“Uh, I have another question,” said Susan. “Only it’s a bit intrusive. . . .”
“I am human,” said Merlin. “A human male at the moment, as it happens.”
“At the moment?”
“We are somewhat . . . shape-shiftery . . . I guess you could say,” replied Merlin. “I was born male, but I have been pondering if I should change.”
Susan didn’t answer for a moment, digesting this.
“You get to change that easily?”
“Oh, it’s not easy,” replied Merlin. “But much more possible for us than—”
He was interrupted by the sudden sound of a horn, not very far away, from deeper in the woods. Not a car horn, but the deep, long, drawn-out bellow of some large medieval instrument.
“What’s that?”
“The Shuck being called off, sent back to its source,” said Merlin. He had tensed; Susan could feel it through his shoulders. “The fog will dissipate, too. It’s an odd move; there’s still hours before dawn. I wish I knew who summoned it in the first place. It can’t have been Thringley.”
“What do we do?”
“Keep walking, but be ready to run, along the new path. Hear that? The fog’s clearing.”
The sounds of the city were coming back. Traffic; the deep, distant rumble of a train; indistinct voices on the wind. It was lighter, too, particularly back towards Lanchester Road, and intermittent flashes of blue light were coming through the trees.
“The police!”
“At your ‘uncle’ Frank’s house. They’ll have responded to the gunshots, at the least,” said Merlin. He was looking left and right and up into the trees. “I hope not too quickly, for their sake. Okay, the Shuck’s gone. Get ready—”
All of a sudden he pushed Susan violently to the ground. She heard something whoosh above her head as she struggled to get up and then a sudden harsh slap as Merlin’s left hand intercepted something, and he was pushing her back down again with his right. She rolled away and began to sit up, lying back down immediately as a white-fletched, red-shafted arrow whisked past and buried itself deep in the tree behind her.
Merlin batted another arrow away, his left hand moving so fast she could barely see it, his lithe body dancing to avoid another. But he couldn’t move fast enough to avoid the third, which struck him high on the right shoulder with a sound Susan wished she hadn’t heard. He spun around and fell on one knee, his yak-hair bag with the revolver falling from his shoulder. Without any conscious thought, Susan crawled for it, to get the revolver and fire back in the direction the arrows were coming from.
But Merlin hadn’t fallen to one knee. He’d knelt on purpose, hitching up his trouser leg to draw a small automatic pistol from an ankle holster. This one he fired right-handed, while his left hand continued to deflect arrows up and away, protecting both himself and Susan.
The smaller pistol’s shots were much quieter than the big revolver, which Susan was still trying to extract from the bag. Almost like a sharp dog’s bark, but the flash was bright and Merlin fired fast, eight shots in quick succession. After his fifth shot, there were no more arrows.
Susan got the revolver out, holding it in two hands. She’d fired shotguns, and ironically was a fair archer, but she’d never fired a handgun before. Still, it seemed simple enough.
“No, no . . . put it down,” said Merlin. He put his back against a tree trunk and his left hand gripped the shaft of the arrow. “Police’ll be here . . . any minute . . . from Frank’s . . .”
“Who fired the arrows?”
“A Raud Alfar warden . . . I guess awakened by the Shuck . . . ah . . . intrusion. That’s why Shuck . . . called off . . . should have . . . have thought of the Raud Alfar . . . propitiated them with gifts. . . .”
“Did you kill . . . er . . . this warden?”
“No . . . gunfire drives . . . off. Sometimes. Machine sounds . . .”
Susan left the revolver on the bag for easy access and crawled over to Merlin. In the moonlight she could see the arrow was embedded below his shoulder bone, and his shirt and the mustard-colored coat were already sodden with blood. She hadn’t looked at him up close until now, but she didn’t have time to dwell on how handsome he was, because he was much paler than he should be and his breath was coming in short, controlled gasps.
“I need . . . your . . . help. A silver vial in my left . . . waistcoat pock . . . get . . . good . . . open it . . . swish and hold in your mouth . . . yes, I know . . . and hold . . . I’m going to break arrow, push it through. Soon as I do, spit into . . . wound.”
Whatever was in the vial was disgusting, but Susan swished it from cheek to cheek and held it. Merlin snapped the shaft easily with his left hand, letting out a small gasp, his face twisted in pain. He gasped again as he started pushing the shaft through, and tears welled up in his eyes.
“Pull . . . pull it through . . . and spit. . . .” he whispered, fainting, and fell forward, the bloodied arrowhead thrust clear out of his back.
Susan clamped her lips on a sob. Holding the precious fluid in, she reached over and pulled both halves of the broken arrow out, front and back. Throwing them away, she bent down close and spat into the wound. Pale blue-green light spilled from her mouth, like burning brandy on a Christmas pudding, but without heat, the cold flames licking about the hole in the coat before sinking into the flesh beneath.
Susan sat back and wiped her mouth, but there was no light in her saliva now. Whatever the strange fluid had done, it hadn’t brought Merlin back to consciousness. As gently as she could she laid him down and stripped off his coat. Taking the pocket square from it, she folded a pad and held it against the exit wound on his back, while she kept direct pressure with the palm of her other hand against the hole in his chest.
It was hard to see, but she thought he was still bleeding, and she couldn’t tell if his chest was moving.
She bent closer, hoping she would catch the sound of breathing, but instead she heard heavy footsteps behind her, and the white beam of a flashlight suddenly lit up the area, sending her shadow across Merlin’s body.
“Stop! Armed Police! Show me your hands!”
Chapter Three
No sorcerer can compare
For such magic strange and rare
As in the glov’d bookseller’s lair
But secrets, nay, they will not share
HALF AN HOUR LATER, SUSAN WAS UNDER THE HARSH FLUORESCENT lights in an interview room at Highgate Police Station, having at first been arrested for suspected murder by a rather excited armed constable and then five minutes later informed by a passive-aggressive sergeant that maybe that wasn’t right but now that it had been done they had to go through the motions at least, which apparently was her fault as well. At least they’d taken the handcuffs off before the short walk to the station, and once there had let her wash the blood off her hands, and given her tea and biscuits.
The uncertainty about her status centered around Merlin, as far as she could tell from the muttered conversations that started once the sergeant got a look at a black leather case from the elegant young man’s suit pocket, which contained an identification card that sent the sergeant straight on the radio to higher authorities. Merlin was being worked on by two ambulance attendants at that stage, and Susan was relieved to hear them talking as if he was still alive and, surprisingly, not too seriously injured.