The God in Red (legends of ethshar) Page 2

  Santa did not appear until the morning was half-over. Alir had wearied of waiting for her guest to arise, and had gone to Tazar’s shop to make a long-delayed down-payment on the tapestry, so when Santa did finally descend from the attic he found Darrend sitting alone at the kitchen table.

  “Ho!” he called. “How is everything this fine morning?”

  The apprentice smiled at him. “Good,” he said.

  “Did Alir find her gift, then?”

  “Yes, she did.”

  Santa winked at him. “You know, my lad,” he said, “Christmas properly lasts for twelve days. Particularly when it’s never been celebrated here before.”

  “It does?”

  Santa laughed. “It really does,” he said.

  Darrend absorbed this, then hesitantly asked, “So should I put up a stocking, too?”

  “You, and every other good boy or girl in this city!”

  That didn’t sound right to Darrend; what did anyone else in Ethshar have to do with this red-clad spirit? But he certainly thought he should put one up.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  “Now, I believe I should finish up that painting of my workshop, don’t you?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The fat man laughed so hard at that that his belly shook like a bowlful of... well, actually, like a bowlful of one of those nasty seafood puddings Darrend couldn’t stand. Then he turned, gathered up his board and paints, and settled in a sunlit corner to finish his illustration.

  When Alir returned Darrend pulled her aside, out of earshot of the fat man — or at least, he assumed it was. “Mistress,” he said, “he says there are twelve days of this Christmas thing, and we should put up stockings again.”

  “Stockings? Plural?”

  “One for me, and one for you.” Darrend frowned. “And he said, ’and every other good boy or girl in this city.’ But I don’t know how he means that.”

  “He’s a god,” Alir said. “He probably means it literally.” She stared thoughtfully across the room at the red-clad spirit. “That much gold could unbalance the economy, though. And why ’boy or girl,’ rather than man or woman? And we don’t know how he defines ’good.’” She shook her head. “I don’t think we want to worry too much about that part, but perhaps we could speak to a few people. Tazar, for example.”

  Santa looked up from his work. “And tell them to leave the dampers open on their flues,” he called. “It makes it much easier for me.”

  Alir and Darrend stared at him, then looked at each other, remembering how the god in red had vanished up the chimney, then come back down. “What is this thing about him and chimneys?” Darrend asked. “What does that have to do with being a spirit of giving?”

  Alir turned up an empty palm. “Who knows?”

  On the far side of the room Santa Claus laughed. Darrend tried not to think about that shaking belly.

  The next morning Darrend hurried to the hearth to see whether the two stockings were really filled with gold. He knew that as an apprentice he would need to turn his over to his mistress, but still, the prospect of holding all that money was exciting.

  And there the stockings were, bulging very promisingly — but they looked different. He frowned, and took his down. He turned it over.

  No gold spilled out, but there was definitely something in there, something that was snagged in the fabric. Carefully, he reached in and worked it free.

  It wasn’t gold. It was a book, a very old, very worn little book in a soft leather binding. Darrend stared at it, and read the title inked on the cover:

  How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Deyl Karneggi, translated into Ethsharitic by Lieutenant Kelder Radler’s son.

  Darrend opened it carefully, and read a few lines here and there; it seemed to be a collection of advice.

  Very interesting advice. Darrend began reading in earnest, forgetting about the other stocking.

  He was roused from his reverie by Alir’s arrival. “What’s that you have there?” she said.

  He showed her the book. “It was in my stocking,” he said.

  She stared at it for a moment, then hurried to her own stocking.

  “No gold,” she said. “But...” She looked at the objects she had shaken out of her sock.

  “What are they?” Darrend asked.

  Alir shook her head. “I’m not sure,” she said. “But there’s a pamphlet...” She opened the little booklet. “It’s instructions.” She glanced at Darrend.

  “Instructions for what?”

  Alir was staring at the mysterious little cylinders and boxes. “They’re cosmetics,” she said. “But they aren’t like any I ever saw before.” She looked back at the booklet. “Hmmm.”

  Darrend was not very clear on the concept of cosmetics, beyond the fact that they were things rich women used to improve their appearance. He supposed it was a minor sort of magic — a branch of sorcery, perhaps, or wizardry, or maybe just herbalism. It wasn’t anything that concerned him. He turned back to his book.

  Later that day Alir called on Tazar, and virtually the first words the wizard said were, “How did you do that?”

  “Do what?”

  “This,” he said, pointing at a small table by the door of his workshop.

  An empty sock lay at one side of the table; beside it were several cones of bluish incense, two cut roses, a small bunch of pine needles neatly bound up in a black ribbon, and an assortment of other junk. Alir stared at this uncomprehendingly.

  “It’s the ingredients for the Transporting Tapestry!” Tazar said. “Some of them, anyway — we’ll also need all the yarn, of course, and threads of gold and silver, and a loom. But the rest of it is right there! How did you know what was needed? How did you get it into the sock? And where did you get that incense? It’s the right kind, and I didn’t know there was any of it in the city! I thought we’d need to make it ourselves!”

  “I didn’t do anything,” Alir said. “Santa did.”

  “Well, he’s pretty amazing,” Tazar said, staring at the table.

  “Ten more days,” Alir said, staring at the sock.

  By the sixth day of Christmas Alir had told virtually everyone she knew about the stocking trick, and various people had received gifts of sorcerous talismans, rare and precious ingredients for spells, books on a dozen subjects, candy, coins, toys, jewelry, clothing accessories, and various other small treasures. Tazar had all the materials for the tapestry spell, and Alir, after collecting her fee for telling everyone how to obtain mysterious gifts with nothing but a sock, had paid half of the total cost.

  Santa had finished his painting, and Alir stared at it in fascination. The workshop in the picture was amazingly cluttered, but still very clean. Toys and tools and devices were everywhere, most of them very alien.

  The painting was delivered to Tazar, who assured Alir, Darrend, and Santa that a tapestry-capable wizard had at last been found, and that she would be starting work on the spell immediately. Tazar was as fascinated by the picture as Alir had been, and Santa began identifying and explaining the various details to the wizard. After a few moments Alir decided the conversation was going to continue all day; she made her excuses and slipped away.

  Santa had not come back by the time she went to bed, but she didn’t worry; after all, he could always come down the chimney. She had hung her stocking once again.

  By the eleventh day of Christmas virtually the entire city of Ethshar of the Spices had heard about stocking magic, and the overlord had sent a magistrate to question Alir and Santa about it.

  At first, neither of them understood just why the overlord was concerned; the magistrate wearily explained, “These gifts are putting a large amount of new coinage into circulation. That can affect prices. Meanwhile, certain merchants have complained that their business has suffered, because their customers have received goods from this godling without making any payment. As for all these sorcerous talismans, and potent herbs, and other magic, well, you know that magi
c is tricky stuff, no matter what form it takes. Having more of it in circulation is not helping the overlord sleep more easily.”

  “Oh.”

  “And there’s the matter of fairness — one person gets a stockingful of gold, another a stockingful of candy. The obvious injustice is troubling.”

  “Everyone gets what they want and deserve,” Santa said.

  “And how is that determined, sir?” the magistrate asked.

  “I have a list,” Santa explained. “I know who’s been naughty and who’s been nice. I know when anyone writes to tell me what they want; I know what they tell family or friends.”

  “Naughty or nice?” The magistrate glanced at Alir, who turned up an empty palm.

  “He’s not from the World,” she said. “I know nothing about his standards or abilities.”

  The magistrate frowned. “Is this stocking phenomenon going to continue indefinitely, then?”

  “Oh, no!” Santa exclaimed, with a laugh. “No, no. Just one more day, and Christmas will be over for another year.”

  “And a year from now, we hope to send him back where he came from,” Alir said.

  “A year?”

  “We’re having a Transporting Tapestry made.”

  “I’ll ask the Wizards’ Guild to make that a priority.”

  “Thank you.”

  “But, sir...” Darrend began.

  The magistrate turned to glare at him. “Yes, apprentice?”

  “Is it really so terrible, that people are being given these little gifts? I’ve mostly seen happy children playing with the toys they found in their stockings, not the problems you describe. Do we really need to send him away?”

  The magistrate considered for a moment, then said, “Yes.”

  Santa laughed. “After Twelfth Night I’ll be going, then. I’ll come back when the tapestry is ready.”

  “Wait, going?” Alir asked. “Going where?”

  “North,” he said. “Where I always go after Christmas.”

  “But... but...” Alir looked at Darrend and the magistrate.

  “That will be satisfactory,” the magistrate said. “I will inform the overlord.”

  The following morning Alir found a bottle of fine Dwomoritic wine in her stocking, and a note reading, “Thank you for your hospitality! — Santa Claus.”

  Santa Claus himself was gone, though; his attic bed was empty, and there was no evidence he had ever been there.

  At first, Alir kept expecting the fat man in the red coat to turn up again, or at least send word, but there was no sign of him, but as the months passed she gradually turned her attention to other concerns.

  It was on the first day of Midwinter that Tazar came around to Alir’s shop and said, “The tapestry is almost ready; where’s your spirit?”

  “I don’t know where he is,” she admitted. “I haven’t heard from him since last year.”

  “Well, we’ve put a great deal of time and effort and magic into that tapestry, so I hope it hasn’t all gone to waste!”

  “I’m sure it hasn’t.”

  “If he turns up, tell him it’ll be ready in a sixnight.”

  “Thank you, I will.”

  That started her thinking — where had Santa gone? She had heard no reports of sightings anywhere in the World. Over the next day or two she asked a few gods, but none of them admitted knowing anything about any red-garbed spirit from another world. She considered using the spell that had brought him in the first place, but summoning him when he was already somewhere in the World did not seem like a good idea.

  At last, though, when she realized that it was the fourth of Midwinter, she had an inspiration. She hung a stocking on the chimneypiece, and stuffed a note in it.

  She did not go to bed that night; instead she fell asleep in a chair near the hearth.

  She was awakened by the sound of laughter. “Santa!” she exclaimed, sitting up.

  “It’s traditional to leave a glass of milk and a plate of cookies, and slip the note under the plate,” he said gently. He leaned over to kiss her on the forehead. “I’ll come around on the seventh, shall I?” Then he stepped quickly to the fireplace, and vanished up the chimney.

  She stared at the spot where he had stood, and wondered, in her half-asleep state, how he did that. Then she stood up and took down her stocking.

  Candy, a few unfamiliar coins, an orange — nothing of any real value, but still, she found herself smiling. She thought about eleven more days of little treasures — but then she decided not to be greedy.

  Besides, in three days Santa Claus would be going home to his own world.

  She wondered whether anyone else had thought to put up a stocking.

  On the afternoon of the seventh of Midwinter it was snowing, and Alir was wondering whether that would keep Santa away, when there was a knock at the shop door, and Darrend opened it to let Santa in. He had his bag slung over his shoulder, and was laughing heartily. “Merry Christmas!” he called.

  “Merry Christmas, Santa!” Alir replied.

  They chatted for a few minutes; Santa wanted to know how business had been, how her three brothers were, and so on, and she wanted to know where he had been all year.

  “Srigmor,” he said. “And Kerroa, and Aala, and both Sardirons.” Before she could ask for more details, though, he said, “Isn’t there somewhere we should be going?”

  “Yes, of course!”

  Twenty minutes later they were in Tazar’s shop, where he cautiously unveiled the tapestry.

  “My goodness!” Santa exclaimed at the sight of it. “That’s very realistic, isn’t it?” He reached out.

  “Don’t touch!..” Alir began, but it was too late; the fat man in red had vanished.

  For a moment the three magicians stared silently at the tapestry and the empty patch of floor where Santa had stood.

  “Well, it apparently works,” Tazar said at last. “You understand, we couldn’t test it — there’s no way back.”

  “Then how do you know he wound up in the right place?” Darrend demanded.

  Tazar turned up an empty palm. “We don’t,” he said. “But if that picture was accurate, that’s where he is.”

  “I hope it is,” Alir said, staring at the image of that weird workshop.

  That was, she realized, a god’s home.

  Well, more or less. Santa had said he wasn’t a god, but Alir really wasn’t sure the difference was meaningful. He was something like a god.

  No one had ever seen where the gods lived. None of Ethshar’s gods were willing to say anything about their homes; when asked, they would either deny the existence of any home, or say that mere humans could not comprehend it.

  But there was Santa’s workshop, looking fairly comprehensible. And she could step into it, if she wanted.

  But she couldn’t come back.

  “Well, now that he’s gone, what do you want to do with the tapestry?” Tazar asked.

  Alir started. “What?”

  “You paid for it,” Tazar explained. “It’s yours. What do you want to do with it?”

  “Put it away somewhere safe,” she said.

  “You said there’s no way back?” Darrend asked.

  “Somewhere very safe,” Alir said.

  Tazar nodded. “We can do that,” he said.

  Alir stared at the tapestry a moment longer.

  She was almost tempted to reach out and touch it herself, to fling herself into that alien world that had produced Santa Claus, the world where there was an annual holiday dedicated to peace, generosity, and good will.

  But it was a world without theurgists; she would be out of a job there. And there was no way to know what lay beyond the workshop door. She turned away.

  “Somewhere very safe,” she repeated. She hesitated, glanced at the tapestry once more, then asked, “But could I have the original painting?”

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