Gossamyr Part 41

That Dominique was fee explained why the unicorn tolerated him riding it. Almost. Unicorns were not beasts of burden. Mayhap the missing alicorn gentled the unicorn's nature? Sir San Juste seemed so mortal. His eyes-normally fee possessed brilliant violet eyes-were violet yet dark. Not true blood?

"Ask me," Dominique said as they neared the door to Armand's home. "I feel your curiosity. I am ashamed."

"I mean you no disrespect." But curiosity stirred. "Very well. You are true fee?"

"Yes. But."

She quirked a brow.

"I am a changeling. I was laid in a mortal infant's crib after I was newly born. I know," he said. "I should have perished. Or so say the tales I hear."

Gossamyr had always thought Faery changelings died. On the other hand, mortal exchanges were supposed to die, as well. Yet here she stood very much alive and well.

"But my fee mother had darker reasons for hiding me away. I have never been to Faery. Though I can feel it all around." He scanned the alley, reaching to touch the cool stone wall of Armand's home. "Not in Paris though."

"Never," Gossamyr agreed. "So you were...raised by mortals?"

"A fine set of parents. They raised me as their own. Despite-"he shrugged, easing his shoulders up as if to work out an itch on his back "- my differences."

"You are winged?"

He nodded. "You must know how difficult it is for a faery to walk unnoticed in Paris."

"But they do."

"They are able to work a glamour for so long?"

Gossamyr nodded. "Most mortals cannot See a faery should they spread their wings before them. And when the Disenchantment sets in, well...their wings, they dissipate. Why is it you still have yours?"

"I cannot say. They've never disappeared, much as I wished for such when I was a child. I only wanted to run and play with the others," he said. He drew the cloak out along one arm. "This is my disguise."

"It serves to hide your nature well. But with the Red Lady holding court, do you know the danger you are in?"

"I know nothing of this red lady. I am not of Faery, demoiselle. I am fee, but...an outcast. I can never have Faery. I function as a mortal with some of the powers of glamour. I suspect this red lady, if it is fee she seeks-"

"The Disenchanted."

"Disenchanted? The woman will not recognize me as one?"

"Perhaps not, for you were never Enchanted in the first place," Gossamyr said, understanding growing. One must live in Faery to be Enchanted. Yes?

"It pains me to hear you put it in such a manner."

"Forgive me." She felt the wall of a house behind her and pressed her hand to it. She was so stunned to hear this man's confession, and yet, curious. He was she in every opposition.

"What troubles you? My lady?" He searched her face. A look that gentled even with its curiosity.

...a fine handsome faery man to sweep you from your feet-literally?

She stretched a look to the unicorn, which stood outside the door to Armand's home. Peaceful acceptance glittered in the beast's pale violet eyes. Perfection destroyed by the mortal who would take its horn for devastating magic. She must return the alicorn immediately.

But you vowed to help Ulrich. Gossamyr stilled. Indeed, she had made a vow.

Close, the presence of this stranger. He reminded her of Faery-at least the semblance of her former home. Your truth keeps you from returning. She wanted to be there. To touch it. To feel the comfort of her home. A home she might never again visit.

It is not your home! It was never yours!

"How long before you learned the truth?" An abrupt question, but she hadn't time for dally.

"I have always known I am a fee in the mortal world. My mortal mother made sure I knew whence I came. Though she knew nothing of the faery ways and could not teach me."

"You were fortunate to have the truth."

Do you know the truth of yourself?

Verity d'Ange. Always she had carried that bit of her truth, unknowing.

You have the truth complete now. You are the truth.

"Remove your cloak. Please," she pleaded. He balked, placing a hand to the hilt of his sword. Not a menacing move, merely, unsure.

"I-I just need to see. To...to remember. Please?"

"To remember?"

"Since I have been in Paris, the Disenchantment...I think it draws away memories. I simply want to believe."

"Ah." He unclasped the silver agraffe at his neck and swung the cloak from his shoulders. Behind him unfurled s.h.i.+mmering violet wings, quarter-sectioned like the fetch, and her own tribe-but the upper wing was larger than the lower, unlike the symmetrical wings of tribe Glamoursiege. Such wing structure identified him as from an old and revered family.

"Wisogoth." Not troopers but ancient earth dwellers who lived in great underground caverns lit by crystals and iridescent rivers. Desideriel's tribe.

The span of Dominique's wings fluttered in the still air, gus.h.i.+ng a sweet breeze across Gossamyr's face, a summer meadow rich with clover. She closed her eyes and drew in the aroma of all she had once had.

To seal the rift would for ever close your access to Faery.

"What is Wisogoth?" he asked.

"It is a Faery tribe. The oldest in Faery. Your tribe, I would judge from the form of your wings. Have you a blazon?"

"I know naught."

"It is...the Wisogoth blazon covers the back. It s.h.i.+mmers with glamour.

A permanent marking."

"I have nothing like that."

"Perhaps you are not Enchanted?"

"Yet, I've glamour. That d.a.m.ned dust constantly spumes from me at the most inopportune moments."

"Interesting. I cannot figure this." How to possess glamour without Enchantment?

"You know Faery?" he inquired softly. "Tell me who you are, demoiselle. You are on a quest?"

"I am come from Faery," she confessed. "Glamoursiege, a tribe that borders the Netherdred. But I am mortal. Like you, I...am a changeling."

He tilted his head wonderingly.

That she had spoken the word secured it into her soul. A completely mortal soul. No essence of Faery within. In a rocking sway of unstoppable comprehension, Belief altered.

Lost to you now...Faery.

I bid you farewell...

Gossamyr stroked a finger under her eye. No tears. Just the memory of pain. "I am mortal, stolen from my cradle as a child and taken to Faery. I have lived there all my life because I...believed."

"Wondrous."

"And now I do not belong."

"Why not?"

"Because a mortal must Believe to Belong." Gossamyr twined her fingers together before her and pounded her balled hands to her forehead. "I have always believed myself to be born of a mortal woman and a Faery lord; only recently have I learned I am true mortal-that my birth parents are no longer."

"I am sorry."

Bouncing on antic.i.p.atory footsteps, she shook out her fingers and entreated, "Did you ever meet your faery parents?"

"Yes. My mother lives close to me now. My father...is dead. For the best; he was not fee."

"I see."

"That may be the reason I have glamour while you deem me without Enchantment. My father, he was...cruel. Of the angelic ranks. I am..."

"Quite astounding," Gossamyr offered.

Charmed by his smile, an easy charm and not gratuitous, Gossamyr knew she had found a friend.

"Why have you come to Paris, my lady?"

"I have left Faery to seek the Red Lady and destroy her. My father sent me, knowing no fee could approach the villainess without her seducing and killing them."

"You possess the powers of the fee?"

"No. I am Disenchanted, stripped of the little glamour I once held."

"Ah." He curved his hand before her, looking to caress her cheek, but he did not touch her. Only he smiled upon her with a calm look of peace that rea.s.sured he was friend not enemy. "What is your name?"

"Gossamyr," she said, and then looked to the ground. Overwhelmed, that is all she could feel here in the presence of such a regal man and the unicorn. Gossamyr Verity de Winters.h.i.+nn of Glamoursiege, false child of s.h.i.+nn. Avenall's words cut to her tender heart. Who was this Verity d'Ange?

The unicorn snorted at the sudden appearance of a man in the doorway. A froth of white beard tufted the door frame. Ulrich's uncle tilted his head, sensing those around him. "Who is about?"

"Monsieur LaLoux." Gossamyr approached the old man. "It is Gossamyr. I've come for Ulrich. Is he inside?"

"Ulrich? I've not spoken to him since last he was here with you, my lady."

"I told him to return anon. Where could he possibly-" Spinning her half staff, Gossamyr looked both ways down the dark street. "Oh, no."

"What is it?" Dominique calmed Tor with a palm to the beast's muzzle.

"She was calling to him earlier," Gossamyr said. "I should have never left her lair. The Red Lady has likely lured Ulrich and the alicorn to her."

"The alicorn?"

"Yes." She started walking the cobbles. "My friend was on a quest to return the alicorn to its rightful owner. I must hurry."

"I shall accompany you!"

"You cannot," she called to the changeling. "You would put yourself in harm's way should the Red Lady recognize you are fee. Stay with the unicorn; protect it."

"Very well," the changeling called. "But Tor does not take orders. He will go where he pleases, there is nothing I can do to stop him."

Gossamyr winced. A unicorn anywhere near the Red Lady was surely a dead unicorn. "If the beast knows what is good for it, it will stay far from the Red Lady's lair."

A protesting whinny and clomp of hooves preceded the charge of the unicorn. He cantered past Gossamyr. Close behind ran the changeling.

"Very well," Gossamyr said, picking up her pace to match the others. The smile of adventure emerged. "To charging head on into danger!"

The world undulated away from him. Or rather, he was being dragged, arms wrenched overhead and wrists clasped by pinching fingers. His muscles, stretching from pit to torso, screamed. Too dazed to struggle, Ulrich remarked the thick white candles flas.h.i.+ng fire sparkles across the walls. Stars stolen from the sky. The flickers of light moved away from him, appearing from wherever it was he was being dragged.

At his feet trailed a disturbing vision, the succubus who had kissed him -briefly. Not really a kiss though, more like she had moved close enough to kiss and had...inhaled his essence. Your soul, lackwit! She draws out your soul! Even so, that blithe moment had literally left him drained.

Lifting a knee, Ulrich thought to kick out, to put a stop to this.

"Ah, ah," the lady with the red marking on her face cooed-still he could but see a swath of her face where she had wiped his tears; it floated mysteriously above the white dress. She poked Ulrich with the tip of the alicorn.

Such fire! 'Twas as though he'd been pierced with a flame-red poker, when all she had done was touch it to his knee.

Drowsy with pain, Ulrich muttered, "Gossamyr?"

"Be that her name, then?" The Red Lady danced the alicorn in the air gaily, drawing a circle of iridescent glamour in its wake. "Gossamyr, s.h.i.+nn's false daughter?"

"The man knows not what he mumbles," the unseen voice from above Ulrich's head snapped. "Gossamyr is a common name."

Something gave a tug to one of Ulrich's wrists, making him cry out. He could not see who or what held him. A faery thing, curse them all!

"Why do you hide things from me, Puppy? There, in the torture chamber."