“But you were all free.”
“The Hell Beasts have been bound to the Pit of Hell. We are not totally free.”
Melissa considered this as she moved to the next cell and looked in at the Toad. He lay sprawled on the stone floor, asleep. He was huge, nearly filling the cell. A lumpish beast, his green skin was covered with warts, his pale throat ballooning with each breath. Before she could try to wake him, the Harpy reached around with an icy hand and pulled her away.“If you wake him he’ll blow himself into a stinking air ball. Phew. He won’t speak to you.”
Melissa’s head was beginning to ache. “Are there human prisoners here?”
“Behind that wall.” The Harpy pointed a white finger toward the featureless black interior of the cellar.
Melissa cast her spell-light, picking out barrels and shadowed pillars, and beyond these, a stone wall grown over with moss.“Do you know the spell to open it?”
The Harpy laughed, darting her pink tongue between sharp teeth.“Do you think I’d be in here if could commandany of her spells? Do you think I haven’t tried?” And quite suddenly the beast began to cry. Heaving sobs shook her, tears coursed down her white feathers, darkening the brown streaks. When at last the beast stopped crying, her eyes were red, andher voice was sharp with self-pity. “I thought you came to free me, but you didn’t.You wanted the human prisoners. I’ll never get out of this cell. I’ll never see my little mirror again.”
“What mirror?” Melissa asked, frowning.
“My mirror was my only companion, my only legacy from my dead mother, and that bitch queen has taken it from me. If you cannot free me I’ll never see it again. Never.” The Harpy combed distracted fingers through her feathers, and one white feather floated to the cell floor.
Melissa reached through the bars and took the Harpy’s hand, trying to comfort her. “Why did the queen take your mirror?”
“I wouldn’t bring images for her.”
“I don’t understand. The queen fears images.”
“She fears images in the present,” the Harpy said patiently. “My mirror could show the past. There is something in the past she wants to see.”
“Then can you show me my past? I don’t need the Toad. You can tell me who I am.”
The Harpy stared at her cannily.
“I can remember nothing of my childhood,” Melissa said. She considered the beast warily, searching its small cold eyes.
“I cannot bring any image,” the Harpy said assessing Melissa with a keen avian stare. “Unless you steal my little mirror for me.”
“Could you show me my childhood? Could you show me who my parents are? And where I come from?”
“If I had my mirror, I could show you those things.”
“Where does she keep your mirror?”
“Itwas in her chambers, but not anymore. I can speak to my mirror from any distance. I made it give her images that drove her to nervous trembles.” The Harpy laughed. “She couldn’t rid herself of them. She kept taking my mirror out and looking, like digging your finger into a sore wound. Atlast she moved it to the king’s chambers.”
“How can you know where it is if you can’t bring visions without it?”
“It calls to me. Every night my little mirror calls to me. Oh, I know where it lies hidden—in a wardrobe in the king’s chambers. But that is not a vision, that is love calling.”
“If I get it for you, will you show me my past?”
The Harpy reached through the bars to stroke Melissa’s arm. “If you bring my mirror, I will give you whatever vision you choose.”
“It would be terribly dangerous to go to the king’s chambers.”
“Two visions. And you will be safe enough; she never goes to his chambers anymore. Nor has the king slept in her bed since the weakling prince was born. The queen blames the king for the child’s illness.” The Harpy smiled. “The king blames her. He was a fool to marry her. Of course, he is still a fool. Go when the queen is at supper.”
“If I were caught thieving in the king’s chambers…”
“Everything in life is dangerous.”
“I could be killed for such a thing. The laws would call it treason, to steal from the king’s chambers.”
“Three visions.”
“As many visions as I choose.”
“You already have the best of the bargain. The king will be no problem; any woman can twist him around one finger. All you need do is climb into his bed, and you can have anything.”
“I do not intend to climb into his bed.”
The Harpy smiled wickedly.“If you did not, that would be an opportunity lost, my dear. Think of it. The right woman has only to take herself to the king’s bed to become the new queen of Affandar.” She clasped her long white hands together. “Oh, I would like to see someone dispossess that bitch.”
“If I steal the mirror, you will give me all the visions I choose.”
“Five visions. That is my last offer.” The Harpy fluffed her feathers, stirring ancient dust. “Someday the Netherworld kings and queens will fall andwe will rule again. The Hell Beasts will rule again.”
“Five visions,” Melissa said. “But you must describe to me the queen’s powers so I know them exactly.”
“Everyone knows her powers.”
“I don’t. And I must know them if I am to steal the mirror.”
The Harpy sighed with exasperation, as if Melissa were very dull.“A daughter of Lillith can open all that closes and close all that opens: locks and spell-doors, of course. And she can open a were-beast to his alter shape. And she can close his power to change. But her real strength lies in this:
“Siddonie can close away truth so only falsehood remains.
“Thus does she mean to twist the peasants so they follow her: she means to close their minds to truth. Thus,” said the Harpy, “does she mean to enslave the Netherworld.”
“And can nothing prevent her?”
“Many powers united might prevent her.” The Harpy looked hard at Melissa. “The power of the Catswold might prevent her.”
“Who are the Catswold?”
The Harpy stared at her, her eyes opening wide.“The Catswold are shape-shifting folk of the eastern nations.” She searched Melissa’s face. “You know nothing of the Catswold?”
“No, nothing.” Uneasily she looked back at the womanbird. “How can there be people in the Netherworld that I don’t know about?” But she was reminded uncomfortably of the forgetting spells Mag wove over her when they visited the villages, those little deaf spells that had touched her in the middle of numerous conversations.
“The Catswold have many powers,” the Harpy said. “But Catswold folk are independent and stubborn.” She looked hard again at Melissa. “They will not easily unite, even to defeat Siddonie. Likely the Catswold will never organize into a formidable force against the queen, as the elven and the human rebels are organizing.”
“How many rebels are imprisoned?” Melissa said impatiently. “When were the last ones brought down?”
“There are twenty-nine rebels here. The last three were brought five days ago. Siddonie tortured them. Their screaming kept me awake.”
“You heard them through those thick stone walls?”
“My hearing, like my eyesight, is quite wonderful.”
“When the queen tortured them, what information did she ask?”
“I couldn’t hearher, just their screams. But she would want to know the rebels’ plans, and she would want to know the names of their leaders.”
“Couldn’t you have shown her that, in your mirror?”
“Why should I? That is part of why she locked me here, because I wouldn’t help her.” The Harpy wiped her bill on her shoulder.
“You side with the rebels, then,” Melissa said hopefully.
“I side with no one,” the Harpy snapped. “Siddonie drew me out of the Pit with her cursed spells, and then she took my mirror. I want to see her dead. But I do not side with the rebels. Now go and fetch my mirror.”