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King Goldoblin’s ears, snarled into the heart of their talk “Who cares? If a vampire I must be to live and dance and howl at the sun, then let me show my teeth! They paid their price, we’re fools not to take it! To have let them hoard it all this tiht to turn the wheel again I shall drink it and live forever and rule forever and eat forever and turn utterly to gold—don’t you look at my arm like it’s poison!—and none of you will ever be able to stick a knife in !”
“No,” Mallow said softly, but in her voice moved a hardness she had always known she owned in some deep cupboard of her heart, but rarely taken out, even for co cold and implacable She strode forward and leveled her needle-sword at the King’s throat It joined there a sudden and unexpected green lance, balanced in the Green Wind’s lovely, jeweled hand The Wind’s stare could have curdled stone, but she said nothing
It happened so quickly Mallow could not afterward say for certain who reen lance as easily as a branch and seized the Green Wind’s neck in his fleshy fist As soon as he turned fro but a needle as she was, Mallow buried her blade in his side The Winds sprang toward their sister, and Mabry, too, all screa and Mallow could not even hear herself think Blood gushed warht blood, and full of stars Goldether and pushed them into the Green Wind’s throat Green tears spilled froed as he worked his hands into her
And then the King reeled, screeching Black starry blood streamed everywhere in inky ribbons Mabry Muscat had drawn the Blue Wind’s azure cutlass and sliced Goldround, clawing at the severed ar in the spreading blood Mallow tugged her needle free of the King’s sodden body And three things happened in the same moment:
Gold around Mabry Muscat’s throat and tying off before he could gasp The light blew out of his eyes and his body fell to the streetside
The Leopard of Little Breezes roared so loud and long every soul in Fairyland clapped hands over their ears
Goldmouth’s broken hand opened on the cobblestones beside the body of the Green Wind In its golden palreen leaf
A great battle followed—but that is not ie, and the Great Cats of Nephelo rose up to fight thereat, stormy sky In years hence they would call the battle the Nor’Easter, for its squalls turned the heavens black and brought rain onto every head The Red Wind shot so o, her Panther, tore so many with his teeth that afterward she would be called Cloudwyf, and the cowed nation of clouds would be hers to rule and ride A bonny knight, Mallow rode upon Ien, the Leopard of Little Breezes With her needle stitched cloud to cloud until a thread of wind pierced a hundred hearts all in a row Great cries were uttered, loyalties made, and far below the people of Fairyland fled home or took up their brooms and bird-mounts and carpets to join the fray Grandbabies would be told of the day, rest you certain
But that is a battle story, and battle stories belong to those who fight them How a battle feels is i rip It felt like a weight landing upon me, over and over It felt like red It felt like a bell unringing forever What can be told is that when Mallow and her Leopard and the Red Wind and all her brothers and sisters landed, Gold in between his breaths Beside hiers stood whole and with so ered to see it But beside the sorrow lay a rueful hued, and only now did these two youths catch the punch line
One was a pretty young wo hair and a si from it She wore a bonnet of valerian and heartsease The color in her cheeks gleamed rich as bread and sun-rosy, and her feet were bare
The other was a man with a neat, pointed beard and kindly eyes which had becoreen sreen jodhpurs, and green snowshoes In his hands he held a long green lance, quite whole
“He died to save her,” the Leopard growled “And now he must take her place It’s different for
each Wind Red will need to be tricked by her replaceown Gold will be killed So it goes Long ago, a girl named Jenny Chicory loved a boy, andon the Great Hunt She drowned saving a little boy in green, a boy she did not know froer, from a pirate band with a whale on their side She could not let hireen with a job to do and no more a happy maid with a suitor at her door Now Mabry’s done it, and he can’t take it back, nor go home with her to Winesap any ales of the upper Fairyland heavens would shatter her, as they would have shattered hie to meet at sea, where the sails droop and crow’s nests swelter I iine they’ll keep that date”
Jenny looked at her Leopard with a grand and sorry love “We are used to it,” she said thickly “And storms must sometimes come to Winesap, too”
Mallow looked down at the dying King His breath did not stop or slow—a clurichaun his age had reserves of aiting to be tested He ht live years in distress but not die She considered what to do She considered the Gre Pandeoblet and that blue and cloudy blood, the wettest of all possible Wet Magics,with all the other blood that had poured out onto the square, wretched, dull, of use to no one