“Yes,” Matt said slowly, “I’d say that was a good reason not to start flying again. Stegoman, do you mind a hike?”
“It is not my favorite form of travel,” the dragon grumped.
“Maybe we can get by if we scrunch down on your back and fly low,” Matt suggested. “They’re looking for me, but they’re not looking for a dragon.” He turned back to the djinna. “Either way, we stand a lot better chance of survival, now that we’re warned. Thanks.”
“It is my pleasure, though not pleasure enough.” Her eyelids drooped, her smile became lazy and inviting, and she radiated allure again. “Are you certain there is no other service you wish from your handmaid?”
Matt didn’t want to see the hand that had made her. “Not at the moment, thanks… but I’m sure we’ll meet again.”
“Oh, be very sure,” Lakshmi said with a sultry smile. “We shall meet again indeed. Until then, farewell, O most considerate of wizards.”
But her words had a sarcastic tone to them, and as she faded from sight, Matt didn’t know whether to sigh with relief or moan with disappointment. He compromised with a shudder. “I tell you, Papa, I’ve had a lot of run-ins with a lot of strange spirits and creatures here, but in some ways, I think that was the most dangerous!”
“She may have been indeed,” Papa agreed. “Son, have you begun to find amusement in dancing with tigers?”
“Well, I didn’t want to hurt her felines. Seems I remember a certain party telling me I should always be polite to strange women,” Matt said, with a pointed glance.
“Well, yes, but I didn’t mean that strange,” Papa said. “Still, I am quite proud of you, my son… I had not known that you had developed such a way with the ladies.”
Matt frowned. “Just being polite, the way you taught me.”
“Yes, but I did not teach you to win their hearts as a matter of course.”
“Oh, come on now! All I did was throttle her most murderous intentions!”
“You don’t know?” Papa said with surprise. “Your spells did considerably more than that, my son.”
“Oh?” Matt felt a very nasty sensation of foreboding creeping over him. “What else?”
“That line I had doubts about, where you told her to ‘Hearken ever to love’s call’? That, plus verse after verse praising her beauty and allure? They made her fall in love with you, at least as much as her kind seem able to do!”
“Which means fall in lust.” Matt shivered. “Help, Papa! I just got myself in deep trouble!”
“Courage, my son.” Papa clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Maybe the spells didn’t include a compulsion.”
“Yeah, but maybe they did.” Matt frowned. “Come to think of it, though, I did follow them with a spell that liberated her from compulsions.”
“Yes, and told her she was free to go where she wished.”
“Yeah,” Matt said with relief, then frowned again. “Let’s just hope she doesn’t wish to go where I go.”
“That could be a problem,” Papa admitted.
Matt remembered that Solomon had originally imprisoned djinn in bottles and lamps because they were so dangerous. He hoped he hadn’t made a very bad mistake.
“You are on the side of the angels,” Papa said by way of reassurance. “Surely they will protect you from your enemies.”
“Enemies I can deal with,” Matt said. “Who’s going to protect me from my new friend?”
Saul and Mama began their acquaintance with a strategy conference. She was very patient with his prickliness, and he came out of the meeting with a high respect for her as a person, a strategist, and a diplomat. She didn’t seem to be the slightest bit paranoid, but she did manage to think of every conceivable enemy who might come against them and how those enemies might attack, even though she claimed to know nothing about matters military.
“I have read the old epics,” she explained, “the Songs of El Cid and of Roland, of The Madness of Roland and The Death of Arthur. I have learned from them which enemies came, and how they attacked.”
It made fine sense to Saul. He had learned from his association with Matt that a literary education in his birth-universe was an excellent preparation for life in this one. So they set out their sentries, established patrols, and took turns walking the battlements, making the rounds with a word of cheer for each sentry and the occasional brief conversation that let them come to know every soldier as a human being. So it happened that Saul was on the ramparts when he saw a rider raising a dust cloud fifty feet long, streaking flat-out toward the castle gate. “What man is that?” he asked the nearest sentry. The man shaded his eyes and peered “I cannot see clearly, Witches’ Doctor, but he wears our livery.”
“Hoist the portcullis and let him in!” Then Saul ran for the nearest steps, heading down to the courtyard.
The rider pounded into the bailey and reined in his horse Saul ran up. “What’s the news, man?”
“Moors!” the rider gasped. “Ships with triangular sails! Our squadron was riding patrol and saw them sailing up the river toward Bordestang! Fifty at least, perhaps a hundred! The fleet went on as far as we could see!”
Saul stared. His first thought was, Where did they come from? His second thought was how to stop them, but his third thought was that he couldn’t tell without more information. “The rest of your squadron still scouting?”
The man gulped air and nodded. “They ride behind the cover of the trees atop the ridge that runs beside the river, to learn what they may of this sudden enemy. They sent me to bear word. By your leave, my lord, I should ride to rejoin them.”
“Sure.” Saul was oddly touched by the man’s devotion to his buddies. “But rest for an hour and take a little food and ale first, okay?”
The man nodded his thanks, still gasping, and Saul turned away, heading for the solar. “I think Lady Mantrell needs to be told about this right away.” He didn’t even realize that he had promoted Mama… she hadn’t officially been ennobled yet. But what else do you call the queen’s mother-in-law? The solar door was open. Saul nodded to the guards and went in. “Mrs Mantrell, a little problem has just come up.”
Mama looked up from a huge leatherbound geography book. “What kind, Saul?”
“A hundred ships full of Moors. Maybe more. A lot more.”
Mama stared. Then she said, “Where did they come from?”
“Just what I said,” Saul answered. “I think the answer is ‘Morocco.’ “
“Yes, of course,” Mama said impatiently, “but how?”
“Nice question, now that you mention it. I never knew the Moors were sailors.” Saul frowned, thinking.
“The Rifs and Berbers were not, but the Arabs had excellent fleets,” Mama reminded him. Saul lifted his head, wide-eyed. “The Moors could have borrowed them!”
“They had sources for a fleet, surely,” Mama agreed, “and they did have a small colony on the European side of Gibraltar, no?”
“Yes,” Saul said, surprised at her knowledge… but why shouldn’t she know Spanish history as well as he knew English? “In fact, ‘Gibraltar’ is the English form of an Arabic name,” Mama went on, “Tariq, the general who conquered that first European province. Since the Moors hold both sides of the Strait, Algerian ships could pass with ease.”
“And around the Spanish coast to the mouth of the Seine!” Saul nodded. “Now that I think of it, Alisande has built an excellent army, but I’ve never heard anyone say much about a navy! They just sailed right on up the river without anybody so much as asking to see a passport!”
“We must send a courier to the queen.” Mama rose. “Let us hope that courier reaches her… there will be many Moors, and many agents of their sorcerers, between Her Majesty and our rider.”
“I can do a backup on that,” Saul told her. “I can send word to your son… if he looks into puddles now and then, the way I told him.”