The Warlock Unlocked

“Why,” the elf said craftily, “why not the way that witches do? Thou hast no difficulty understanding why she lives.” He nodded toward the witch-girl.

“That is known to me; she is like to any other lass, excepting that God gave to her at birth some gifts of powers in her mind; and I can see that, when first her ancestors did come to this world, those who chose to come had each within him some little germ of such-like powers. Thus, as generations passed, and married one another again and yet again, that germ of power grew, until some few were born who had it in good measure.”

“ ‘Tis even as Rod Gallowglass did guess,” the elf mused. “Nay, thou art certainly from the realm that birthed him. But tell me, then, if such a marrying within a nation might produce a witch, why might it not produce an elf?”

“It might; it might indeed.” Father Al nodded thoughtfully. “Yet were it so, my whistling, and the turning of my coat, would not dispel thy glamour, as was told in Terran legend. Nay, there is something more than mortal’s magic in thee. How didst thou come to be?”

“Thou dost see too well for easy liking,” the elf sighed, “and I do owe thee truth for truth. I do know that elves are born of forest and of earth, of Oak, and Ash, and Thorn; for we have been here as long as they. And well ought I to know it, for I am myself the oldest of all Old Things!”

The phrase triggered memories, and Puck of Pook’s Hill came flooding back to Father Al’s mind from his childhood. “Why, thou’rt Robin Goodfellow!”

“Thou speakest aright; I am that merry wanderer of the night.” The elf gri

“Well, all worth knowing.” Father Al silently admitted to a bit of bias within himself. “For surely, all who know the Puck must be good fellows.”

“Dost thou mean that I should trust thee, then?” Puck gri

“Why… ‘tis thus…” Father Al took off his robe, and turned it right side out again, getting his thoughts in order. He pulled it on, and began, “A wizard of a bygone age foresaw that, in our present time, a change would come to thy High Warlock, a transformation that could make him a mighty force, for ill or good—a force so mighty as to cast his shadow over all the worlds that mortal folk inhabit. This ancient wizard wrote this vision down, and sealed it in a letter, so that in our present time, it might be opened and read, and we could learn, in time to aid Rod Gallowglass.”

“And bend him toward the good, if thou canst?” Puck demanded. “Which means, certes, thy notion of the ‘good.’ ”

“And canst thou fault it?” Father Al stuck out his chin and locked gazes with Puck, hoping against hope as he remembered the long hostility between Christian clergy and faery-folk, and the diminishing of the faeries’ influence as that of the Christ had grown. And Puck glared back at him, no doubt remembering all that, too, but also reassessing the values the clergy preached.

“Nay, in truth, I ca

Father Al let out a long-held breath. “Then wilt thou lead me to thy Warlock?”

“I would I could,” the elf said grimly, “but he hath quite disappeared, and none know where.”

Father Al just stared at him, while panic surged up within him. He stood stock-still against it, fighting for calm, silently reeling off a prayer from rote; and eventually the panic faded, leaving him charged for otherworldly battle. “Admit me to his wife and bairns, then; mayhap they hold a clue they know not of.”

But Puck shook his head. “They have vanished with him, friar—all but one, and he’s so young he ca

“Let me gaze upon him, then.” Father Al fixed Puck with a hard stare. “I have some knowledge gleaned, sweet Puck; I may see things that thou dost not.”

“I doubt that shrewdly,” Puck said sourly, “yet on the chance of it, I’ll bring thee to him. But step warily, thou friar—one sign of menace to the child, and thou’lt croak, and hop away to find a lily pad to sit on, and wilt pass the rest of thy days fly-catching with a sticky tongue of wondrous length!”

He turned away toward the cottage. Father Al followed, with the witch-girl.

“Dost thou think that he could truly change me into a frog?” Father Al asked softly.

“I do not doubt it,” the girl answered, with a tremulous smile. “The wisest heads may turn to asses’, when the Puck besets them!”

They passed through the door, and Father Al paused, amazed at the brightness and coziness of the house, the sense of comfort and security that seemed to emanate from its beams and rough-cast walls, its sturdy, homely table, benches, chests, two great chairs by the fire, and polished floor. If he looked at it without emotion, he was sure it would seem Spartan—there were so few furnishings. But it was totally clean, and somehow wrapped him in such a feeling of love and caring that he was instantly loath to leave. Somehow, he knew he would like the High Warlock’s wife, if he should be lucky enough to meet her.

Then his gaze lit on the cradle by the fire, with the two diminutive, wizened old peasant-ladies by it—elf-wives! They stared up at him fearfully, but Puck stepped up with a mutter and a gesture, and they drew back, reassured. Puck turned, and beckoned to the priest.

Father Al stepped up to the cradle, and gazed down at a miniature philosopher.

There was no other way to describe him. He still had that very serious look that the newborn have—but this child was nearly a year old! His face was thi

So did the witch-girl. She was weeping silently, tears streaming down her cheeks. “Poor mite!” she whispered. “His mind doth roam, searching for his mother!”

“Even in his sleep?”

She nodded. “And I ca

Father Al frowned. “How can that be?” Then he remembered that the child was too young to have gained the mental framework that gives the human mind stability, but also limits. He found himself wondering where that little mind could reach to—and if, in a grown man, such searching would produce insanity.

He looked back at the child, and found its eyes open. They seemed huge in the tiny face, and luminous, and stared up at him with the intensity of a fanatic. Father Al felt an eldritch prickling creep over his scalp and down his back, and knew to the depths of his soul that this was an extremely unusual baby. “Child,” he breathed, “would that I could stay and watch thine every movement!”

“Thou mayest not,” Puck said crisply.

Father Al turned to the elf. “Nay, more’s the pity; for my business is with the father, not the child. Tell me the ma

Puck frowned, like a general debating whether or not to release classified information; then he shrugged. “ ‘Tis little enough to tell. Geoffrey—the third bairn—disappeared whilst at play. They called the High Warlock back from council with the King and Abbot, and he drew from his eldest son the place exact where the child had vanished, then stepped there himself—and promptly ceased to be. His wife and other bairns ran after him, dismayed, and, like him, disappeared.”

Father Al stared at the elf, while his mind raced through a dozen possible explanations. It could’ve been enchantment, of course, but Father Al wasn’t quite willing to surrender rationality that completely just yet. A space-warp or time-warp? Unlikely, on a planet’s surface—but who could say it was impossible?