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  RAVES FOR RAYMOND E. FEIST’S FAERIE TALE

  “Faerie Tale is sleek. It’s a smart, harrowing sleigh ride down a very dark mountain.”

  —Richard Christian Matheson

  “The author of Magician spins a masterly mystery web of good and evil out of the tension between Middle America and the ‘Fair Folk’ of western myth life—unsettling shadow shapes that are not yet ready to disappear from the mind’s fearful eye.”

  —The Christian Science Monitor

  “Solid writing, strong development of both human and nonhuman characters.… A tantalizing sense of foreboding permeates the novel and makes it highly readable.”

  —Library Journal

  BOOKS BY RAYMOND E. FEIST:

  A Darkness at Sethanon

  Faerie Tale

  The King’s Buccaneer

  Prince of the Blood

  Magician: Apprentice

  Magician: Master Silverthorn

  BOOKS BY RAYMOND E. FEIST

  AND JANNY WURTS:

  Daughter of the Empire

  Mistress of the Empire

  Servant of the Empire

  Available wherever Bantam Books are sold

  Contents

  Cover

  RAVES FOR RAYMOND E. FEIST’S FAERIE TALE

  Other Books By This Author

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  JUNE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  JULY

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  AUGUST

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  SEPTEMBER

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  OCTOBER

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Copyright

  One of life’s truly rarest treasures is friendship. I count myself exceedingly fortunate in this regard. My friends have given of themselves above and beyond the call, in far too many ways to recount, but, most important, in love, support, and acceptance. I shall never be their equal in generosity.

  But as a humble token of appreciation, this book is dedicated to:

  The Original Thursday Nighters: Steve A., Jon, Anita, Alan, Tim, Rich, Dave, Ethan, Jeff, Lorri, Steve B., and Bob (and April, for I can’t seem to remember a time when she wasn’t there)

  back when April & Steve’s house was Steve & Jon’s apartment and we all sweated finals, experimental results, orals, dissertation defenses, finding jobs, the triumphs and the failures, the pain, the love, and the growing … together.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  My deep appreciation to:

  April and Steve Abrams, Richard Freese, Ethan Munson, Richard Spahl, Adrian Zackheim, Jim Moser, Lou Aronica, Pat LoBrutto, and Janny Wurts for helping me realize a rather odd idea.

  Raymond E. Feist

  April 1987

  San Diego, California

  PROLOGUE

  MAY

  Barney Doyle sat at his cluttered workbench, attempting to fix Olaf Andersen’s ancient power mower for the fourth time in seven years. He had the cylinder head off and was judging the propriety of pronouncing last rites on the machine—he expected the good fathers over at St. Catherine’s wouldn’t approve. The head was cracked—which was why Olaf couldn’t get it started—and the cylinder walls were almost paper-thin from wear and a previous rebore. The best thing Andersen could do would be to invest in one of those new Toro grass cutters, with all the fancy bells and whistles, and put this old machine out to rust. Barney knew Olaf would raise Cain about having to buy a new one, but that was Olaf’s lookout. Barney also knew getting a dime out of Andersen for making such a judgment would be close to a miracle. It would be to the benefit of all parties concerned if Barney could coax one last summer’s labor from the nearly terminal machine. Barney absently took a sharpener to the blades while he pondered. He could take one more crack at it. An oversized cylinder ring might do the trick—and he could weld the small crack; he’d get back most of the compression. But if he didn’t pull it off, he’d lose both the time and the money spent on parts. No, he decided at last, better tell Andersen to make plans for a funeral.

  A hot, damp gust of wind rattled the half-open window. Barney absently pulled the sticky shirt away from his chest. Meggie McCorly, he thought absently, a smile coming to his lined face. She had been a vision of beauty in simple cotton, the taut fabric stretched across ripe, swaying hips and ample breasts as she walked home from school each day. For a moment he was struck by a rush of memories so vivid he felt an echo of lust rising in his old loins. Barney took out a handkerchief and wiped his brow. He savored the spring scents, the hot muggy night smells, so much like those that blew through the orchards and across the fields of County Wexford. Barney thought of the night he and Meggie had fled from the dance, from the crowded, stuffy hall, slipping away unnoticed as the town celebrated Paddy O’Shea and Mary McMannah’s wedding. The sultry memories caused Barney to dab again at his forehead as a stirring visited his groin. Chuckling to himself, Barney thought, There’s some life yet in this old boyo.

  Barney stayed lost in memories of half-forgotten passions for long minutes, then discovered he was still running the sharpener over a blade on Andersen’s mower and had brought the edge to a silvery gleam. He set the sharpener down, wondering what had come over him. He hadn’t thought of Meggie McCorly sinc
e he’d immigrated to America, back in ’38. Last he’d heard, she’d married one of the Cammack lads over in Enniscorthy. He couldn’t remember which one, and that made him feel sad.

  Barney caught a flicker of movement through the small window of his work shed. He put down the sharpener and went to peer out into the evening’s fading light. Not making out what it was that had caught his attention, Barney moved back toward his workbench. Just as his field of vision left the window, he again glimpsed something from the corner of his eye. Barney opened the door to his work shed and took a single step outside. Then he stopped.

  Old images, half-remembered tales, and songs from his boyhood rushed forward to overwhelm him as he slowly stepped backward into his shed. Feelings of joy and terror so beautiful they brought tears to his eyes flowed through Barney, breaking past every rational barrier. The implements of society left for his ministrations, broken toasters, the mower, the blender with the burned-out motor, his little television for the baseball games, all were vanquished in an instant as a heritage so ancient it predated man’s society appeared just outside Barney’s shed. Not taking his eyes from what he beheld beyond the door, he retreated slowly, half stumbling, until his back was against the workbench. Reaching up and back, Barney pulled a dusty bottle off the shelf. Twenty-two years before, when he had taken the pledge, Barney had placed the bottle of Jameson’s whiskey atop the shelf as a reminder and a challenge. In twenty-two years he had come to ignore the presence of the bottle, had come to shut out its siren call, until it had become simply another feature of the little shed where he worked.

  Slowly he pulled the cork, breaking the brittle paper of the old federal tax stamp. Without moving his head, without taking his gaze from the door, Barney lifted the bottle to the side of his mouth and began to drink.

  PART 1

  JUNE

  1

  “Stop it, you two!”

  Gloria Hastings stood with hands on hips, delivering the Look. Sean and Patrick stopped their bickering over who was entitled to the baseball bat. Their large blue eyes regarded their mother for a moment before, as one, they judged it close to the point of no return where her patience was concerned. They reached an accord with their peculiar, silent communication. Sean conceded custody of the bat to Patrick and led the escape outside.

  “Don’t wander too far off!” Gloria shouted after them. She listened to the sounds of eight-year-olds dashing down the ancient front steps and for a moment considered the almost preternatural bond between her boys. The old stories of twins and their empathic link had seemed folktales to her before giving birth, but now she conceded that there was something there out of the ordinary, a closeness beyond what was expected of siblings.

  Putting aside her musing, she looked at the mess the movers had left and considered, not for the first time, the wisdom of all this. She wandered aimlessly among the opened crates of personal belongings and felt nearly overwhelmed by the simple demands of sorting out the hundreds of small things they had brought with them from California. Just deciding where each item should go seemed a Sisyphean task.

  She glanced around the room, as if expecting it to have somehow changed since her last inspection. Deep-grained hardwood floors, freshly polished—which would need polishing again as soon as the crates and boxes were hauled outside—hinted at a style of living alien to Gloria. She regarded the huge fireplace with its ancient hand-carved façade as something from another planet, a stark contrast to the rough brick and stone ranch-house-style hearths of her California childhood. The stairs in the hallway, with their polished maple banisters, and the sliding doors to the den and dining room were relics of another era, conjuring up images of William Powell as Clarence Day or Clifton Webb in Cheaper by the Dozen. This house called for—no, demanded, she amended—high starched collars in an age of designer jeans. Gloria absently brushed back an errant strand of blond hair attempting an escape from under the red kerchief tied about her head, and fought back a nearly overwhelming homesickness. Casting about for a place to start in the seemingly endless mess, she threw her hands up in resignation. “This is not what Oscar winners are supposed to be doing! Phil!”

  When no answer was forthcoming, she left the large living room and shouted her husband’s name up the stairs. Again no reply. She walked back along the narrow hallway to the kitchen and pushed open the swinging door. The old house presented its kitchen to the east, with hinged windows over the sink and drainboard admitting the morning light. It would be hot in the mornings, come July, but it would be a pleasant place to sit in the evenings, with the windows and large door to the screened-in back porch left open, admitting the evening breeze. At least, she hoped so. Southern California days might be blast-furnace-hot at times, but it was dry heat and the evenings were impossibly beautiful. God, she wished to herself, what I’d give for an honest patio, and about half this humidity. Fighting off a sudden bout of regret over the move, she pulled her sticky blouse away from herself and let some air cool her while she hollered for her husband again.

  An answering scrabbling sound under the table made her jump, and she turned and uttered her favorite oath, “Goddamnitall!” Beneath the kitchen table crouched Bad Luck, the family’s black Labrador retriever, a guilty expression on his visage as he hunkered down before a ten-pound bag of Ken-L-Ration he had plundered. Crunchy kernels rolled around the floor. “You!” she commanded. “Out!”

  Bad Luck knew the rules of the game as well as the boys and at once bolted from under the table. He skidded about the floor looking for a way out, suddenly confounded by discovering himself in new territory. Having arrived only the day before, he hadn’t yet learned the local escape routes. He turned first one way, then another, his tail half wagging, half lowered between his legs, until Gloria held open the swinging door to the hallway. Bad Luck bolted down the hall toward the front door. She followed and opened it for him, and as he dashed outside, she shouted, “Go find the boys!”

  Turning, she spied the family’s large, smoky tomcat preening himself on the stairs. Philip had named the cat Hemingway, but everyone else called him Ernie. Feeling set upon, Gloria reached over, picked him up, and deposited him outside. “You too!” she snapped, slamming the door behind him.

  Ernie was a scarred veteran of such family eruptions and took it all with an unassailable dignity attained only by British ambassadors, Episcopal bishops, and tomcats. He glanced about the porch, decided upon a sunny patch, turned about twice, and settled down for a nap.

  Gloria returned to the kitchen, calling for her husband. Ignoring Bad Luck’s mess for the moment, she left the kitchen and walked past the service porch. She cast a suspicious sidelong glance at the ancient washer and dryer. She had already decided a visit to the mall was in order, for she knew with dread certainty those machines were just waiting to devour any clothing she might be foolish enough to place inside. New machines would take only a few days to deliver, she hoped. She paused a moment as she regarded the faded, torn sofa that occupied the large back porch, and silently added some appropriate porch furniture to her Sears list.

  Opening the screen door, she left the porch and walked down the steps to the “backyard,” a large bare patch of earth defined by the house, a stand of old apple trees off to the left, the dilapidated garage to the right, and the equally run-down barn a good fifty yards away. Over near the barn she caught sight of her husband, speaking to his daughter. He still looked like an Ivy League professor, she thought, with his greying hair receding upward slowly, his brown eyes intense. But he had a smile to melt your heart, one that made him look like a little boy. Then Gloria noticed that her stepdaughter, Gabrielle, was in the midst of a rare but intense pout, and debated turning around and leaving them alone. She knew that Phil had just informed Gabbie she couldn’t have her horse for the summer.

  Gabbie stood with arms crossed tight against her chest, weight shifted to her left leg, a pose typical of teenage girls that Gloria and other actresses over twenty-five had to dislocate joints t
o imitate. For a moment Gloria was caught in open admiration of her stepdaughter. When Gloria and Phil had married, his career was in high gear, and Gabbie had been with her maternal grandmother, attending a private school in Arizona, seeing her father and his new wife only at Christmas, at Easter, and for two weeks in the summer. Since her grandmother had died, Gabbie had come to live with them. Gloria liked Gabbie, but they had never been able to communicate easily, and these days Gloria saw a beautiful young woman taking the place of a moody young girl. Gloria felt an unexpected stab of guilt and worry that she and Gabbie might never get closer. She put aside her momentary uneasiness and approached them.

  Phil said, “Look, honey, it will only take a week or two more, then the barn will be fixed and we can see about leasing some horses. Then you and the boys can go riding whenever you want.”

  Gabbie tossed her long dark hair, and her brown eyes narrowed. Gloria was struck by Gabbie’s resemblance to her mother, Corinne. “I still don’t see why we can’t ship Bumper out from home, Father.” She said “Father” in that polysyllabic way young girls have of communicating hopelessness over ever being understood. “You let the boys bring that retarded dog and you brought Ernie. Look, if it’s the money, I’ll pay for it. Why do we have to rent some stupid farmer’s horses when Bumper’s back in California with no one to ride him?”

  Gloria decided to take a hand and entered the conversation as she closed on them. “You know it’s not money. Ned Barlow called and said he had a jumper panic aboard a flight last week, and they had to put him down before he could endanger the crew and riders, and he almost lost a second horse as well. The insurance company’s shut him down until he resolves that mess. And it’s a week into June and Ned also said it would be four or five weeks before he could get a reliable driver and good trailer to bring Bumper here, then nearly a week to move him, with all the stops he’d have to make. By the time he got here, it would be almost time for you to head back to UCLA. You’d have to ship him right back so he’d be there to ride when you’re at school. Want me to go on? Look, Gabbie, Ned’ll see Bump’s worked and cared for. He’ll be fine and ready for you when you get back.”