Hart's Hope

Sleeve did not know that Asineth matched his reading day by day, and that she, too, discovered what he knew. She understood even more, however, much more, and when Sleeve got back to the hut, Asineth and the child were gone.

He tried to follow her afoot, but she lost him in the rocky hills behind the shore. He bled himself copiously to buy power enough to search magically for her, but his searching eye could not see her. He knew then that he had moved too late. The infant already understood some of her powers.

It was only when he realized that four of his books were missing that he first suspected that it was not the infant, not the daughter of Asineth and Palicrovol who was thwarting his search. It was Asineth herself, for the babe could not yet read. He cursed himself for having let her study what it was his duty to protect. But beyond that, there was nothing he could do. And so he waited, and built up his strength against the return of his adversary. He was not sure just how strong women's magic might be, and he wanted to be sure of the victory in case the contest proved to be a difficult one. He was almost pleased at the prospect—he had not had a difficult battle in decades, for there was no wizard that he knew of in the world who was a match for him.

"Berry," he said. "I thought that you were dead."

She smiled and raised her eyebrows. "And I had no idea that you knew her."

So this woman who wore Berry's flesh was not Berry at all. "Asineth," he whispered. It was a bad sign, if she had the power of changing shapes to such a degree that it fooled even him.

"Asineth?" she asked. "I do not know her."

"Who are you, then?"

"I am Beauty," she answered. "I am the most powerful of all the gods." With a single perfect, graceful motion she was naked. "Am I not perfect, Sleeve?"

"You are," he freely admitted. To see Berry's body again, so perfectly recreated—Asineth could not have known that he had been Berry's lover long before Nasilee had her, but the sight of Berry there on the beach u

"Am I not? I came from battle to you, Sleeve," she said. "I had learned so much, and I had to try it out. First I challenged the brute Hart, for I thought he would be easiest to rule. I was wrong, for my first battle was the worst of all, and he nearly won, and as it was I still fear him a little. But no matter—he is in chains at the root of the world, and you will have no help from him."

She was mad, of course. To challenge the Hart and win—absurd.

"The Sweet Sisters next, for I had a quarrel with them. I was surprised at how easily they bowed—they have no weapons for the kind of war I wage. They have been born into the most amusing bodies, and in flesh they will stay, bound up as long as I want them there."

"And God?" asked Sleeve, amused.

"He's slippery. I'll have to keep him where I can watch him over the years. But you, Sleeve. You I do not fear at all."

His love of theatricality would have made him say some heroic epigram in answer, but he had learned at an early age that theatricality is no substitute for sure victory. So he bit down upon her heart with the teeth of his left hand, to fell her at once with a single magical blow. Even if she endured it she would be too shaken to fight him after that.

But she did not so much as flinch, and as he squeezed with his cruel inward hand, he was surprised to find that he felt the agony in his own chest. He stopped, but his pain went on, and in a moment of anguish he realized that her words were not brag. There was no help for him from the Hart, and that presence of gods that he had always felt underlying all his power—it was gone..

"Took you by surprise, didn't I," she said. "Oh, never mind, Sleeve. If the gods could not resist me, how could you?"

The pain in his heart eased, and he found himself lying on the sand, looking up at her through blurred eyes.

"Can't you see me well?" she asked. And suddenly his eyes were clear of tears. It was that which frightened him most of all. A magic that could break the power of gods was terrible indeed, but a magic so delicate it could take the tears out of a man's eyes—that was a thing he had never heard of before in all his reading, in all his life.

"Look at me," she said again. "Berry was the most beautiful woman I know, but I am Beauty,

and I thought of some improvements. Here, is this better? And this?"

He lay in the sand and told her yes, yes, it was better.

"Well, now," she said at last, dressing herself as she spoke, "well, now, Sleeve. I suppose you'll

want to come with me."

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"Why, to Palicrovol," she said. "Am I not his wife? Did he not marry me with many, many

witnesses?"

"I told him he should have killed you."

"I remember that," she said. "But he didn't, and here I am. Do you think he'll find me beautiful?"

It was impossible that she could mean to live with him as his wife.

"Oh, I don't mean to," she said. "Live with him? Absurd. But I heard that he was bringing the Flower Princess to him from the southern islands. She is of age, I hear. And apparently he thinks that he can marry her. While I still live, he thinks that he can marry her. When he sees me, will he still think that she is beautiful?"

Sleeve took a bit of satisfaction in telling her, despite his fear, "Asineth, improve on Berry all you like, but no woman of flesh has ever been so beautiful as Enziquelvinisensee Evelvenin."

Suddenly his tongue was thick in his mouth, and he felt snakes slithering inside his clothing, a forked tongue tickling at his throat. "Never call me Asineth again," she whispered.

"Aye, Beauty," he answered. "You will come with me to Palicrovol. I will keep you as a pet."

She giggled, and the snakes were gone. "Get up," she said.

He got up, and in the process discovered that she was not content with changing her own shape. She had changed his, too.

"Tell the truth," she said. "Don't you like yourself better like this? Weren't you tired of standing out, a pale giant among other men?"

He did not answer her, just stared at his hands and nodded. This is what defeat feels like, he told himself, but he knew it was not true. This was only the begi

Only when he had packed his books and hoisted them on his back, only when she led him away from Brack on the end of a golden chain, only then did he invent a role for himself that might just keep him alive. He wrapped the long chain around his legs to hobble him and toddled after her like a child, singing loudly,

I have captured Beauty,

I have her on a string,

I keep her in the cupboard,

And poke her with my thing.

She looked back at him in a

Looking down at him, she smiled in spite of herself. She had given him a ridiculous shape; now he was living the part she had assigned him. It pleased her. "What is the name of the wine?" she asked, playing along.