Jinx Outside Rainmoor
Jinx's eyes snapped open suddenly, and he lay there in the dark, certain that something alarming was happening, yet without a clue to what it might be. He lay very still, breathing shallowly to suppress any unnecessary sound, straining his night-vision to see what had alerted him. Surely it couldn't be wild animals? This was no place for any sort of animal. Those Rainmoor wizards had driven them all away, and there wasn't an animal within miles of their stinking castle.
Except him, of course, a tiger sort of animal.
No, that wasn't true. It couldn't be true. He was, after all, half human, though he did not look it, and from his wizard father he'd gotten hands that could hold a sword, and a mind that was as good as a normal human's (not counting those damned wizards). He was people, even if his father didn't think so. But then there was the other half, the tigress that was his mother and had given him the form of his body and the savagery and wariness that kept him alive, not to mention the night-vision that he was straining to its limits, trying to see what had jolted him out an uneasy sleep. Humans couldn't do that, and it was always a problem because he did look like a tiger. Did that make him an animal? His mind ached as it ran over the old dichotomy, and it was then that he noticed the magic eye.
It didn't look like an eye, it looked like a tiny firefly, but Jinx recognized it and unthinkingly let out a hiss of frustration and anger. He caught himself doing it, and cut it short with his usual sense of shame, and as he held his breath, staring fixedly at it, the Eye wavered and then flew off in the direction of Rainmoor at tremendous speed.
Jinx's tail lashed nervously as he considered his situation. It had seen him, and it was heading back to its master to report. That much was obvious- it was exactly what a wizard spy thing could be expected to do. Jinx considered idly that his racing thoughts must have identified him as a person, for he knew what these Eyes were- he knew this Eye would have magically compelled any animal to flee. That was its job, and he'd seen the Eyes do it, seen woodland animals running until they collapsed in frothing exhaustion. It wasn't much consolation that it hadn't compelled him, because it was obviously fetching its master, doubtless some powerful wizard, and Jinx had no intention of being around when the wizard finally arrived.
Jinx would never know how sorely confused the Eye had been over him. It sensed thoughts to distinguish humans from animals, and it had been unable to decide what Jinx was because his thoughts were fairly intelligent but unmistakably tigerish. It had finally decided in favor of Jinx's being human merely because his thoughts had become more complex and detailed than any animal's could be, but the thoughts had never lost their fierce, tigerish flavor, the brittle wariness of a cornered jungle cat. The Eye's report was destined to give a certain magician a terrible headache from trying to figure out what his spy had spied...
Though Jinx expected the worst from the Eye's departure, he was nevertheless relieved to see the last of it. He watched it go without making a sound, and when it was lost to sight, he set off at a right angle to it, wary of following it too directly for fear of encountering it again. The fur on the back of his neck still bristled slightly from the experience, and he wondered again how he could have been so stupid as to agree to meet anybody at Rainmoor, even if they did live there and even if they were willing to pay him just to come there. The whole thing was ugly and strange- he'd been minding his own business passing through a town when this rich-looking man accosted him for no good reason at all.
Jinx had developed a finely tuned sense of town and city dangers by sheer necessity, and he'd recognized at once that the man was not an immediate threat. He also spotted that the man was edgy and nervous, but there were any number of possible explanations for that, not least Jinx himself. It seemed that six-foot tigers, even when walking on two legs like humans, made the real people nervous. The sword Jinx carried probably didn't help, either.
Jinx was used to thinking of humans as baffling creatures that rarely made sense, and for that reason he hadn't tried to make sense of it when the strange, rich-looking man emerged from the shadows and said "Jinx, I will pay you fifty gold pieces if you will come to me in Rainmoor the next full moon. Can you do that, or would sneaking in be too difficult for you?"
Jinx liked the idea of being paid fifty gold just for meeting the man in the King's castle. He had been scornful, explaining that he could sneak in anywhere if he wanted to and Rainmoor was no different. Then, after he'd agreed, he'd learned more about Rainmoor and become appalled. The place was nothing but a nest of wizards! The man had even given him a magic rock, which he claimed Jinx would need: Jinx didn't tell him that he'd rather give up the fifty gold than use the cursed thing. But in the end it wasn't the money that decided him: he'd said that he could get into Rainmoor easily, and he was damned if he was going to have some wizard laughing at him for giving up. What he was going to do once he got there was a mystery, but that would take care of itself, probably. Besides, there was always the fifty gold pieces to consider. Gold was useful stuff- when he had it, the humans treated Jinx like people, almost.
Before long, Jinx was climbing to the top of a small mountain, the mountain Rainmoor. He figured the castle had to be on the other side of the mountain: it certainly wasn't on this side. The mountain itself seemed to fit the description he'd heard. It was fairly steep and went up to a point, and bore little resemblance to the hills and valleys around it. Just for the hell of it, Jinx climbed straight up to the point, which was amazingly even and conical, and peered over the top at the castle...
No. There was no castle on the other side. From his lofty vantage point, Jinx could see that there was no castle in any direction. Did he have the wrong mountain? Jinx considered that perhaps the castle was invisible. That would be just like wizards, to do a thing like that. It also explained the stone he'd been given, a guiding stone that would glow when Jinx, holding it, pointed to the man.
Jinx had buried the stone in his pack and tried to pretend it wasn't there: he'd wanted to throw it away, and had argued about it, lashing his tail agitatedly, but the rich man had insisted he keep it, claiming that Jinx would not be able to locate him without a guiding cantrip, which the stone carried. Now Jinx reluctantly dug it out, holding it gingerly in his furry hand. He began to point back the way he came, and then stopped in haste, realizing the thing was going to be making magic and he'd be touching it. Jinx shuddered, and got a scrap of cloth out of his pack, wrapping it loosely around the stone. He was barely willing to use the thing in the first place: touching it while it did magic was out of the question.
Jinx pointed off to the west, feeling slightly foolish. Nothing happened, so he began to revolve slowly, his arm sweeping gradually over the hills and valleys. Nothing. Jinx considered that maybe he was dealing with a flying invisible castle, and began pointing at the sky, with still no reaction. Could the thing be dodging him? Or did he have to touch the cursed rock to get it to work? He gingerly touched the stone with the tip of one finger, the fur standing up on the scruff of his neck as he did so. Nothing happened, but he'd thought something might. While delicately touching the stone, he once more scanned the horizon, pointing in every direction, and then scanned the sky for good measure. Nothing at all. Jinx's hand dropped to his side in disgust, and it was then that the stone flared into painful brightness.
Jinx dropped it like it had burned him, though it hadn't, and it shut off again, landing in the dirt and rolling a few feet. He hardly noticed, for he was starting to tremble as the horrible truth dawned on him. There was no castle to find. Getting into Rainmoor might indeed be difficult, but finding it was not. He was standing on it.
Then he laughed, perhaps a little hysterically, and picked the guiding rock up again. He felt giddy and strange, as if he was dreaming the whole thing, and could not fear the magic stone he held, even as it shone brightly in his hand. How frightening could a magic rock be, compared to Rainmoor itself? He was standing right on top of an entire mountain (granted, a small one) filled with magic and wizards, and he was afraid of a glowing pebble!
Still in the giddy, fey state of danger too great to be taken seriously, he playfully experimented with the glowing rock, pointing it this way and that. It did seem to glow more brightly when pointed at one side of the mountain, but not much. Perhaps he was to go to a particular spot. Then what? Dig, maybe. If only he'd brought a shovel! Jinx giggled nervously at the twisted notion of attacking a stronghold of powerful wizards with a shovel, and began wandering over the face of the mountain, following the glow of the magic rock.
By the time he'd found the spot he was looking for, his fey mood had gone completely, and he'd gone back to holding the rock with a scrap of cloth. He was about halfway down the mountain where trees and underbrush began to encroach upon the smooth conical expanse of the mountain, and it was getting on toward evening: the top of Rainmoor still glowed with the fading light of dusk, but Jinx was in shadow and preferred it that way. He wondered if perhaps his mad amusement had been brought on by standing on the tip of Rainmoor, but thought it was probably a result of being unable to flee. As he'd gotten closer to the surrounding woods, his fear had lessened to the point that he was able to feel it again, something which he could not feel properly thankful for.
He searched hectically among the underbrush, looking for some sort of door, his edgy nerves shown in the way he swiped viciously at the bushes, lashing out as if his hands were paws. He'd cut the lightly furred palm of his hand doing this, but did not notice. The stone said that he was in the right area, but the spot it pointed to moved around within an area of about fifty feet. Human feet, he thought: it would be about a hundred of his feet, unless you counted his lower leg as part of the foot. He snarled under his breath at yet another reminder of the human world, and continued to search.
It occurred to him that if the stone was pointing at the man who'd invited him, and if the man was walking around in whatever dank, gloomy caves they had in there, then the stone was pointing at a spot inside the mountain, not at an entrance. That made sense, and it explained why he wasn't finding a door anywhere: he was walking around on the roof of the man's house. Where would the door be? If the door led to a stairway, it might be directly over the man's location. Jinx couldn't find one, though. However, if the door led to a passageway, it would be lower on the mountain, leading straight in, and Jinx would have to look farther down and ignore the rock for a moment. That suited him, and he did so.
There was still no door, but Jinx spotted a depression in the ground that looked unnatural. He looked closely at it and realized that it fitted the magic rock perfectly. With a resigned shrug, he carefully placed the rock into the small hole, then jumped back wild-eyed and hissing, ears laid back, for the rock whined shrilly and then exploded with a blinding flash of light and a smell of scorched earth. Jinx crouched tensely, his carefully learned upright posture gone, his blood pounding in his ears as he stared fixedly at the expanding hole in the ground. A shaft of light shone out, blinding his dusk-adjusted eyes for a moment, and then there was a neat square hole in the ground, and the man who'd hired him was standing there.
"I must say, I'm impressed at how quickly you found me..." said the man, and then he asked, "Is something wrong?"
Jinx struggled to regain control of himself, shaking his head as if to clear it and letting out a half-suppressed snarl. It had been a long day, and a scary, uncomfortable one, and that bit with the exploding rock had startled him so badly that he desperately wanted to either flee or attack something. But what? The rock was gone, there wasn't anything else on the whole damn mountain, and this man before him was going to give him money now. Attacking him would be utterly inappropriate, and fleeing would mean not getting his reward. Jinx was a tense, rigid statue, his adrenaline roaring through his mind, and his mood was all too plain.
The man was no fool. "Damn it, I should have changed the key procedure," he said. "Did the flash upset you?"
"Jinx hates that sort of thing." Jinx managed to say.
"I'm very sorry. Had I thought about it, I might have realized that the secondary effects of that key procedure could be disturbing to you..."
He watched Jinx carefully, as if he wasn't sure this wild beast was safe to allow into his house. Jinx noticed it, and was ashamed. His tiger side had saved his life often, yet it was just as capable of making him into the living image of a dangerous animal. It was horrible when that happened in situations where Jinx desperately wanted to be thought of as a human, because he looked almost exactly like a tiger. He had to make a special point of his having hands, and his being able to talk and think, and he had to walk upright, and even then he knew that there would always be a doubt...
Jinx realized with a shock that he was still in a predatory, feline crouch, lashing his tail agitatedly, the claws on his feet digging into the dirt. In fact, though his hands bore no claws to match the feet, he was trying to dig his fingers into the dirt as if they were claws. Ashamed, he hastily stood up, fighting off the tiger reactions with practiced skill, looking the man in the eye, saying "I feel better now." in a tone that refused to admit discussion.
The man relaxed visibly. "Do come in," he said. "You must have had a long day. Come sit by the fire and relax for a while, before we talk business."
Jinx followed him down the corridor, feigning nonchalance, his tail twitching nervously and revealing his true feelings. He glanced over his shoulder and winced to see the corridor closing itself up after him, but he kept on walking, grimly determined not to act inappropriately. As he entered the man's house, this resolve was tested severely.
The place was vast, luxurious, and filled with obvious magic everywhere you looked. The 'fire' the man had mentioned floated in the air, a big roaring bonfire without wood or smoke. It occupied the center of a clearing fifty feet in diameter, and cast its bright flickering light everywhere. It seemed to be creating more light than a fire should. Overhead was an early evening sky with the stars beginning to come out, which was impossible because there had been no large hole in the top of the mountain. Also, the sky outside had been cloudy and forbidding, and this sky was clear.
Jinx saw all this in a flash, and tried to back away from it all, but the passageway continued to close up behind him, gently pushing him out into the room. Soon he found himself pressed against a perfectly ordinary cave wall, which showed no sign of an exit. Jinx gathered his courage and looked around.
There were doors leading everywhere, but not just to rooms: some opened out on grassy plains, or jungles, and some led to underwater scenes or stormy skies. A few were closed, but the rest hung open, as if the man liked to see all the places he had access to. A fish swam into view in the underwater scene. It looked at Jinx, apparently didn't like what it saw, charged through the doorway and promptly fell to the ground, flopping around frantically. The man hurried over, deftly picked it up and tossed it back through the door, at which it floated in confusion for a moment, then swam away as fast as it could.
"I must remember to have you around the next time I go fishing." said the man. "You make a great lure. It's not easy to find something a fish will go through a Gate after, you know. Oh, are you hungry? I wasn't thinking."
"Jinx isn't hungry."
"Well, when you are, you're welcome to anything I have, Jinx."
Jinx pointed at a closed door. "What's behind that one?"
The man looked smug. "See for yourself," he said, and opened it, revealing a roaring inferno that cast a savage, searingly brilliant light over the room. The man closed it again.
"You have a door into Hell?" asked Jinx, wary but fascinated.
"Oh, no!" protested the man. "Only an evil mage would have a gate to Hell. No, it's the Sun. You probably don't realize that the Sun is a tremendous fire, very far away. My gate to the Sun is very useful to me."
"Do you toss people through that door if they annoy you?" asked Jinx.
"Certainly not!" exclaimed the man. "Such an idea! I use it myself, for an energy supply. Really, Jinx, do you take me for an evil warlock? I'm quite offended!"
"No offense," said Jinx. "Would you be so kind as to close the other doors as well? Jinx finds them... distracting." The stress of the strange environment was weighing on him, drawing out his old manner of speaking. It had been a long time since he was trained to speak by a kindly human, taught phrases such as 'Jinx belongs to Sir Irwin. Jinx doesn't bite.', yet still the old habit recurred at times.
"Certainly." said the man, and did so. It wasn't much help, because Jinx was noticing other things now, such as the starry sky overhead with its constellations marked out by delicate glowing lines, and the disconcerting tendency of the wood paneling to ripple like the wood grain was a river, and most distressing, stuffed animals like hunting trophies dotted here and there. One was a lithe black panther, fullgrown and not that much smaller than Jinx himself. It was beautiful, almost beautiful enough to justify its display in this way, but that was little comfort. Jinx thought that his own body was not quite as shapely, though he was built along the same lines, and he hoped he wasn't going to end up a stuffed tiger. The black panther crouched stiffly, facing him, and when Jinx looked closer he was shocked to see it looking back at him with a fascinated gaze from clearly living eyes, obviously not dead at all, just frozen by some sorcery. In just such a place, his wizard father had mated with his tigress mother and created Jinx, for no better reason than senseless whim...
"Oh, you've noticed Elanor! Don't worry, it's not what you think. Here, I'll let her meet you. Elanor! Thaw!"
The panther began moving stiffly, and then stretched and bounded eagerly over to Jinx with great interest, gazing at him with glowing eyes.
"She's a watch beast," said the man. "Elanor is one of my most trusted guards. She roams Rainmoor in astral form, keeping an eye on my enemies. I link minds with her every few days, and if she finds anything dangerous, she tells me, in a sort of crude, animal fashion. She may not use language, but such a beast has very clear imagery when threats are concerned, and the mind-images are very nearly perfect in their accuracy and vividness. She's a dear girl, even if she is an animal, and very much devoted to me. Although I see she's taken a fancy to you right away. Perhaps you'd, ah, enjoy her company, shall we say, at times when she's not working? I've regretted, at times, the... ah... limited nature of her life here with me. Seems unfair to the poor girl, somehow, after all the help she's been. She's working full-time now, but I could give part of her territory to one of the owls, if you wanted to, ah..."
"Jinx is not an animal," said Jinx. "Jinx is a person. Jinx is offended at what you're suggesting."
He shrank away from the panther, embarrassed at the way she was rubbing sensuously against him. He couldn't afford to let this man think he was an animal, or he might end up a statue himself, prowling Rainmoor in astral form for the rest of his life, or he might end up being the gigolo for the man's pet panther. The insulting thing about that was what it implied about him: he wasn't an animal, he just looked like one. He hoped the man would call off his pet quickly, before she managed to get a reaction out of him that would make matters worse. His sense of smell told him, through instincts he hadn't known he had, just how interested she was.
"Oh, you needn't be offended," said the man. "I wasn't suggesting anything. Elanor! Go back to work, and freeze!"
The black panther gave the man a reproachful look, and returned to where she'd been, casting glances at Jinx over her shoulder, moving reluctantly and seemingly grudging every padding step. Back in her guard position, she froze in place, and the man continued.
"Don't worry, the job I'm hiring you for is very different. Besides, you surely know me well enough to realize I wouldn't compel anybody to do work for me..."
"Jinx doesn't know you at all. Who are you?"
The man seemed thunderstruck. He sputtered for a moment, then laughed.
"Jinx, my friend! Don't you know your own King?"
"Jinx doesn't have a King. Jinx does what he pleases."
"Ah, but you do!" said the man. "And a good, just King as well, if I do say so myself. I must say, I'm surprised at you. Do you even know my name?"
"No. Should I?"
"Perhaps you can't read. It's on all the proclamations. I'm King Thomas."
"Oh." said Jinx. "That King." He'd heard occasional talk of a King Robert, and of a nameless King Of Rainmoor as well.
"The King, Jinx, not 'that king'. I am the rightful king, sir. The pretenders are, as they have ever been, unworthy scoundrels or fools seeking to usurp the throne, and one in particular has gone too far, making hideous threats and committing murder, and he must be stopped. That's where you come in."
"Do you mean King-Robert," asked Jinx, "or King-of-Rainmoor?"
King-Thomas sputtered a bit, then became very calm and earnest.
"Jinx, they're not the King. They're pretenders. Lord Robert is not a problem. He's hopelessly mad, and he believes that proclaiming himself King is all he must do. Oh, he's not a bad sort, quite decent at heart, but I assure you, nobody takes Robert seriously. The second one you mentioned is the man I was speaking of, a dangerous, evil man. He killed First Lord Nicholas, or so he says. He is known only through letters and proclamations, and none have ever seen him. He claims to have no name. Some say that is because he's a demon from Hell, and dares not use his name for fear of being compelled to return to the fiery pit."
"His name isn't 'King-of-Rainmoor', then?"
"'King' isn't a name, Jinx. King is a rank, the highest rank of nobility."
Jinx was silent, for he'd never been able to understand what humans meant when they talked about things like 'rank' and 'nobility' and 'good' and 'evil', which they seemed to do incessantly. He gathered his thoughts, trying his best to think like people, even remembering to speak like a person instead of speaking like Sir Irwin's harmless pet.
"So you want me to kill King-of-Rainmoor, but I don't have to kill King-Robert. Is that it?"
King-Thomas sighed heavily. "I never said I wanted you to kill anybody. To hire an assassin is an evil thing, one I will never stoop to. It is better to be cast down with honor than to cling to the throne by methods so foul that I would become the same as those who would destroy me. I said I wanted you to stop the nameless pretender, or 'king-of-rainmoor' as you insist on calling him. I suppose it would do no good to point out that I, I am the rightful king of Rainmoor."
"If you like." said Jinx, puzzled. "I thought you were King-Thomas."
"Never mind. Do you understand? You are to stop him, not assassinate him."
"Wouldn't killing him be the simplest way of stopping him?"
"Don't say such things! I don't wish to hear about it. What you must do is go among the denizens of Rainmoor, pretend to join his cause, and seek to discredit the nameless pretender. If he doesn't have a cause, you can try to learn more about him. Perhaps you can learn his name: perhaps you can reveal him as the evil creature he is. I will meet you here periodically, and you will tell me of your progress."
"Why me?" asked Jinx, utterly confused at the barrage of meaningless concepts.
King-Thomas looked earnestly into his eyes. "I don't think I could explain it to you. I have searched the outlying provinces for a suitable champion, and I have heard much about you, Jinx. I will say that I was greatly moved by your fearless defense of Sir Irwin, and the way you stood over his dead body while the forces of evil raged around you. Few can boast of such loyalty. Yet I find, now, that you seem unaware of the truth of the political situation and even show disquieting tendencies toward assassination. This troubles me. However, I consulted the oracles and stars, and I am certain that you are the one I need. The magic of Rainmoor itself seems to suggest this. Who can say why? I am not infallible: I was unable to learn more, and the reasons are dark to me. Yet I trust you, somehow, strange creature though you be. I will not quail."
Jinx was shaken at the King's mention of Sir Irwin, the man who had saved his life years ago, shortly after he'd been banished from his wizard father's house. The knight had been astonished to see a young tiger standing on its hind legs and trying to fight off a pack of attacking wolves by throwing rocks at them. Strangely, it seemed to fear him even more than the wolves.
Jinx had taken his attention from the wolves, looking fearfully at Sir Irwin, and as he did a wolf behind him seized him, and when Sir Irwin heard Jinx's yowl of pain he set upon the wolves with his sword and drove them off. This stunned Jinx, for he'd seen Sir Irwin as another attacking monster even more dangerous than the wolves. He still tried feebly to escape, but hunger and injury had left him too weak to run away. Sir Irwin held him down gently, soothing him with soft words and petting him.
Jinx was baffled, for the man didn't try to twist his wrist, didn't kick him or stamp on paws or tail: he just stared at Jinx with a completely unfathomable expression on his face. Sir Irwin was a compassionate man, and the young creature he was hanging onto was as cute as a tiger kitten and quite helpless, obviously injured.
Jinx had nowhere to go and nobody to care for him, and he was not able to resist the kindness of Sir Irwin for long. It was something he had never known, except from his tigress mother, and she was dead. His fear crumbled gradually, replaced by helpless trust and acceptance, and when he dragged himself nearer and laid his furry head in Sir Irwin's lap, there was no turning back. He became Sir Irwin's pet, and rapidly became a sort of adopted son. Sir Irwin named him, and, as cat owners will, became convinced his pet was a person and should be treated as such. Since Jinx's mind was part human, he responded by learning all that Sir Irwin could teach, and soon learned to speak, although other humans tended to think of this as a trick.
Sir Irwin taught Jinx to wield a sword, to eat with table manners, to stand up straight and look people in the eye. Sir Irwin also, unwittingly, taught Jinx to never drop to all fours, to never snarl or hiss, to never knock anything over with his tail or sit curled up comfortably before the fire. Jinx grew up knowing that Sir Irwin cared for him, and that most other humans thought it strange and unfitting for a knight to keep such a pet. There was always an argument, whenever they went among other humans, tried to stay at an inn, joined a group of other knights or attended the court functions of the outlying provinces. Sir Irwin was adamant: it was both of them or neither, and nothing could sway him. He called this honor and decency. Most other humans called it silly, sentimentality or idiocy. Jinx knew only that Sir Irwin would stand up for him no matter how many other humans were against him.
Ever since then Jinx had defended Sir Irwin passionately, only to fail during the battle the King had mentioned. The King's sources had tactfully omitted the end of the story, about how Jinx, finally realizing that Sir Irwin was dead, had wandered forlornly away from the battle, distraught, caring nothing for the curses and cries for aid of Sir Irwin's fellow knights. Jinx was shattered by the experience, and had never really gotten over it.
King-Thomas looked at him as if expecting his questions, and Jinx, coming back to the present, realized he had a few.
"Isn't your home a bad place for Jinx to meet you, if you want Jinx to be a spy? And how much are you going to pay?"
The King, scandalized, exclaimed, "Not a 'spy', Jinx! Call it a... you could think of it as a.... I can't explain. You can call it 'spying' if you must. Just remember not to put it that way to anyone else, all right, dear boy?"
"And pay?"
"My dear Jinx, if you carry out your duty well, you are bound to be knighted. Then you'll be 'Sir Jinx'. Isn't that compensation enough?"
Jinx was unimpressed. Why would he want to change his name?
"As for meeting me in my home!" said King-Thomas, beaming. "This is not my only home: in fact, it's the place I stay at least often. It's... How shall I put this? Too shabby for a proper King."
Jinx looked around, mystified. If this was shabby, he didn't even want to see a fancy place. Too much magic, too big, too strange... Jinx felt uncomfortable just being there. He was not about to consider going anywhere fancier.
"You see, as you've no title, no rank, and you're not a servant, you couldn't possibly meet me in my home, so we'll make other arrangements. I will meet you in yours!"
Jinx didn't get it, and the King spelled it out for him.
"This, Jinx, is your new home. How's that for payment, eh? Impressed?"
Jinx was, indeed, impressed. He was more than impressed. He was appalled.
