbards that hung at their
sides, mirror images of one another. Conan Doyle held his palms together in
front of him as he walked up the stairs. When he opened them, a shaft of
razor-sharp, shimmering blue magick grew from the palm of his right hand. This
would be his sword. But he would not need it for long.

Dagris moved first, stepping delicately down the stairs to
meet him. Fenris came after, more cautiously. They had some skill with magick,
these two, but Conan Doyle was pleased they had not chosen to attack him as
sorcerers. It would have taken more time than he wished to waste with them.

"There are those who would argue that madmen cannot be
held responsible for their actions," Conan Doyle said as he continued up
toward them. "Perhaps. Perhaps."

With a lunatic gleam in his eyes and a sickening smile,
Dagris swung his sword. "For Morrigan! For The Nimble Man!"

Conan Doyle parried his attack. Dagris deftly maneuvered his
weapon again and again, and each time Conan Doyle turned it away. The azure
blade crackled, the air redolent with the scent of cinnamon and other spices,
the smell of magick.

Dagris thrust his sword. Conan Doyle knocked it away and
slammed the Fey warrior into the banister, knocking him over the rail. He fell
to the floor with a crack of bone, and did not move again. Seeing his brother
killed, Fenris rushed in, but Conan Doyle was ready. He had choreographed this
bit in his mind. Dagris was the madder and more dangerous of the twins. Fenris
swept his blade down. Conan Doyle tried to dodge, but was only partly
successful. The tip of the sword cut his arm and he felt the sting and the flow
of hot blood.

But his own azure blade was buried deep within Fenris's
abdomen.

Yet there was no Fey blood spilt. Fenris fell to his knees. His
eyes were wide as he stared up at Conan Doyle, and his face lost its mask of
lunacy. His features grew younger. His body smaller.

"This is the Sword of Years," Conan Doyle told
him. "It is not a weapon, but a spell. It is the magick of second chances.
Without the cruelty of your brother, we shall see what becomes of you."

The blade had drawn from Fenris nearly all of the years of
his life, and so when Conan Doyle withdrew it from his flesh he was only an infant.
The Fey child opened his mouth and wailed, a baby's cry. There was a thin line
seared upon his belly where the sword had been, but he was otherwise unharmed.

"We shall see," Doyle repeated.

He carried the infant to the second floor landing and left it
there, knowing the Corca Duibhne would catch the scent of the Fey upon it and
leave it alone.

And he moved on.

The tea kettle began to whistle. Julia twitched, startled by
the noise. For a moment she felt frozen to her seat, as though even the simple
act of making tea was beyond her. She gazed across her kitchen table at Squire,
who sat with a gallon of chocolate chip ice cream in front of him, eating right
from the container with a soup spoon. When he wasn't talking, or following the
instructions of his employer, he was eating. It ought to have been repulsive,
but there was something oddly charming about it.

From the first moment she had seen him she had avoided
looking directly at him, or allowing her eyes to linger. He was ugly. His nose
too long and too pointed. His face was long and angular as well, and his mouth
was too wide, as though its corners had been slit, so that when he spoke or
smiled it seemed his head was about to split in two. His teeth were jagged and
yellow. An animal's teeth. His hair was brittle and unkempt.

But his eyes were kind. It had taken her this long to notice
that. The little man — she refused to think of him as a goblin or
hobgoblin or whatever Danny had said he was — watched her with the
gentlest, most expressive eyes. Squire cussed like a sailor and obviously
enjoyed his verbal sparring with the others. And yet despite his appearance and
despite his cutting wit, there was something tender about him.

"Want me to get that?" he asked, licking the ice
cream from his spoon and nodding toward the tea kettle. Its whistle had become
a shriek.

"No." She stood up. "No, I'm sorry. I was
just . . . I feel a little numb. Just . . . preoccupied."

"Can't say I blame you," Squire said.

Julia went to the stove and took the kettle off. The whistle
died to a low hiss, like air leaking from a balloon. The kitchen was lit only
by the tiny flames that flickered atop a half dozen candles she had set about
the room. There were other places in the house that would have been more
comfortable, but she felt the safest in the kitchen. How odd was that? She did
not want to think about the answer. She only knew that it felt like a refuge. Like
sanctuary. Like a place she might be busily toiling when her little boy came
home to her.

Her lips pressed together in a tight line and she squeezed
her eyes shut, refusing to cry. As she gripped the kettle and began to pour the
steaming water into the two cups she had taken from the cabinet for herself and
Squire, her hand trembled. She set the kettle down. In her mind she saw the
next steps that were necessary. Get the tea bags from the cupboard. Milk from
the fridge. Some cookies to go with the tea. Anyone else would have been happy
with a gallon of ice cream, but she doubted Squire would say no to the cookies.

She leaned against the stove to keep from collapsing.

"Mrs. Ferrick," Squire said, his voice a harsh
rasp in the flickering shadows. This little man . . . this little monster in
her kitchen.

Her shoulders shook.

"Julia."

Slowly, she turned to face him. His eyes were wide and she
saw such caring and intelligence there that she immediately regretted having
thought of him as a monster, not to mention dozens of other uncharitable
thoughts that had crossed her mind.

"He's going to be all right," Squire said,
planting his spoon back in the ice cream container. It jutted upward like a
flagpole.

Julia stared at him, slowly shook her head. "How . . .
how can you be so sure?"

His gaze was intense. "I'm
not
sure. But you
believe me, don't you?"

Her pulse slowed. She took a deep breath and let it out. A
strange peace came over her. Amazed at herself, she began to nod.

"Yes. Yes, I do."

Squire grinned and leaned back in his chair, throwing up his
hands. "See that! I've just got one of those faces, y'know! My work here
is done."

Julia could not help but laugh. It lasted only a moment, but
Squire had lightened her heart, and she was grateful for that. Also, the truth
was that she did believe him. He seemed so certain of it. The little man
believed with his whole heart that things were going to turn out all right. She
knew she had to do the same, that she had to have faith.

Without it, she would never survive the night.

The Black Annis caught Clay by the throat as he was
defending himself from the Corca Duibhne. He had one of the Night People in his
own hands, its chest crushed, its eyes bulging as it breathed its last. But
then the hag appeared, far swifter than he would have expected. She was a thing
of legend, one of the dark creatures that prowled the shadows of Faerie. It was
no surprise that Morrigan had enlisted her aid, and now the corpses in the
basement made more sense. The Black Annis fed on human children. Morrigan had
promised her a lifetime's supply.

The hag lifted Clay by the throat, sickening glee in her
eyes. She stank like vulture's breath, a fetid carrion stench that billowed off
of her with every move. Her claws could carve stone or bone, and she was only
one of a family of sisters. Clay hoped there were no others in Morrigan's
employ.

One, though . . . one he could handle.

With a single swipe of her free hand, she tore his stomach
open. In the same moment, Clay changed. He
shifted
. Now the Black Annis
saw not a seven foot earthen man, but a mirror image of herself. One of her
sisters. Just as hideous, just as rank. The simple creature's eyes went wide
and she threw Clay to the ground and knelt by his side, holding her hands over
the wound in his gut.

Even as he retained the shape of a Black Annis, he felt his
abdomen knitting together, healing. He was not flesh and blood after all. Not
really. He could only mimic it.

He was Clay.

With one Black Annis hand, he reached up and grabbed the hag
by her filthy, matted hair. He flexed his right hand; claws that could carve
stone or bone. With a single swipe, he tore her throat out, all the way back to
the spinal column.

Shifting once more to himself, to the face he knew as his
own — not the human one who wore so often but the earthen body that had
spawned the legend of the golem — he stood to fight the Corca Duibhne. The
boggarts were after Graves, now, howling and snarling as they tried to reach
the ghost. Only a few Corca Duibhne remained. Clay did not bother to alter his
form again. One leaped at him and he drove it down to the concrete floor and
crushed its skull with his fist.