War For The Oaks Part 3

"We have many names," said the water-woman. "We are the Gray Neighbors, the Good People, the Strangers, the Fair Folk-"

"The Little People," drawled the short, dark man.

"Fairies," said Eddi, her laughter strangled. The resulting silence was so complete that she was afraid they'd struck her deaf.

"Had we come to grant a favor, the sound of that name would drive us off," growled the dark man. "Use it again at your peril."

"But that's what you are, isn't it?" Eddi turned to the water-woman. "Isn't it?"

Slowly, the pale head inclined, the attenuated white hands with their long nails rose and turned palm up. Yes.

Fairy tales. That was all she could remember about fairies, and as she tried desperately to recall the ones she'd heard or read, she realized she knew of few with fairies in them. And the two before her were nothing like Rumpelstiltskin or Cinderella's fairy G.o.dmother. Elegant Oberon and t.i.tania, silly Puck- Shakespeare was no help, either. These two, with their changing shapes and their offhand cruelties, had their roots in horror movies.

"Are you going to kill me?" Eddi whispered. The mention of mortal blood was taking on more significance.

"Not necessarily," replied the water-woman, as if it were a question of purely intellectual interest. "Let the phouka finish."

"That is what my kind is called," said the dark man. "Phouka. You may call me so; it's name enough.

She"-he nodded toward the woman in the pool-"is a glaistig, and so you may call her. For all that she may deny it, she and I have much in common."

Eddi ignored the glaistig's scowl, and said to the phouka, "And you turn into a dog."

"And a man," he grinned. When he was satisfied that he had startled her, he added smugly, "I have been credited with horse and goat as well, but I take no notice of it."

The glaistig shook her hair irritably, and it foamed in the soft light. "So, introductions all around. These amenities will outlast dawn if I leave this to you, Dog."

He snapped at her. The gesture was a grotesque fit for his human jaws.

"We are of the Seelie Court, n.o.blest blood of Faerie," the glaistig continued. "We are the guardians, the rulers"-here the phouka snorted-"and to us are reserved the sacred grounds of hill and spring, the magical herbs and trees."

"But of course," the phouka broke in, "where there are those who think themselves n.o.ble folk, there must be some poor sod to play the commoner...."

"Dog-"

"And in our case, we have the Unseelie Court, the most sodden lot you're like to see."

"Am I... like to see?" Eddi said weakly.

"Oh, yes. You're certain to, betimes. They've laid claim to territory of ours," he went on, in a voice edged with satire. "We've resolved to water it with their blood."

"That's nice." Eddi felt a queasy forboding. "What do you want me to do? Referee?"

The phouka flung his head back and barked laughter. "Ah, sweet-ling, you are fresh as the wind, if not as quick. The Unseelie Court are as immortal as we are. We could strike off all their warty heads tonight, and have it all to do again tomorrow. How would you slay an immortal?"

"I wouldn't."

"A sweet sentiment." He smiled fondly at her. "But there is a way. Were you upon the battlefield, you would bring to it the taint of mortality. All wounds would be true ones, and some would be fatal."

Eddi said slowly, "You want me to help you kill each other. And all I have to do is stand there."

"For all that it's inelegantly expressed, yes."

"Good. I hope you all die to the last man-or elf."

"Tsk. Oh, did I neglect to say that the Unseelie Court, being less than fond of parting with their loathly lives, will be eager to prove your mortality and rob us of your talismanic presence?"

"Ah," said Eddi. "I suppose I would have figured that out eventually." So this, she thought, her stomach clenched with fear, is how it feels to be drafted.

The glaistig spoke again. "The phouka has been a.s.signed as your keeper, that we need not hunt you out when you are wanted. He will be at your side always. He serves also as your bodyguard," she continued, before Eddi could protest. "Spies for the Unseelie Court will learn of you soon." She raised her sharp white face to the sky. "Dawn is almost upon us, and I am tired. Begone." And she melted back into the pool with a rush.

Eddi saw that she was right about the dawn; the windows across the street reflected pink-tinged gray.

She was aware, suddenly, of the reality of the buildings around her. This was the same Nicollet Mall that had been here yesterday. The difference, the unreality, must lie with her.

But she felt real. She ached from falling down the steps, she was tired, the fingertips of her left hand smarted from playing guitar... Carla, she thought. I could call her right now, and she'd answer the phone and grunt at me, and say. "Are you crazy, girl? It's-" is it six? "-six o'clock in the G.o.dd.a.m.n morning!" And I'd tell her what just happened, and she 'd say- "Rowan and Thorn, woman!" came the voice of the phouka from the street above her. "Do come along, or I'll fetch you!"

Climbing the steps felt like mounting a scaffold. When she got to the top, there was no sign of the phouka. Then, three feet away, the black dog rose from behind a planter and turned his red eyes on her.

"Stop that," she said. "Change back."

"Indeed not. I'm to be your bodyguard, am I not? Many's the mortal in this city who'd envy you your fine big guard dog, poppet. See?" And he leaped between her and some imaginary a.s.sailant, his head lowered and hackles bristling, stiff-legged, a rumble in his throat that seemed to shake the pavement. "Oh, what a terror I am! But puppy-gentle with my mistress." He bounded back to her, tail wagging, and licked her hand.

Eddi s.n.a.t.c.hed it away and wiped it on her jacket. "Cut it out, you hear me? Don't touch me again!"

His ears drooped, and he rolled his fearsome eyes upward. "She rejects my doggish loyalty. Ah, my heart, my heart." He turned and began to prance down the mall ahead of her.

"Where are you going?"

"Why, home with you, my sweet."

"How do you know the way?"

He looked at her over his black-furred shoulder. "Did you think, perhaps, that I wandered into that vile hole last night by chance? You've been my study, Eddi McCandry, for many a day. I know where you live." And he set off once again.

She was furious. What else did these-things-know about her? The color of her rugs? The contents of her refrigerator? That she talked to her reflection in the bathroom mirror?

"What makes you think I'm going home?" Eddi said sweetly.

He looked back and c.o.c.ked his head. "Aren't you?"

"No. I'm going to the pound. There's a dangerous dog loose in this neighborhood."

His lip began to curl back from his teeth. "Eddi..."

She didn't think he'd let her get as far as the pound. But she might manage a phone booth-yes, there was the blue-and-white sign on the corner. Don't look at the phone. And don't run. She strode across the street as if she meant to keep walking. At the last moment, she ducked into the booth and slammed the folding door.

She braced her feet against the door and her shoulders on the opposite wall.

"May I lend you a quarter?" said the infuriating voice. The black dog sat beside the booth, ears up, head tilted inquiringly.

Eddi felt foolish, but she didn't take her feet off the door.

"This call's free."

"Ah. You don't mind, do you, if I listen? I want to know what you'll think of to tell them."

She let her breath out slowly. "I'm going to call the cops. The squad car will come, and whether you're a dog, a man, or not here at all, I'm going to the station with them. If they won't take me, I'll hit one of them and they'll have to take me."

The phouka's look of patient attention only intensified.

"And once I'm there, I can use the same techniques to get them to keep me there. Then if you want me, you can break me out of jail."

Why she hadn't already dialed 911, she didn't know. Perhaps it was the expression on the phouka's face, polite, intelligent, and doggy.

"Very good," he said at last. "And I, for my part, could break one of these gla.s.s walls and sever the cable on that telephone before you could say h.e.l.lo." Eddi began a surrept.i.tious move toward the receiver. "But I'd much prefer not to. It would set a bad precedent."

"You mean like chasing me down the Nicollet Mall?" she snapped.

To her surprise, the phouka's ears drooped a little. "If you were to call that ill-considered, self-indulgent idiocy, I would probably allow it to be true."

Eddi would not have chosen any of those words, so she said nothing.

"But let us reason together, sweet. I have not tried the walls of your fortress." He indicated the phone booth with his nose. "I have not offered you violence." Eddi snorted, but let it pa.s.s. "Will you not deal fairly, and let me bear you company, at least until I do transgress?"

"Did it occur to you to try this approach down at the other G.o.dd.a.m.n end of the mall?"

He looked offended and embarra.s.sed, and both expressions sat oddly on his dog face. "No," he said irritably.

Eddi decided it would be unwise to laugh. "What if I don't want to deal?"

He stood. "I do not predict the future."

Eddi stared at him. Her shoulders were getting sore, and one of her feet was asleep. She was cold. For all she knew, he never got cold or tired. She would feel like a perfect idiot if she stepped out the door and he strangled her. But just now he didn't have hands. She unfolded the door.

"You gladden a poor dog's heart," he said. He trotted to the curb and looked back; after a moment, she followed him.

The phouka seemed oblivious to the effect a talking dog might produce; he chattered brightly to her all the way to her apartment building on Oak Grove. Fortunately, they pa.s.sed no one else. She interrupted him only once, to ask, "Why me?"

"Why you, what?"

"Why are you picking on me? Why not grab some drunk off Hen-nepin Avenue and drop him on your stinking battlefield? They're all mortal, too."

"Lay the blame on good taste. We're a fastidious lot." But a block later, he said, "I can't explain now.

Later, when you know our ways, perhaps I can answer you and you'll understand."

She felt strange holding the front door of the building for him. As she stood at the inner door, fis.h.i.+ng in her pocket for her keys, he said, "There's a stink on this place."

"Drunks come in here to get warm."

"No, this is a reek of another sort. I smell rules and laws and Thou Shan'ts."

She pushed open the second door. "Mm. That's Roberta, the caretaker."

"Oho-a threat worthy of your guard dog! I shall go for her throat-GRRAAHRRR!" He bolted snarling down the hall and up the stairs, toenails clattering on the wood floors.

"Shut up!" she hissed, and ran after him. She caught up with him on the third floor, outside her apartment door. "G.o.d d.a.m.n you! If she heard that, I am screwed to the wall!"

He c.o.c.ked his head and looked doggily innocent. "Have I... done something?"

"This is a 'no pets' building, you..." Something about his voice lit her suspicions. "You knew that, didn't you?"

Eddi wondered if, had he been in human form, he would have pressed a hand to his breast. "You could believe that of me? Oh, I am wounded to the quick!"

She unlocked the door. "Get in there."

He loped into her tiny blind-alley kitchen, through the living room, into the bedroom. His voice drifted back, hollow from bouncing off the bathroom tiles. "Charming! A bit cramped for two, but I don't regard it in the least! What's for breakfast?"

"Chew off one of your hind legs." She sank down on the couch and rubbed her temples. Then she heard the sound she dreaded: the clack-clack of a woman's shoes on the stairs.

Eddi opened the door to the firm knock. Roberta stood before her in a robe of salmon velour and white eyelet, and little heeled slippers. "Miss McCandry," she intoned, "I heard a dog."

"You did?" said Eddi stupidly.

"I did. And I heard you, as well."

"You did?"

"Miss McCandry, we do not allow pets here. I wish to inspect your apartment."

"You d-ah, right." But she didn't move.

Roberta frowned. "As stated in the lease, which you signed-"

"I know, I know. Come in."

As if she could smell the trail the phouka had left, Roberta stalked into the kitchen and out, into the living room, where she looked behind all the furniture, and across to the bedroom door. "May I?" she asked as if the answer didn't matter.

With a sigh, Eddi flung open the door.

Roberta gasped in horror, and Eddi followed her transfixed gaze. There on the bed was the phouka. He was lying on his stomach, propped up on his elbows, facing the door. His brown skin was a shocking contrast to the rumpled white sheets, which were drawn across him to barely cover his b.u.t.tocks. He wore absolutely nothing.

"Good morning," he said with sleepy charm.

Roberta slammed the door.

"Uh, I'm sorry," Eddi began. "He's, uh... I mean..."