Secret of Spring Page 24

  “But I thought—”

  “That it was my high principles?” She smiled. “I did like to think so. But now I know, when a woman is truly in love with a man, principles are very cold comfort.”

  “I tried to leave,” Herb said, “but I couldn’t. Something always drew me back, even though I knew in my heart it wouldn’t work.” He looked at Spring. “I never knew what love was, until now.”

  Spring’s eyes began to melt. Herb reached for her, but Lily intercepted him. “A last kiss,” she said, giving him a warm hug, and kiss. On the cheek. Then she took Spring’s hand and placed it in Herb’s. “I hope you will be happy in your new love, as I hope to be—with mine.”

  Flabbergasted, they watched as she went to Zygote and put her hand upon his shoulder. The magician turned about slowly, facing her. She took one of his hands in hers, and placed her other to his cheek. “One door has closed, yet another may open,” she said.

  “Lovely lady.” Zygote smiled sadly, pressing the soft green hand to his lips.

  Spring and Herb looked at each other in shocked astonishment. Evidently they had not only mistaken Zygote’s relationship to Elton, but his attentions to Lily as well.

  “Lily!” Herb exclaimed. “Earlier, upstairs?” He recalled his wild accusations in the bedroom. Rape, indeed!

  “But—Zygote?” Spring said with disgust. “Oh, Lily! How could you?”

  Lily turned to her with understanding. “Spring, I know it is hard for you to accept after all that has happened between you and Zygote, but he has shown me only kindness since my arrival. I have seen a side of him that you haven’t.”

  “Evidently.” Spring didn’t bother to conceal the irony.

  “You see,” Lily continued as if Spring hadn’t spoken, “I know you did something to change the time so you could arrive to save me, but for some reason, it did not affect my memory when reversed.” She addressed Zygote now.

  “Zygote, I know and retain all the memories of what happened during those long days until their ship’s arrival.”

  Zygote visibly blanched. “That—that was to be but an interlude,” he said, shaken. “I, of course, knew of the timewarp through my magic. But, when they arrived, that part of it should have been erased as if it never happened to you.”

  “To us.” She addressed Herb and Spring again. “You see, Zygote attended to me during my weakness, and no one could have been more gentle. Then, a young man began visiting me. He was also kind and gentle, and warm. He evoked something within me. Something that had been missing from our relationship, Herb. We talked, exchanging our feelings, and after those days, those wonderful days, I knew that I had fallen in love with him. More than that, I knew he loved me, too.”

  “A young man? Who? Where?” Herb asked, bewildered. So much had happened so fast!

  “He was wonderful. I’ve never felt that way about anyone before, and that’s why I do understand how you and Spring could have become so close. He—he made love to me, and I have never known anything so beautiful. Then, you arrived, and I was confused because at first it all seemed like a dream—”

  “A dream,” Zygote said. “You were ill. There is no young man here.”

  “But there is. I can’t go on without him now,” she protested.

  “You should not have remembered,” Zygote said rubbing his thinning hair with one hand. “I would not have you suffer a loss.”

  “I’m glad I remember. And I feel no loss. Do you think a woman does not know the man she loves?” Lily smiled, embracing Zygote warmly.

  “Lily,” Zygote said, seeming appalled. “You don’t know.”

  “Oh, but I do. I know that young man was you, Zygote.”

  “A spell,” Herb cried. “He used a spell on you, to have his way.” He moved in to punch out Zygote. The man was unspeakable!

  Lily blocked his way. “Only to change his appearance. He didn’t expect me to remember any of our time together. What we felt was in need of no spell. From the time your ship arrived, he put all that behind us. He has treated me as an honored guest and nothing more.”

  “What about what I saw upstairs?” Herb asked, referring darkly to the incident in the bedroom. “I saw his arms around you.”

  “He was helping me into bed. To rest. I am the one who embraced him. I was determined to reveal my memories and ask him to release you, but then you burst in to save me.” She smiled.

  “But, this is too crazy!” Herb said.

  “Herb, you never needed me. Zygote does. He’s been a lonely man despite his power. Would you begrudge me happiness now that you’ve found yours?”

  “No.” Herb was torn. He wanted Lily to be happy, but how could she find that with a man like Zygote?

  “I think our love could flourish. The love of a good woman has brought forth the good in many men; I know many women who would envy a fairy tale life with a brilliant, reformed, mad magician.” She looked at Zygote questioningly. So much depended upon his answer.

  Zygote raised an eyebrow and considered. It seemed that he was being proposed to by a beautiful young woman. And at his age. His age! Quickly, he cast a silent spell and looked younger as the lines began disappearing.

  “Quite reformed,” he affirmed, his eyes glistening with a slight moisture.

  “But not too much,” Lily said, noticing the character lines fading from his features. “I love you just the way you are,” she said, tracing a smile line with her fingers.

  The process stopped abruptly, and they stood gazing into each other’s eyes with a silent communication, forgetting the other three. The magician enclosed Lily in his arms—where she seemed quite content to remain.

  “Let’s leave,” Spring whispered to Herb and Cling Ling. “We aren’t wanted here now.”

  Herb looked at the unlikely couple lost in their embrace, then shrugged and went along with the others. This time no giants pursued them; no dragons dive bombed from the skies. Cling Ling wandered away to search for transportation.

  “We can’t just leave her here,” Herb insisted. “Zygote is too old for her. And besides, he’s evil. Look at everything he did to you.”

  “I’m not forgetting, Herb. I have no love for Zygote. True, he didn’t kill my father, but he caused that death. Zygote’s failure has been a small punishment. But, I do owe Lily, and crazy as it is, if she wants to stay with Zygote, I won’t deny her that choice. I have to go on. I want my life back.”

  “Why do you think she retained all those memories? It shouldn’t have been possible. It’s not—not scientific,” Herb muttered.

  “I don’t have an answer, but this is a magical realm. If anyone deserves to live happily ever after, it’s Lily,” Spring said.

  “Yes, but—”

  “Shh,” Spring said silencing him with a kiss. “Love casts its own spell. That’s all we need to know.”

  “1 think I feel some of that magic now,” Herb said, kissing her again. And again. And again.

  The noise of a throat being cleared sounded behind them. Cling Ling had returned. He had rounded up a sleek spaceship with a robot pilot at the modern, private port behind Zygote’s castle. The magician might have preferred days of old, but he wasn’t a fool when it came to modern comfort and convenience.

  The new ship was nothing close to the bucket of bolts they had travelled in with the Txnghc. It had luxurious accommodations with good food from well stocked nutrition units, and even separate sleeping compartments.

  Cling Ling sat in the front of the ship with the metallic pilot while Spring and Herb shut their compartment door for long awaited privacy.

  “What did your father say when you called to tell him you were bringing home a bride?” Spring asked. “Was he disappointed it wasn’t Lily? Does he know I’m not—green?”

  “My family loves Lily, but they understand. They are happy for us, so don’t be afraid. Cross-pollination is not unknown on my planet, after all. You are beautiful, and they will love you as much as I do.” He took her in his arms and squeezed
to make this point. And also because he enjoyed it.

  Spring snuggled close on the small bunk, and reminisced. “Lily was a beautiful bride. I’m glad she came after us. I never thought I’d be married in a double ceremony. Especially with Zygote as one of the grooms.”

  “Love conquers all,” Herb said.

  “Did you just make that up?” Spring teased. “So much talk. What kind of honeymoon is this, anyway?”

  “This kind,” Herb said, with an immediate demonstration. Spring heartily endorsed the suggestion. This time around there were no giants pounding on the walls. There was no need to rush, so they went slowly, getting to know each other as lovers, as well as friends. “But you know, it was almost better when we were pretending, there on Kamalot.”

  “Who was pretending?” she demanded with a mock frown.

  He laughed. “When we pretended we were pretending.”

  At the wonderful moment of union, Spring cried out her deep love for Herb. As Herb reciprocated the sentiment, he felt a tremendous wave of—knowledge.

  “Spring! Oh, Spring!” he cried. “It’s working!” he gasped as his mind was filled with—practically everything.

  “Is it ever,” Spring sighed, misunderstanding his meaning.

  “No. I mean the transference. The secret. Don’t you see? The first time, we held back our true feelings. We pretended it was just sex. But now it’s love. No pretense. Love is the answer!”

  “It always was, darling,” Spring said, covering his face with kisses. She relaxed in the afterglow, feeling truly happy for the first time since the loss of her father. She wanted to stay in Herb’s strong arms forever.

  “You don’t understand,” Herb said gently. “I have all the information now. All of it. And Lily was only partially right about your father and why he did this. This secret is your legacy. You see,” he continued, assimilating this aspect, “your father loved you very much Spring, but he—he was dying. Of an incurable malady.”

  “Dying? No!”

  “This was the only way he knew to be sure you would have this knowledge, in the arms of someone you loved. He knew you would need someone.”

  “I never—” She swallowed, still in shock. “I never even suspected that anything was wrong. He would have left me anyway.” She tried to remember if there had been any signs, but there hadn’t been. He had spared her even that. “Then, it wasn’t Zygote at all? It would have ended the same way, even if he hadn’t taken the poison. I’ve been so wrong about so much! Lily—somehow she sensed it.”

  “I feel better about Lily, knowing this. Perhaps now it will be easier for you to—to let go, Spring,” Herb said, knowing how close she had been to her father. It was still a lot to ask.

  Spring looked at Herb and realized that he was right. The old life was over. It was time to move on. Her father had been a wonderful man, but now she had another. “Kiss me Herb,” she implored as if they had never done it before. “Kiss me.”

  Herb gladly complied, and another shock wave of information rocked his brain. “Spring! Every time we kiss, I learn something new. You wouldn’t believe some of the things I know how to do now.”

  “And I can’t wait to find out,” she said mischievously. “Tell me, is it true what they say about plant men?” She cupped her hands and whispered in his ear.

  Herb blushed a bright lizard green but smiled broadly. Some secrets were better when shared. As for the rest, it would take time to learn, but he was an eager student.

  AUTHORS’ NOTES

  Piers Anthony

  I have known Jo Anne Taeusch since 1987, when we met at the World Fantasy Convention in Nashville, Tennessee. She really didn’t make much of an impression on me then. As I recall, she was a tiny figure under a mass of orange hair who came to one of my autographings and to my reading. It wasn’t until she started sending me cute letters that I delved into the recesses of my cranium to reconstruct the lost memory. She also sent me cards for holidays, always clever, and sometimes little gifts.

  I should clarify that I try to discourage too many letters from readers, as I have been answering an average of 150 a month for several years, and it strains my time. I especially try to discourage gifts, because I really have everything I need, and feel that my contact with readers should be via the printed pages of my novels. I seldom give gifts, other than the words in my fiction, to any of my readers, as part of a similar principle. But Jo Anne was one of three who would not be gainsaid in such respects. I am not the fastest study in such matters, but eventually I realized that something more than mere generosity was motivating these three, all married women, in this respect, and concluded that it was best to let the matter be. So I have a growing collection of gifts in my study, some of significant value, and they do remind me of their donors. I have met each of them, at some event. And I do use the novel solar calculator Jo Anne sent (it had blue fluid saturating its works; eventually that evaporated, leaving it empty, but it still works nicely), and the Samurai sword letter opener on those hundreds of other letters that pile in. This year it was a toy computer that blinks MERRY CHRISTMAS.

  So I was there, as it were, during Jo Anne’s ups and downs, watching somewhat helplessly from the sidelines as her marriage failed, debts she hadn’t incurred bankrupted her (our legal system is at times an ass), and illness led to depletion and surgery. But her cute outlook remained. Once she remarked that she had just turned forty, and was still mad about it. I watched as she slowly put her life together again, though it was clearly no joyous existence. I hear from many whose lives are, as I put it, subdivisions of Hell, and many more who seem to be skidding on thinning ice over a threatening abyss. I’m depressive; I felt that my own life was not a pleasant one, until success came by luck and tenacity and drove the wolf from my door. But it has become clear that I never faced the trials some of my readers endure.

  When Jo Anne asked whether I would critique her failed fantasy novel, I knew it was payback time. I don’t claim to know a lot about much, but I do know something about commercial fantasy. So I gave her my usual warning about the likelihood of having to tell her all the ways she was going wrong—maybe there are those who enjoy that, but I don’t—and agreed to read it. Thus came The Secret of Spring. Therein I found all the cute cleverness formerly evident in her letters, plus a pretty good entertainment science fantasy novel. It did need work, and I told her what I felt it needed. But I also advised her that I was doing an experimental series of collaborative novels, and could do the work I recommended myself, if she wished. I’m not eager to get into more collaborations, as I have more than enough of my own writing to do, but I judge each case on its merits, and I felt Spring deserved her chance.

  Thus this volume, my 21st collaborative novel, and 104th overall book. I’ve done two collaborative anthologies, too, but on reconsideration I decided that they don’t count, because they represent the work of other writers. This will be Jo Anne’s first published novel, but perhaps not her last. I think there is a place in Parnassus for cute, clever stories like this one.

  So why am I talking about Jo Anne, instead of myself? Well, my life is dull; all I do is sit in front of a red screen with yellow print and type fiction. But perhaps one interesting thing is happening to me now: I’m being sued. No, it’s frivolous; someone is trying to get the commissions I paid my literary agent. But the legalistic vilification in the suit is something to appreciate. There must be a fiction writer in the works.

  Remember, those interested in more of my works can call the troll-free 1-800 HI PIERS for a sample Newsletter. And no, they won’t give you Jo Anne’s phone number.

  Jo Anne Taeusch

  I had a lot of fun writing this story, which was one reason why I did it; there hasn’t been nearly enough of that in my recent history. But that aside, I believe, like most folk who do this, I wrote because I had to. There’s still a soft callous on my middle finger from holding a pencil so often as a child.

  Due to family illness and other circumstances I was enco
uraged to be quiet and entertain myself. Thus began a lifelong love affair with books; even the means of earning my living has revolved around them, as I’ve been in library services for more than thirty years.

  The Secret of Spring is my first published work, but not my first effort. Over the years I’ve penned poetry, written short stories and even puppet plays, but when going through an especially difficult period around the time I met Piers Anthony (no connection) it was time to tackle “The Book.”

  It served me well as therapy and although not published, has proved profitable, since it was from a minor character came the notion for the plant people. So while I’d love to claim a green thumb and say inspiration came naturally from my great storehouse of knowledge about plants, the truth is that grass turns brown where I walk. I also wanted to explore communication differences between the sexes without losing the humor, and this story seemed a natural vehicle.

  Some have said the pun is the lowest form of humor, but I’ve always enjoyed them; the worse, the better. I truly believe that Piers Anthony’s Xanths are the highest form of punishment. Whenever I’ve needed a lift, his wonderful books have been there to turn to, and he has been my favorite author for many years. In spite of the pest (I read his Author’s Note) I’ve made of myself, when I asked for an opinion of my story he was kind enough to look it over.

  The result has been an opportunity beyond any I could have hoped for or expected. Spring is here!

  All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.