Blue Adept

CHAPTER 2 - Lady

Back at the Blue Demesnes, Stile uninvoked the spells, became visible and full-weight, and turned Neysa out to graze. Then he talked to Hulk and the Lady Blue. “I must meet the Stallion in ritual battle a fortnight hence,” Stile said. “At their Unolympic celebration. This is for honor, and for the use of Neysa this season—yet I know not how I can match him, and am bound to suffer humiliation,”

“Which is what he wants,” Hulk said wisely. “Not thy blood, but thy pride. He wants to take a thing of value from the Blue Adept, in public, not by theft or by technicality but by right.”

The Lady’s blue eyes flashed. In this frame, it was literal: a momentary glare of light came from them. She was no Adept, but she did have some magic of her own. Stile remained new enough to Phaze to be intrigued by such little effects. “No creature humiliates the Blue Adept!” she cried.

“I am not really he, as the Stallion knows,” Stile re-minded her unnecessarily.

“Thou hast the image and the power and the office,” she said firmly. “It is not thy fault that thou’rt not truly he. For the sake of the Demesnes, thou canst not let the unicorn prevail in this manner.”

The preservation of the Blue Demesnes was of course what this was all about, to her mind. Stile was merely the figurehead. “I am open to suggestions,” he said mildly. “I would ask the Oracle how I might prevail, had I not ex-pended my question in the course of achieving my present status.”

“The Oracle,” Hull; said. “It answers one question for any person?”

“Only one,” Stile agreed.

“Then I could ask it!”

“Thou shouldst not waste thine only question on a concern not thine,” Stile said. “Ask instead about thine own future here in Phaze. There may be an ideal situation awaiting thee, if thou dost but inquire as to its where-abouts.”

“Nay, I want to do it,” Hulk insisted. “Neysa is my friend too, and it was thou who showed me how to cross the curtain into this marvelous and not-to-be-believed world. The least I can do is help thee in this matter.” “Let him go,” the Lady murmured.

Stile spread his hands. “If thou truly dost feel this way, go with my blessing. Hulk. I shall be in thy debt. I will arrange for thee a magic conveyance—“

“Nay, I can walk.”

“Not that far, and return in time to be of much help. I need to know how to prepare as soon as possible. If I must master a special skill—“

“Okay,” Hulk agreed. “But I’m not good at riding unicorns.”

The Lady smiled, and there seemed to be a momentary glow in the room. “Only two I know of have ever ridden a unicorn, except at the unicorn’s behest: my lord Stile and I. The Adept will summon for thee a traveling carpet—“

“Oh, no! Not one of those flying things! I’d be constantly afraid its magic would poop out right over a chasm or near a nest of dragons. I’m not the lightest of creatures, thou knowest. Can’t we find a motorcycle or something?”

“A motorcycle?” the Lady asked blankly.

“A device of the other frame,” Stile explained. “A kind of traveling wheel, rather like a low-flying carpet. It is an idea. Science is inoperative here, yet I might fashion a magic wagon.”

They went about it, and in the end Hulk had his motorcycle: two wooden wheels, a steering stick, a seat, a windshield. No motor, no fuel, no controls, for it was motivated by magic. Hulk had only to give it key verbal commands and steer it. Both men were clinically interested in the construction, determining how far magic would go, and where the line between functional magic and nonfunctional science was drawn.

Hulk boarded the magic machine and rode away in a silent cloud of dust. A flock of grouse took off, startled by the apparition. “I just hope he follows the map and doesn’t drive into a chasm or meet a monster,” Stile said. “He might hurt the monster.”

“Nay, Hulk is kind to creatures,” the Lady said, overlooking the humor. “He is a gentle man, under all that muscle. A clever and honorable man.”

“True. That is one reason I brought him here.”

The Lady rose and turned about, her blue gown flinging out sedately. Every motion she made was elegant!

“Now we are alone, I would talk to thee. Adept.”

Stile tried to still his suddenly racing pulse. She could not mean she had had a change of heart about him; he remained an imposter in her eyes. Her loyalty to her true love was a thing he envied and longed for. Should such loyalty ever be oriented on him ...

“Any time,” he agreed. They went to her apartment, where she bade him be seated in a comfortable blue chair. She maintained the blue insignia of these Demesnes with loving determination. It was a wonder, he thought with fond irritation, that she did not dye her fair hair blue.

“Thy friend Hulk told me of thy life in Proton-frame,” she said. “I bade him do it during thine absence, as it behooves me to know of thee.” Pumping Hulk for information: a natural pastime.

“I would have told thee, hadst thou asked.” But of course she had wanted to obtain a reasonably objective view. What was she leading up to?

“Now I know, from that third party, that thou art much the way my husband was. A man of great honor and skill, yet one who has suffered abuse because of size. Neysa, too, has told me of thy qualities.”

“Neysa talks too much,” Stile muttered. It was a joke; the unicorn was a marvel of brevity.

“Thou art a good man, and I wrong thee by mine aloofness. Yet must I am the way I am. I feel it only fair to acquaint thee with the way I was.”

“I do not seek to force information from thee. Lady,” Stile said quickly. But he really wanted to hear anything she wanted to tell him.

“Then it comes to thee unforced,” she said, with a fleeting smile that melted his heart. Could she, could she really be starting to soften toward him? No, she was not; she was merely doing what she felt was right, giving him necessary background.

Stile listened to her narration, closing his eyes, absorbing her dulcet tones, picturing her story in full living color and feeling as it unfolded.

Long and long has our realm of Phaze endured apart from other worlds, from that time when first it separated from the science frame of mythology. Three hundred years, while our kind slowly spread across the continent and discovered the powers that existed. The animal kingdoms too expanded and warred with each other and found their niches, the dragons to the south, the snow demons to the north, the giants to the far west and so on.

Soon the most talented among the Human Folk became adept at magic, restricting others from its practice except in specialized ways, so that no more than ten full magicians existed at any one time. Only talent distinguished them, not honor or personal merit, and any who aspired to Adept status but was less apt at sorcery than the masters were destroyed by the established magicians.

Today the common folk eschew all save elementary enchantments, and associate not with Adepts; likewise the animals keep largely to themselves. I grew up in a village of fifteen families to the east, near the coast, far removed from strong magic except the natural spells of the deepwoods. I thought I might marry a local boy, but my folks wanted me to wait, to meet a wider range before deciding. I realized not their reason, then; they knew me to be fair, and thought I might waste myself on some farmer’s boy or fisherman if I chose quickly. Had they known whom I was destined to marry, they would have thrown me at the nearest pigherder! But they knew not that an Adept sought me, and we were well off, with good fields and animals, so that there seemed no need to go early into matrimony. My father is something of a healer, whether by nature or effort I know not, and I am too. We helped the ill or injured animals of the village, never making show of our talent, and never did the dire attention of a hostile Adept focus on us for that.

When I was nineteen the lads and lasses of mine age had already mostly been taken. But I loved the animals, and felt no loss. It has been said that the women most attractive to men are the ones who need them least, and so it seemed to be in my case. Then my horse’s foal wandered too far afield, returning not to our stable. I called her Snowflake, for her color was white as snow though her spirit was hot as peppercorn. Ever was she wont to take that extra step, and this time she was lost. I rode out on my good mare Starshine, Snowflake’s dam, searching, searching, but the prints we followed led into the deepwoods. Then I knew in my heart that Snowflake was truly in trouble, but I was nineteen and I loved that foal, and I went into that jungle though I knew it was folly. And in that wood I came upon moss that shrouded whole trees and reached out for me, all green and hissing, and sand that sucked at my horse’s feet, and there were shapes and shadows looming ever-near and nearer, and I was afraid.

Then did I know I must turn back, that Snowflake was doomed, and I would be in dire strait too an I not give over this hopeless task presently. But still I adored my foal, as I adore all horses, and the thought of Snowflake alone and in straits in that wilderness tormented me, and I made pretexts one after another to quest beyond yet another tree or yet another looming rock. I thought I heard a tremulous neigh; gladly I dismounted and ran, but there was nothing, only a branch creaking in the rising wind.

A storm was coming, and that meant mischief, for in our region the trolls come out in foul weather, yet I dallied foolishly afoot. This time I was sure I heard a plaintive neigh. I pursued it, but again found naught; it was a will-o’-the-wisp.

Then the brooding sky let down and in a moment I was drenched with the chill spillage of the heavens. A crack of thunder spooked Starshine, and she bolted for home, for-getting me, nor could I blame her. I fled for home myself, shivering with more than cold, but the reaching brambles tore at my skirts and the gusts buffeted me so harshly I could not see. I cried out, hoping to be heard at home, but this was futile in the fury of this storm. It was the trolls who barkened, and when I saw the grim apparitions I screamed with much-heightened force. But the gross monsters caught hold of me, all gape and callus, and I knew I was done for. I had not saved the life of my pet; I had sacrificed mine own.

A troll clutched me by the hair, dangling me above the ground. I was now too terrified to scream. I feared for death, assuredly; more I feared for that which would surely precede it, for the troll folk ever lust after human folk. Then came the beat of hooves, approaching. Now did I manage to cry out again, faintly, hoping Starshine was returning, perhaps ridden by my father. And the beat came nigh, and it was no horse I knew, but a great blue stallion with mane of purple and hooves like blue steel, and on it a manchild in blue—

(“The Blue Adept!” Stile exclaimed, interrupting her.

The Lady nodded soberly, and resumed her narrative.) I knew not who he was, then. I thought him a lad, or perhaps one of the Little Folk. I cried out to him, and he brandished a blue sword, and the trolls gibbered back into the shadows. The small youth came for me, and when the trolls saw what he sought, they let me go. I dropped to the ground, unhurt in body, and scrambled toward him. The lad put down a hand to help me mount behind him, and I did, and then the blue stallion leapt with such power the trolls scattered in fear and I near slid off his rear, but that I clung desperately to my rescuer. It seemed but a moment we were out of the wood, pounding toward our village homestead. The rain still fell;

I shivered with chill and my dress clung chafingly to me, but the boy seemed not affected. He brought me to mine own yard and halted the stallion without ever inquiring the way. I slid down, all wet and relieved and girlishly grateful. “Young man,” I addressed him, in my generosity granting him the benefit of a greater age than I perceived in him. “Thou’rt soaked. Pray come in to our warm hearth—“ But he shook his head politely in negation, speaking no word. He raised a little hand in parting, and suddenly was off into the storm. He had saved my honor and my life, yet dallied not for thanks.

I told my family of mine experience as I dried and warmed within our home before the merry fire. Of my foolish venture into the wood, the storm, the trolls, and of the boy on the great blue stallion who rescued me. I thought they would be pleased that I had been thus spared the consequence of my folly, but they were horrified.

“That is a creature of magic!” my father cried, turning pale.

“Nay, he is but a boy, inches shorter than I,” I protested. “Riding his father’s charger, hearing my cry—“

“Did he speak thus?”

I admitted reluctantly that the blue lad had spoken naught, and that was no good sign. Yet in no way had the stranger hurt me or even threatened me; he had rescued me from certain horror. My parents quelled their doubts, glad now to have me safe.

But the foal was still missing. Next day I went out again to search—but this time my father went with me, carrying a stout cudgel. I called for Snowflake, but found her not. It was instead the blue lad who answered, riding across the field. I saw by sunlight that the horse was not truly blue; it was his harness that had provided the cast. Except perhaps for the mane, that shone iridescently.

“What spook of evening goes abroad in the bright day?” I murmured gladly, teasing my father, for apparitions fear the sunlight. My father hailed the youth. “Art thou the lad who rescued my daughter yesterday?”

“I am,” the lad replied. And thereby dispelled another doubt, for few monsters are able to converse in the tongues of man.

“For that my deepest thanks,” my father quoth, relieved.

“Who art thou, and where is thy residence, that thou comest so conveniently at our need?”

“I was of the village of Bront, beyond the low midvalley hills,” the lad replied.

“That village was overrun by trolls a decade past!” my father cried.

“Aye. I alone escaped, for that the monsters overlooked me when they ravaged. Now I ride alone, my good horse my home.”

“But thou must have been but a baby then!” my father protested. ‘Trolls eat babies first—“

“I hid,” the lad said, frowning. “I saw my family eaten, yet I lacked the courage to go out from my hiding place and battle the trolls. I was a coward. The memory is harsh, and best forgotten.”

“Of course,” my father said, embarrassed. “Yet no one would term it cowardice for a child to hide from ravaging trolls! Good it is to remember that nature herself had vengeance on that particular band of trolls, for that lightning struck the village and destroyed them all in fire.”

“Aye,” the lad murmured, his small face grim. “All save one troll cub.” At that my father looked startled, but the lad continued: “Thou searches for the lost foal? May I assist?”

My father thought to demur, but knew it would draw blame upon himself if he declined any available help, even in a hopeless quest. “If thou hast a notion. We know not where to begin.”

“I am on tolerable terms with the wild equines,” the lad said. “If the Lady were to ride with me to the herds and question those who may know ...”

I was startled to hear myself defined as “Lady,” for I was but a grown girl, and I saw my father was similarly surprised. But we realized that to a lad as small as this I might indeed seem mature.

“This is a kind offer,” my father said dubiously. “Yet I would not send two young people on such a quest alone, and I lack the time myself—“

“Oh, please!” I pleaded, wheedling. “How could harm come on horseback?” I did not find it expedient to remind my father that I had gotten into trouble on horseback very recently, when I dismounted in the wood near the trolls. “We could range carefully—“ Also, I wanted very much to see the wild horse herds, a thing seldom privileged to villagers.

“Thy mare is in mourning for her foal,” my father said, finding another convenient objection. “Starshine is in no condition for such far riding. She knows not thy mission.” I clouded up in my most appealing manner. But before I spoke, the lad did.

“I know the steed for her, sir. It is the Hinny. The mare of lightest foot and keenest perception in the wilds. She could sniff out the foal, if any could.” I clapped my hands in that girlish way I had.

“Oh, yes!” I knew nothing about that horse except that a hinny was the sterile issue of stallion and jenny, most like a mule but prettier, yet already I was eager to ride her. My father, more sensible than I, brooded. “A hinny, and wild. I trust this not. Such crossbreeds bear little good will to men.”

“True,” the blue lad said. He never contradicted my father directly. “But this is not any hinny. She is the Hinny. She can be bred, but only by my blue stallion. For that price she will be the best mount anyone could ask. She is fit and wise in the ways of the wilderness; no creature durst cross her, not even a troll or dragon. Like unto a unicorn she is, almost.”

My father wavered, for he had a deep respect for good horses. To encourage his acquiescence, I threatened to cloud again. I had a certain talent at that, and my father had a certain weakness for it; oft had we played this little game.

“Canst thou summon this hinny here?” he inquired, temporizing. “I would examine this animal.” The lad put fingers to his mouth and whistled piercingly. Immediately, it seemed, there was the sound of galloping, and an animal came. What a creature it was! She was shades of gray, lighter on the flanks and withers, darker at the extremities with a mane of both shades a good yard long that rippled languorously in the breeze. Her tail, too, was variegated gray, like carven onyx, and flowed like the waves of an ocean.

My father, prepared to be skeptical, gaped. “The speed of that horse!” he breathed. “The lines of her!”

“Thy daughter will be safe on her,” the blue lad assured him. “What the Hinny cannot defeat she can outrun, except for the unicorns, who leave her alone. Once she accepts the commission, she will guard her rider with her life.”

But my father was already lost. He stared at the Hinny, the most beautifully structured mare ever to be seen in our village. I knew he would have given his left hand to own such a mount. “And she hearkens to thy summons,” he said, awed.

“Nay,” the lad demurred quickly. “Only to my stallion.” Then he approached the Hinny and extended his hand, slowly, as one must do for a strange horse, allowing her to sniff it. Her ears were angled halfway back, silken gray. When they tilted forward, reassured, he addressed her directly. “Hinny, I require a service of thee, for the price thou knowest.”

The mare switched her nacreous tail and lifted her head. She was by no means large, standing about fifteen hands tall, but she had a slender elegance that made her classic. She glanced sidelong at the blue stallion, and it was as if magic electricity lifted her mane. She was interested. “A service for a service,” my father murmured, intrigued. He contemplated the lines of the blue stallion, recognizing in this creature the very finest of the breed. The foal of such a union would be special.

“Thou must bear this Lady,” the blue lad said, indicating me. “Thou must carry her on her search for her lost foal, and bring her back safely to her father. I will travel with thee, assisting. An we find the foal not, but the Lady is safe, payment will be honored. Agreed?”

“How can a horse comprehend all that?” my father muttered skeptically. But the Hinny surveyed him with such uncanny certainty that he could not protest further. The Hinny now oriented on me. I held out my hand and she smelled it, then sniffed along the length of my arm, across my shoulder and up to my face. Her muzzle was gray velvet, her breath warm mist with the sweetness of cured hay. I loved her that moment.

The Hinny turned back to the blue lad, one ear moving forward with agreement. My father found himself unable to protest; he too was enthralled by the mare. And it seemed but a moment until arrangements were complete and we were riding out, the Hinny’s canter so gentle I could close my eyes and hardly know we were moving, yet so swift that the wind was like that of a storm. I had never before ridden a steed like her! It seemed but another moment, but when I opened mine eyes we were miles from my village, proceeding west toward the interior of the continent where the greatest magic lay. The groves and dales were passing like the wind. No horse could maintain such a pace, so smoothly—yet the Hinny ranged beside the blue stallion, now and then covertly turning a sleek ear on him; she desired the service only he could serve. I wondered fleetingly whether it could be like that for me as well, with only one man destined to be my husband. Little did I know how close to the truth that was, and that he was as close to me then as the stallion to the Hinny.

“Whither do we go?” I asked the lad.

“The wild horses should know where thy foal has strayed,” he replied. “They range widely, but my steed is searching them out.”

“Aye,” I said. “But will they not flee at the approach of our kind?”

He only smiled. Soon we spied a herd, and its stallion lifted his head toward us, and stomped the ground in warning. But the blue lad put his two hands to his mouth, forming a conch, and blew a whistle-note, and at that signal all the horses relaxed, and remained for our approach.

“They respond to thy whistle?” I asked, perplexed.

“They know my stallion,” he said easily. So it seemed. The wild stallion was a great buckskin with dark legs, not as large as the blue stallion. The two sniffed noses and thereafter politely ignored each other. The Hinny was ignored from the start; she was not quite their kind, being half-breed.

The lad dismounted, and I followed. It had been a long, fast ride, but both of us were excellent riders, and both our steeds were easy to use. They grazed, for horses are ever hungry. We passed among the small herd—and strange it was to be around these wild horses, who never ordinarily tolerated the nearness of man. I was in young delight. They were mostly fine, healthy mares, with a few foals, but one among them ailed. The blue lad went to this one, a spindly colt, and ran his hands over the animal’s body, and the dam watched without interference while I stood amazed.

“What’s wrong with him?” I asked, for I could not determine the malady. I, who thought I knew horses.

“Spirit worms,” the lad responded absently. “A magical infestation, common in this region.” Then he said to the colt in a singsong lilt: “Comest thou to me, the worms will flee.” It was nonsense verse, a joke—yet suddenly the colt perked up, took a step toward the lad, and there was a ripple in the air as invisible yet ugly somethings wriggled away. Instantly the colt seemed healthier, and his dam nickered gratefully. I realized that a little encouragement was all the colt had needed; he was not really sick, merely undernourished.

The blue lad approached the herd stallion and said: “We search for a lost foal, that went astray yesterday. Hast thou seen it, or dost thou know aught of it?” The stallion glanced at me as though requiring news from me, and I said: “It is a filly, only a month old, pure white and lovely and helpless. I call her Snowflake.” The stallion snorted.

“He says he has not seen the foal,” the blue lad said. “But he knows of one who collects white foals, and found one in this area, and that is the Snow Horse.”

“Where is this Snow Horse?” I asked.

“He knows not, for the Snow Horse ranges far and associates not with ordinary equines. Only Peg can tell where he might be now.”

“Peg?” I asked, perplexed.

“I will take thee to her.”

We remounted our steeds and were off again like the wind. We ranged south across plains and woods, fording streams and surmounting hills as if they were nothing. We passed a young unicorn stallion grazing; he had pretty green and orange stripes, and his hooves were ebony, and his horn spiraled pearl. He started up, approaching us, and I grew nervous, for that the unicorn is to the horse as the tiger is to the housecat. But he merely ran beside us, and then drew ahead, racing us. He wanted to play. The blue lad smiled, and leaned forward, and the blue stallion leaped ahead as though he had been merely idling before, and the Hinny set back her ears and launched herself after him. Oh, these fine animals loved a race! Now the ground shot behind in a green blur, and trees passed like arrows, and I clung to the Hinny’s quicksilver mane for fear I would fall, though her gait remained wonderfully smooth. We passed the unicorn.

Now the unicorn lengthened his stride and made great leaps, passing right over bushes and rocks while we had to go around them. He recovered the lead, flinging his tail up in a mirthful salute. But again the blue stallion bore down, and the Hinny’s body became like a hawk flying through a gale, and we pounded out a pace that passed the homed stallion again. Never had I traveled at such velocity! A third time the unicorn accelerated, and now his body was shimmering with heat, and fire blasted from his nostrils, and sparks cast up from his hooves, and slowly he moved ahead of us once more. This time we could not match him, for that our steeds carried burdens and were merely physical equines, not magical. Yet had we given that unicorn a good race, and made him heat before he bested us. Very few natural horses could do that. We eased off, cooling, and I patted the Hinny’s shoulder. “Thou’rt the finest mare I ever met,” I murmured. “I could ride with thee forever and never be bored.” And so I believed.

Then we came to the purple slope of the great southern range of mountains, ascending until the air was rare and the growing things were stunted. There on a crag was a huge nest, and in it lay what at first I took to be a monstrous bird, for that I saw the feathers on it. Then the creature stood, perceiving our approach, and spread its wings—and lo, it was a horse!

“Peg,” the blue lad called. “We crave the favor of information. Wilst thou trade for it?”

Peg launched into the air, circled briefly, spiraled to the ground and folded her pinions. The white feathers covered her whole body so that only her legs and tail and head projected, and the tail also had feathers that could spread for aid in navigation in air. I had not before imagined how large such wings would be! She neighed, her nose flicking toward the nest.

“Mayst thou have what’s best for thy new nest,” the lad said appreciatively, again in that lilt. Then I noticed what I had not seen before: a pile of vines, perchance the refuse of some farmer’s harvest, too long and tough to be ground for fodder. Peg went to them as though she too had only now become aware, tugging one out with her teeth, delighted. This was ideal fiber for her nest. She neighed again.

“She says the Snow Horse is moving toward its fastness in the White Mountains, and will be there by dawn tomorrow,” the lad said. “For us it will be a ride of more than a day; we shall have to camp the night.”

‘Thou dost understand the language of horses?” I asked, remembering how he had seemingly conversed with the stallion of the herd, too. There was so much I knew not, then!

He nodded. “How could I love them as I do, and not converse with them? Who is better company than a horse?” And of course I could not gainsay that. We mounted and rode north. It was noon, and we had far to go; we slanted north and west, wending toward the white range. We halted for an hour when we came across a grove of apple trees; we fed ourselves and our steeds on delicious apples. The Hinny ate from my hand, and how I wished she could be mine for life, but I knew she was only on loan. I was not sorry this quest was stretching out; I wanted to save Snowflake, but I wanted also to be a little longer with the Hinny, and to experience more of the magic of the interior wilds of Phaze.

In the early afternoon we halted again, for our steeds had to graze and rest. The blue lad found raspberries growing on a slope, and a streamlet with freshest water, and some ripe grain. He gathered dry wood and made a small fire; from his saddlebag he brought a pot. We boiled the grain until it was tender. I did not realize then that he had used magic to facilitate things; the farthest thing from my mind was that he could be Adept. He was only, after all, a boy!

He brought next from his saddlebag—he had a bag without a saddle, oddly—some material that he formed into a canopy for me beside the fire. I lay down to sleep feeling quite safe, for few wild creatures brave the fire, and the two horses were grazing near.

But at dusk, as I was nodding off, glare-eyed little monsters erupted from a trapdoor in the ground and swarmed toward me. They were goblins, huge of head and foot, vicious, out for human flesh. They feared not the fire, for they used it in their subterranean demesnes. I screamed. The Hinny was nearest me, for I had been placed in her care. Now I discovered what that meant. She squealed and charged, her hooves striking like dubs, each strike crushing a goblin’s head, while I huddled beside the fire in tenor.

The goblins fought her, for they liked equine flesh almost as well as human; they scrambled up her tail, clung to her mane, and tried to grab at her feet. There were so many! I saw one get on her head, and open its big frog mouth to clamp its sharp alligator teeth on her sweet soft gray ear—and suddenly I was on my feet and there, my hands on its grotesque rat body, hurling it off her and away.

Then the blue stallion arrived, his hooves making the very ground shudder, and he bellowed a battle-challenge that nearly blasted the hair from my head and I cowered in terror though I knew it was not me he fought. The goblins panicked and fled, the stallion pursuing; where his foot struck, the broken body of a goblin flew twenty feet across the flickering night and dropped like a clod of dirt. The stallion’s eyes flashed like blue fire and the snort from his flaring nostrils was like tempest-wind and the sheen of his great muscles danced about his body as he plunged and reared and kicked. In a moment the last living goblin had vanished down the hole, and the trapdoor clanged shut. The stallion stomped it again and again until naught save rubble remained. It would be long before the goblins used that exit again!

I collapsed in reaction. Never in my life had I been so horrified, except perhaps during the episode of the trolls, for goblins come not into the villages of the man-folk. The Hinny came and nuzzled me, and I was ashamed for that I had let her 5ght while I did naught. But the blue lad told me: “She thanks thee for casting the goblin from off her ear; she knows what courage it required of thee for that goblins terrify young ladies.” Then I felt better, though by no means proud, and resolved to be less squeamish in future. I stroked my hands over the bruises and scratches and bites on the Hinny’s body, helping to heal them and abate the discomfort, and she nudged me with that so-soft nose and everything was nice.

The goblins came not again—and who would have, after tasting the wrath of the blue stallion? I slept safely until dawn. The blue lad was up before me, and had found ripe pears from whence I knew not, and we ate and mounted and were off again. I thought I might be sore from the prior day’s riding, but the Hinny’s gait was so gentle I suffered not at all. I wondered what the winged horse’s gait was like; what was the cadence of footfalls in air?

In due course we came to the White Mountains that bound our land ill the north, and ascended their foothills. The way grew steep, and there was hardly any easing as we crested ridges and drove on up. For the first time the Hinny’s gait became rough, as she labored to carry me on swiftly, and even the blue stallion was sweating, his nostrils flaring and pulsing with the effort. We climbed slopes I would not have cared to navigate on foot, rising into the mountain range proper. The air grew chill, and wind came up, and I gathered my cape about me, shivering. The blue lad glanced at me. “May I speak bold?” he inquired melodiously. “Thou art not cold.”

“Not cold,” I agreed bravely, for I knew that if we desisted this quest now, never would I find Snowflake, and evermore would I curse myself for my neglect. And, strangely, I no longer felt the chill; it was as if my clothing had become doubly insulative. It was of course his magic, that I did not recognize. I was so young then, and so innocent! We climbed on into the snows, and there in a cave half-hid in the white we found the lair of the Snow Horse. He stood there awaiting us expectantly, a fine albino stallion whose mane and tail resembled glistening icicles and whose hooves were so pure white I could hardly tell where they left off and the packed snow beneath them began.

The lad dismounted and walked to the Snow Horse. I made to dismount too, but the Hinny swung back her head, warning me “no” with a backward glance, so I obeyed her and stayed put. I was learning already that here in the wilderness the final word was not mine. In a moment the lad returned. “The Snow Horse did lure thy foal,” he said to me. “He thought her of his kind, for her color, but when they reached the snow she was cold, and he knew she was no snow filly and he let her go, never intending harm to her. But the snow demons came and took her ere she could return to thee.”

“The snow demons!” I exclaimed, appalled. Never had I heard good tidings of that ilk.

“Pray we are in time,” he said.

“In time?” I asked blankly. “Snowflake is lost forever! We can not brace snow demons, even if they have not yet eaten her.” I felt the hot tears burning mine eyes. “Yet if there is a chance—“

“A white foal they will save—for a while.” He mounted and led the way along the slope.

We made our way deeper into the snowy region, and the breath plumed out from the nostrils of our steeds, but still I was not cold. Then the blue stallion halted, sniffing the snow, and pawed the slope. I knew we were near the lair of the demons, and I shivered with fear, not with cold. Al-most, I preferred to let the foal go—but then I thought of the demons devouring her shivering flesh, and horror restored my faint courage.

A snow demon appeared on a ledge above us. “Whooo?” it demanded, with sound like winter cutting past a frozen crag.

The blue lad did not answer in speech. He stood upon the back of his stallion and spread his arms, as if to say “Here am I!” I was both impressed and concerned. It was clever of him to keep his balance like that, but he could so readily fall and hurt himself. Though he acted as if the demon should recognize him and be awed, in fact it was a foolish posturing. An ogre or a giant might awe a demon; the lad was pitiful in his insignificance.

To my astonishment, the demon drew back as if confronted by a giant. “Whiiiy?” it demanded. The lad pointed to the Hinny, then moved his hands together to indicate small size. He had come for the foal. The demon scratched its icicle-haired head in seeming confusion: no foal here! The blue lad then did something strange indeed. He brought out a large harmonica—I had not known he carried such an instrument—and brought it to his mouth. He played one note—and the demon reacted as if struck. Sleet fell from it like droplets of perspiration, and it pointed down the slope. I looked—and there, in a patch of green in a narrow valley, stood my beloved Snow-flake. The poor little filly was huddled and shivering, for nowhere in the White Mountains is it warm. The demon faded back into its crevice, and we made our way down the steep slope to the valley.

The way was tortuous, but the blue stallion picked out footholds where I thought none existed, and slowly we descended. It was like being lowered into a tremendous bowl, whose sides were so steep our every motion threatened to start a snowslide that could bury the foal. Oh, yes, we moved cautiously!

At last we reached the patch of green. I dismounted and ran to Snowflake, and she recognized me with a whinny. The warmth that encompassed me seemed to enclose her too, and she became stronger. “Oh,” I cried, hugging her. “I’m so glad thou art safel I feared—“ But my prior worries were of no account now. The blue lad had enabled me to rescue Snowflake, even as he had promised. Then I heard a rumble. Alarmed, I looked up—and saw the snow demons on high, pushing great balls of snow off ledges. They were starting an avalanche—and we were at the base of it! It was a trap, and no way could we escape.

For the first time I saw the blue lad angry. Yet he neither swore nor cowered. Instead he brought out his harmonica again and played a few bars of music. It was a rough, aggressive melody—but what good it could do in the face of the onrushing doom I knew not. Soon the sound was drowned out by the converging avalanche. The snows came down on us like the lashing of a waterfall. I screamed and hugged Snowflake, knowing our end had come. But as I braced myself for the inevitable, something strange happened.

There was a blinding flash of light and wash of heat, like as an explosion. Then warm water swirled around my feet. Warm water? I forced open mine eyes and looked, unbelieving. The snows had vanished. All the valley, high to the tallest surrounding peaks, was bare of snow, with only water coursing down, and steam rising in places. We had been saved by some massive invasion of spring thaw.

“It must be magic!” I cried, bewildered. “Unless this is a volcanic region. But what a coincidence!” The lad only nodded. Still I recognized not his power! We walked up the slope, escaping the valley and the deepening lake that was forming at its nadir. I rode the Hinny, and Snowflake walked beside. It was a long climb, but a happy one.

At the high pass leading to the outside the cold intensified. From out of a crevice a snow demon came. “Yyoooo!” it cried windily, and with a violent gesture hurled a spell like a jag of ice at the blue lad.

But the Hinny leaped forward, intercepting that scintillating bolt with her own body. It coalesced about her front legs, and ice formed on her knees, and she stumbled, wheezing in pain. I leaped off, alarmed. The blue lad cried out in a singsong voice, and the foul demon puffed into vapor and floated away. Then the boy came to minister to the Hinny, who was on the ground, her knees frozen.

“That bolt was meant for me,” he said. “Hinny, I can cure thee not completely, for knees are the most difficult joints to touch and thou canst not rest them now, but I will do what I can.” And he played his harmonica again, a few bold bars, then sang: “Hinny’s knees—now unfreeze.” The ice vanished from her legs. The Hinny hauled herself to her feet. She tested her knees, and they were sturdy. But I could see some discoloration, and knew they had been weakened somewhat. It seemed she could walk or run on them, but special maneuvers might now be beyond her. Then I realized what I should have known before. I turned to the lad. “Thou didst that!” I accused him. “Thou canst do magic!”

He nodded soberly. “I concealed it not from thee,” he said, like as a child caught with hand in cookie-jar. He was so shamefaced and penitent I had to laugh. I put mine arm about his small shoulders and squeezed him as a big sister might. “I forgive thee,” I said. “But do not play with magic unduly, lest thou dost attract the notice of an Adept.”

He made no comment. Shamed am I to recall now the way I patronized him then, in mine ignorance! We re-mounted and went on out of the mountains, slowly, in deference to the Hinny’s almost-restored knees and the weakness of the foal. At last we reached the warmth of the lowlands, and there we camped for the night. Snowflake grazed beside the Hinny, who watched out for her in the manner of a dam, and I knew the foal would not come to harm. We foraged for berries and nuts, which fortunately were plentiful and delicious. Such fortune was ever in the presence of the blue lad, for he preferred to use his magic subtly.

At dusk the sunset spread its splendor across the western sky, and in the east a blue moon rose. The lad brought out his harmonica again, faced the moon, and played. Before, he had produced only single notes and brief strident passages. This time he started gentle, as it were tuning his instrument, warming it in his hands, playing a scale. His little hands were hardly large enough to enfold it properly, yet they were marvelously dextrous. Then, as the moon waxed and the sun waned, he essayed a melody. I was tired, not paying real attention, so was caught by surprise. From that instrument emerged music of such beauty, such rare rapture as I had never imagined. The tune surrounded me, encompassed me, drew me into itself and transported my spirit up, high, into the ambience of the blue moon. I sailed up, as it were, into the lovely blue-tinged clouds, riding on a steed made of music, wafting through blue billows toward the magic land that was the face of the moon. Larger it grew, and clearer, its landscape ever-better denned.

As I came near it I saw the little blue men on its surface, blacksmiths hammering out blue steel. Bluesmiths, I suppose. Then I saw a lady in blue, and her hair was fair like mine, and she wore a lovely blue gown and blue slippers set with blue gems for buttons, and on her head a blue tiara, and she was regal and beautiful beyond belief. She turned and fixed her gaze on me, and her eyes were blue like mine—and she was me. Amazed, flattered and alarmed, I retreated. I flew back past the blue mists like a feather-shafted arrow, and suddenly I was on the ground again. The boy stopped playing, and the melody faded hauntingly.

I realized it not then, but he had shown me the first of the three foundations of my later love for him: his music. Never in all Phaze was there a man who could make such—

(The Lady Blue paused, resting her head against her hand, suffering. Stile started to speak, but she cut him off savagely. “And thou, thou image, thou false likeness! Thou comest to these Demesnes bearing his harmonica, using it—“ (“His?” Stile asked, astonished.

(“Has it not the word ‘Blue’ etched upon it?” she demanded. “He had it imported from the other frame, to his order.”

(Stile brought out the harmonica, turning it over. There, in small neat letters, was the word. “I conjured his instrument,” he murmured, awed and chagrined. “I must return it to his widow.”

(She softened instantly. “Nay, it is thine. Thou art the Blue Adept, now. Use it well, as he did.” Then she re-turned to her narrative.)

I shook my head. “Never have I heard the like, thou darling child!” I said. “How could a lad thine age master music so well?”

He thought a moment, pensive in his concentration, as though pondering some weighty ethical matter. Then he replied: “May I show thee my village on the morrow? It is not far out of our way.”

“Was not that village destroyed?” I asked thoughtlessly.

“Aye, it was.”

I was sorry for my question. “Of course we can go there, if it please thee. Unless the trolls remain—“ “No trolls remain,” he assured me gravely, and I remembered that lightning had destroyed the trolls. Next day we came to the site. It was nothing, only a glade of greenest grass and a few mounds. All had been destroyed and overgrown. I was vaguely disappointed, having anticipated something more dramatic—yet what is dramatic about long-past death?

“May I show thee how it was?” he inquired, his small face serious.

“Of course,” I said graciously, not understanding what he meant.

“Go and graze;” he said to our steeds. They moved out gladly, and little Snowflake with them. Then the blue lad played his harmonica again. Once more the absolutely lovely music leaped out, encompassing us, and some intangible presence formed. I saw a cloud about the glade, and then it thinned to reveal a village, with people going about their business, washing clothing, eating, hammering horseshoes, playing. I realized that this was a vision of his home as it had been, years ago, before the disaster. A village very like mine own. The village was perhaps a little better organized than mine, however, more compact, with the houses in a ring and a central court for socializing and supervision of the children. Mine was a sea-village, mainly, open to the water; this was an inland establishment, closed against the threats of the land. The sun was shining brightly—but then the shadows moved visibly, and I knew this was to show time passing. Night fell, and the village closed down. Then in the stillness of dark the trolls came, huge, gaunt and awful. Somehow they had broken through the enchantment that protected the village, and they descended on it in a ravening horde. Faintly I heard the screams as the monsters pounced upon sleeping villagers. Men woke fighting, but each troll was large and strong, and there were many of them. I saw a woman torn apart by two trolls who were fighting over possession; they laughed with great grotesque guffaws as her left arm ripped out of its socket, and the troll holding that arm was angry because he had the smaller share, and clubbed the other troll with it while blood splattered everywhere. But then a screaming child ran by, a little girl, and the troll caught that child and brought her to its face and opened its awful mouth and—and bit off her screaming head.

Then the image faded, mercifully, for I was screaming myself. Never had I seen such horror! The darkness covered all. After a pause, the dawn came. The trolls were hidden in the houses, gorged; they would not go abroad by light of day, and suffered no fires, for that they were the opposite of goblins in this respect and the light was painful to them. They had buried themselves under piled blankets, shutting out all signs of the day. They were safe; no villager remained alive.

No—one remained. A child, a boy—he emerged from the trunk of a hollow tree. It seemed he had been playing in it when the trolls descended, or doing something he wasn’t supposed to, like practicing spells, then had hidden frozen in fright until dawn made it safe to emerge. Now he stood, surveying the ruin—and it was the blue lad. “Thou!” I exclaimed. “Thou didst witness it all! Thy village, thy family, most brutally destroyed!”

“Have no sympathy for me,” he replied grimly. “I was transformed that hideous night from youth to enchanter. I realized that no force but magic could restore the balance, and so—“ He spread his hands. “Look what I did.” I looked—and saw the figure in the image raise his hands, and I heard him faintly singing, though I could not make out the words. Then, suddenly, a ring of fire appeared, encircling the village, blazing ferociously. Magic fire, I knew, but still fierce and hot. It burned inward, not outward, while the blue lad watched. He must have spent his sleepless hours in hiding devising that terrible spell, perfecting it. It ignited the outer thatch cottages. Now the trolls woke, and ran about in the fire, burning, terrified—but they could escape only inward toward the center of the village. And there the fire pursued them, itself a ravening demon.

Now it was the trolls who gibbered in horror, and were granted no reprieve, as they huddled in the center of the village, heads covered, backs to the fire. Inevitably it closed on them, torturing them before it consumed them, and then fain would I have felt sorry for the trolls, but that I remembered the woman torn apart and the decapitated child. No mercy for the merciless! The trolls fought each other, trying to keep place in the closing circle, showing not the faintest compassion for their fellows, only selfish-ness.

At last the dread fire burned itself out, its magic consuming flesh as readily as wood. Only mounds and ashes remained. All of the trolls had been destroyed. Except—except there was a stirring in a mound, and from it came a little troll, that must have been deeply buried by its mother, so that it alone survived. Now it looked about and wailed, afraid of the coming day.

The blue lad spied it, and knew that this one could not have killed any people, and he cast a spell of darkness that clothed it, and let the little troll go. “Thou’rt like me,” the blue lad quoth. Then he turned his back on what had been his home, and walked away.

The music stopped and the vision dissipated. I looked across at the blue lad. He had shown me his second major component: his power. Yet I did not realize, or perhaps refused to let myself know, the significance of this deadly ability.

“Thou—thou wast as thou art now!” I exclaimed. “Thou hast not changed, not grown. But the destruction of thy village occurred ten years ago! How could—“ “I was seventeen,” he replied.

“And now thou’rt—twenty-seven?” I asked, realizing it was true. “I thought thee twelve!” “I am small for my size,” he said, smiling. He was as much older than I, than I had thought him younger. No child of twelve, but a full-grown man. “I—“ I began, nonplussed.

“Thou didst ask how a person my age could play the harmonica so well,” he reminded me.

“Aye, that I did,” I agreed ruefully. Now that the joke was turned on me, I felt at ease.

The blue lad—blue man—summoned our steeds, and we proceeded on. We made good progress, and arrived the next day at mine own village. Almost, I had been afraid I would find it a smoking ruin, but of course this was a foolish fantasy born of the horror I had viewed. My folks rushed out to greet me in sheer gladness, and Snowflake was reunited with her dam Starshine, and all was gladness and relief.

Then the blue man said to his blue stallion: “Go service the Hinny; she has completed her pact with me.” And the stallion went off into the privacy of the forest with the Hinny, who must have been in heat—aye, in heat from the first time she spied that stallion!—and I was glad for her. She would have her foal, and well had she earned it. My father’s gaze followed them. “What a stallion! What a mare!” he murmured. “Surely that foal shall be like none known among us.”

The blue man shrugged, and said to me: “Lady, an thou ever needest me, sing these words: ‘Blue to me—I summon thee.’” Then he turned to my father, thinking me distracted by my tearful mother, for that my days-long absence had worried them much. “Sir, may I marry thy daughter?” he asked, as if this were a question about the weather.

My mouth dropped open in sheerest surprise, and I could not speak.

“Art thou the Blue Adept?” my father asked in return. I was stunned again, knowing suddenly the answer. How could I have missed it, I who had seen his power! Then the Blue Adept shook hands with my father and walked in the direction the horses had gone. No answers had been given, for none were needed. Normal people associated not with Adepts, and married them never. The Lady Blue finished her narrative and looked up at Stile. “Now canst thou go about thy business. Adept,” she said.

“I thank thee, Lady,” Stile said, and departed her presence.