The Wood Nymph, the Cranky Saint

somebody made the horned rabbits under your nose, and you got so jealous of your position as Royal Wizard of Yurt that you decided you’d try something of your own, eh?”

Evrard, I noticed, was wandering off in the direction of the old wizard’s cottage with an air of not hearing our conversation.

“At least you made it with plain magic,” continued my predecessor, almost grudgingly. “Nothing demonic about it, which may be why it was a pretty pathetic excuse for a magic creature.”

“No, I didn’t make it,” I said loftily, stopping myself just in time from saying that Evrard had. “I know all about it, of course. But how did you find out?”

The old wizard glanced in Evrard’s direction and snorted. But he didn’t say what he seemed to have guessed. “I found it, of course. When you told me there were magical creatures roaming through the kingdom, and that you didn’t know what to do about them, I figured there ought to be at least one wizard here in Yurt acting responsibly. I spotted the duchess and that giant chasing the horned rabbits-where did she find him, by the way? — so I decided to let them have their fun. I did improve the spells a little, though, to give them more of a challenge.” He gave a malicious chuckle.

“But you brought the man-like creature back here with you,” I said. Could Evrard’s stick-creature have been what threw him out the door?

“What was left of it,” said the old wizard. “It had dropped most of its sticks by the time it got here.”

Then it was not Evrard’s creature inside the house. That meant-

“So you decided to make a few improvements,” I said with a glare to match his own. I pulled my eyebrows down into a frown that I knew would have been more impressive if they had been as shaggy as his. “When I came here today,” I continued sternly, not giving him a chance to deny it, “I had not expected to find a wizard from whom age and isolation had taken his reason. But now I learn you’ve been giving old bones the form of life! You know only renegade wizards try to create life. As Royal Wizard, I demand that you dismantle the thing you’re making!”

The old wizard was, for a few seconds, too taken aback to answer. I had never talked to him like this before-or, for that matter, to any older wizard. Then he bent over sharply, making creaking sounds. For a second I was afraid I had sent him into a fit. But then I realized he was laughing.

“It isn’t funny,” I said, trying to preserve at least some of my dignity.

The old wizard straightened up, wiping spit from his mouth and still chuckling. “You’re certainly amusing, young wizard, trying to act as wise as though you were four times your age and actually knew some magic, and trying to face me down in my own valley.”

“You have to tell me what you’re doing,” I said, refusing to be distracted. “I’m responsible for the over sight of any wizardry practiced in this kingdom. It’s horribly complex magic. I would think a wizard of light and air had better things to do with his time than mutter long spells over dead bones.”

The old wizard had started to turn away. Now he shot me a sharp, sideways glance from under his eyebrows. “And what do you know of complex spells and dead bones?” he asked.

“Look,” I said, speaking to the old wizard directly, mind to mind, which I had never dared do before. I probed for magic, as I had down in the valley by the Holy Grove. And here, as there, were magic forces channeled by a powerful spell. “Don’t deny it now!”

I felt rather than heard reluctant assent. But then the wizard turned his own mind toward me, and I staggered back, my own spell disintegrating.

Anyone else’s mind is always profoundly strange when met directly, even the mind of a friend. The old wizard’s mind revealed both powers beyond what I had expected, as much as I had always respected his abilities, and a strange twist I could not identify but which terrified me.

Back in my own body, I stared at him. What had I felt there? Was it depravity, insanity, or just the strangeness of the old magic? His eyes held mine for five seconds, then he started to laugh again.

I tried to slow my heartbeat with calm breaths. “So you can’t deny it,” I said, speaking aloud. “You still haven’t told me why.”

Before the old wizard could answer, I heard a thin, sharp squeak. It sounded almost inhuman, but as I spun around I realized it was Evrard.

He had opened the green door of the wizard’s house a crack and was staring within. A second squeak was forced from him as he took a backward step, and the door slowly began to swing open.

The old wizard leaped forward with a cry. He threw his body against the door and threw a powerful binding spell around the entire house. The door slammed shut again.

But not before I had had a glimpse of the creature inside. It was a creature out of nightmare. It was six feet tall and had arms and legs, but other than burning eyes it had no face. The eyes stared at me as though in comprehension. This was no botched student project. It looked as though it might once have been human.

Evrard clung to me, his head twisted to stare at the house. His face had gone dead white under the freckles. The old wizard, his dirty beard whipping around him, glared at us with eyes of fire. A whirlwind swirled around him and his whole house.

“Get out,” said the old wizard, his voice magically amplified to carry over the roar of the wind. “Get out if you value your lives.”

Evrard tugged at my shirt in evident agreement.

“But we can’t!” I shouted. “Master, we have to help you!”

“With your weak school spells? Go, and go now!”

I took a step back. The whirlwind seemed to be diminishing in power. The binding spell, I could tell, held firm.

It might have been my terrified imagination, but the old wizard seemed to be growing, as tall as his house, taller, until his head disappeared among the branches of the oak that leaned over the roof. Staring fascinated, I let Evrard pull me slowly away. Whatever might be beyond the door, the wizard clearly had the powers to deal with it.

Evrard turned and bolted, and I was right behind him. Our normally placid mares had retreated back up the valley, tangling their reins until forced to stop.

They rolled their eyes and bared their teeth as we approached. Evrard, who I had not expected to know much about horses, spoke to them softly and reassuringly, giving them confident shoves on their sweating flanks as he freed the reins.

Behind us, the sound of the whirlwind stopped. I looked back to see a bent, white-haired figure, restored to his normal size, calmly open his green door and disappear within.

I hesitated with one foot in the stirrup. “We have to go back and help him.”

“Didn’t you hear him? He doesn’t want our help!” Exasperation mixed with fear in Evrard’s voice. “Don’t try to show off again.”

I had not been showing off, but otherwise he was right. He kicked his horse into a rapid trot. I swung up into the saddle and hurried to catch him. “How did you know how to calm the horses?” I asked. “Is it some new spell?”

“My father ran a livery stable in the City-didn’t you know?”

After we crossed the bridge-no sign of the lady and her unicorn this time-we had to dismount to lead our horses under the low branches beyond. Evrard’s light blue eyes were still nearly round. “What was that in the cottage?”

I shook my head. “You saw it better than I did.” I did not say that to me it looked like a dead human body, resurrected by a renegade wizard who had lost control of his own magic, then given living eyes.

“It looked almost human to me,” said Evrard. “You should have warned me the old wizard knew such powerful magic.”

I doubted I would ever know that much magic, even if I lived as long as the old wizard had. “I’d had no idea anyone could work spells like that without the aid of the supernatural.”

Unexpectedly, Evrard smiled. “After you’d warned me so care fully not to antagonize him, you certainly seemed to be trying to do so yourself!”

I decided I should feel relieved he could still smile after what he had just seen, but my immediate thought was that he was taking all this far too casually. “Evrard, I hope you realize you started this. He only decided to try