And careened wildly through a mild breeze, almost crashed into a squat tree, somersaulted over a boulder, and fell awkwardly onto the soft earth. Instantly, the other two birds crowded around him, pelting him with incoherent exclamations. He was afraid that Kirra would decide this stunt was too perilous and turn him back into his natural state, so he righted himself quickly, gave them both a baleful stare from his left eye, and practiced a little strutting walk over the uneven ground. He was fine; nothing was broken. He just did not understand the principles of flight yet. Kirra was still following him, asking him urgent, indecipherable questions, but he ignored her. He spread his wings to their fullest, tried to gauge their power. He was used to working in utter harmony with his body; he knew exactly what his strengths and limits were. Just not this body. He would try again.
His second attempt at flight was slightly better—still clumsy but more controlled. At any rate, he landed where he wanted to, head up and every feather intact. All right. That time it had made a little more sense. He could do this. He just needed more practice.
Over the next two hours, Justin took progressively longer and more successful forays around the clearing. He still looked like a drunken bumblebee, he thought, at the mercy of any strong wind and wholly incapable of such maneuvers as landing on a tree branch, but he was getting the trick of it. Give him a few more days and he’d be able to take this shape to travel across Gillengaria.
“I think that’s enough for one lesson,” Kirra said, materializing in human form as Justin took a somewhat longer break. He tried to explain to her that he wasn’t ready to change back yet, but his words came out as an agitated twitter. She didn’t seem to have any trouble guessing what he was trying to convey, however. “I don’t care what you want. I want to turn you back into a man while you’re still more or less whole.”
He didn’t move away fast enough, and she cupped her hands around his small, trembling body. Again, that sense of heat and pressure, and then the world seemed to tilt and melt around him. He closed his eyes, taking a hard breath against a searing discomfort, and suddenly he was kneeling on the ground, his head resting against Kirra’s palms, every bone and muscle of his body stretched with pain.
“Ow,” he said, not opening his eyes. “This hurts more than I thought it would.”
She pulled her hands away and knelt there until he opened his eyes. “I think you got pretty battered. I probably let that go on too long,” she said. “Look. You’ve already got a bruise on your arm.”
He tugged back his sleeves to do a quick inventory, then sat and turned up the legs of his trousers. Oh, yes, nicks and bruises everywhere, and the soles of his feet felt like he’d stomped across broken glass. He gave Kirra a sideways look. “Does this happen to you every time you change shapes?”
She shook her head, laughing. “I’m better at it. When I was younger and first learning, I had a few unfortunate incidents, but these days the transitions are always very smooth.”
Donnal came to rest in the grass beside them, cawed once, and then shifted into his natural state. “Not too bad though,” he said in an approving voice. “It’s hard to master flying. Even harder to do it as a moth or a butterfly. It’s just so different from everything you know.”
“Can we come back tomorrow and practice again?” Justin asked.
Kirra was amused. “I am continually amazed that a man who expressed so much disdain for magic when I first met him—”
“That’s before I understood how useful it could be,” he answered, grinning.
“Before you found out how much you enjoyed it,” she countered.
“That, too.”
She rose to her feet and Justin followed suit, repressing a groan at the ache he felt in his thighs. “We can’t stay,” she said. “I’m already a week overdue in Danalustrous.”
“But you’ll come back? I want to do that again.”
She was still amused. “We’ll come back. Or maybe you’ll be in Ghosenhall again before long. I’m sure we’ll be heading there once we’ve left Danan Hall.”
“Till then, I suppose.”
“Till then.”
She glanced at Donnal, who nodded, and the dark man flowed into the shape of a wolf. Kirra’s own transformation followed, more choreographed, in some ways more unnerving. So much for a civilized good-bye. Donnal had already turned his head north and was scenting the air, checking for danger on the route ahead. Kirra stepped forward and butted her sleek, pointed head against Justin’s leg, and he leaned down to pet the brushy fur.
“Travel safely,” he said. “Thanks for coming by.”
She nudged his hand again, then trotted to Donnal’s side. Without a backward glance, the two went racing off, chasing each other through trees and bushes. Justin untied his horse and rather carefully hoisted himself into the saddle. The return trip to Neft seemed even longer than the trip out.
CHAPTER 14
FOUR days later, Ellynor was back. The intervening time had not been without incident, for more visitors had arrived in Neft. One was a serramarra of Nocklyn, come to visit her sick aunt at the Gisseltess house. She was accompanied by her husband, a dark and intense man that Justin was pretty sure Kirra and Senneth disliked. The second day they were in town, he left his wife’s horse at the stables, took his own animal, and was gone a night and most of the next day. Justin found himselfwondering if he had ridden out to Lumanen Convent. And whether Halchon Gisseltess and his entourage were still there. They had not come back this way.
A red-faced and unpleasant-looking fellow passed through the next day—no one Justin recognized, though he heard someone call him marlord Rayson. Justin guessed he was the man who held most of the lands in Fortunalt and was commonly believed to be allied with Halchon Gisseltess in a desire to take the throne.
Justin thought this must be the busiest little city in the south.
He actually said something of the sort that night to Faeber, who joined him in the Golden Boar for a beer as Justin was finishing his meal. The magistrate often worked his way around the tavern at night, having drinks with one table of men, playing a hand of cards with another group. Justin admired his style. A good way to get a sense of the mood in your town, a good way to show you were aware of what was going on.
When Justin made his remark about the recent wave of noble visitors, Faeber ran his hand through his unkempt gray hair, mussing it even more. “We get all kinds of traffic through Neft,” the older man said, giving Justin an unreadable smile. “Even some Daughters today.”
Justin kept his expression neutral. “Daughters? Oh, you mean from the convent?”
Faeber nodded, watching him. “Saw them ride in this afternoon. So if you’re feeling chivalrous and you see any of them on the streets tomorrow—”
Justin pretended to laugh. “I’ll get my sword ready.”
Faeber toyed with his glass. “You want to be careful about getting too close to those convent girls,” he said at last.
Justin narrowed his eyes. “You warning me away from them, or warning me against them?”
“Wouldn’t seem as though they could do any harm to you, would it?” Faeber said. “You’d think it might be the other way around. Man like you could take advantage of a young girl. But I don’t think the convent guards take too kindly to anyone who gets interested in those novices.”
“Well, I guess I’ll just have to watch myself then.”
“I guess you will.”
Justin paid his bill, returned to his attic room to sleep for a couple of hours, and shook himself awake at midnight. Out into the crisp night air—they were well into autumn now, and the nights were brisk—to move with a catlike care through the quiet streets of the city. No matter what Faeber had said, Justin had read it as a warning. I will be watching you. His own men might be out prowling the streets tonight, patrolling past the Gisseltess house, under orders to make sure Justin did not loiter there.
But Justin was fairly confident that he could outwit any half-trained
city guards who didn’t know a damn thing about true combat.
At any rate, he only encountered a few other late-night wanderers, none of them in the uniform of the city guard, most of them drunk, and none of them near the Gisseltess house. He stood in the shadows and watched the windows, knowing by now which one overlooked serra Paulina’s room and which one was the guest room commonly assigned to Ellynor. She would not be sure he knew she was in town, but she would look for him anyway; she would hope.
In fact, he had only been at his post about twenty minutes when he saw a haze of white at the serramarra’s window. He stepped forward, still half in shadow, but knowing that Ellynor’s keen eyes would pick him out just by motion. He did not want to risk waving or making himself too visible in case the form at the window was not her.
But it was. The glass was pushed back, and a body leaned out over the sill, gesticulating enthusiastically. He saw her turn her head back, as if to speak to someone in the room, and then she faced him again, holding up a finger. Give me one minute. She disappeared back inside and pulled the window shut behind her.
Justin drew back into the shadows to wait, imagining the stealthy route she must take through the sleeping house. Who might be awake at this hour? The old lady, obviously, and probably a footman or two. Anyone who was restless or troubled and could not sleep. Justin hoped Ellynor had a story ready if someone caught her.
No one did. A few minutes later she was creeping out the front door, flying across the yard, and letting herself noiselessly out the gate. Her hands were extended, so he took them in a strong clasp. She did not seem to mind.
“Justin! How did you know we were here? I looked for you when we rode in, but I didn’t see you anywhere.”
“Someone mentioned Daughters coming to town. So it’s not just you this time?”
“No, there are five of us. This time I’m not here to take care of serra Paulina, though she did ask to see me while I’m here. But we’ve all come to proselytize in Neft tomorrow and the day after.”
“What do you mean?”
She casually pulled her hands away as she answered. “We’ll walk through the town square and offer the benediction of the Pale Mother to anyone who wants it. We’ll stop people who try to hurry by, and we’ll explain that the Silver Lady can see their souls, don’t they want to do her honor? We’ll give out moonstones to people who want them—and you’d be amazed how many people do.”
Justin remembered riding through Neft many months ago, when the way was blocked by Daughters who wanted to lay their hands on every passerby. Donnal and Kirra and Cammon couldn’t endure the touch of those hands, covered with moonstones; there had been a short, ugly scene when the Lestra’s men came asking questions. “Do the convent guards come with you and watch to see who shies away from the Pale Mother’s benediction?” he asked, a bitter edge to his voice.
“Yes,” she said. “I hate it. I don’t mind sharing the blessing of the Silver Lady—in fact, I rather like it, and so many people are quite grateful! But when people turn away, or hurry past, or look over at us, so afraid, and I see the guards watching them—I get anxious. I’m afraid of what might happen next.”
“And have you seen it?”
“Seen what?”
He made a motion, as if he had suddenly pulled a hilt into his hand. “Seen what happens when the guards track down a nonbeliever.”
“I’m not sure they do,” she said, troubled now. “They’re with us all day—most of the day, anyway—and surely they don’t—I mean, there must be plenty of people here in Neft who—not everyone loves the goddess.”
“I think your guards are looking for mystics,” he said in a hard voice. “And they think anyone who won’t take your benediction is suspect. And I think they follow some of those poor folks and question them in a pretty brutal way. I’m wondering if there aren’t a few dead bodies littering the alleys on days after the novices come to town.”
“Oh, no,” Ellynor said, seriously distressed. “That can’t be. The Lestra and her men abhor mystics, of course, but—I mean—they don’t harm them. They don’t—what are you saying? That the Lestra has them killed? Mystics? Justin, that can’t be true.”
“You’re living under her roof and you don’t know what she’s capable of?”
“But, Justin—! You’re talking about murder! Yes, she despises mystics—all the Daughters do—I listen to the rhetoric but I don’t know that it means anything. It’s like my brothers talking about the men they don’t like and how they want to hurt their enemies, but it’s mostly just muttering and posturing. The Lestra doesn’t—I mean—”
He spoke in a gentle voice, because she was really upset, but his tone was uncompromising. “Throughout Gillengaria, for the past few years, there has been a rising tide of distrust toward mystics. Your Lestra has been the source of much of that distrust. She has spread her doctrine of hate across the Twelve Houses and to every small town and backwater farm from here to Brassenthwaite. Mystics have been stoned to death in city streets by common men enflamed by the words of the Daughters. But the Lestra is more direct than that,” he said, raising his voice when she tried to speak. “As I rode into Neft five weeks ago, I came across a hut in the woods where a mystic woman was being tortured to death by five men. They all wore convent livery. They were there under the Lestra’s orders.”
Now Ellynor was staring at him as if he had told her the worst possible news. Her house had been burned down, all her family was dead. No one she loved was left alive. “What happened to her?” she whispered.
He did not particularly want to recount this tale, he suddenly realized—did not want to tell his part in it. “She escaped,” he said shortly.
“And the men? The convent guards?”
He watched her a good long moment before answering. Well, it had been inevitable. She was used to violent men, but she had made it clear she did not condone their ways, and if she knew him long enough, she would learn just how ruthless he could be. And then, even if she had liked him before, she would like him no longer, and he might as well tell her now and watch her walk away. If not tonight, some other time. Some other wretched day or night.
“Dead—four of them, at any rate,” he said.
She swallowed. “You killed them?”
He just nodded.
Then she surprised him. “Why not the fifth one?”
He looked away. “He was a boy. He looked—sick. Horrified at what was being done. I didn’t think he had a hand in her torture. I thought he wanted an excuse to run. I let him go.”
“Great blessed Mother,” she breathed, and fell forward into his arms.
His hands came up automatically to enfold her; she was weeping bitterly against his chest. He didn’t know what to say, how to console her, how to explain himself or apologize. He could not believe she had not picked up her skirts and raced back inside the house, away from him and his bloodstained hands. Instead she clung to him for comfort, and he cradled her against his body. Bright Mother burn me, he thought. She is so tiny and frail. If I hold her too closely, she will break. And yet he drew his arms around her even more tightly.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered into her dark hair. “I thought you knew. I thought everyone knew. I’m sorry it was me who told you. I’m sorry I’m the one who—who stopped the guards. I’m sorry this is the truth of the world.”
It was a few moments before she was calm enough to speak, and by that time Justin had pulled them both to the ground and settled Ellynor across his lap. He had never done such a thing before, and yet it seemed entirely natural. He noticed that her feet were not bare tonight, though she wore only thin slippers. Still, better than nothing on a chilly night like this.