The Wood Nymph, the Cranky Saint

about his ancestry and family wealth, if that’s what you mean,” she said, smiling to keep the comment mild. Something about the way she phrased it made me wonder if she might already have a good idea of his ancestry and family. “I know he’s very intelligent as well as very handsome, and he’s a far better hunter than anyone I’ve ever seen. You probably haven’t had a chance yet to see him use that enormous bow of his, but he’s an absolute dead shot.”

I had heard too little of Nimrod’s conversation to be able to tell if he could keep up with her humor and often biting wit, but as a hunter I was sure she had met an equal.

“In fact, I even-” She stopped without finishing what might have been a very interesting sentence. Instead she looked at me with a frown. “Your question doesn’t really sound like you. Did Dominic tell you to talk to me?”

I nodded ruefully, rather glad in fact that she’d guessed the truth.

Fortunately, she seemed to find this highly amusing. “So he’s worried that a member of the high aristocracy, the queen of Yurt’s own third cousin, is flirting outrageously with a nobody? I ought to become really outrageous about it, just to teach Dominic a lesson.”

“I’m sorry, my lady, I wouldn’t have said anything if he hadn’t insisted. In fact- Well, Dominic himself has been acting a little strangely lately.”

“In what way?”

“After the royal family called the other night, he was talking about the baby prince and asked me if I’d ever thought of getting married!”

She unexpectedly became serious. “So it’s bothering Dominic too,” she said, which made no sense. But then her eyes twinkled. “I presume you told him that even an adorable little blond prince wasn’t going to make you forget that wizards never marry?”

I took a deep breath. “The regent’s going to ask me what you said.”

She looked down her aristocratic nose. “Tell him,” she said with a smile twitching the corner of her mouth, “tell him that I was deeply offended at your insult to my honor, and that I told you I would always behave in the most honorable way possible, and that, since I was sure of that point, I would always do exactly what I wanted.”

Back in my own chambers, I found Evrard wearing my best dressing gown and sitting in my favorite chair with his feet up, leafing through the first volume of my copy of Ancient and Modern Necromancy.

I sat down across from him. “I need to talk to you.”

“Fine,” he said brightly. “I was just reading again about the Black Wars.” When I cocked an eyebrow at him, he continued, “Surely you remember the end of the Black Wars.” He waved the book in his hand. The first volume of Ancient and Modern Necromancy, which I’d never read very closely, was almost entirely devoted to history.

“I’m afraid I’ve never given very much attention to the history of wizardry,” I answered. I was trying to remember if the Black Wars had come before or after the period in which Saint Eusebius was eaten by the dragon- after, I decided.

“You haven’t? But I love history! Didn’t you want to study all about how the wizards ended the fighting in the western kingdoms? Isn’t that what made you decide to study wizardry in the first place?”

“No,” I said sheepishly, thinking that maybe I could skim the book this evening after he was asleep. But I didn’t want to be distracted by history. “You’ve taken courses at the school more recently than I, and some of them were different. I want to show you a spell I found this morning and ask if you’ve ever seen anything similar.” I pulled the heavy volume onto my lap and found the place. “I don’t think it is written down entirely correctly, but this gives the general outline.”

“What is this book?” asked Evrard, sneezing from the dust.

“It used to belong to your predecessor, the old ducal wizard, thirty years ago,” I said with a sideways glance. “There are four volumes. If you want them, you can have them, once we’re done.”

“I guess so.” He wrinkled his forehead at the handwriting. “I’d rather have a nicely printed book, but-” He stopped, and his forehead cleared. “But this is the same spell-”

“Yes?” I prompted.

“Nothing,” he said quickly. “Nothing. I thought I recognized it, but of course I don’t.”

He sat back with a cheerful smile. I looked at him in silence, putting several things together. “In fact,” I said at last, “I think you do.”

At that moment we were interrupted by a hard knock on the door. Dominic, I thought resignedly, rising to my feet. “Yes, I talked to her,” I started to say even before I had the door fully open.

But it was not Dominic. It was the chaplain, standing under an umbrella. In his hand was a small white square. He must have heard again from the bishop.

He turned to me without seeming to notice Evrard. “The priests are coming here to Yurt.”

“Which priests?”

“Priests from the church of Saint Eusebius, the church that asked for his relics.” These were the ones, I recalled, whom Joachim almost suspected of trying to make the Cranky Saint cranky enough that he would leave the hermit’s grove. “They want to examine the situation at first hand, according to the bishop.” He glanced at the paper in his hand. “They’re already on their way. The bishop has still given me no specific instructions, but the priests will be here in three days.”

“It really does sound as though the bishop is giving you a free hand in all this,” I said, just managing to meet the intense look on his face. “Clearly he trusts you.”

Evrard, behind me, cleared his throat.

“Let me know if I can help, but I don’t know if I can,” I said to Joachim.

“Of course. Sorry to interrupt you.”

“So the chaplain’s your very good friend?” asked Evrard as I closed the door again. “It sounds as though he’s got plenty of problems of his own, what with bishops and priests and who knows what else. I guess it must be hard out here for you to find someone intelligent and interesting to talk to.”

Although I had more than once thought the same thing, I didn’t like the implications of what he had said and decided not to answer.

“He looks very dour,” Evrard continued. “Somehow it’s hard to imagine wild old Daimbert making friends with a priest!”

He would realize Joachim’s merits when he got to know him better, I reassured myself. “Right now,” I said, “I want to ask you why you made the great horned rabbits.”

II

I had anticipated several reactions, from denial to angry pride. But instead Evrard laughed. “I should have known I couldn’t hide it from you indefinitely,” he said with a broad smile. “When did you figure it out?”

“So you did make the horned rabbits?” I said, wanting to be sure of this point.

“Of course I did. Pretty good, weren’t they?”

“It was something you learned in that class you took with Elerius,” I said casually, not mentioning that it had taken me the better part of a week to work it out. “That class on the old magic. Did all the students make horned rabbits? I don’t like to think of the western kingdoms overrun with those things.”

“No, we all made something different. I thought of the rabbits myself,” he added proudly. “It’s hard magic, too! Elerius had to work with us individually to make sure we got the spells right, and as it is the horns kept falling off mine. So when the duchess said she wanted me to make her magical creatures, I thought of the rabbits at once.”

“Wait,” I said sharply. “The duchess asked you to make them? You mean she’s been chasing them across the kingdom these last few days, but they’re something she wanted specifically?” I knew Diana loved hunting, but making something magical just for the purpose of hunting it seemed excessive, even for her.