The Best Paranormal Crime Stories Ever Told

The Unicorn Hunt by Michelle West

Hunting the Unicorn in the big city isn’t exactly a simple proposition. Unicorns being what they are, sleek bastards, they’re steeped in old lore, as if lore were magic.

Some of the lore is true, mind you; there’s always a bit of truth in any old legend, if you know how to sift through the words. Words often get in the way. Maggie’s my sometime partner, when it comes to things that exist outside of whatever passes for normal. She’s got half a family-which is to say, herself and the kids-and a full-time job, besides. But she’s got a bit of a temper, and a memory that just won’t quit. She takes the whole business personally.

Me? I never did.

I was raised by my grandmother, a tough old woman with a mouth like a soldier’s, and a pretty strong right hand to boot. She had some standards, expected good grades, and carried a weary disdain about life that pretty much seeped into everything I ever tried to do. It wasn’t so much that she laughed at me-although I might have mentioned she was a touch harsh-as that she saw through me.

It was hard to dream much, in my grandmother’s house. And make no mistake, it was her damn house. Small, squat building, red brick painted in a drab grey, porch up the backside of the house and round the side to the front. Garden for days, and in a city house, that says something. She didn’t much believe in grass; it was a waste of water and sun, in her opinion. No, she grew useful things. Herbs, spices, fruits, vegetables. No flowers for her either, although I sort of liked them when I was younger. Flowers in her garden always withered and died, and I learned not to plant ’em.

You get odd communities in the city. My grandmother was at the centre of ours. When she wasn’t drinking, she was often on that porch, and she had words of wisdom for any poor sucker who happened to stop within earshot of her chair. She had a cane that she used like a gavel-she sure as hell didn’t need it for walking-and a voice that could make thunder seem sort of pleasant.

But I learned to love her. It was an uphill battle, for the early years of my childhood, and much of the affection I feel for her is hindsight and odd memory. She told me things I hated, when I was young, and watching them prove true was both a liberation and a bitter reminder that that old woman knew things.

She didn’t believe in magic.

Which isn’t to say that she didn’t believe in Unicorns or Elvis sightings. She thought astrology was idiotic, thought crystals were stupid, and could spend whole days deriding the healing powers of just about any newfangled fad. She had God’s ear, in a way-she believed in God-but whatever he had to say to her, she didn’t share.

But I was talking about Unicorns.

Because Maggie got it into her head that she had to have one. Time of year. Time of month-I don’t know. Maggie’s like her own mystery, as different from my Gran as night from day; part of the same continuum, if you look close enough, but really, how many people do?

“Mags,” I told her, “this is stupid.”

Maggie, hefting her six-month-old onto the perch of her left hip, gave me The Look. Shanna, her oldest, is four, and because Shanna is both capable of listening and repeating what she hears, Maggie’s gotten a little less verbose when she’s in a mood. Doesn’t matter. The Look pretty much says it all.

So when she turned it on me, I shut up for a bit. Not for long; living with Gran, I learned how to talk. If I hadn’t, I’d’ve probably been a mute-that woman could talk. “Look, you’ve got Connell and Shanna to think about now.”

“I’m thinking about them,” she said, in that cast-iron voice of hers. “It’s not for me.”

Now, Maggie’s no idiot. “Look, you know the stuff about healing powers and unicorn horns is just shit. Besides, they look healthy enough to me.”

Connell obliged by spitting up on her left shoulder. It’s not one of his most charming activities, but we’re both used to it by now. Maggie, determined, didn’t even bother to reach for something to clean herself off. And Connell, being the age he is, can swallow or spit with equal comfort. I glared at him, but he just thought it was funny. He usually does.

Baby laughter is a type of disease; it rots the brain. I spent a few minutes descending into that language that isn’t really language at all, and after liberating my finger and my glasses-both of which he’d grabbed-I turned back to Maggie.

“You’re not getting enough sleep.”

She looked like she was fit to spit herself. “It’s not sleep I need,” she snapped.

Creation is an act of defiance. Whose, it’s hard to say. Unwanted pregnancies happen all the time, and if you’ve the mind, you can end ’em. But Maggie’s a special case. I’ve known it for a while. My grandmother told me, before she passed away.

Maggie moved in two houses down the street, and let her grass go to seed the first summer, which is high on the list of mortal sins as far as my Gran was concerned. But there are worse sins-barely-and she sent me along to check things out.

Turns out Maggie, being single, was in that constant state of exhaustion that also comes with being newly parental, and, as she put it, either the grass went or she did. Given that Maggie has eyes to die for (and a temper to die by), I thought it was a fair trade, and after introducing myself, I trudged on back to Gran’s place. And then trudged back to Maggie’s with a lawn-mower. I’m not that fond of gardening, in case I hadn’t made that clear, but there are forces of nature you just don’t ignore, and Gran had decided that this particular woman needed some help.

After I added a new layer of burn to the upper side of my arms and face, I asked my Gran why she was so interested in Maggie. And the old woman gave me The Look-oddly enough, it’s pretty much the same as Maggie’s-and then launched into a bunch of stuff that made me wish I hadn’t asked.

“Mark my words,” she said, after saying a whole lot of them, “Maggie is special. She’s the mother.”

“The mother?”

“The mother.”

Given that we live in a neighbourhood which is more or less over-run with kids of all ages, colours and volumes, this struck me as a tad woo-woo, even for Gran.

“Gran,” I said, sitting down on the porch steps so she could comfortably tower over me, “what’s so special about this mother?”

“She,” Gran answered, with a sigh that indicated she didn’t think much of my intellectual faculties, “doesn’t have much choice.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Gran shook her grey head, and her face wrinkled as she pursed her lips. “You think about it,” she told me. “You’re not always going to be this carefree. You have to know things.”

That one caught me short. “Gran?”

“That’s right,” she said, pushing herself up out of her chair. “I won’t be here forever, and when I’m gone, no one’s going to do your thinking for you.”

I remember thinking, at the time, that that would be a bit of a relief.

Asking Gran a question always involves a certain amount of humiliation, because to her, they all seem stupid. It’s like she reads answers that are written across your forehead, only you’re illiterate, even when she gives you the mirror. She’d spent the day working in the herb garden, and smelled of crushed bay leaves and smoke. But that aside, she was on her throne, and waiting with less patience than she usually did.

I used to think of the pipe she smoked as an affectation, a way of making her seem even more weird than she already was. I was younger then. Not even my memory can encompass that fact that she must have been younger as well; she never seemed to change. Even her clothing seemed to weather the passing of fad and style.

“All right, Gran,” I told her, taking my seat on the stair, “I’ve been thinking.”

“And?”

“I’m stupid.”

She snorted, smoke coming out of her nostrils as if she were a wizened dragon. The ritual of emptying her pipe stilled her voice for a few minutes, which was its own kind of mercy. I don’t smoke pipes, but I have a fondness for them anyway, probably because of her.

“I’ve talked to Maggie,” I told her. I didn’t tell her how much I’d been talking to Maggie; it wasn’t her business.

But her eyes narrowed. “So what.”

“She’s not that fond of men at the moment, but it seems like she has a reason.”

Gran snorted. “That’s it?”

I shrugged. “She’s got two kids.”

“A boy and a girl.”

“Pretty much.”

“And a cat.”

I’m not a cat person. “And a cat.”

“Good. And?”

“A messy house. A better lawn. A job she hates just a little bit less than she’d hate welfare.”

Gran inhaled. Exhaled. Frowned. “You’re right,” she said, spitting to the side. “You’re stupid.”

“I said that, didn’t I?”

“Doesn’t mean I can’t.”

My turn to shrug. “So what about her makes her the mother?”

“She didn’t tell you?”

“I didn’t exactly ask.”

“But she didn’t tell you?”

“No.”

Tobacco ashes flew as she gestured. It was a pretty rude gesture for an old lady, and I dodged a few stray embers. “And you couldn’t tell.”

“Obviously.”

She grabbed her cane, and I thought she might hit me with it. But she didn’t. “Then maybe she doesn’t know,” she said. Using it, for a moment, to stand. It was the first time in my life I thought she looked old, and I didn’t like it. “She’s the mother,” she said quietly, “because she was born to be the mother. It’s a responsibility,” she added, with a trace of sarcasm. “And a duty.”

“Well, she’s certainly had the kids.”

“She had to. You ask her who the fathers were?”

“I got the impression she wasn’t going to say.”

“She can’t.”

“What?”

“She doesn’t know.” Not exactly the sort of thing you’d expect from your grandmother-at least not in that tone of voice. Tired voice, not judgmental. “She might think she does. She’d be wrong. If she’d never touched a man, she’d still have had those kids.”

“She did say something about birth control. No, I’m not going to repeat it.”

“She’s angry about the kids?”

I shrugged. “She’s angry about being alone with them, if I had to guess.”

“Don’t guess. It makes you sound-”

“Stupid. Yeah, I know.” I chose the next words with care. She was still gripping the cane. “How did you know?”

“That’s probably the first smart question you’ve asked all day.”

Given that the rest of them had to do with lawn care, a thing she generally despised, this wasn’t hard. “Does that mean you’ll give me an answer?”

“I’m thinking about it.”

I waited her out. Have I mentioned she loved to talk?

“I’m the crone,” she said at last.

“And that makes me the maiden?” I couldn’t keep the bitter sarcasm out of my voice.

“You?” Neither could she.

Having retreated back into the realm of idiocy, I waited, cheeks burning some. “I guess that’s a no.”

“Big damn no. You think I’ve taught you how to tend a garden all these years for nothing?”

No, because you’re a sadist. Smart me, I didn’t say it out loud. She rapped my knuckles anyway.

“I’m getting old,” she continued.

I didn’t point out that she’d always been old.

“And I’m getting tired.” She sat down again. “And the damn pipe keeps going out.”

“Gran-”

“There was another mother,” she said at last. “And the maiden, which is definitively not you, so get that thought out of your head.”

It wasn’t in my head any more. “Another mother?”

“The mother,” she told me quietly.

“What happened to her?” Because it was pretty clear that something had.

“She died.”

Thanks, Gran. Guessed that. “When?”

“When I was younger.”

“You weren’t the crone then?”

“Damn well was.”

“What happened?”

She shrugged. “War,” she said at last, her eyes gone to blue. “She lost her son.”

“Lost him?”

“He died.”

“And she couldn’t have another one?”

“No.”

I frowned. “The kids are special, too?”

“The children are the mother’s. They define her. She always has two.”

“How did he die?”

“I told you. Pay attention. There was a war. He was in it. He didn’t come back.”

“And she died?”

Gran nodded quietly.

“Her daughter?”

And shrugged. “Her daughter buried her mother.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

“Then what-”

“It’s been a long time,” Gran continued, “since there was another mother.” She got up again. “Better that I talk to her, since you’re so useless.”

“Gran, Maggie’s-”

She rapped the porch with the cane tip. “You going to get out of my way, or am I going to have to go through you?”

I got out of her way, and trailed after her like a shadow. I liked Maggie. I didn’t want to subject her to my grandmother without offering a little cowardly moral support.

Gran snorted at the grass. Emptied her pipe on it and shoved said pipe into her apron pocket. Then she marched up the walk, which was short, and knocked on the door with her cane. It opened. No one was behind it. I hate it when Gran does that. Then again, I hate it when she does anything that defies rational explanation.

She walked into the small vestibule. It was littered with the debris of two children; coats, boots, shoes, a smattering of dishevelled and empty clothing, a dirty stroller. “Margaret?” she shouted, standing in the center of the mess as if she owned it.

Maggie came out of the kitchen, frowning. Connell was on her hip. She saw me, and the frown sort of froze.

“This is my Gran,” I told her.

And lifted. “I’ve heard a lot about you,” she said, extending a hand. Her left hand; her right hand was full of baby, and she had nowhere to put him down. Mags is pretty practical.

Gran took it in that iron grip of hers, but instead of shaking it, she turned it up to the light, as if to inspect it. The frown that Maggie had surrendered, Gran picked up. “This won’t do,” the old woman said, in as stern a voice as she used on the racoon who had the temerity to inspect her garden.

“What?”

“What’s this ring?”

“Detritus.”

“Good. Take it off.”

Maggie shot me an ‘is she sane?’ look. I shrugged.

“It’s a wedding ring,” Maggie told Gran.

“I know what it is. Why on earth are you wearing it?”

Maggie shrugged. I knew the shrug. It was nine tenths bitterness and one tenth pain, and I personally preferred the former.

“You aren’t the wife,” Gran said, in her most imperious voice. “You’re the mother.”

“Funny, that’s what my ex said.”

Gran ignored her. “This is the boy?” she asked. I started to say something smart, and thought better of it. At his age, it was hard to tell.

“This is my son, yes.”

“And the girl?”

The ‘is she sane’ look grew a level in intensity. “My daughter is in the backyard digging her way to China.”

Gran nodded, as if the answer made sense. Given that she’d raised me, it probably did.

“Well, he looks healthy enough.” She pushed past Maggie, and Maggie looked at me. I shrugged. Gran made her way to the sliding doors of the kitchen and took a look out. “So does she.”

“Thanks. I think.”

“Give me the ring,” Gran said.

“Yes she’s sane.” I added. “Mostly.” I held out my arms for Connell, and Maggie slowly handed him to me. He was pretty substantial, and he was squirming, but he wasn’t angry. Yet. Hands empty, she looked at my Gran, and then looked past her to me. She took off the wedding ring slowly, twisting it around her finger as she did.

Her expression made it clear that she was humouring the old lady for my sake, and I’d owe her. Given that I took care of her lawn, I figured we were even. Stupid me.

Gran took the ring and held it up to the kitchen light. Snorted, moved toward the sliding glass doors, and held it out to sunlight instead. She swore a lot. Closed her fingers around the ring, as if exposing it to light at all was a sin.

“What’s wrong with the ring?” I asked.

She opened her fist.

And I saw it up close, for the first time. It looked different than it had when it had been a flash of gold on Maggie’s finger. It was bumpy, but gleaming, more ivory than golden, and its pattern was a twisted braid.

“Not a braid,” the old woman said, pursing her lips coolly. “A spiral.”

“A… spiral?”

“This was fashioned,” she continued coldly, “from a Unicorn horn.”

Maggie stared at us both as if we were insane. But she didn’t immediately reach out and grab Connell, so insanity of our kind wasn’t immediately dangerous.

“It’s a binding,” Gran continued quietly. “And part of a binding spell. I’ll take it to study, if you don’t mind.” It was like a request, but without the request part. She marched out of the kitchen, ring once again enclosed in her leathered fist.

When she’d also slammed the front door behind her, I looked at Mags. “Sorry,” I said.

“That’s lame,” she replied. But she rubbed her finger thoughtfully, looking at the white band of skin that had lain beneath the ring for years. “She’s a strange old woman,” she added.

“Tell me about it.”

After the loss of the ring, things changed with Maggie. I didn’t notice it all that much at first, which gave Gran several opportunities to wax eloquent about my intelligence. But shedding the ring, she seemed to shed some of her helpless, bitter anger. She wasn’t as constantly tired. She even helped with the yardwork, although it took much longer with her help than without it, because Connell could crawl into everything, and Shanna insisted on helping too.

Connell discovered that dirt melted when you put it in your mouth. He wasn’t impressed. Maggie picked him up with affectionate disdain, helped him clean out his mouth, and put him down again; he was already off on another spree of discovery.

She became happier, I think. Stronger.

And then, one day, when the Winter had come and everything was that white brown that snow in a city is, she invited my grandmother over. I came as well.

We sat down in the kitchen-all meetings of import were to be held there-around a pot of dark tea. Too bitter for me, it seemed perfect for Gran. Maggie herself hardly touched it.

She said, “I know I’m biased,” which was usually the signal for some commentary about her children, “but sometimes it seems to me that my children are the most important thing in the world.”

“It seems that way to all mothers,” I said. “About their own children.”

But Gran simply nodded. Quietly, even.

“Was that ring really made from a Unicorn’s horn?”

“What do you think?”

She shrugged. “I think that once I was willing to let it go, I was happier. But there are a lot of men-and women-who could make money telling me that.”

Gran nodded. “Too much money, if you ask me.” Which, of course, no one had. Before she could get rolling, Maggie continued. She chose all her words carefully, and she didn’t usually trouble herself that way.

“I feel,” she continued softly, “as if, by protecting them and raising them, I’m somehow… preserving the future.”

Again, not uncommon. But something about Mags was, so I didn’t point it out.

“That I’m somehow helping other mothers, other sons, other daughters.”

Gran nodded broadly, and even smiled.

“Which makes no sense to me,” Maggie continued, dousing the smile before it had really started to take hold, “because it isn’t as if other mothers aren’t doing the same. Protecting the future.” Smart girl, Mags. “And it isn’t,” she added, with just a hint of bitterness, “as if other children aren’t dying as we sit here drinking tea.”

“We aren’t the arbiters of death,” Gran said quietly.

“What in the hell are we?”

“You’re the mother,” Gran replied. “I’m the crone.”

“And the crone is?”

“Knowledge. Experience. Wisdom, which usually follows. Not always,” she added, sparing a casual glare for me.

“You said I was the mother.”

“You are.”

“For how long?”

“Good girl!”

Gran can be embarrassing at times.

“Who was the mother before me?”

The old woman’s eyes darkened. “You’re the first one in a long time.”

“Why?”

She spit to the side. “If I had to guess,” she said, with just a trace of fury, “I’d say those damn Unicorns have been up to no good. Again.”

“You mean there were other mothers?”

“Like you, but not as strong. I should have known,” she added. There is nothing worse than Gran when she’s feeling guilty.

“What happened to the last one?”

“She failed.”

“How?”

“Her son died.”

Maggie closed her eyes.

“Wasn’t her fault,” Gran added. “But it doesn’t matter. Her son died, and she died as well. Left a daughter. It should have passed on, then.”

“It’s like a public office?”

Gran shrugged. “Sort of. It should have passed on. Maybe it did. I’m not as sharp as I used to be.”

“But you’re older. Isn’t wisdom-”

“Shut up.” She lifted her cup, drained it, and thunked it back down on the table top. “Even the old get tired. Especially the old.” She hesitated for just a moment.

I didn’t like the sound of the silence.

“I’m better at hiding than I used to be,” she finally said. “And I never answered your question.”

“Hiding? From what?”

“You’ll find out, girl. And that’s a different question. You’re the mother until your children are old enough to have children of their own.”

“And then… my daughter?”

“Probably not. It doesn’t pass down blood-lines. But when they are, you’ll be free.”

Maggie said, “You’ve never had children, have you?”

And Gran’s voice was surprisingly bitter. “Oh, I’ve had ’em,” she answered. “Outlived them all.”

Maggie reached out and placed a hand over Gran’s in something that was too visceral to be called sympathy. “When is it over, for you?”

“I get to choose,” the old woman replied.

“And I don’t.”

“No. I often thought the mother got the rawest deal. No choice at all about having the children, only a choice about how they’re raised. Raise ’em well,” she added, “and the world changes.”

Maggie looked openly sceptical. “The world?”

“There’s a lot of difference between 1946 and 1966,” the old woman replied softly. “And trust me, you wouldn’t have liked living in either year.”

“You’re going to be with me for a while?”

“While you learn the ropes,” Gran replied. “But don’t be an idiot. Learn quickly.” She got up and headed toward the front door.

Maggie’s voice followed her. “If there’s a mother, and a crone,” she said, the growing distance forcing her to speak loudly and quickly, “what about a maiden?”

Gran’s snort carried all the way back to the kitchen.

“She’s a strange woman,” Maggie said at last. “How old is she?”

I shrugged. “I asked her once.”

“What’d she say?”

“She almost made me wash my mouth out with soap. It wasn’t considered a polite question.”

Mags laughed. I love it when she laughs.

“She’ll probably answer that one later. She likes to parcel out information.”

“Why?”

“Because she’s sadistic.”

Winter passed. Darkness made way for longer days and the snow melted.

Maggie started to garden, which scared me. Not only did she start, but she took to it with a passion that was only slightly scarier than the ferocity with which she watched out for her children.

Things grew when she touched them. Me? I’m no black thumb, but green isn’t my colour either; it takes work. I envied Maggie, the way I envy someone with a natural singing voice. I would have put my foot down when she started collecting stray cats, but hey, it wasn’t my house. And the kids seemed to like the cats-Connell even managed to survive pulling out a whisker or two from one of them.

But it wasn’t until the height of Summer that Gran chose to answer the question about the maiden. She invited herself over to Maggie’s. Apparently, all conversations of import were to be held at Maggie’s. I think this is because Gran didn’t particularly care to have children destroying the knick knacks in her house. Either that or because Gran’s cats weren’t as tolerant as Maggie’s.

Tea was like ritual, although without the fuss. The pot sat in the centre of the table; Connell toddled his way around the chair, and Shanna drew pictures while laying flat out against ceramic tile. Unfortunately, some of those pictures tended to bleed off the page, so the floor was a bit more colourful than it had been when the previous owner had laid down said ceramic tiles.

“So,” Gran said quietly. “You’ve started gardening.”

Maggie’s smile was calm and warm.

“And cat collecting. I’d advise you to take up a fondness for rabbits instead.”

“Why?”

“Less of ’em. They’re still work,” she added. But she shrugged. “The kids are growing.”

Maggie smiled fondly. She still looked like the same woman I’d first met-but not when she smiled. “I wanted to thank you both. But I also wanted to ask a question.”

Gran snorted. She had her pipe in her hand, but she didn’t light it. Mags would have thrown her out of the front door and watched to see how many times she bounced; she respected age and wisdom, but smoking around her children was a definite no-go. Gran seemed to expect this, and as she was in Mags’ house, she obeyed the unspoken rules.

“You’re the crone. I understand what you do.”

“What?”

“You preserve wisdom,” Maggie replied. “Collective wisdom. Maybe bitter wisdom.”

“It’s all bitter.”

“Maybe. But necessary.”

That got a ‘good girl’ out of the old lady.

“I’m the mother, and I understand-I think-what that means.”

“Better harvests,” Gran said.

Maggie raised a brow.

“It’s true.”

“Well,” she said, looking doubtfully out at her garden, “we’ll see.” She picked up her cup, staring at the cooling tea. “What does the maiden do? Preserve our innocence?”

Gran snorted. “You’ve been reading those trashy novels again.” It was a bit of a bone of contention between them.

Maggie chose to let the matter drop; she really was curious.

“Look,” Gran said, with open disgust, “just how innocent do you think you were when you were a maiden?”

“Well,” Maggie said, defensive in spite of her best intentions, “I wasn’t the maiden now, was I?”

Gran laughed. “Good answer! No, you weren’t. But I’m going to tell you that you’re confusing innocence with inexperience.”

“That’s her way of saying stupidity,” I added.

“Got that.” She looked over at her daughter, who had finished her odd drawing and had started in on another piece of paper. Shanna was humming a song I tried very hard not to recognize. Because Gran didn’t hold with television much, either.

“You think that the maiden is supposed to preserve stupidity?”

“I didn’t use the word.”

Gran snorted again. “Innocence implies guilt.”

“Stupidity implies-”

“Not guilt,” Gran snapped, before Maggie could get started. Watching the two of them, I could almost see a familial connection between them, and you know what? I almost got up and slunk out of the room. “Innocence is a Unicorn word. It’s a defacement. It’s a linguistic injustice, an act of defilement.”

“Unicorns speak?”

Gran’s laugh was dark and ugly. And unsettling. “You wore that ring for how many years, and you have to ask?”

Maggie’s turn to get dark. “It didn’t exactly whisper into my ear.”

I really wanted to be anywhere else.

“It did. You just weren’t listening. You want it back? I’ll give it to you. You’ll probably hear a lot more now.”

Maggie’s brows rose. “You didn’t destroy it?”

Gran hesitated for just a second, and a shudder seemed to pass through her. “No.”

“Why?”

“I’m no warrior,” she replied.

“The maiden is a warrior?”

Gran was quiet for a long time. “At her best,” she said at last, “she can be.”

“And at her worst?”

“Lost.”

“Was there a maiden, back when there was a mother?”

Gran said nothing at all for a long time. Silent Gran? Always made me nervous.

“Look, what is the maiden about?”

“Sex,” Gran replied primly.

Maggie stared at her as if she’d started speaking in tongues.

One week later, round two.

“So, the maiden is about sex?”

“That’s what I said.”

“If she’s about sex, she can hardly be a maiden.”

Gran shook her head. “That’s Unicorn talk,” she said firmly.

“Will you quit that?”

“I could call it something else, but you probably don’t want Shanna to repeat it at school.”

Maggie hadn’t asked for the ring back, and failed to mention it. Gran failed to offer. This was an armistice.

“The maiden has always been the most vulnerable of the three,” Gran continued. “The hardest to find. The hardest to keep.”

“Why?”

“Because.”

“It’s the sex.”

“Something like that.”

Maggie turned to me. “Your grandmother is driving me crazy.” Unfair, trying to drag me into the discussion. “It’s because of the sex, right? There aren’t a lot of young women who don’t. Have sex.”

“It’s because of the sex, but not in the way you think. You’re thinking like a Unicorn,” she added. So much for armistice.

“Look, what are Unicorns? I’ve seen a lot of pretty pictures, and I’ve read a lot of pretty books. I’ve done more internet research on that than I have on almost anything, and my saccharine levels are never going to be the same. For something malign, they seem to occupy a lot of young girls’ minds.”

“Not the practical ones,” Gran snapped.

“Fine. Not the practical ones. Are we looking for a practical girl?”

Gran seemed to wither. “No,” she said at last. “We’re not. That’s why it’s so hard. To find her. To save her.”

“She dies?”

“Not the way you or I do. But her gift is the easiest to lose. It gets passed on, but sometimes it’s just the blink of an eye.”

“Unicorns are usually associated with purity.”

“What the hell is purity?” Gran snapped. “A bottled water slogan?”

Round three.

“Okay. If the maiden isn’t defined by not having sex, and she isn’t defined by purity-which,” Mags added, holding a squirming Connell while trying to get him to eat, “I’ll agree is pretty nebulous, I have two questions.”

“You’ve got a lot of questions. How, precisely, are you intending to pay for the answers?”

Maggie glared. It was a pretty glare. “By being the mother,” she snapped.

Gran nodded, as if this was the only answer she expected. “What are your questions?”

“One: there are three. Maiden. Mother. Crone.”

Gran nodded.

“You’ve been waiting for me.”

Nodded again, but more wary this time.

“But we’re only two. The third one must be important.”

“She’s important.”

“But you weren’t waiting for her.”

Snorting, the old woman said, “I wasn’t exactly waiting for you, either. I just knew you when I saw you.”

“Fine. And the maiden?”

“You’re not going to let go of this, are you?”

“No.”

“Fine. Be like that. What’s the other question.”

“You haven’t answered the first one yet.”

“Never promised answers.”

“She is really driving me crazy.”

“Hah. You’re getting there on your own.”

“What is her role? Why is she important?”

“It’s the sex,” Gran said quietly. “And not the sex. It’s not the act; it’s the possibility inherent in the act.”

Maggie looked pointedly down at Connell.

“The maiden never has children.”

“Why?”

“Because children are the mother’s. Try to pay attention.”

“So she gets to have-”

Gran held up a hand. “She’s important, because she’s dreaming,” she said quietly. “Dreams are fragile, and endless; they’re also a tad self-centered. Have to be. Heroes dream. She’s dreaming, and she can walk in any direction she wants. She has a freedom that neither you nor I have.”

“You envy her?”

“You don’t?”

“I’ve seen what happens to dreams,” was the bitter reply. “Young girl dreams. You’re right. I was stupid.”

Gran’s smile was bitter. Old. “I didn’t say you were stupid,” she said. She had, but I didn’t point this out. “Or if I did, I didn’t mean it.” She sighed, and caressed the bowl of her pipe. “Sex is union,” she said quietly. “When it’s done right. Union of body. A glimpse of dream. It transfigures us.”

“Sex is about babies.”

“Wasn’t always.”

“Is now.”

“Hah. You want my answer?”

Maggie shut up.

“Having sex doesn’t destroy the maiden. Abstinence doesn’t define her-unless she lets it. The maiden has freedom. But she doesn’t see it yet. Maybe she will. More likely, she’ll lose it; shackle it; accept what others tells her. By the time she wakes up, she’s given over dreams to reality. She’s become something solid, but she’s not-”

“The maiden.”

“Not anymore, no.”

Maggie was thoughtful. “This is why you haven’t looked for her.”

“She’s not entirely necessary,” was the reluctant reply, “and she’s much abused. Always. It’s hard. To keep her. And it’s damn painful to lose her,” she added.

“How can you say she’s not entirely necessary?”

“Sometimes dreams have edges. Sometimes they just cause pain.”

“A world without dreaming-”

“There will never be a world without dreaming,” Gran replied.

“Joan of Arc was a maiden?”

“Maybe. And look what happened.”

“Buffy?”

“Buffy?”

“Television character,” I told Gran. I started to explain, and she lifted a hand. “Maybe. First two seasons at any rate.” Which really surprised me, given that Gran doesn’t hold with television. “But she’s not real. If she existed, she would be.”

“So all we have to do is find-”

“We don’t have to find anything.” Gran stood up. End of conversation.

Question two was never asked.

Maggie’s hands were on her hips. Unfortunately, no children were. This was her battle posture, and I didn’t much like it. “Your grandmother drives me nuts.”

“She has that effect on people.”

“I thought wisdom was supposed to be soothing.”

“Judge for yourself.”

Maggie snorted. “We need to go on a Unicorn Hunt,” she said at last.

Which more or less brings us full circle. “Why?”

“Because.”

More argument, which I’ve already mentioned, followed by grim silence, which I may have failed to add.

“The ring,” she said at last. “I would have held on to that ring forever. And it would have cost me my life. No, I’m not saying it would kill me-but look at me now. Look at me then. I’m alive now. I live in the present.” She walked over to her computer and flipped up the lid. I suppose it won’t come as a surprise to say Gran doesn’t hold with computers much either, so I’m not real familiar with how they work.

“So you want revenge?”

Maggie was silent. For a minute. “I think this is the first time I’ve ever understood why your grandmother calls you stupid,” she said in a flat voice.

“Ouch.”

“Live with it.” Maggie shouted a warning to Shanna, who seemed intent on turning two teetering chairs into a makeshift ladder. “I know the maiden is out there,” she said at last.

“Pardon?”

“I know she’s out there. I think she’s close.”

“How?”

“Because I feel younger than I have in years,” she replied softly. “And I feel-right now-that I can do anything.”

“You’re the mother,” I told her.

“Even the mother has to dream. Maybe especially the mother.” She looked fondly at the head of her younger child. “Look at this.” The computer was now flickering.

“Unicorn hunt.”

“It’s all garbage,” she added. “I’m sure your Gran was right about that.” Big concession. “But there’s got to be a grain of truth in this somewhere. What if,” she added, as her fingers added prints to the screen, directly across the face of a painted woman with a delicate, horned head in her lap, “it’s true?”

“What’s true?”

“Not that Unicorns are drawn to virgins,” she said, “but that they’re drawn to maidens.”

“Which is usually the same thing.”

“In Unicorn speak.”

“Don’t you start that too.”

Maggie didn’t seem to hear me. “If we go out on a Unicorn hunt,” she continued, “we’re bound to find the maiden.”

“Okay. But.”

“But?”

“What the hell does a Unicorn want with the maiden, anyway?”

“My guess? To kill her,” she said softly.

“That’s phallic.”

“Idiot.”

“And all that rot about Unicorn horns and healing?”

“I don’t know. Maybe there’s something in that. We can always find out.” She paused. “But I’m guessing that Unicorns don’t actually look like this either.”

“They’d be pretty damn hard to miss.”

So Maggie and I went over to Gran’s house. Gran was waiting for us on her porch. Which is to say, she was sitting on it, her arms crossed, her expression pure vinegar.

“You know why we’re here,” Maggie said, without preamble.

“I might.”

“We need your help.”

Gran pushed herself out of her chair. “I don’t have a lot of help to offer,” she said at last. “You’re going in search of the maiden.”

“We’re going in search of Unicorns,” Maggie replied firmly. “And we’re not certain that we’ll be able to even see them.”

“You might. She won’t.”

“I think you can see them well enough, if a glint of ring could tell you so much. We need to be able to see them.”

“You won’t like it,” Gran said, as if that would make a difference.

“Doesn’t matter. We’ll live; we all do what we have to.” She paused, and then added, “I’d like it if you kept an eye on the kids while we’re out.”

“That’s your job.”

“Yes. And I’d guess yours would be to find the maiden, which you aren’t doing.”

Gran relented so quickly it was pretty clear she’d already made her decision. “I’ll go to your place,” she said. “They won’t be as safe here.”

The tone of her voice made me wonder if I’d misjudged her reasons for keeping them out of her house in the first place. And I liked the older reasons better.

She gave us glasses. Sort of. Nothing you could wear on your face, though. She gave us some sort of sticky, foul-smelling ointment as well. “You might need it,” she said. “But if you don’t, don’t waste it. Costs a fortune to make.”

“Is that blood?”

Gran shrugged. The last thing she gave us, looped around fine, long strands of something that looked like hair, was Maggie’s old ring.

Maggie looked at it, but she didn’t touch it. “You carry it,” she told me. I was looking at Gran.

“She’s right. You carry it. It’ll point you in the right direction.”

“We can trust it?”

“To find a Unicorn? Yes. You can’t use it against one, though. Don’t even try. And if it talks? Don’t listen.”

“As if.”

“There are a couple of other things I should have probably told you both. Maggie’ll get a clue, once you’ve started. You might have trouble.”

Great. “What?”

“You’ll be walking old roads, if there’s a Unicorn to be found.”

“You’re not talking about old city roads.”

“Good girl.”

“They’re safe?”

“Not bloody likely.”

“What does not safe mean?”

“You’ll find out.” She handed me the last item. It was a long dagger, slender and shiny. And not really legal, on account of the way it disappeared in the hand. “Concealed weapons,” I told her, doubtfully.

“You take it, or you’re not going.”

“What am I supposed to do with it?”

“You’ll figure it out. Oh, and one more thing.”

“What?”

“You wait until the full moon. You hear me?”

“Yes, Gran.”

Maggie was different, that night. Different in pretty much every way I could think of. Clothing was different. Hair was pulled right back off her face, and her skin seemed almost silver, like moonlight incarnate. Her eyes were clear and dark, and she didn’t look afraid. Of anything.

The cars made their constant background purr, punctuated by honking. Gran cursed them roundly as she joined us in front of Maggie’s house. “I’ll stay until you get back,” she told us firmly.

“You’d better,” Maggie replied. But her tone of voice was strange as well.

Gran seemed smaller, thinner, than she usually did. “It’s your time,” she told Maggie, “not mine. But you’re right-the maiden is out there. I can see her in your face.”

Maggie didn’t seem to hear. I took a good, hard look at Gran. “Don’t light that,” I told her, because she was fumbling with her pipe.

“I know, I know.”

So, with a ring for a compass, and one that swayed every time there was the faintest hint of breeze, we began to walk down the street. Maggie decided-for reasons that aren’t even clear to me now-that we had to walk in the middle of the damn road.

“You’ve got kids to think of,” I told her. “What the hell is wrong with the sidewalk?”

She didn’t answer. Then again, if I’d asked Gran that question, she’d have clipped me with her cane.

Instead, she walked. She didn’t apparently look at the ring to see which direction we should be walking in, but she had me for that, and I was thankful for streetlights.

“Do you think your husband was a Unicorn? I mean, your ex?”

“No.”

“But the ring-”

“No.”

“But you think a Unicorn gave him the ring.”

“Yes, I do.”

Light dawned, in the figurative sense. “Because then you wouldn’t know.”

She nodded.

“And if you didn’t know-”

“I couldn’t find them.”

“Why didn’t they try that on Gran?”

“I don’t think your Gran can do this,” she said softly. “She’s too far away from the maiden. And she has to be.”

“Why?”

“Because of what she is. She can see the maiden in my face,” she added softly. “But I would guess that if we manage to find the Unicorn, and if the Unicorn is with the maiden, the maiden will see her in my face as well.”

I thought about that for a long time. “My Gran does like you,” I said.

“I know. She drives me crazy, but I like her too.” She gave me an odd look, then. I didn’t understand it. “She’s tired.” Maggie banked left. “But she’s waited a long time, and I’m really grateful to her. She’s the hardiest of the three of us,” she added.

Looking at Maggie, I wasn’t so sure.

I fingered the invisible knife, thought some more, and then asked Maggie, tentatively, if she wanted it.

Maggie’s brows rose. “Me?”

“That would be no.”

“Definite no.”

“Why?”

“I’m the mother,” she said quietly. “I don’t think I could use it.”

“Then I’ll use it for you.”

Maggie said nothing. After a while, I joined her in nothing, and we walked into the darkness.

When the darkness changed, I can’t be certain. But the streetlights vanished, and the moonlight grew more distinct. I could see stars, cold and clear, without the haze of light and pollution as a veil. Trees passed us by; they were tall, weeping willows, and beneath them, water pooled in still, clear mirrors. Everything about this road was beautiful. But you don’t live long with Gran if you’re an obvious sucker for beauty.

I followed Maggie. Maggie glanced occasionally at the ring, tilting her head with a vague look of disgust as she listened to it. I didn’t hear anything. But it was clear that in this place, she could. I almost envied her the ability.

“We should have gone on the new moon,” she said. Something about her voice made my hair stand on end. But she didn’t dwell on the should have, and I was just as happy not to.

We made our way down a sloping hill, crushing flowers as we did; there wasn’t any way to walk this place without leaving a mark. Maggie didn’t seem to care, and because she didn’t, I didn’t. I never did like flowers much, anyway.

And I discovered, that night, that Unicorns run in packs. This goes against conventional wisdom, but then again, everything does. We stopped for a minute while we watched these creatures cavorting in the shadows. The shadows cast by one huge tree that seemed to go up forever. I thought that it must go down forever as well, but then again, Gran leaves the weeding to me, and I’ve learned to take roots personally.

I expected them to be beautiful. And they were. Breathtakingly beautiful, in the sense that I stopped breathing while watching them. Their white coats were gleaming, and they looked like some sort of cross between a deer and a horse. But their horns glittered, and it became clear after only a few minutes that they weren’t exactly involved in a dance of joy.

They were fighting.

I don’t think they noticed us at all. I really, really wanted to be unnoticed. But Maggie had other plans, and she didn’t actually take the time to impart any of them to me. Instead, she ran the rest of the way down the hill, as if her feet were on fire.

As if, I thought suddenly, her children were in danger. This is the danger of putting the full moon, the old roads, and the mother together. I wouldn’t have guessed it, but then again, Gran never called me the brightest star in the sky.

When she almost crashed into them, I was just a few feet behind her. Running down the damn slope had been effortless for her-but for me it was a constant battle not to wind up sliding down on my face. The ground here was treacherous; it whispered.

And the Unicorns? They screamed. In outrage. In fury. They reared up, muscles rippling on their hind legs, horns no longer turned in casual cruelty against each other, as they faced this unexpected intruder.

Maggie hardly seemed to notice.

But I knew that dying here was pretty much death. It didn’t matter if we weren’t in the city; it didn’t matter if we weren’t in reality. Had Gran told me that? I couldn’t remember. I’d try later.

Gran’s knife in hand, I leapt in after Maggie, moving faster than I’d ever moved in my life. A horn hit the blade, and the blade was no longer invisible.

I expected the impact to knock the weapon out of my hand; it’s not as if I use weapons, much. But that didn’t happen. Instead? The horn gave. The knife passed through it. The Unicorn’s scream of rage gave way to a scream of what sounded-I swear-like mortified pain.

They had hooves, cloven hooves, and those should have been their weapon of choice. Would have done a damn sight more damage. But they didn’t seem to clue in, and I wasn’t about to tell them what to do.

I thought Maggie would; she’s like my Gran that way. But even if we’d started out hunting Unicorns, they weren’t on her radar at the moment. And I couldn’t see what was, but I could guess.

I would have been half right.

The Unicorns drew back when I approached; the knife was literally glowing, and a faint trace of black ran down its edge. I thought it was blood, but the wrong colour. It probably was. Unicorn horns are tricky.

But they didn’t approach us again, and no one was stupid enough to try the horn against the knife. I shadowed Maggie-literally. I knew that if I was too far away, they’d fall on her like jackals. Like really beautiful, really delicate, jackals.

She made her way to the tree they had been circling around, and I discovered a second thing about Unicorns. They can look an awful lot like men.

Or a man.

White haired, but youthful, tall, slender, garbed in something that would probably pass any fashion test an enterprising highschooler would set-except for that horn. Middle of the forehead. Dead centre. Glistening as it drank moonlight.

Maggie was mad. Not angry, which I’m used to.

Mad mother? Not a good thing. I tried to call out to her. No, I did. But she was beyond listening.

And in a second, I was beyond trying. Her eyes were better than mine. If she was seeing with her eyes at all.

Because beyond the man, was a girl. Bruised eyes. Bruised lips. Skin the white that skin goes when fear has overtaken almost everything else. A lot of skin; exposed and framed by shredded fabric. Might have been a shirt, once. Or the top of a dress.

School-girl, I thought. Maybe. She seemed so young to me as I looked at her, I couldn’t think straight. I had never been that young. Gran said I was born old.

Should’ve been a hint.

But Gran could have told me that Unicorns are rapists.

We split up the minute the Unicorn turned. His eyes were a startling shade of blue, clear and bright in the night sky. He looked beyond us, for just a moment; saw what must have been there-the gathering of his pack.

His hands fell away from the girl as he shoved her, hard, against tree-bark. Her hands gripped the tree as she tried to meld with it. Her eyes were dark, normal eyes. Her hair was dark and dishevelled.

He looked at Maggie.

He looked at me.

I held the dagger. I don’t think I have ever wanted to kill. He looked at Maggie.

He looked at me.

I held the dagger. I don’t think I have ever wanted to kill anything so badly in my life. He laughed. He could sense it.

But Maggie moved not toward him, but toward the girl. He wasn’t her concern. No, I thought, he was mine. Mother creates life. Crone sees its end.

I’ll stay until you get back.

I lunged with the dagger as he lunged with his horn. He narrowly avoided losing it, and I side-stepped. I’m not much of a fighter, but I was fast enough; it’s kind of hard to really get into a tussle when your pants have dropped past your butt.

I wondered if this was what naked men actually looked like. Which was my stupid thought for the evening, and it almost cost me my arm.

The shadows were dancing at my back. The others were waiting. But they were a bit of a cowardly lot, when it came down to that; they knew what the knife could do, and they were willing to wait and see.

I could have despised them more if I tried really hard. But mostly, I was trying to stay alive.

Losing battle. What had my Gran said? She wasn’t a warrior. I wasn’t raised to be one either. His horn grazed my thigh, and the threads of my jeans unravelled at its touch, as if they were all trying to avoid the contact. I bled a bit.

He hit me again, and I bled more.

He wasn’t laughing, but his eyes were glittering with rage. I had denied him something, and he intended to make me pay.

I would have died there.

I would have died had it not been for Maggie. At least I thought it was Maggie who came for me, Maggie who touched my shoulder, my wrist, my dagger arm.

But when Maggie took the dagger from my slowing hands, I knew I’d been wrong. Because Maggie was the mother, and she couldn’t wield this knife.

The Unicorn’s blue eyes widened, and he lost his form-which is to say, he reverted. It was certainly easier to look at him. Harder to look at the girl he’d had pinned to the tree a few wounds back.

She wasn’t wearing much. But she didn’t need to. She was utterly, completely beautiful in the stark night, and her expression was one that will haunt my nightmares for years.

She didn’t speak a word.

Not a word of accusation. Not a word that spoke of betrayal. Nothing at all that made her seem like a wronged victim, or like any victim.

Crone sees life’s end?

Not like this. She used the knife as if she’d been born with it in her hands. And he bled a lot; she wasn’t kind. Or quick. Or even merciful.

But he was very much alone, in the end. Packs are like that.

Later, I joined Maggie. Or Maggie joined us. The girl was holding the knife and her breasts rose and fell as lungs gave in to exertion, which was very distracting. Maggie had taken a sweater from her shoulders, leaving herself with a thin, black t-shirt. She put the sweater around the girl’s shoulders in silence. Like a mother. Her hands were shaking.

They looked at each other, and then the girl looked down at the knife almost quizzically.

“It’s yours,” I told her.

“You’re giving this to me?”

“No,” I replied. “It was always yours.”

She looked at it, and I handed her its sheath. She looked at that two. Her hands were shaking. “Did I kill him?”

I nodded.

“Good.” And then her eyes started to film over. “You know, he said he loved me?”

I nodded quietly.

“And I believed him.”

Before I could stop myself, I told her-in as gentle a voice as I could, “You had to.”

“No, I didn’t.”

But she did. Because she was the maiden. I could see it in her clearly. Could see it; was horribly, selfishly glad that I would never be the maiden. I wasn’t certain that she would stay that way, either.

“He was a Unicorn,” I told her, after a pause.

“He was an asshole,” she said, spitting. Like a cat.

“That too.”

She gave me an odd look. “How did you know?”

“What?”

“That he was a Unicorn?”

“The horn was a dead giveaway.”

“He wanted me because I was special.” She was. I could see that.

“Yes,” I told her, and I put an arm around her shoulder. “But he wanted to destroy what was special about you. Don’t let him. Don’t forget how to believe.”

Maggie cleared her throat. “Your mother is probably worried about you,” she said. In a mother’s tone of voice. “And my kids are waiting for me. Why don’t you come back to my place? You can phone her from there.”

“I told her I was staying at a friend’s house tonight,” the girl said. She hesitated, and then added, “I’m Simone.”

“I’m Irene,” I told her, extending a hand. “And you can stay at Maggie’s.”

Maggie nodded quietly. She held out a hand, and the girl took it without hesitation. Good sign.

We made our way back to Maggie’s house, but stopped at the foot of her walk. She looked at me, her eyes bright with moonlight. Simone was talking; she had started to talk when we had started to walk, and she hadn’t stopped. She wasn’t crying. She wasn’t-at least to my eye-afraid. Rescue has its purpose.

“I think you should go in first,” Maggie told me quietly.

I knew. I knew then.

“I’ll be up; I think Simone and I have a lot to talk about.” She hesitated, and then added, “We’ll be waiting for you if you need company.”

I nodded stiffly and made my way up the walk. Opened the door, which Gran hadn’t bothered to lock. Very, very little can get past Gran when she’s on the lookout.

She was in the kitchen, beside a pot of tea. She looked up as I entered, and the breath seemed to go out of her in a huff. As if she’d been holding it since we left.

“We found her,” I told my Gran. “In time, I think.”

“She’s an idiot?”

I frowned, and Gran gave me a crooked smile. “You understand.”

I nodded.

“Why it’s hard to be the maiden.”

And nodded again. “But Gran, I understand other things, too.”

“Oh? That would be a change.”

“I understand why it’s hard to be the crone. To watch. To know and to have to sit back on your hands.”

“Good.” She rose, pipe in hand. “I’ll be getting home, then.”

“I’ll go with you.”

“I don’t need company.”

“I do.”

She snorted. “You have company. Maiden and mother. I never thought-” She bit her lip. “I stopped hoping.”

“You kept watch,” I told her. “You remembered the old lore. You kept it for us.” I offered her a hand, and she took it; her hand was shaking. Old, old hand.

“You’ll be good at this,” she said, as she rose. “But you take care of my garden, hear?”

“I’ll take care of the garden,” I told her. It was really hard. “And the house. And the lore.”

“No television in my house.”

“Yes, Gran.”

“And none of that trashy garbage Maggie reads, either.”

“Yes, Gran.”

“And don’t think too much.”

I laughed. I walked her out of the house, and past Maggie, who stopped her and gave her a ferocious hug. No words, just a hug.

Gran snorted, and lit her pipe; Maggie, unaccompanied by her children, took it in stride.

And me? I waited. I bit my lip and I waited.

I walked Gran home. I took her up to the porch. I let her get comfortable in her chair. I even sat on the steps, because I wouldn’t be sitting on them again anytime soon.

I don’t know when she died. I know that she was talking; that she was telling me all the things that she thought I’d forget. That she also knew that I wouldn’t be forgetting them, now.

Because I was the crone.

And she was finished. She could be tired. She could rest. She said as much, and then drifted off into silence, the way she sometimes did when she was satisfied with the state of her garden.

The silence lingered, grew louder, grew, at last, final.

And when it had gone on for long enough, I closed her eyes, took her pipe, and emptied it. I kissed her forehead. I would have asked her to hug me, but public displays of affection had always made her uncomfortable. I hugged her only afterward, because it wouldn’t matter to her.

Then I made my way back to Maggie’s house, carrying Gran’s cane. The light was still on, and two thirds of my self were waiting for me to join them.