A Quest-Lover's Treasury of the Fantastic Page 13

  He looked so miserable she couldn't stay angry. Her expression softened. “I'd better send you away.”

  “Like the governor?”

  “Only drier.”

  “No.” The rising wind from the dark gate whipped her hair into her face. He caught a strand and tucked it gently behind her ear. “I'm responsible for this, it's only fair I stay.”

  Eyes half lidded, Magdelene sighed. “I only regret that …”

  “Wizard! You haven't got time!” H'sak kicked his feet, jerking the chain still in Magdelene's hand. “And don't raise those eyebrows at me! You know what you haven't got time for! After two hundred years,” he muttered as she took a quick look at the nearly open gate and began to frantically unwind the chain, “you'd think that the novelty would've worn off.”

  Free, the demon rolled off the Lombardi Disks as the darkness fully dilated. Hooking his claws in the back of Ciro's shirt, he yanked the thief to the far side of the room and dropped him. “The man is out of the way,” he hissed as a pale figure began to take shape in the gateway. “You'll only get one chance. Don't screw it up.”

  In answer, Magdelene leaned into the wind, and snapped the chain out to its full length. Wrapped around H'sak, the links had only gleamed but now, they blazed. She waited, eyes locked on the materializing Prince, noting the full thick fall of golden hair, the broad shoulders, the rippled stomach, the slender waist, the …

  “What are you doing?” H'sak shrieked. “Waiting to see the whites of his eyes?”

  “Not quite,” Magdelene murmured and flicked the chain forward.

  The Prince howled with laughter as the delicate links traced a spiral around him from neck to knees. “Foolish little wizard, you cannot hold …” His eyes widened, showing only onyx from lid to lid. “This is impossible! This toy is intended to contain the lesser demons!” He writhed in place. “I am a Prince!”

  Trying very hard not to be distracted by the writhing, Magdelene held out her arms at shoulder height and brought her palms together. The gate began to close.

  He stopped struggling. The perfect lines of his face smoothed out as he began to concentrate. The light of the chain began to dim. “You think you have power enough to keep me from this world?” he sneered as link after link went dark. “You think you can defeat m …”

  The gate closed.

  “Apparently,” Magdelene said, twitching her skirt back into place.

  Remembering how to use his legs, Ciro leaped to his feet and started forward. “Magdelene, you were magnificen …”

  Magdelene turned, knowing exactly what she'd see.

  “Now, we make a new bargain,” H'sak announced, claws forming a cage around Ciro's head, their tips just barely into the skin of his throat.

  Magdelene sighed. “You may find this hard to believe, H'sak, but I'm going to miss you.”

  The demon frowned. “I have the man.”

  Folding her arms over the purple vest, she tapped one red leather sandal against the floor.

  H'sak withdrew his claws one at a time. Slowly. So that it didn't look as if he were making any sudden moves.

  “Thank you.”

  Ciro's heels thumped back onto the floor, and he swayed in the rush of air that filled the space where the demon had been. “Where did you send him?”

  “The Netherhells.” She pursed her lips sympathetically at the collar of shallow punctures. “I'd have done it years ago but I didn't know the way.”

  “And now you do?” He glanced over to where the gate had been.

  “Now I do.”

  Ciro managed a shaky smile. “That ought to terrify them.”

  “I don't see why it should,” Magdelene protested. “If they don't bother me, I won't bother them. Shall we gather up the bits and pieces and get out of here?”

  The guards were still asleep outside the library door. Magdelene woke them, helped them up onto their feet, and made a suggestion Ciro was rather glad he hadn't heard given the reaction of two strong men.

  No one tried to stop them from leaving the building. No one paid them any attention at all until they were past the civic fountain.

  “My eyes see Her!”

  “Hard work and chastity,” sighed the most powerful wizard in the world. “I don't think so.” She squeezed Ciro's hand, and disappeared.

  A heartbroken wail went up from the crowd. A weeping woman grabbed the thief's arm. “You were with Her! Tell us, tell us, will She return?”

  Gently, but firmly, he disentangled himself. And then he smiled. “You can bet on it.”

  It took her a week to notice.

  Ciro winced at the crack of displaced air and hoped the neighbors weren't home. This was exactly the sort of thing to get a normally quiet man an undeserved reputation. “Good afternoon, Magdelene.”

  “Don't good afternoon me, Ciro Rasvona, you little shit! You stole the gold hieroglyph of my name!”

  He got slowly to his feet and held out his hand, the small gold plaque lying across his palm. “What,” he asked, “can I possibly do to make amends?”

  Cut off in mid rant, Magdelene looked down at the plaque, up at the thief, and the corners of her mouth turned up into her best smile. “I'll think of something,” she promised, stepping forward. “That had better be a lock pick in your trousers, 'cause you don't seem very happy to see me … oh, wait a minute … my mistake.”

  “I also took that big blue pearl,” he murmured when he could catch his breath.

  “And the crystal gryphon?”

  “No, but I'm willing to go back for it….”

  Chivalry

  Neil Gaiman

  Mrs. Whitaker found the Holy Grail; it was under a fur coat.

  Every Thursday afternoon Mrs. Whitaker walked down to the post office to collect her pension, even though her legs were no longer what they were, and on the way back home she would stop in at the Oxfam Shop and buy herself a little something.

  The Oxfam Shop sold old clothes, knickknacks, oddments, bits and bobs, and large quantities of old paperbacks, all of them donations: second-hand flotsam, often the house clearances of the dead. All the profits went to charity.

  The shop was staffed by volunteers. The volunteer on duty this afternoon was Marie, seventeen, slightly overweight, and dressed in a baggy mauve jumper which looked like she had bought it from the shop.

  Marie sat by the till with a copy of Modern Woman magazine, filling out a Reveal Your Hidden Personality questionnaire. Every now and then she'd flip to the back of the magazine, and check the relative points assigned to an A), B) or C) answer, before making up her mind how she'd respond to the question.

  Mrs. Whitaker pottered around the shop.

  They still hadn't sold the stuffed cobra, she noted. It had been there for six months now, gathering dust, glass eyes gazing balefully at the clothes racks and the cabinet filled with chipped porcelain and chewed toys.

  Mrs. Whitaker patted its head as she went past.

  She picked out a couple of Mills & Boon novels from a bookshelf—Her Thundering Soul and Her Turbulent Heart, a shilling each—and gave careful consideration to the empty bottle of Mateus Rose with a decorative lampshade on it, before deciding she really didn't have anywhere to put it.

  She moved a rather threadbare fur coat, which smelled badly of mothballs. Underneath it was a walking stick, and a water-stained copy of Romance and Legend of Chivalry by A.R. Hope Moncrieff, priced at five pence. Next to the book, on its side, was the Holy Grail. It had a little round paper sticker on the base, and written on it, in felt pen, was the price: 30p.

  Mrs. Whitaker picked up the dusty silver goblet, and appraised it through her thick spectacles.

  “This is nice,” she called to Marie.

  Marie shrugged.

  “It'd look nice on the mantelpiece.”

  Marie shrugged again.

  Mrs. Whitaker gave fifty pence to Marie, who gave her ten pence change and a brown paper bag to put the books and the Holy Grail in. Then she went next door t
o the butcher's and bought herself a nice piece of liver. Then she went home.

  The inside of the goblet was thickly coated with a brownish-red dust. Mrs. Whitaker washed it out with great care, then left it to soak for an hour in warm water with a dash of vinegar added.

  Then she polished it with metal-polish until it gleamed, and she put it on the mantelpiece in her parlour, where it sat between a small, soulful, china basset hound and a photograph of her late husband, Henry, on the beach at Frinton in 1953.

  She had been right: it did look nice.

  For dinner that evening she had the liver fried in breadcrumbs, with onions. It was very nice.

  The next morning was Friday; on alternate Fridays Mrs. Whitaker and Mrs. Greenberg would visit each other. Today it was Mrs. Greenberg's turn to visit Mrs. Whitaker. They sat in the parlour and ate macaroons and drank tea. Mrs. Whitaker took one sugar in her tea, but Mrs. Greenberg took sweetener, which she always carried in her handbag in a small plastic container.

  “That's nice,” said Mrs. Greenberg, pointing to the Grail. “What is it?”

  “It's the Holy Grail,” said Mrs. Whitaker. “It's the cup that Jesus drunk out of at the Last Supper. Later, at the crucifixion, it caught his precious blood, when the centurion's spear pierced his side.”

  Mrs. Greenberg sniffed. She was small and Jewish and didn't hold with unsanitary things. “I wouldn't know about that,” she said, “but it's very nice. Our Myron got one just like that when he won the swimming tournament, only it's got his name on the side.”

  “Is he still with that nice girl? The hairdresser?”

  “Bernice? Oh yes. They're thinking of getting engaged,” said Mrs. Greenberg.

  “That's nice,” said Mrs. Whitaker. She took another macaroon.

  Mrs. Greenberg baked her own macaroons and brought them over every alternate Friday: small sweet light-brown biscuits with almonds on top.

  They talked about Myron and Bernice, and Mrs. Whitaker's nephew Ronald (she had had no children), and about their friend Mrs. Perkins who was in hospital with her hip, poor dear.

  At midday Mrs. Greenberg went home, and Mrs. Whitaker made herself cheese on toast for lunch, and after lunch Mrs. Whitaker took her pills: the white and the red and two little orange ones.

  The doorbell rang.

  Mrs. Whitaker answered the door. It was a young man with shoulder-length hair so fair it was almost white, wearing gleaming silver armour, with a white surcoat.

  “Hello,” he said.

  “Hello,” said Mrs. Whitaker.

  “I'm on a quest,” he said.

  “That's nice,” said Mrs. Whitaker, noncommittally.

  “May I come in?” he asked.

  Mrs. Whitaker shook her head. “I'm sorry, I don't think so,” she said.

  “I'm on a quest for the Holy Grail,” the young man said. “Is it here?”

  “Have you got any identification?” Mrs. Whitaker asked. She knew that it was unwise to let unidentified strangers into your home, when you were elderly and living on your own. Handbags get emptied, and worse than that.

  The young man went back down the garden path. His horse, a huge grey charger, big as a shire-horse, its head high and its eyes intelligent, was tethered to Mrs. Whitaker's garden gate. The knight fumbled in the saddlebag, and returned with a scroll.

  It was signed by Arthur, King of All Britons, and charged all persons of whatever rank or station to know that here was Galaad, Knight of the Table Round, and that he was on a Right High and Noble Quest. There was a drawing of the young man below that. It wasn't a bad likeness.

  Mrs. Whitaker nodded. She had been expecting a little card with a photograph on it, but this was far more impressive.

  “I suppose you had better come in,” she said.

  They went into her kitchen. She made Galaad a cup of tea, then she took him into the parlour.

  Galaad saw the Grail on her mantelpiece, and dropped to one knee. He put down the teacup carefully on the russet carpet. A shaft of light came through the net curtains and painted his awed face with golden sunlight and turned his hair into a silver halo.

  “It is truly the Sangrail,” he said, very quietly. He blinked his pale blue eyes three times, very fast, as if he were blinking back tears.

  He lowered his head as if in silent prayer.

  Galaad stood up again, and turned to Mrs. Whitaker. “Gracious lady, keeper of the Holy of Holies, let me now depart this place with the Blessed Chalice, that my journeyings may be ended and my geas fulfilled.”

  “Sorry?” said Mrs. Whitaker.

  Galaad walked over to her and took her old hands in his. “My quest is over,” he told her. “The Sangrail is finally within my reach.”

  Mrs. Whitaker pursed her lips. “Can you pick your teacup and saucer up, please?” she said.

  Galaad picked up his teacup, apologetically.

  “No. I don't think so,” said Mrs. Whitaker. “I rather like it there. It's just right, between the dog and the photograph of my Henry.”

  “Is it gold you need? Is that it? Lady, I can bring you gold …”

  “No,” said Mrs. Whitaker. “I don't want any gold, thank you. I'm simply not interested.”

  She ushered Galaad to the front door. “Nice to meet you,” she said.

  His horse was leaning its head over her garden fence, nibbling her gladioli. Several of the neighbourhood children were standing on the pavement watching it.

  Galaad took some sugar lumps from the saddlebag, and showed the braver of the children how to feed the horse, their hands held flat. The children giggled. One of the older girls stroked the horse's nose.

  Galaad swung himself up onto the horse in one fluid movement. Then the horse and the knight trotted off down Hawthorne Crescent.

  Mrs. Whitaker watched them until they were out of sight, then sighed and went back inside.

  The weekend was quiet.

  On Saturday Mrs. Whitaker took the bus into Maresfield to visit her nephew Ronald, his wife, Euphonia, and their daughters, Clarissa and Dillain. She took them a currant cake she had baked herself.

  On Sunday morning Mrs. Whitaker went to church. Her local church was St. James the Less, which was a little more “don't think of this as a church, think of it as a place where like-minded friends hang out and are joyful” than Mrs. Whitaker felt entirely comfortable with, but she liked the Vicar, the Reverend Bartholemew, when he wasn't actually playing the guitar.

  After the service, she thought about mentioning to him that she had the Holy Grail in her front parlour, but decided against it.

  On Monday morning Mrs. Whitaker was working in the back garden. She had a small herb garden she was extremely proud of: dill, vervain, mint, rosemary, thyme and a wild expanse of parsley. She was down on her knees, wearing thick green gardening gloves, weeding, and picking out slugs and putting them in a plastic bag.

  Mrs. Whitaker was very tender-hearted when it came to slugs. She would take them down to the back of her garden, which bordered on the railway line, and throw them over the fence.

  She cut some parsley for the salad. There was a cough behind her. Galaad stood there, tall and beautiful, his armour glinting in the morning sun. In his arms he held a long package, wrapped in oiled leather.

  “I'm back,” he said.

  “Hello,” said Mrs. Whitaker. She stood up, rather slowly, and took off her gardening gloves. “Well,” she said, “now you're here, you might as well make yourself useful.”

  She gave him the plastic bag full of slugs, and told him to tip the slugs out over the back of the fence.

  He did.

  Then they went into the kitchen.

  “Tea? Or lemonade?” she asked.

  “Whatever you're having,” Galaad said.

  Mrs. Whitaker took a jug of her homemade lemonade from the fridge and sent Galaad outside to pick a sprig of mint. She selected two tall glasses. She washed the mint carefully and put a few leaves in each glass, then poured the lemonade.

  “I
s your horse outside?” she asked.

  “Oh yes. His name is Grizzel.”

  “And you've come a long way, I suppose.”

  “A very long way.”

  “I see,” said Mrs. Whitaker. She took a blue plastic basin from under the sink and half-filled it with water. Galaad took it out to Grizzel. He waited while the horse drank, and brought the empty basin back to Mrs. Whitaker.

  “Now,” she said. “I suppose you're still after the Grail.”

  “Aye, still do I seek the Sangrail,” he said. He picked up the leather package from the floor, put it down on her tablecloth and unwrapped it. “For it, I offer you this.”

  It was a sword, its blade almost four feet long. There were words and symbols traced elegantly along the length of the blade. The hilt was worked in silver and gold, and a large jewel was set in the pommel.

  “It's very nice,” said Mrs. Whitaker, doubtfully.

  “This,” said Galaad, “is the sword Balmung, forged by Wayland Smith in the dawn times. Its twin is Flamberge. Who wears it is unconquerable in war, and invincible in battle. Who wears it is incapable of a cowardly act or an ignoble one. Set in its pommel is the sardonyx Bircone, which protects its possessor from poison slipped into wine or ale, and from the treachery of friends.”

  Mrs. Whitaker peered at the sword. “It must be very sharp,” she said, after a while.

  “It can slice a falling hair in twain. Nay, it could slice a sunbeam,” said Galaad, proudly.

  “Well, then, maybe you ought to put it away,” said Mrs. Whitaker.

  “Don't you want it?” Galaad seemed disappointed.

  “No, thank you,” said Mrs. Whitaker. It occurred to her that her late husband, Henry, would have quite liked it. He would have hung it on the wall in his study next to the stuffed carp he had caught in Scotland, and pointed it out to visitors.

  Galaad rewrapped the oiled leather around the sword Balmung, and tied it up with white cord.

  He sat there, disconsolate.

  Mrs. Whitaker made him some cream cheese and cucumber sandwiches, for the journey back, and wrapped them in greaseproof paper. She gave him an apple for Grizzel. He seemed very pleased with both gifts.