The unicorn reared and threw her to the grass. With a thunderous indignant snort, the animal fled. Alianora sprang up and glared at Holger and Morgan, “Now see wha’ ye ha’ done!” she wailed irrationally. “He’ll ne’er comeback!”
Holger disentangled himself. Alianora burst into tears.
“Get that peasant wench out of here! “ cried Morgan in a fury.
Alianora flared up. “Get away yourself!” she screeched. “Foul witch that ye be, get away from him!”
The queen’s teeth gleamed forth. “Holger, if that beanpole betake herself not hence this very minute—”
“Beanpole!” yelled Alianora. “Why, ye overstuffed flesh-pot. I’ll claw your popeyes out!”
“Little girls shouldn’t cry,” snarled Morgan. “They’ll grow up even homelier than they are.”
Alianora clenched her fists and stalked closer. “Better a wee bit young than ha’ my skin sag wi’ eld.”
“You have such pretty skin,” hissed Morgan. “How did you ever achieve that peeling-sunburn effect?”
“Not in the shop where ye bought your complexion,” said Alianora.
Holger crept aside, wondering how to get out of this alive. “I see you’re a swan-may,” said Morgan. “Have you laid any good eggs lately?”
“Nay. I canna cackle so shrill as some old hens.”
Morgan flushed and raised her hands in a violent pass. “See how you like being a hen yourself!”
“Hey!” Holger leaped forward. He didn’t intend to strike her, but one arm encountered Morgan and the queen went rolling over in the grass.
“None of that,” he gasped.
She got slowly to her feet. Color and expression had alike departed her countenance. “So that is how it stands,” she said.
“I guess it is,” said Holger, and wondered if he meant it.
“Well, have your way, then. We’ll meet again, my friend.” Morgan laughed, an ugly sound this time, and waved. Suddenly she was gone. There was a bang as air rushed in where she had stood.
Alianora began to cry in earnest. She leaned against a tree bole and buried her face in one arm. When Holger went to lay a hand on her shoulder, she shook him off. “Go away,” she mumbled. “G-g-g-o off wi’ your witch, sith she p-p-please ye so well. Uh-h-h—”
“It wasn’t my fault,” said Holger helplessly. “I didn’t ask her to come.”
“I willna hearken, I tell ye. Go away.”
Holger decided he had troubles enough without a hysterical female on his hands. He pulled her around, shook her, and said between his teeth, “I have nothing to do with this. Hear? Now will you come along like a grown human being, or must I drag you?”
Alianora gulped, stared at him with wide wet eyes, and dropped her lashes. He noticed how long they were. “I’ll come wi’ ye,” she said meekly.
Holger got his pipe going again and fumed most of the way back. Damn, damn, damn, and damn! Almost, there with Morgan le Fay, he had remembered that other life. Almost, and now the knowledge was gone again.
Well, too late. From this day on she’d doubtless be his bitterest opponent. Though in all frankness it was probably a good thing that they’d been interrupted. He couldn’t have held out against her blandishments much longer.
And the worst part was, he rather wished he hadn’t. Who had written that line about nothing being so futile as the memory of a temptation resisted?
Too late. He’d just have to carry on.
His buried self shot a gleam into his conscious mind, and he knew why the unicorn had departed. Morgan le Fay must have been the last straw on its outraged sensibilities—or the last dozen straws. That made him chuckle, and he took Alianora’s hand. They walked back to camp side by side.
12
THEY WERE NOT PLAGUED that night, which Hugi said was without doubt because something worse was being prepared. Holger was inclined to share the dwarf’s pessimism. And now they had only one mount, for three people. Of course Alianora could spend some of her travel time aloft; but swans aren’t hovering birds, and they dared not let her get too far ahead. However great his endurance, Papillon couldn’t carry a large warrior in chain mail, a girl, a half-pint man, and their gear, at anything like his normal speed.