This Scepter'd Isle Read Online Free PDF Page B

they lived mostly in Elfhame Avalon.
    Denoriel did not need to speak or guide the elvensteed. Miralys stepped delicately up on the mosaic under the silver trees and was at the heart of the eight-pointed star when he was barely in the saddle. With his mind on his distasteful duty, Denoriel hardly felt the disorientation of passing through the gate and was only minimally aware of the steed trotting through Logres. When Miralys stopped, Denoriel dismounted. He did not look to see where he was; all he did was rub his face gratefully against the cheek of his elvensteed, who lipped his hair fondly and moved away.
    Sighing, Denoriel turned to climb the broad marble steps to the wide portico. He did not try to enter by the huge brazen doors that were opened only to admit the king and queen. Beside them, deep inset into the thick wall of the palace, was a man-sized door, always open. As he passed he felt the slippery, icy feel of the recognition spell. Had he not been approved, an invisible wall would have formed before him, and if he had not retreated swiftly enough, that cold welcome would have changed to one hot enough to broil the flesh off his bones.
    The corridor he faced when he entered, though short, was broad enough to permit passage to anything the great doors could admit. There had been times when that space was necessary, as when the Cern Abbas giant had come to complain that his worshipers were not being given free passage through the Gates of Underhill. Mythical beings were not common even Underhill but it was the expression on Oberon's face that made the visit memorable. Denoriel's own taut features relaxed a trifle as he recalled the sight of the enormous naked being, club in hand, with, even for his size, exaggerated private parts.
    At the end of that broad corridor was another pair of closed doors, these of marvelously worked silver depicting scenes of the founding of Elfhame Logres; the doors opened onto the throne room of the king and queen. Denoriel did not even glance at them but turned right into a cross-corridor that looked narrow. That, however, was only in comparison with the grand scale of the center passage.
    Once in, the cross-corridor was a comfortable size, the walls glowing softly in opalescent mother-of-pearl colors broken regularly by doors. These were as fanciful in color, design, and composition as the maker of the private domain behind them wished . . . or could manage.
    Denoriel's door was an amusing trap. It looked like an open way into the outdoors, showing a flower-starred meadow with an elegant manor and some trees in the distance. Many an uninvited guest had ended with a sore nose and forehead from trying to walk through. To any not sealed to it, the doorway was as solid as a painting on stone.
    Denoriel passed through and stopped dead. The small antechamber opened left into a spacious dining area with a huge window that looked out onto the same meadow scene, except that the manor and the woods, dark and tangled, were much closer. To the right a broad arch showed a comfortable living space. The floor was covered with glowing rugs, thick and soft. Chairs covered in spider-silk formed two groups around small marble tables; other chairs flanked a beautifully carved lounge, also upholstered in dark red spider-silk, which faced a handsome white marble fireplace.
    The witch-lights in the chamber were all glowing, but they would have lit as soon as Denoriel passed the door. The give-away that his apartment was not empty was the small but brilliant fire leaping behind a silver screen in the hearth.
    For one heart-stopping moment Denoriel could not remember whether he had forgotten to seal his doorway against one of his past mistresses, and then he saw the little, lithe orange-red creature cavorting and dancing in the flames. His breath whooshed out.
    "Mwynwen," he said, walking forward as a tall, slender woman rose from the lounge that faced the fireplace.
    He was pleased, flattered even. Mwynwen