Kingfisher(65)
“That’s not sorcery. That’s perception. What you do with that knife—that’s magical.”
“It’s in the knife, not in me.”
“Is it?” Val waggled his fork at his brother. “What could you do with this, for instance?”
“Eat,” Pierce said flatly. He did, then added, “I still think we may have some of her powers. We’ve just never had to use them before. If you wanted to make all of this—”
“It’s illusion,” Val pointed out.
“You mean it’s all in our heads? We’re imagining this house?”
“No. The sorceress is. It’s in her head.”
“Well—” Pierce grappled a moment. “Can we—can we change it with our minds? Put a door in it that leads out?”
Val considered the question, then answered simply, “I’m a knight. I’m better at bashing things apart than imagining doors through them.”
They tried that for a while, swinging at scarred plaster and torn wallpaper with whatever they could find: removable shelving, a rolling pin with a missing handle, a mop. The sorceress appeared as they were battering at the walls around a chimney, raising clouds of soot but doing no discernible damage to her spell.
She sat down on a couch with a few springs sticking out of it, and said, “I need some help with your father.”
They gazed at her, still holding makeshift battering tools, which she ignored.
Val said, “Of course we’ll help. Just take us to him. What’s wrong with him?”
She brushed his words away. “Not that kind of help. He’s fine. He just— Is he always so stubborn?”
Val took a step toward her, still wielding the mop handle. He asked tightly, “About what?”
She waved her hand again; the mop disappeared. “About— Well. His feelings? I’ve been doing everything for him. I put him in the loveliest room in my house. I removed the basilisk’s spell. He has only a bit of a headache. My attendants bathed him, dressed him in clean clothes; I cooked for him myself. I would have fed him with my own hands. He refuses to be grateful. All he does is ask for you.”
“Why wouldn’t he? He’s our father. We were traveling together.”
“I explained that to him,” the sorceress said a trifle querulously. “More than once. That everyone around him was incapacitated by the monster, that I saw the incident from a distance and went to help, that he was alone when I found him, and in such distress that of course I did all that was possible to get him out of there, and quickly. The roads were blocked, so I brought him here. I saw nothing of a limo, a driver, or two young, red-haired men wearing uniforms. They must have driven on to search for him when the road cleared.”
“He doesn’t know we’re here?” Pierce said, appalled.
“No. He has no idea where you’ve gone.” She brooded a moment. “I suspect that—in some tiny way—he doesn’t entirely believe me. I don’t know why.” She stood up restively, paced a moment across a rumpled, faded hearthrug. They watched her in complete bewilderment.
“What is it you want from him?” Pierce pleaded. “Maybe we can help? Is it something he did to you? Are you that angry with him?”
“Of course not. He has never met me before in his life. But I’ve known about him all of mine.” She paused, studying them, nibbling on a fingernail. “It may be that you’ll both—no, maybe just one of you, to be on the safe side—will have to appear at my door asking if I’ve seen him. He will be so grateful to me when he sees at least one of his sons. But we’ll need some convincing story of where the other one has gone.”
“How about this?” Val said sharply. “That one of us was kidnapped by the incredibly stupid and selfish sorceress who turned herself into a basilisk and attacked our father.”
The sorceress took her finger from between her teeth and pointed it at him. “You,” she said coldly, “can stay here. I’ll take your brother with me to see your father.”
“I’m not going to lie to him for you,” Pierce said adamantly.
“Fine. Decide for yourselves who stays and who goes free to see Sir Leith. But if I glimpse the faintest falseness in your eyes, in your face, hear it in your words when you speak to him, the brother you left behind will share stale bread and moldy cheese rinds with the rats.”
Val gazed at her, his eyes narrowed and so intent on her that Pierce wondered uneasily what, by word or action, he might trigger in her. He only asked, with unexpected gentleness, “What is it? If you want our help, tell us what you need.”
Her face crumpled suddenly; she dabbed at the corner of one eye with her forefinger. “I need him to understand how deeply I am in love with him. That he holds my heart in his. I need to move him as he moves me. Can you help me with that? He finds it so difficult to be grateful despite all I’ve done for him. Can you persuade him? I want to rule his heart, to make it tack and turn toward me, always toward me, until all the world understands the poetry that he feels for me. I want him to forget the queen. I want to be known, from this time on, as his legendary love. Can you help me?” She flicked a finger at her other eye, then gave them both a dark, tearless stare. “If you can’t, then stay out of my way. Now. Choose. Which of you remains here, which of you sees your father. Be ready to tell me when I return.”