Songs of the Dancing Gods

He tried to dampen his emotions as best he could, though, become Joe the Barbarian. There was nothing at all he could do about this now, and, at least, he was no longer ignorant of it. The fairy soul might panic at this news, but Joe would accept it as something to be dealt with later and, for now, something to be used. If wood nymphs saw him as one of their own, then they were potential allies. Not in a fight—wood nymphs were totally passive, as he well knew—but that wasn’t what he needed right now. And this head nymph, while no Einstein, talked smarter than any other one he’d known. Maybe if you lived long enough you had time to learn something. Or, possibly, the clan leaders were always a bit smarter. Although he’d been one of them, he’d, never lived among them, and he was totally ignorant of their ways when they were among one another. No matter now.

“All right—sisters—can you help us with some information?”

The nymph leader shrugged. “Maybe. We don’t go far from our trees, you know.”

“What’s in this neighborhood that we have to worry about? ”

“Nothin” much right ’round here,” she told him. “But there’s hundreds of them walkin’ dead all holed up at the edge of the forest, run by some witches workin’ for the Master of the Dead. We dunno what they’re doin’ here. There’s lotsa firesprites up another coupl’ve miles, but they don’t come near here and they sleep days. ’Round here there’s just the usual snakes ’n’ lizards ’n’ stuff like that.”

“How do you know about the sprites and coven and zombies if you never go far from this spot?” he asked, genuinely curious.

She shrugged. “Oh, we heard it through the great vines.”

He let that one pass. Some things it was better not to know.

“Can you do me a favor, then? As one of you to another? Keep a watch out tonight for anything that might harm us and awaken me if it draws near before sunup?”

“Yeah, sure. But can’t you wake up the young one, there? It’s been a real long time for most of us.”

He stiffened. “That young one’s my son, and he’s still not ready for the likes of you yet.”

That seemed to amaze them. “Your kid,” one breathed, almost in awe. “Ain’t none of us ever had a kid. The only time one of us is born is When one of us dies, and ain’t none of us ever died yet. Wow…”

“Will you do it, then? And keep out of his sight if he wakes up?”

The leader sighed. “Oh, well, what the hell. Sure.”

He bid them a good-night, then realized he was well away from the glade and it was still pitch dark. Something in him didn’t want to admit to them he couldn’t see out here, but what was that they’d said about having fairy sight if he really believed in it?

He let his mind go and stared into the darkness, and he found that it was oddly easy. How many times could he have used this, if only he’d known and believed in its existence? But he’d spent nights when his mind continually refused to admit what they had now told him was true, and now he knew.

The scene came alive. Not with normal sight, but truly alive, magically so. He was seeing not reflected light but the auras of a forest teeming with life. Each tree, each weed, had its own unique pattern. About ten feet from where he stood, two forms blazed brightly.

He walked confidently back and lay down beside them. Now that he knew the truth, it really wasn’t that hard to deal with. If a nymph could walk off in his old barbarian body and become mortal, then he could eventually find a way to fix his own unique problem. In the meantime, use it, and try not to get killed or stabbed through the heart with iron, two things he was earnestly trying to avoid in any case. Don’t fight it, use it.

In the midst of a dank rain forest, naked and undefended against all sorts of things that lurked, he had his best sleep in months.

When Ti awakened it was false dawn. The sun still hadn’t come up, but there was some light from its reflections from over the horizon, and the forbidding scene around them was dimly glowing. It was sufficient to keep from breaking your neck, but it was kind of eerie, with wisps of ground fog about and a deathly silence.

She looked down at Joe. Why hadn’t he awakened her? Irving didn’t look as if he’d been up for hours, so Joe had simply decided to go to sleep. She didn’t like the thought that they’d been undefended, without guards, through that night, but, on the other hand, they seemed to have lucked out. Still, it disturbed her.

I should have had the watch, all night if necessary. It was my duty to do so, and I have failed my master.

She caught herself with the thought and analyzed it. That wasn’t a thought she’d have ever had before. Joe was husband, lover, equal, or just plain Joe, but never her “master.” And yet, somehow, the thought, the attitude it represented, felt right. Intellectually, she still rebelled at the mind-set, but the mindset remained stubbornly there, none the less.

She went off a ways and relieved herself, then checked the horses, who all seemed well rested and even able to have munched on some of the vegetation. Joe’s loincloths were still damp, but they would do. Likewise, the horse blankets and gear were drying out, but would need to get out of here and into full sunlight to get right. In places like this there was always the danger of jungle rot on clothing.

Irving’s leather outfit wasn’t in very good shape as it was, and she decided that it was time he stopped being the tough guy and suffering with it and maybe trying one of his dad’s loincloths for a while. It would be oversized, but she could adjust it to protect his manly modesty.

The food was also not in good shape. She got a knife from Joe’s pack and trimmed off some of the mold that was already creeping in, keeping what was edible, and laying it out on a blanket, but, although she was quite hungry, she ate none of it.

Slaves eat last.

It was something she’d known, of course, but she’d never thought of that with herself as the slave. Defiantly, she reached out and picked up the stump of a carrot, as if to show that she was still in charge of her life, but, somehow, she just couldn’t bite into it.

So it had happened. After slowly building one step at a time over a period of months, she was now so thoroughly defined by the major Rules that all the minor ones just tumbled in at once, filling in the gaps.

She recalled an incident, forgotten until now, when she’d asked one of the maids at the palace if the girl, who was bright and intelligent, resented being a slave. “Oh, no, my lady,” she had responded. “It is much like being a housewife, only you don’t expect your husband to say thank you and, while you owe him your loyalty, you do not owe him fidelity. It all works out. There is nothing dishonorable about being a slave, and it is necessary work. I would certainly rather be living this way, in such a fine place, than as my mother did, living in a small place where meat was a luxury we rarely could afford and her dying of complications in the birth of her fifteenth child at age twenty-eight.”

It was a sobering thought, particularly when thinking of all those women at the town wells and small cafes.

There were other compensations. She would much rather be out in the world and in adventurous circumstances than being cooped up in a satin prison. And Ruddygore had estimated the physical age of her body at possibly fifteen, certainly no older than sixteen, which meant she had lost more than a decade in physical aging. Physically, at least, she was closer in age to Irving than to Joe.

“There is nothing dishonorable about being a slave, and it is necessary work…”

It would be hard, but that was the way she had to think, had to look at it. As she had told Irving, it wasn’t a matter of liking or not liking it, it was a matter of acceptance and adjustment. The only” alternative was to wage futile war against the reality arid dishonor herself by doing it badly as a result.

She went over and quietly nuzzled Joe awake. He came to with a sweet smile, stretched, looked around, and saw at once all the work she’d done. “Impressive.”

“You’re my master now, remember,” she said softly. “It’s part of my job.”

He looked at her strangely for a moment, then smiled. “That’s the biggest turn-on statement I can think of.”

At that moment, Irving stirred, spoiling the mood.

Joe sighed. “Well, it looks like the sun’s coming up and we shouldn’t have much trouble getting out of here