ChuMana rose from the reeds like the sinuous growth of a black, limbless tree, startling the poet so that he almost dropped his burden. Her head emerged first, her eyes bright and unblinking. Mud fell from her scales, blobbing into the pool about her, and still her great neck stretched higher and higher. Her scarlet underbelly flashed redder even than the poet’s grimy cloak.
At last she reached her full size, towering over Eanrin. Her tongue flickered once. Then a tall, slender woman in a black robe stood before the poet. The front panel of her robe was embroidered in rich red threads, and her eyes were like two rubies. She was strange and horrible to look upon, for she was so tall and thin. But strangest of all, she had no arms.
“Poet of Rudiobus,” she hissed. She slowly lowered her chin to her chest, her long neck bending gracefully. Her gaze never shifted from Eanrin’s face. “Many years have I wondered when you would return to claim your rights.”
“Yes, well.” Eanrin gave a shrug and the sweetest of smiles. He dared not bow for fear of dropping the girl. “I hadn’t intended to make it so soon. But I was thinking to myself today, ‘See here, it’s been some time now since you laid eyes on that sweet ChuMana, hasn’t it?’ And then I asked myself, ‘Why not stop in for a chat and inquire after—’”
“Still that wandering tongue of yours, charmer!” ChuMana’s long body swayed gently, as though moved by some soft breeze. “I fell for your pretty words once, and once is enough!”
Eanrin met her red gaze with his own steady stare. “Charmer, eh? You misrepresent me to all those present.” He swept the hand that did not hold the mortal girl to indicate the hundreds of frogs peeping out from the weeds and rushes. “Why should you say such harsh things, m’dear? Can you possibly have forgotten that little run-in with the Roc?”
The memory crashed back upon the serpent’s conscious mind, images she had long tried to forget: a form like a mountain hovering in the air; wings like thunderclouds; talons like lightning.
“You tricked me!” Her whole body swayed now, rocked by some internal force. A grotesque vision, for without arms for balance, she should have toppled into the pool. Yet her lithe body undulated with perfect, unnatural grace. “You sang your pretty songs and entranced me!”
“I’m a bard. We bards were born to sing. As I recall, you asked me my business, and I told you.”
“You led me from the safety of my realm!”
“You followed without my invitation.”
“You lured me into the Karayan Plains, where the great Roc hunts and where there is no cover for one such as I!” A shudder ran up her body, and she flickered between snake and woman form. When the shudder passed, she stood as a woman again, though her flickering tongue was forked. “You knew what would be my fate.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” said the poet with a disinterested shrug. “The Rocs are odd ones, and you never know what they might want to bring home to their nestlings. And it was your own fool fault, you must admit, for crossing into Arpiar. Vartera was sure to be upset.”
“Vartera?” The serpent hissed and showed long fangs between her womanly lips. “It was never Vartera’s doing! It was yours. Yours, poet!”
“It was my doing that you’re still alive,” said he. “I saved you from the bird, and at great risk to my own limbs, I might add. And . . . well, a fellow hates to bring it up, but you know the law as well as I.” His eyes glinted. Despite the misery of that damp land and the burden of the mortal girl slung across his shoulder, he was enjoying himself. It was not often that he found himself holding the upper hand to a Faerie queen. And such a queen as ChuMana, no less!
He watched how she coiled and churned, losing her womanly semblance to that of a snake flashing her red underbelly as though to ward off some danger. Eanrin leapt back for fear of getting lashed by the sharp scales at her tail’s end. He staggered and almost dropped the mortal girl but managed to brace himself at the last.
Everything in ChuMana wanted to devour the poet. Her jaw swung open and shut in its urge to unhinge and swallow him whole. But the laws of Faerie were unbreakable, and she owed him a favor. Whether by trickery or fair dealing, he had saved her life, and she was at his beck and call until such a time as she might repay him.
Finally she regained her woman’s form, her head bowed so that she need not look at her enemy. Her long tongue flickered again. “I am in your debt,” she said.
“Yes, you are,” said Eanrin, grinning. He could feel the dampness of the land seeping into his bones. “And as it happens, I need a tiny little favor from you.”
“Name your price,” said the snake. “I can refuse you nothing.”