Chapter 26 #3
“But the office of Sorcerer Royal is not merely reserved for the magician that can prove himself most powerful,” said Lord Burrow.
“One of its purposes is to preserve our traditions of magic, and the Sorcerer Royal’s familiar is not the least of these.
The Sorcerer Royal must have Leofric as well as the staff.
Since it appears Mr. Wythe retains Leofric as his familiar, he cannot simply relinquish the staff and expect to be divested of his office. ”
“I assure you,” said Zacharias wearily, “if I could be free of Leofric, I would.”
Prunella was not particularly interested in the discussion.
It was clear to her that she was Sorceress Royal, and if the Society wished to quarrel with the fact now, they would soon think better of it.
Leofric, however, was a subject in which she had considerable interest, and she felt no compunction in interrupting the Committee’s ditherings for this.
“Have not you tried persuading Leofric to leave you, Zacharias?” she said. “I think we ought to have it out with him, ought we not? He seems a wretched inconvenience. I am sure we could find you a better familiar.”
“There is nothing to have out,” said Zacharias shortly. “Our agreement was clear. In any case, even I am unable to converse with Leofric. Our communication takes place by other means.”
“I suppose you mean your midnight visitations!” said Prunella. “It all sounds very unpleasant. I think we ought to speak to him by ordinary means.”
Zacharias opened his mouth, doubtless to object, but Prunella’s familiars had explained his arrangement with Leofric, and it did not seem to her that it would be difficult to extract the dragon.
The procedure might cause Zacharias some discomfort, but if she acted quickly enough, he would scarcely notice it.
Since his mouth was already open, she decided to take time by the forelock, and plunged her arm down his throat.
“Good God!” cried Damerell.
Zacharias was choking around Prunella’s arm—a horrible sensation—but she resolutely ignored it, and rummaged about.
Leofric did not, of course, occupy Zacharias’s physical insides, much though it might feel like it to Zacharias.
He inhabited instead a magical space that happened to overlap with Zacharias’s vitals.
Fortunately Leofric was the only inhabitant, and Prunella soon found what she was after: a bony limb, covered with scales. She grasped hold of it.
Prunella withdrew her arm in triumph. Zacharias was clutching at his chest, his face twisted in a grimace. He bent over, his hand pressed to his heart, and let loose an enormous sneeze.
“Is this he?” said Prunella.
A dragon sat on the floor, looking astonished. It was far smaller than Rollo, and not half as attractive, for its skin was leathery with age, and its amber eyes had a hardened, cynical look.
“Good day, Leofric,” said Zacharias. He looked somewhat dazed. “May I present to you the Sorceress Royal?”
Leofric had clearly not been attending to the goings-on outside Zacharias, for he said:
“A Sorceress Royal? I agreed to serve you only upon the condition that you held the staff.”
“Your agreement is precisely what I wished to speak to you about,” said Prunella. “What good does your bond do Zacharias, if you are forever gnawing away at his insides and making him indisposed?”
Leofric gave her an incredulous look.
“Zacharias has access to the profoundest depths and most exalted heights of magic,” he said. “I have bestowed upon him the gift of an ageless wisdom, and an understanding of the mysteries of sorcery surpassing the ken of ordinary mortals.”
“If ordinary mortals can do without, I cannot see why Zacharias should not be content with a comprehension only of those mysteries that fall within their ken,” said Prunella.
“Would not you consider terminating the agreement? You could return to Fairyland. I am told it is a prodigiously agreeable place.”
“The agreement will only be terminated when I have received my payment,” said Leofric, with hauteur.
“I accepted Zacharias’s soul in exchange for Stephen’s, on the understanding that I could begin to exact payment while he was still alive.
As matters stand, I have rendered service to two sorcerers, and have enjoyed the benefit of only a portion of one soul. ”
“But,” argued Prunella, “if Zacharias were to live till he were seventy—which let us say he will, because the Bible says so, though it would be no surprise were he to be killed off earlier, living as he does in a nest of snakes and scorpions in human form—if, as I said, he were to live to a ripe old age, defying assassins, and being Sorcerer Royal all that time, that would require of you forty-six years of bondage. You have only rendered Zacharias a few months of service. Even if we were to be generous and allow it to be a year, you would only be entitled to one sorcerer, in compensation for your service to Sir Stephen, and two percent of another.”
Prunella was delighted with this calculation, which she had invented as she spoke, and thought rather clever. Leofric seemed less pleased.
“I am not sure I like your purported successor, Zacharias,” he said.
“Nor do any of us,” said Mr. Plimpton.
“You will have to recover the staff,” said Leofric to Zacharias—speaking as though Prunella were not there at all! “It was shockingly careless of you to have lost it.”
Prunella saw that she was losing her audience’s attention.
She had hoped to avoid what she must do—what she had planned since she had heard Zacharias’s account of how he had come to be Sorcerer Royal—but there was nothing for it.
The alternative was to permit Leofric to continue tormenting Zacharias, with the certain result that Zacharias would be bound for an early grave, and that was not to be thought of.
“You have not heard me out, Leofric, but I think you ought,” said Prunella.
She must be calm, and keep her mind clear as glass, or the familiars would begin to suspect her intentions.
“Zacharias promised you one mortal in exchange for two. But what if I were to offer you something else entirely? Another type of feast, far better, far finer, not to be compared with mortal flesh or spirit? Would not that settle the balance?”
A gleam of interest lit Leofric’s eyes.
“Speak further,” he said—but then her meaning struck him. He reared back, squealing, a noise that startled the thaumaturges, and sent Tjandra fluttering up to the ceiling.
Prunella did not take her eyes off the dragon.
“Which would you offer me?” growled Leofric.
“The oldest. It is best,” said Prunella. Her hands were trembling. She clenched them into fists. She would need them soon. She would need to act at once, quicker than thought. “But you must release Zacharias from his bond. Say it now.”
“Yes,” said Leofric, and Prunella’s hand flashed out. She seized Nidget by the scruff of its neck, and, with a strength she had not thought she possessed, threw the elvet at Leofric.
Leofric darted forward. A snap of his jaws, a heartrending wail from Nidget, and Nidget vanished.
Zacharias sat down abruptly. The other magicians were pale with shock.
Prunella observed that the trembling in her hands had spread to the rest of her person. She felt as though she had been hollowed out.
But it had had to be done, and she had her mother’s own capacity for ruthlessness. The daughter of a Grand Sorceress—the heir to the Seven Spirits—could not hesitate to act for fear of any consequence.
“Tjandra, Youko—to me,” said Prunella quietly.
There was a moment of doubt, when it was not clear what the simurgh and the unicorn would choose: loyalty, or rebellion. Out of the corner of her eye, Prunella saw Zacharias reach for his staff, before he recollected that it was no longer his.
She was not afraid. And her lack of fear—her certainty that her familiars would come to her—communicated itself to them. The familiars valued fidelity, but above all, they esteemed power.
They came to her hand, as she had never doubted they would: first Youko, bowing her head to be stroked, and then Tjandra, perching on her shoulder, and burying his face meekly in her hair.
Lord Burrow collapsed into his chair. Damerell swore in a low voice.
Prunella raised her head and looked at Leofric.
“It suffices?” Her voice was rough, as if she had been weeping, though she had not made a sound. She touched her cheek, and saw that her hand was wet. She had not noticed the tears rolling down her face.
Leofric swallowed and let out a contented sigh.
“The debt is discharged,” he said.
Damerell was clearly shaken, but he said:
“It strikes me that a fairy, in return for one and a bit of a mortal, goes far beyond an equal exchange. Indeed, it seems to me that you are somewhat in Miss Gentleman’s debt.”
“The agreement—” began Leofric.
“Oh, leave off your rules-lawyering, pray,” said Damerell. “Rollo always said this was why you were so disliked at Court. You may call it a fair bargain, and perhaps it will suit Miss Gentleman to agree, but how will the Fairy Court view your devouring one of its subjects?”
“You would never tell the Court. It would make Miss Gentleman too unpopular,” said Leofric—but this line of talk seemed to make him nervous.
“The honour of mortals is not much esteemed in Fairyland anyway,” said Damerell. “It may even be said that a fairy that submits itself to the indignities of mortal service deserves whatever it gets. But the Court is likely to take a very different view of a dragon who eats its own kin.”
He lowered his quizzing-glass and began to polish it.
“Of course,” he continued, “if the, ah, devourer in question were a familiar of Miss Gentleman’s, I should not dream of breathing a word to anyone.
Miss Gentleman is a friend of mine. A ravening dragon to whom one has no connection may be criminal, but the familiar of a friend can only be eccentric. ”