The Wizards Contract

Ed stared dumbfounded at the strange creature standing in the center of the room. "My Lord?" He glanced up at the wizard, who appeared deep in thought.

"Do not trouble yourself," said the wizard. "This is as I intended."

Ed looked back, where the young woman was standing. She was a pretty creature, yellow-haired with a round, gentle face, and big brown eyes that were looking down at herself in confusion. Or at least, that was the upper half of her. A little ways below her pert, pale breasts, her pink skin turned a little darker, and below her waist was just a shade of tan, and continued down, farther behind her, impossibly far behind her, over the equine shape of a body that no ordinary young woman would have. Four legs stretched to the stone floor to hold up the long barrel of a horse underneath her, but instead of sitting on the creature, she simply seemed to blend into it, her human hips disappearing into the horse's shoulders, its head and her human legs nowhere to be seen.

A moment ago, all that stood in the chamber was bloody bags of body parts, which Ed had dutifully unwrapped and laid out neatly at the wizard's instructions. It had never even occurred to him as they'd prepared that the body parts hadn't all been human.

"This -- was your intention?" asked Ed nervously.

"That girl died last week," said the wizard softly. "She was -- well, the men who did horrible things to her are now in my dungeon, and I have intentions for them. And the horse was a fine mare, sired by the best of stallions, but she was put down for the mere cost of a broken leg. Both had passed to the next world, my boy. The world of men had rightly given up on them both."

Ed grimaced. "Necromancy?"

"Nothing of the sort!" said the wizard. "When the body dies, the soul begins to separate. It takes time. The horse and the girl each had but half a soul this morning. And now together, I have made her whole."

"But -- why?"

"Would you let a lovely flower die if all it needed was water?" said the wizard. "This world has too much loss. I promised her father he would see his daughter alive again, and so she is."

"But -- she's a horse." Ed frowned harder, looking up at the wizard.

"She's alive," said the wizard. "And she's no horse. I dub her a 'centaur.' The ancients saw men on horseback and thought they were one and named them such, but I have made their story real. She and her steed are forever bound -- but this is no cruelty, boy. She is more now than either of her parts were before: She is a new creature wrought by my art, neither woman nor mare, but the best of both. No horse indeed."

The girl was blinking, still confused, and looked left and right as her eyes cleared, and finally noticed that she was not alone. "Um -- hello," she said nervously. "Where am I?"

"You are in my Keep," said the wizard, "and under my protection." He waved a hand toward Ed. "This is my apprentice. He will take care of you."

"My Lord?" said Ed, looking up at him.

"Show her to the westernmost chamber, and offer food if she will take it. She has been through much. A meal and a rest will aid her recovery. As for me, I have things to do, and I must write in my journal. The spell succeeded as I was certain it would, but some details of its invocation ought not to be lost."

Ed looked back at the horse-girl, who was looking at him nervously, biting her lip. "Don't worry," he said. "I'll see to it that you're well taken care of."

She nodded.

"Come with me, and I'll show you to your room."

* * *

The halls of the great Keep wound almost endlessly, and Ed was worried at first that the horse-girl would not be able to follow him, but she seemed to have little difficulty, and spent much of the walk glancing about at the vast chambers, some opulent, some bare.

Here, there was a hall of paintings, and there, dozens of suits of armor on stands; here, the room's every corner was gilded with jewels; there stood an empty room save for a single wooden bucket. Ed had learned long ago not to pry into the wizard's reasons. He was old, impossibly old, hundreds and hundreds of years, and Ed had long ago realized that the chambers represented past times in his life: The wizard was once a Knight. And here were memorabilia from the time he was a King. And this room of books was from two hundred years of scholarly study. There was a room that Ed had seen but once, and on its wall hung a single portrait of a young woman, brown-haired and gentle-looking, with a candle lit on each side: Ed was unsure if the woman had once been the wizard's wife, his fiancée, or his daughter, but he had never dared to ask.

They stopped at last at the very end of the western wing of the Keep. This wing was reserved for the wizard's guests, who visited from time to time. The last chamber was large, forty feet across, decorated in regal red and gold, and like all of the Keep, had been kept spotless and clean by the maids.

Ed shuddered. The maids. Those were strange creatures. Something like two-foot-tall squirrels or mice, pale and white, and dressed in little red uniforms, they traversed the Keep each day and cleaned every room, and then disappeared -- where, Ed had no idea. Each morning, they would appear and start cleaning, and each evening they would simply turn corners and vanish. In between, they would chatter endlessly, gossiping about the nearby village -- which they had never been to, but somehow seemed to know every detail of. Ed was nearly certain that they had never been human, that the wizard had created them himself, but they spoke so clearly he sometimes wondered if like this horse-girl they were born of human flesh.

He led the horse-girl inside the chamber, and she stood in the center, looking all about, her jaw slightly agape.

"This is where you'll sleep," said Ed.

"This -- is for me?" she asked, her eyes wide and shining.

"Yes, by the wizard's grace you will stay here until he grants you leave."

She looked down, her eyes suddenly worried. "I'm -- trapped here?" she said.

"No, no, of course not! You have been through much, and the wizard would simply have you rest, and recover. None save those in the dungeons are trapped here."

"Dungeons?"

"There are a few men down there, men who did terrible things, who are kept locked up by the wizard's power. Like the ones who -- " Ed paused. "-- who hurt you."

She blinked. "I -- I remember. A little. A big man, with a beard, and evil eyes. And we were in -- I don't know where. It was dark. And he did -- " Her eyes went wide, and she stopped for a moment before continuing. "He hurt me," she said softly.

"He -- killed you," said Ed.

She took a breath and nodded.

"The wizard brought you back to life. But you're -- a bit different now."

"I'm not -- what I was," she said, looking over her shoulder. "I remember running in the fields, too." She looked down at her hands, turning them over a few times. "I remember -- shopping in the market. And -- and being in a barn."

"You're both of the things you were made from," said Ed. "But the wizard says you're more than that now."

She nodded. "I -- all of those things -- it's like I dreamed them. But now I'm awake, and I'm here, and I feel odd, but only like I can't -- quite shake the dreams."

"A little rest will do you some good," he said. "Can I bring you some food?"

She nodded again. "I -- I do feel hungry."

"What would you like?"

She paused again, wincing. "Oats -- no, beef and bread -- no, some hay would fill me up -- I -- I don't think I know." The pretty girl bit her lip.

Ed smiled. "I'll have Cook make you a little of both, and you can see what you like best."

She nodded again, and walked over to the bed, gingerly putting a foreleg on it. "I think I'll rest first," she said. "But -- in a few hours, that would be lovely." She smiled sweetly at him, and Ed swallowed nervously.

"A -- all right," he said. "Uh -- before I go -- do you have a name?"

She pondered this, clambering onto the giant bed. "I'm -- I mean -- I'm Cassie. Or Yura? I -- I know I called myself 'Cassie,' but I used to come when people called 'Yura.' I think my name is -- both?"

He shrugged. "Maybe you're 'Ca-ra' until you figure out which one you like better?"

She smiled again. "I like that," she said. "You can call me Cara."

* * *

Ed marveled as the week went by. Cara recovered quickly, and after only two days she was regularly in the courtyard, racing from one end to the other as the wizard instructed her to test out her new body. At first she moved awkwardly, her limbs slightly tangled as her two halves conflicted over how to function. But the wizard seemed to know what he was doing, and before the week was out, she was moving as gracefully as a deer, skirting and dodging corners as if she'd always been doing it. He'd managed to create a perfect fusion of the mind and wisdom of a human and the grace and elegance of a horse, and Ed found himself at the windows for hours watching her -- to the neglect of his duties.

"You fancy her," said a voice from behind him.

Ed froze.

The wizard circled around beside him, where he was standing at an upper window, watching the pretty blond centaur girl racing and looping in the yard outside.

"I -- no, I -- "

The wizard chuckled. "You're a young man, and she's the first young woman in my Keep since before you were apprenticed to me. And she's a pretty specimen of her kind, too."

"My Lord," said Ed, bowing slightly, "she is in our care. I would never dream of anything that would -- besmirch your reputation. Her father -- "

"Her father only wishes for her to have a future," said the wizard. "He has met with her, and while glimpses of his Cassie are behind her eyes, he knows that what my spell brought back is not exactly what he lost. She is Cara, as you named her, and the only thing he wants for her is the happiness she was denied in her old life."

"What happened to her, my Lord?"

"Ruffians broke into their home. Held Cassie and her mother at a knife's edge. Robbed and stole all they could from a House of Nobility, and that is why two of those ruffians are dead, and the other three -- will suffer at my hands for their crimes. They raped and killed Cassie, boy. They committed the worst sin men can commit. For her sake, I excised that memory when I remade her, but that is part of why she is no longer who she was: You cannot uproot a tree without damaging its soil."

Ed nodded soberly.

"That is no longer her life, nor who she is, but merely a piece of how she came to be. Cara is a creature born anew, and pure in a way that her old self never was. See? She has not the shame of men. She runs bare in the yard, joyous in the sun, happy to be alive and to be free. She is more than any woman who has come before her. Any man of red blood and staunch spirit would fancy her."

The wizard stopped speaking for a bit, and they watched Cara loop from one end of the courtyard to another, smiling -- but then frowning as she skidded to a halt. Ed realized the courtyard was far too small: She wanted to run in the fields, to joyfully bound endlessly, but here within the walls of the Keep, she was safe, but she was not free.

"There will come a time," said the wizard, "when I will bid her to leave this place. She is a lovely creation, but she was not made for walls."

Ed nodded again.

They watched her in silence again for a bit.

"She will need a mate," said the wizard.

"My Lord?"

"I dare not release her alone," said the wizard. "She is the only centaur in this world. In but a week's time she would be captured, and bound, and men would ruin that which I remade. The world of Man is no place for her, but she is not a creature that could survive on her own. She is a creature of beauty, of gentleness, of sweetness, of love. I met Cherie, once, before this, and even then she was a sweet and gentle maiden. Cara is only more so. If she is to survive in this world, she will need a guard, a man who will stand by her side, who will see only her, who will protect her to his last breath."

Cara looped about the courtyard below and nearly crashed into a wall, and paused to laugh.

"She has eyes for you," said the wizard.

"My Lord?"

"You fancy her. And though she is ever too shy to say it, she fancies you as well."

"But I would never --!"

"Ed," said the wizard, and he paused. Ed had never heard him once speak his name. "You know that sorcery is not your future. You have tried mightily, and I commend your earnest effort, but you know that my arts well exceed your grasp."

Ed's face fell. "Yes."

"Perhaps -- that could be your future?" said the wizard, waving his hand toward the girl, who'd come to a stop and was stretching in the sun.

Ed looked up at him, confused. "My Lord? I am not -- of her kind. And I have a sworn duty to you to -- "

" -- to protect her, yes. But you'd protect her even without that, wouldn't you? If she came to you in the dead of night, wounded, you would bandage her, and you would not rest until you found those responsible."

Ed was silent.

"You're a good young man, Edward. Honest and forthright. You'd have made a good Knight, if such a role still existed in this land. I took you as my apprentice because I knew that I could put my trust and faith in you. But sorcery is not your future, and it never was."

Ed breathed. "My Lord, if she were human -- "

The wizard chuckled. "But she isn't, is she?"

"No."

The wizard stood up from the window and started to walk away.

He paused, glancing back, his eyes narrow but shining. "Where I have made one, boy, I can make another. Think on it."

* * *

Ed spent the next week tending to her. Each morning, he would bring her meals, and he would spend time tending to her, as was his duty. But in the afternoons, he began to join her in the courtyard as she ran. At first, he simply stood by the wall, and when she asked, he would say he was guarding the courtyard. Fiends existed in this world, he said, and though the Keep's walls were sturdy, she ought not be left alone.

But his eyes never left her.

She was sweet, and she was gentle, and she was free in a way that Ed had never been. She was joyful, not bound by duty, but merely in love with existence itself, and when a butterfly would flutter into the courtyard, she would carefully inch over to it until it would land on her finger, her eyes shining as she smiled. Birds seemed less fearful of the keep, and would perch on the walls as she ran, chirping happily as the graceful girl looped about. She seemed to exist in a world not made of the stone and wood and iron Ed had always known, but somewhere beyond, out in Nature, where Ed had so rarely been.

And then one day at the wizard's urging, they went beyond the walls.

Ed found himself riding beside her on one of the wizard's horses, through the long green fields east of the Keep, and high along the mountain ridges. The joy spread across her face the moment the great iron doors of the Keep slid open, and never left. Here there was greenery, was grass and life, and the birds looped high overhead through the brilliant sunlight. And Ed realized that this was where she belonged: She was neither nude nor naked, but simply as bare as all of Nature's creatures. Cara was home, and as she stopped at a waterfall to sip a drink, Ed knew she could not stay in the Keep much longer.

The ride back was agonizing for him. She was laughing, chattering about how lovely the world about her was, but he was somber. In a few days, he was certain, she would be gone, gone from the Keep forever, and the thought tore at him. She had been his ward, to be sure, but at once like a thunderclap, he realized the wizard was right: He did not merely fancy her. He would give anything to stay with her, wherever she would go.

But did that mean he was willing to accept -- what was surely madness?

They stopped inside the courtyard as the magic drew shut the great iron doors. Cara looked at them longingly as they slammed. Ed led his horse back to the stables, and then came back to her.

She sighed. "I miss it already," she said softly.

"You are -- nearly strong enough to leave," he said.

"I know. But -- I don't know where I would go," she said. "I know I don't belong here. But my parents don't recognize me. My old friends would think I'm a monster. And there are no other centaurs."

She smiled down at him. "But thank you for staying with me," she added. "You've been so good to me. I don't deserve someone so caring."

"Yes, you do," he said.

She smiled wider. "I like the wizard and the maids and Cook and Cardy and all, but after I leave, you'll be the one I'll really miss. And not just because you bring me breakfast and dinner."

His face felt hot. "I'll miss you too," he said, and it felt like his heart had been torn in half.

"It's a shame," she said.

"What's a shame?"

"It's really too bad you're not a centaur too," she said. "I imagined it all day today while we were riding -- and more." She blushed a little.

And then Ed knew what he had to do.

* * *

It had seemed strange to walk with the wizard through the stables, looking at each of the prized stallions, and debating which would be the best choice. The wizard hadn't seemed at all put out by the notion that he would lose one of his steeds; if anything, he seemed excited at the notion that he'd be able to cast the spell again, this time with a willing participant, and not merely a body.

And that was how Ed found himself standing naked and cold in the wizard's laboratory beside Colton, a large horse with a dark brown coat and a feisty temperament. Cara was happily out running in the fields by herself, far from what was about to happen. The horse was tied on one side of the great stone circle, and Ed stood on the other, and the wizard made his preparations, going back and forth, drawing runes, sprinkling dust, and carefully tuning the room's aura for the impossible magic that was about to be cast.

At last the wizard stood up from his efforts, and took a step back. "Last chance," he said gently. "You can back out."

"I'm ready," said Ed.

"You're certain?"

"I'll get to be with Cara," he said. "That's all that matters."

"This will hurt," said the wizard.

Ed nodded. "I know."

"Then one last time I will ask you. Ed: As men, as equals, we speak no longer as master and apprentice: This is your choice and yours alone. Do you want this?"

"I do."

The wizard nodded. "Then take a deep breath."

Ed was grateful that Cara was away, because the nightmarish, unholy screams could be heard for miles.

* * *

It was late in the day when Cara returned. She'd hoped Ed would have gone with her again. It didn't feel right to gallop in the fields alone. But the wizard had told her that Ed was busy on an important duty, and that Ed wouldn't be back until evening, leaving Cara to decide her own fate. Still, it had been a lovely day. It felt so good to run, to be out in the open, out in the sun, to forget the human world and just relax in Nature.

The gates slid open as she stood there, grinding and cranking, and then Cara looked up.

"No -- "

He stood there, flicking his tail, trying not to feel too nervous.

"-- E -- Ed?" She took a step closer.

"I -- think I'm -- Edon? Cord?" he said. "I'm not sure -- if I'm more Colton or Edward. But -- I'm both."

"Did you do this for -- me?" she stammered.

"I think I did it for both of us," he said. "I think -- I'm not sure what I think right now. I'm still -- not me yet."

"It takes a while," she said, smiling. She walked up to him and gently took his hand. "I can't believe you did this."

"Ed -- liked you a lot. Enough to want to stay with you. I do too."

"I can't believe it," she said. "I never thought I'd see another centaur. But I'm so glad you are. I imagined -- I dreamed -- and now you're right here, right in front of me, and it's so much better than all of the dreams."