My mother had learned her lessons well, gentle reader, and by this stage of her life, she refused to go into any situation unprepared. For this action, she knew she had to do her homework like never before. She would get only one shot at this, and if her preparations were anything less than meticulous, she would fail. Perhaps even die.
Thanks to Xarnas, she had done the theory, and her magic was as prepared as it was ever going to be. There was just one more factor to consider: the lay of the land. If she were going to impress Dreya the Dark, she would have to confront her in her own grounds. Typically, of course, the land was a friend to my mother, but these lands were different. They had once belonged to Ulvarius, but Dreya had tamed them and made them her own.
It was the night before Midsummer, and under cover of darkness, Cat flew over Sylfrania in the form of a tawny owl. Unsurprisingly, the whole Faery woodlands were in full bloom. Midsummer’s Day was a big day of romance in Faery culture and a traditional day for prominent weddings. As a Quarthonian Faery, she wasn’t up with Sylfranian politics, but doubtless both communities would be busy tomorrow.
Passing over Ainderbury and crossing into human lands, she found a quiet perch in a tree in Gaggleswick, close to the Black Tower, and took a moment to rest and go over her plan. In this form, she was hopeful that she could scout Dreya’s lands with impunity. In truth, she had no way of knowing how far Dreya’s powers of detection might extend, but this was the best she could do. She had decided to forgo any red bands, confident that she was too focused on her goal to lose herself. In fact, she was mostly ready to let go of that crutch altogether, except for her red-banded falcon, just because it was the first form she’d successfully used and after so long, it wouldn’t feel right without the red bands. Catriona was encouraged when a passing barn owl seemed to take a liking to her. If another owl was convinced of her ‘owliness’ and did not find anything strange about her, she was hopeful that any detection magic would be equally unconcerned.
Resuming her flight and crossing into Dreya’s lands, she could see Xarnas had not exaggerated about the beauty of Dreya’s grounds, now that she had had time to work on them. In fact, Cat grudgingly admitted that she couldn’t have done much better herself. Dreya had transformed this patch of nature, freeing it from a three-hundred-year curse. It would not easily be turned against her. Catriona had prepared for this, however. That’s why she was here.
As I have said previously, gentle reader, my mother routinely carried nature with her, but for this, she needed to go one step further and plant the literal seeds of success in Dreya’s grounds.
She had been carrying plant seeds in her beak since she transformed, and now she let them fall onto the ground beneath her. She was glad to spit them out, but it had been the only way. Using her pocket dimension magic here would no doubt set off all kinds of alarm bells, which would be counter-productive, to say the least. As it was, she only had to use a tiny bit of druid magic, in essence, whispering to the soil to move ever so slightly, to cover the seeds, and encouraging them to begin to quietly germinate. Job done, for now, she flew away to get some rest. She would be back in the middle of the day in a different form.
*****
At noon the next day, as the sun beat down upon the Black Tower, a red-banded falcon was perched on a tree just outside the grounds observing, with her sharp eyes, the black-robed woman sitting on the steps of the Tower, reading a book of magic and occasionally sipping on a glass of wine. The bird also observed the patches of greenery that had grown overnight. Plants that wouldn’t look at all out of place unless the observer was keenly in tune with nature. Certainly not the undead guards that served as groundskeepers. The stage was set, the player was ready. Time for the performance to begin.
Gliding silently to the ground, Catriona reverted to her natural form, pulling her clothes and spell ingredients out of her pocket dimension, as well as her bow and arrows. She was nervous but embraced the butterflies as she walked calmly but purposefully towards the ornate iron gate that opened into Dreya’s gardens.
The groundskeepers paid her no heed. Dreya didn’t often entertain visitors, but neither did she kill everyone who set foot on her land. Her guards and defences would react only in the event of a threat to Dreya herself. Cat had to make sure to not play her hand too soon. For now, she had to walk and wait.
After a few minutes, Catriona arrived at the optimum distance from where Dreya sat and, making no sudden movements, came to a natural halt. Tied to the end of her arrows, along with her trademark red fletching, were roses – some red, some white. Being careful of the thorns, she nocked a non-matching pair and let them fly, swiftly followed by another and a third. The half dozen arrows never got close to Dreya, sailing high and wide to stick to her doorframe, thanks to some magically modified tree resin on the flattened tips. From there, the flowers grew into a rosebush that blocked the entrance entirely.
Dreya’s groundskeepers stopped their gardening and moved threateningly towards Catriona, but a quick mental word with nature caused the plants she had seeded to proliferate and grab them, the stems wrapping around them and preventing any movement. The more they struggled, the more the plants grew, and the tighter they squeezed.
Unconcerned, Dreya placed a bookmark in her book, closed it and put it away in a pocket in her black velvet robes.
Cat found herself feeling quite envious of Dreya’s robes. They looked so soft! Their colour was, without doubt, the blackest black she had ever seen – as if they were spun from the fabric of the night sky. Dreya glanced behind her at the roses and then finally looked up at Catriona.
“That’s an original way to deliver flowers,” she remarked.
“Oh, I’m nothing if not original,” Cat replied.
“And what’s the occasion?”
“Occasion?”
“Well, call me old-fashioned, but when someone brings me flowers, there’s usually an occasion of some kind.”
“Usually?” Cat wondered. “Do people bring you flowers often, then, Dreya?”
“No,” Dreya admitted. “Not often. In fact, I can’t remember the last time anyone did. Which brings me back to…”
“…an occasion,” Cat finished, nodding. “OK, that makes sense. Well, I suppose you could say they’re a ‘thank you.’”
“A ‘thank you’? For what?”
“For agreeing to my proposal.”
Dreya arched her perfectly plucked eyebrows. “You’re proposing to me now?”
Cat winced slightly at her choice of words and warned herself not to be too smart mouthed. Catriona loved playing with words, but clearly, she was in the presence of a master wordsmith. She’d meant to say ‘proposition’ but having said ‘proposal,’ she had little choice but to go with it.
“Well, it is Midsummer’s Day,” she reminded Dreya. Perhaps that was the reason for her slip of the tongue. “But I think we should take it slow,” she said, “date a bit first. Starting with, say, a study date in your library.”
“Interesting idea,” Dreya remarked, “although if we’re going to be dating and eventually married, it seems to me I should probably at least know your name.”
“Thought you’d never ask,” said Cat. “I’m Catriona Redfletching, and you’re going to give me access to your library before this day is done.”
Dreya got to her feet with a kind of fluid grace that reminded Catriona of Shyleen when she’d spotted some fascinating prey, just before her claws came out.
“‘Before this day is done,’ eh?” Dreya echoed. “Someone’s been doing her homework, but then Xarnas does like to brag about his finest student. Not that I can blame him.”
“Well, you are his crowning achievement.”
“Flattery will get you nowhere,” Dreya said, dismissively.
“No flattery,” Cat assured her. “You’re Dreya the Dark – you’re famous.”
“As are you, Catriona Redfletching,” Dreya replied. “According to legend, you’re quite happy to demolish a wizard’s entire home just to get your hands on a single book. I can only imagine what you’ll do for an entire library.”
Cat gave her a crooked smile. “I’m showing you what I’m prepared to do.”
“Do you really believe you can just tear the Black Tower apart? Do you really think you have that power?”
“Power isn’t everything,” Cat shrugged, “and what I believe is that I will have access to your library before this day is done.”
“And what’s to stop me calling on my grounds’ defences to kill you where you stand?”
Cat glanced around, making a show of being unconcerned. “Your guards seem to be a bit tied up at the moment.”
Dreya snorted, “If you’ve done this much prep work, you must know I have a lot more defences than that. Unlike Ulvarius, I keep them dormant, because I’m not insecure enough to jump at every shadow that passes across my land.” She paused before adding pointedly, “No matter what shape that shadow might take.”
Cat fought the urge to respond to that. It was possible Dreya knew all about her avian activities. However, it was equally likely the sorceress knew only that she could shapeshift and was simply making a perfectly reasonable guess. Cat was an information trader, and she wasn’t going to make the mistake of volunteering information just because the other party might already know. She’d used that trick herself.
“Still,” Dreya continued, “it only requires a thought to reactivate them, if necessary. So, tell me, Catriona Redfletching—”
“—Call me Cat,” she interrupted, taking back some control over the conversation.
“Very well, Cat it is, then, and while we’re on the subject of names, given my rank as Secondmage of the Black order, you really should address me as Mistress Dreya, according to Council rules.”
“Actually, I have a few issues with Council rules,” Cat told her.
“So do I,” said Dreya.
“You see? We’ve got something in common. Our date’s going really well already!”
“It is, isn’t it?”
“Sorry,” Cat apologised. “You were going to ask me something and I interrupted you.”
She was determined not to let the supreme mistress of control have things her own way, so she made it seem as if Dreya needed her permission to continue.
“That’s OK,” Dreya accepted, showing not a hint of irritation. “I was just talking about my defences.”
“What about them?”
“Well, why shouldn’t I activate them and be rid of you?”
Cat pounced. Now she knew she’d got Dreya’s attention.
“Because you’re not insecure enough to jump at every shadow that passes across your land,” she said. “Come on, Dreya, if you want to be rid of me, do your own dirty work!”
“An excellent suggestion,” Dreya conceded. “I could use the exercise.”
Without warning, she conjured a flight of poisoned darts that flew towards Catriona, but a sudden gust of wind blew them harmlessly away.
“OK, direct approach, then,” Dreya remarked, focussing her magic to create the poison directly from the magic inside Catriona’s body.
Cat shot her a withering look. “Really, Dreya? Poison? I’m a druid – we’re awesome at curing poisons.”
“Well then, let’s see how you fair if I take your magic away.”
Dreya had developed the ability to literally drain magical power from a wizard’s body, take it for herself. But Cat wasn’t a wizard, she was a druid. Her magic came from an entirely different source.
“You can’t drain me because the power isn’t really mine. It’s the power of nature herself, and you can’t drain nature.” Some of Catriona’s plants began to extend themselves towards the sorceress. “Come on, Dreya,” she said. “Take me seriously, or I’ll just tie you up in your garden and demolish your tower, after all!”
“Alright then,” Dreya agreed. “Let me take things up a notch.” With that, she unleashed flames from her fingertips, but Cat threw some water in the air and directed it to form a jet of water in the path of the flaming attack, extinguishing it, harmlessly. Dreya upped the power to a pair of fist-sized fireballs, but Cat used more water to create a suspended aquatic shield that blocked the strike.
“So, you need water to make water,” Dreya observed. “What happens if you run out?”
She invoked her magic, and Cat’s water bottles shattered, spilling their contents on the ground. Then, for good measure, she caused the spilt water to boil away, robbing Cat of her aquatic resources…or so she thought.
“Well?” she prompted. “Where are you going to get your water from now?”
“Dreya!” Cat admonished her. “I thought you’d be more observant than this. Haven’t you noticed the sun?”
Dreya glanced up at the sky.
“It’s gone behind some clouds, so what?”
“Look at those clouds, Dreya,” Cat said. “Really look. Clouds like that mean only one thing. It looks to me like it’s going to…”
Right on cue, the rain began to pour – hard!
“Well, you certainly have a flair for the dramatic,” Dreya remarked, approvingly. “Just two questions: First, if you can make it rain on cue, why carry water around with you?”
“Partly for convenience, but mostly because the rain makes my hair go frizzy.”
For the first time, there was a flicker of something on Dreya’s face, and while Cat wouldn’t go so far as to call it a smile, it was a beginning.
“Second question?” she prompted.
An enormous fireball, three feet in diameter grew between Dreya’s hands. “Do you think a bit of rain is enough to stop this?”
In response, the rain in the air between them became a waterfall, a curtain of water separating them.
“This might,” said Cat.
Dreya just shook her head, sending the fireball forth. Cat was confident of her aquatic shield, but to her surprise, instead of passing through it, the fireball quickly darted around it. Choosing the better part of valour, Cat shifted to her falcon form and tried to fly away from the approaching fireball, calling off the rain to make flying more comfortable, but no matter what aerobatics she tried, it tracked her every move. She’d never tried to use weather control magic in another form before, but staying as a falcon was the only way she could stay ahead of the fire. It helped that it was the first form she’d ever mastered. By now, it was almost as familiar to her as her real body, which meant she didn’t need much concentration to maintain it. Compartmentalising what her avian-self needed, she devoted the rest of her brain to manipulating the airflow around the moving fireball into a mini-whirlwind, spinning faster and faster until it removed the air from the eye and extinguished the flames.
That done, she shifted back to her true self in midair, standing on one of her Windy Steps.
“Didn’t your mother ever tell you not to play with fire?” she wondered.
“I think she may have said something about that,” Dreya admitted, “but then she also told me to marry a prince, who was willing to overlook certain things, and get showered with rose petals in a traditional marriage ceremony. As if becoming a Faery princess should have been the pinnacle of my ambitions.” She shrugged. “I tended not to listen to my mother too much after that.”
Catriona flattered herself that if Dreya the Dark was volunteering personal information now, then she was definitely making an impression.
“Still,” Dreya continued, “perhaps you’re right. Maybe I should change things up now. Let’s see how you handle this!”
Cat felt the tiny hairs on her arms start to stand up in response to the build-up of charge around the sorceress that was clearly going to develop into a lightning bolt heading in her direction. The druidess had just the thing. Out of her pocket dimension, she pulled out, of all things, a bucket of water, which she threw all over Dreya the instant the bolt was ready, causing it to backfire, painfully. While the sorceress was momentarily stunned, the druid used that same water to trap Dreya in a cylindrical cage of ice.
“Don’t play with electricity, either,” Cat admonished her, as she stepped back down to the ground. “Especially with so much water around.”
Dreya levitated out of the trap, scoffing at Cat leaving such an obvious escape.
“I’m insulted if you think that would be any kind of challenge.”
“Back at ya!” she retorted, making the wind pick up so much that Dreya was thrown back down to the ground with a bump. “As if I’d leave such an obvious escape route without it leading to a trap! You’re still not taking me seriously, Dreya. Stop holding back – show me what you’ve really got, or I might start to doubt that you’re really as powerful and deadly as you make out.”
“Alright,” Dreya acceded. “If you’re sure that’s how you really want it. Just remember you asked for it!”
With that, for the next half hour, Dreya turned up the power and frequency of attacks, putting Cat firmly on the defensive, working frantically to counter whatever came her way. Cat kept on the move, never letting Dreya pin her down, countering with magic or shapeshifting to escape and buy time. The way she ran up and down her Windy Steps, Cat was thankful that her time with Mandalee had got her in shape. Still, she needed a breather for a minute and decided to put a barrier between them while she got her breath back. Throwing a few pebbles on the ground, she grew a stone wall between them as she landed. She didn’t think Dreya would try to levitate over it after what happened the last time. Hopefully, breaking through it would at least take a minute.
“Stonewalling me now, Cat?” Dreya called out. “And here was me thinking we were communicating really well since we started dating!”
“Oh, you know how it is,” Cat returned. “Everybody in a relationship needs their own space, sometimes!”
“True,” Dreya allowed, invoking her magic to shatter the stone into fragments, “but I’m all about breaking down barriers and moving forward. Standing still for too long can be bad for you. It can take the magic right out of a relationship.”
Cat found herself suddenly surrounded by an anti-magic field. “But our two magics are different,” Cat pointed out.
“Yes, of course, I know you’re a druid – don’t think I haven’t adapted the field to take that into account.”
“You know, I really don’t get these things,” Catriona said. “An anti-magic field is itself a form of magic, so how does it operate?”
“It works on a different frequency to other magic and cuts off all other frequencies but its own.”
“Interesting,” said Cat, “so in theory, if I could determine the right frequency, I could adapt my magic to run off the field itself.”
Dreya’s eyes widened slightly, betraying interest in a concept she hadn’t considered before.
“Can you do that?”
“Not yet,” Cat admitted, to Dreya’s apparent disappointment, “but you’ve just given me a big piece of the puzzle. Give me time.”
“Time’s something you don’t have. You’re trapped.”
Cat shook her head. “I’ve been in worse traps than this, and after criticising me for leaving an obvious escape route, earlier, you’ve done the same thing.”
Dreya scoffed, “I don’t make mistakes like that – the field forms a dome over your head. You can’t fly out.”
“Wasn’t planning to,” Cat returned.
The anti-magic field only blocked her from sending her magic outside the barrier, she could still use it on herself, so she shifted to her mole form and burrowed underneath. While she remained underground, Dreya had no way to track her until she came back up and nipped Dreya on the ankle. As the sorceress whirled around, Cat shifted straight to falcon form and flew up into the air over Dreya’s head, where she reverted to her true self and stood on her Windy Steps.
“If this were a real battle,” she said, “I'd have changed to wolf form and bitten you properly, or falcon form and pecked out your eyes, or owl form and…hooted…really loud…or something.”
Dreya’s face twitched to a half-smile, just for a moment before she could get it under control. “Started well, that threat.”
“Wasn’t trying to threaten you; I was trying to make you laugh. Almost succeeded, too!”
“You’re not that funny,” Dreya refuted.
“I am so that funny!” Cat insisted. “Come on, this one was a classic!” she said, pulling another bucket out of her pocket dimension, brandishing it over Dreya’s head.
“Using the same trick twice, Cat? I’m disappointed.”
“Dreya!” Cat rebuked her. “As if I would!”
Cat tipped the bucket’s contents over Dreya, but it wasn’t water, this time, but rose petals.