Dantalion gets some motherly advice

All evening long Dantalion had been reminded of the truth behind Foras’s wish to escape their mother’s notice. Her mere thoughts turned in his direction had been like rasps grating over his flesh and tempests roaring in his mind.

He was already on his belly when she arrived, and not only to do her honor.

He pressed his face against the earth and breathed deeply its complex perfume, mingled of many simple odors. It seemed a grateful thing, as his brother had said.

“You may rise,” she intoned.

Nevertheless, Dantalion dared not even open his eyes until her light had dimmed behind the lids.

He had not forgotten her, and yet his reaction of revulsion at the sight of her seemed to prove he had.

He had always thought her the most perfect, the most elegant being in all of this imperfect creation. So she was still, perhaps, but it was the elegant, glittering, metallic perfection of a wasp – that least lifelike, least caressable of God’s creatures.

For his mother had snakes on her head, and their heavy bodies swayed down on either side of her face and slithered over her shoulders and breasts – there where there could have been simple falls of soft, meadow-​​scented curls.

His mother had soulless mirrors for eyes, revealing nothing and seeing everything, in place of the expressive, sloe-​​dark eyes of a girl.

His mother’s mouth was unkissable, red and reeking as blood, and when she spoke her crimson tongue was all one could see.

His mother had four arms and a pair of wings. She could not be embraced, but she had a suffocating, smothering embrace of her own, which was death.

Worst, most grotesque of all, in place of a girl’s slender legs and tapered knees, in place of the soft thighs which could embrace some fortunate creature otherwise, his mother’s body was fused into the fat, twining coils of a serpent.

Clearly, Dantalion thought, he had spent too many centuries among mortal men and elves.

“A thousand greetings, Mother.”

He lifted his hands to two of hers: a right and a left, a blessing and a curse, such as she offered to all her children.

“Peace be upon you,” he said.

“And upon you peace,” she replied.

She dropped her arms, and her statuesque formality of face and gesture dropped away with them.

“Your brother told me you have something important to tell me,” she growled. “I hope for your sake that he was correct.”

“I have missed you, too,” he muttered.

His mother smiled.

“I believe you will agree that this information was worth the trouble.”

“Let us hear it, then.” As if to demonstrate whom she meant by “us”, one of the drooping snakes curled up across her breast and lifted its head to flick its tongue at Dantalion.

He knew better than to waste her time with anything other than the simple truth. “Dana is meddling.”

His mother’s mocking expression soured, and Dantalion felt the first tendril of fear twining about his heart.

He could not tell whether her blank eyes stared up at the sky or into his face; he could not tell whether she was disgusted at the mention of her sister or by Dantalion’s presumption in summoning her on such meager grounds.

“What do you mean by ‘meddling’?” she finally asked.

“She attacked me!” he cried. “She ate me!”

His mother laughed, and the beaming whiteness of her teeth proved that her mouth was not truly wet with blood.

“I’m certain you deserved it. What did you do to anger Dana, my pet?”

“Nothing! I was only seeing to my own petty affairs, such as could not possibly interest divine beings such as Dana and yourself.”

“Interest, no, but annoy, perhaps. What did you do?”

“Nothing that is forbidden me! And even had I, it is not for Dana to punish me.”

Several of her snakes lifted their heads and gaped their mouths at him, revealing their curving fangs.

“What did you do?” she howled.

Her patience had run out – Dantalion had been fool enough to exhaust it. Another coil of fear twisted up and began to squeeze.

“She caught me in bed with a woman,” he muttered.

His mother laughed still more cruelly.

“She had no right! I cannot fathom why Dana would interest herself in my dalliances with mortals!”

In fact, the girl Eithne was no ordinary mortal, but mortal she was nevertheless, and therefore no concern of Dana’s. Nor of Kalilletha’s, and he did not intend to mention the poor, delicate creature to the Terrible Mother of his race, no matter how she frightened him.

Her snakes turned their faces away in disgust, and she flicked the fingers of two hands at him, as if he were only a bothersome insect.

“And I cannot fathom why you would be interested in dallying with mortals!”

“I must amuse myself in some manner while I am trapped here,” he grumbled.

“Perhaps that is all Dana meant to do: amuse herself by tormenting you while we try to find out what is happening here. Indeed, it is such an excellent idea that I shall recommend it to the others when next we meet.”

“What is happening here is that someone is meddling!” Dantalion wailed. “And I’m telling you it’s Dana! And all you want to do is torment me further!”

His mother scowled. “Surely you will not presume to compare your aborted seduction with the destiny of a world.”

“If she can meddle with one she can meddle with the other.”

“It does not follow. Is that all you wished to tell me?”

The way she drew out the word “all” indicated how insufficient she found his reason for bringing her here.

Dantalion clenched his fists in helpless rage. He wanted to beat her and bite her, tear the snakes from her scalp, and twist off her too numerous limbs. He wanted to terrorize her. He wanted to find her worst fear and make her live it.

Clearly he had been too long among the men and elves: he had forgotten how to handle himself before a superior being.

“I shall spare your pride,” she said coldly, “and save you the shame of begging me to bring you home. I tell you, I shall not.”

“It had not occurred to me to ask.”

“No?” she chuckled. “Perhaps this material world is beginning to grow on you, Dantalion. Or perhaps your lust is getting the better of your pride? Hmm? Shall we tell Shemyaza he has a new recruit?”

Dantalion’s pride forbade him to answer.

“Do not trouble me again with your ‘petty affairs’,” she warned.

“Will you do nothing?” he cried.

“I shall not forget what you have told me. If you believe the matter is important, then you have succeeded in making me aware of it, and you should be pleased.”

“But you will do nothing with the knowledge.”

“If time proves its import, then I am forewarned. Is that not sufficient?”

If he had to speak, he would have to admit that it should have been. Therefore he said nothing.

“As for you,” she said, “may Dana devour you every morning and vomit you every night for all it matters to me.”

She uncoiled her long tail and shook it out into ripples as she advanced, crushing a sweet odor from the dewy grass. She slid past him without a backwards glance.

“My only advice to you is that you pursue your petty affairs in the manner the least likely to annoy her. And me.”