Lodesh was unconcerned. “If you can ground her, I can help keep her there.”
“How?” Talo-Toecan barked, looking at Strell crouched mournfully over Alissa.
“She won’t get past me, old friend, if you can ground her.”
Grimacing, the raku seemed to accept this on faith. “We need at least three to have even a chance,” he said dismally.
“Don’t discard the piper so quickly,” Lodesh warned softly.
“Be reasonable,” Talo-Toecan cajoled, his eyes never leaving Strell. The piper was whispering something, his shoulders hunched. “She will snap him in two,” he predicted wearily.
“I think not.”
The hint of warning in Lodesh’s voice seemed to finally catch Talo-Toecan’s attention. The Master looked sharply at Lodesh and then back at Strell. For the first time, Talo-Toecan appeared to see Strell’s distress and what his presence might portend. “Is their bond already so deep then?” He frowned. “I had hoped to prevent it from forming at all.”
“I deem that it is. It may be strong enough to bring her back.”
Talo-Toecan shifted uneasily. “I don’t like this. If by some miracle her awareness returns, she will be a student and Master of the Hold. I mean no offense, but she cannot be allowed to chain herself to him. If he were a Keeper, perhaps, considering the lack of suitable suitors and her background, but there isn’t a breath of cohesion to Strell’s neural net. He is a commoner, Lodesh. A commoner from an erratic line half the Hold has been surreptitiously trying to wipe out because it doesn’t beget the traits their books and charts predict.”
Lodesh’s pulse leapt, and he struggled to keep his face neutral, but his heart nearly sang. Talo-Toecan would allow a match between a Master and Keeper! And Strell was neither. Steadying his thoughts, he calmly asked, “Would you rather she turn feral?”
“No, of course not.” Talo-Toecan’s gaze was riveted upon the two young people. “But she will far outlive her chosen partner. Once given fully, a raku’s fancy is unwavering.”
“I don’t think they will care,” Lodesh said.
Talo-Toecan sighed heavily. “No. Not at first. But the years stretch intolerably when you’re alone—with only your memories to sustain you.”
Silently they watched Strell sit helplessly over Alissa. “So what do we do?” Lodesh asked quietly.
“We wait.”
“How long?”
“Not long.”
Lodesh arched his eyebrows. “How can you know? The last such as her was before even your time.”
“I’m her teacher. She is a precocious little thing. It won’t be long.”
The songbirds filled the garden with the joy of their certain future. A chill breeze slipped through the bare branches, bringing with it the scent of damp earth and growing things. It would have been pleasant if not for the terrible ordeal to come.
“Ah,” Talo-Toecan murmured as he slowly moved to sit. “I’m too old for this.”
31
Slouched at the firepit, Lodesh lazily opened one eye. He had settled himself in the sun to doze, knowing Talo-Toecan would warn them when Alissa was close to waking. To his left was Strell, slumped helplessly over Alissa, apparently not noticing the dampness of his knees or the cold turning the rims of his ears a bright pink. The Master, Lodesh harrumphed, didn’t look much better, having arranged and rearranged the fire until his fussing had nearly put it out.
There was a small sigh, and Strell rose. “Isn’t there anything we can do?” the piper whispered as he settled himself beside Lodesh. Strell’s eyes went to his mud-covered knees, and he covered them with his hands.
Talo-Toecan looked up from his fire. “No. It’s too late. It was the moment she opened my cursed book, and matters were made tenfold worse when it gave her that bit of nail.”
“Nail?” Strell’s eyebrows rose. “What nail?”
Lodesh chuckled. “The one hidden in the book, of course.” Ignoring Talo-Toecan’s sharp look at having said even that little, Lodesh sat straighter. The piper deserved to know. Perhaps a distraction was in order. “What I don’t understand,” he asked, “is how your nail and that book managed to become so dangerously close together.”
Talo-Toecan tugged his coat straight. “It wasn’t my fault,” he fumbled. “I gave it to her father, a token to him before I left on my last sabbatical. I didn’t know he was going to put it in the book, and besides, Meson’s line wasn’t being groomed to produce such as her. It shouldn’t have mattered they were together. Apparently there wasn’t enough research into her mother’s genetic history—or someone made a mistake. And after I realized Alissa’s potential, I was under constraints and couldn’t recover it. Besides,” he muttered, “the book attracts the tools it needs to accomplish its ends. If it hadn’t been my nail, it would have been someone else’s lost baby tooth fallen between the cracks of the floorboards.”
“And this nail of yours is doing what to her?”
The Master harrumphed at the accusation in Strell’s voice. “My nail is doing nothing. It’s a catalyst. She bound it into her being, and now she is awakening a second, dormant code that lies buried deep within her. The information inherent in my nail will supplement hers, repairing any defects or gaps that may exist.”
Wincing, Strell rubbed at his eyes.
Lodesh felt the corners of his mouth quirk. Talo-Toecan was being most generous with his information today, but he ought to at least try to make it understandable. “What he means is Alissa is polishing up the guide she will use to create her mass when she shifts. It will be a hybrid, a fairly equal mix if you will, of her own latent instructions and Talo-Toecan’s, but only because it’s his instructions she’s using. Any Master’s would do.”
There was a soft grunt as Strell accepted that. A profound quiet settled, broken only by the birds, oblivious to the trials of men and raku alike. Into the hush, Lodesh began to chuckle. Talo-Toecan turned, his eyebrows arched in question. “I see nothing funny, Warden,” he said.
Lodesh grinned. “Congratulations, Talo-Toecan. You have a daughter!”
“Very amusing, Lodesh,” Talo-Toecan said darkly.
Strell turned to the Master. “So she can become anything?”
“No,” Lodesh interrupted. “In theory she could, but anything but a raku or man would lack a complex enough set of tracings with which to shift back. She would be stuck as whatever she was.”
Talo-Toecan tilted his head at Lodesh with a questioning surprise. “You seem very informed for a Keeper.”
“And Bailic knew this would happen?” Strell interrupted in an obvious attempt to keep to the topic at hand.
Talo-Toecan shook his head. “No,” he said firmly. “No one but a Master would know, and now you.”
“But, Lodesh . . .” Strell stammered.
“Ah—Lodesh is a Warden of Ese’ Nawoer,” the Master said. “Many Keepers have read the First Truth, but only the Wardens are told of its real purpose. Unless the book claims and speaks to you, it’s page after page of hard-to-decipher equations and untestable theories.”
Strell’s eyes grew wary. “So why tell the Wardens?”
“It’s a courtesy, Strell,” Lodesh said solemnly. “A show of respect, and we guard the wisdom jealously.” The arrangement had begun long before Lodesh agreed to its stipulations. The knowledge had only one purpose: putting the leaders of the frail, short-lived humans on a more equal footing with the Masters.
Nodding slowly, Strell glanced to Alissa, his worry obvious. “You said we will have to keep her on the ground. With a ward?”
Lodesh shook his head. “That would be a mistake. Although a beast, she will still have her tracings. She won’t recall them upon her own, and to remind her of them will give her another weapon with which to escape. She will be hard enough to catch without giving her the arsenal of tricks she has been exposed to already. No, the beast must be destroyed using only our cunning and physical strength.”
“Are you sure?” Strell pressed.
br />
“It was tried,” came Talo-Toecan’s tired voice, “long ago when it was realized a shift from human to raku was possible. The resulting chaos was said to be so horrific, it precipitated the loss of almost all concerned.” Talo-Toecan shuddered, trying to disguise it by leaning to shift the fire. “Without the holden and the luxury of time it provided, I don’t see how we can prevent her loss.” His twig was abandoned to the flames where it caught and began to burn.
Lodesh leaned back and stretched in the sun, enjoying its warmth pressing down upon him. His medallion glinted, sending flashes of light to be lost in the muddy garden. Slyly, his eyes closed. “Why ever did you destroy the holden anyway, Talo-Toecan?”
It was a seemingly idle question, but upon hearing it, Talo-Toecan shifted noisily upon the bench. “I—um—lost my temper,” he mumbled.
Lodesh opened one eye. “You lost your temper?” he said in a carefully contrived voice that practically oozed astonishment.
Talo-Toecan refused to look up. “You eat vermin and drink nothing but condensation for over a decade and see if you handle your sudden freedom any better.”
“Bailic’s dungeon?” Strell cried. “That’s the holden? You tore the gate off!”
From beneath his half-lidded eyes, Lodesh watched Talo-Toecan, who, oblivious to Strell’s growing anger, shrugged. “It wasn’t meant to hold a Master after sanity was restored,” Talo-Toecan said. “But it was deadly effective. I’ve had enough trouble from one-way doors.”
Lodesh silently watched and waited. His simple and idle questions had been neither. He had successfully administered to a city of thousands. It was seldom his words were as thoughtless as they seemed. Knowing Strell had voluntarily taken the entirety of the blame of Alissa’s fate, Lodesh acted to even it out. Talo-Toecan must take his share of the fault, and Strell should be the one to force him to do so. The question was, Lodesh thought, if the piper had the courage to call the imposing Master on his mistake. If he didn’t, then Alissa was lost. For if Strell couldn’t face Talo-Toecan’s wrath, he couldn’t hope to survive an encounter with the beast Alissa would soon become.
“How could you!” shouted Strell, rising from his seat. “You’ve practically condemned her by your lack of—of— restraint!”
Both of Lodesh’s eyes opened wide. This was better than he could have hoped for. The piper had enough bravery for two men. Either that, or he was extremely stupid.
Talo-Toecan’s head came up, his eyes going from surprised, to irate, and finally choleric. “You dare question my actions?”
Although he turned several shades paler, Strell held firm, his jaw clenched.
Stiff and angry, Talo-Toecan rose. His imposing height bested Strell’s by only a few finger widths. “I,” he accused, “was not the one who fell asleep.”
“Well, I wasn’t the one who destroyed the one thing that would have ensured her sanity in a fit of temper!” Strell shouted back.
“I didn’t know her potential at the time!”
“Even so!”
Talo-Toecan nearly choked on his outrage.
Sensing they would soon come to blows, Lodesh cleared his throat. An all-out war wasn’t what he had intended. The piper would lose, badly, and he had to be alive to be of any help. Still, the exchange needed to take place or the resentment of blame would fester in their memories, forever coloring their futures. Now it could be forgotten. “Excuse me,” he murmured into the tense air, “but if you two are going to bicker over who is more at fault, I’m going to leave.”
Neither heard him, and Lodesh was the only one who noticed Alissa had disappeared in a swirl of pearly white. “She’s shifting!” he shouted, and Strell and Talo-Toecan spun, their anger dissolving into dismay. In a breath, Talo-Toecan leapt from the pit and shifted as well.
“Quick! Move around, Piper,” Lodesh warned, but it was too late. In a breath, Alissa’s form swirled, grew, and solidified. Lunging across the pit, Lodesh grabbed Strell and roughly pulled him to safety. The two men stared up in awe at the shimmering vision of supple grace before them.
The beast, for in no way was it Alissa, swiveled her head to look at them. Lodesh could see no awareness in her gray eyes, and he felt Strell shudder, undoubtedly recognizing it as well. Though Lodesh knew it was impossible, he had hoped that Talo-Toecan would have been wrong, that Alissa would awaken as herself, but he couldn’t find a glimmer of recognition in her eyes. They were Alissa’s, but lost, overwhelmed by the beast she now was. Delicately she cocked her head and looked to the sky.
Talo-Toecan began a low, warning growl. The vibrations could be felt clearly as they shifted the fresh, clean air. Ignoring the larger raku, she stretched like a cat, her muscles sliding smoothly under her shimmering, golden hide. Wings unfurled, she shook them slightly as if testing the air.
“Hounds,” Lodesh whispered. “She’s a formidable beast.”
Markedly smaller than Talo-Toecan by almost a third, she was no less imposing, the size of a small hut. Where Talo-Toecan’s hide was creased and tough, hers was smooth and supple. Maturity hadn’t yet filled out her frame; she was lithe and trim. The power and grace at her command were obvious. Talo-Toecan seemed clumsy next to her.
Shaking off his wonder, Lodesh steeled himself to edge left. They had to surround her, or she would simply fly away. With luck, they’d catch her before she ever left the ground.
At his first motion, her head whipped about to fix a fierce glare upon him. Lodesh froze, and Talo-Toecan’s rumble turned into an aggressive hiss. Head lowered, he promised violence. It was an unmistakable threat even the beast could understand. Caught between them, the two men shrank down, trying to stay out of the way. Their argument had robbed them of the precious moments of warning before she shifted.
The smaller raku looked longingly to the sky, roaring her frustration. Talo-Toecan answered, his voice drowning hers out. Slowly, her wings furled, bowing to his larger size, lowering herself submissively.
Talo-Toecan seemed to relax, and Lodesh breathed easier. She was pinned between them and the wall of the Hold. Perhaps it was enough. Relieved, Lodesh followed Strell’s eyes to the tip of her long tail. It twitched once, twice, three times.
“No!” Strell shouted. “Alissa, no!” but it was too late. Her carefully contrived posture vanished, and with a cry of victory, she launched herself into the sky, her eyes wild in her longing to be free from the heavy restraints of the earth. With a gust of wind that nearly knocked Lodesh over, she was away. Talo-Toecan followed a heartbeat behind. Her deception had worked just long enough. Now she would fly.
Strell watched, a mix of fear and wonder on his face, as the two golden forms rose and dwindled. All too soon they were lost in the absolute blue of the sky, and he slumped, turning to Lodesh. “She’s gone,” he whispered miserably.
His eyes still tracking what the piper’s couldn’t, Lodesh nodded. “She is absolutely magnificent,” he breathed in wonder. “I had all but forgotten.”
“She’s gone!” Strell cried, roughly grabbing Lodesh by the shoulder and spinning him about.
Jolted out of his thoughts, Lodesh cleared his throat and dropped his eyes. “Yes, well, Talo-Toecan will bring her back. He’s a clever beast himself and won’t be tricked again so easily.” With a last look at the empty sky, Lodesh began to head down the path to the kitchen.
“What—” Strell called. “Where are you going?”
“We should fetch your new pipe.” Lodesh grinned. “You may need it to charm your savage beast.” Clearly surprised, Strell hastily stumbled into motion behind him. “Besides,” Lodesh said. “It’s been centuries since I have heard anything played upon mirth wood. You finished it, didn’t you?”
“You know I made a pipe out of Alissa’s staff?” blurted Strell.
“Of course. That’s why I made sure you would be the only one able to cut it. That staff of hers was far too long.”
Strell matched step for step Lodesh’s confident stride to the kitchen. Their booted feet w
ere all but silent upon the wet, soggy ground. “It’s not done, but it’s playable. Music from a pipe of mirth wood will bring her down?” Strell asked as they passed into the Hold.
“I doubt it,” Lodesh admitted as his voice echoed against the walls of the kitchen. “Despite its rarity, it’s only wood, but it may distract or draw her in. It’s rumored that when young, rakus are markedly enthralled by music— you may have already noticed that?—and Talo-Toecan will need all the help he can get. She’s quite a handful, that one.”
“Aye,” Strell sighed, “she is.”
32
Freedom. . . . The word seemed to come from the wind humming over her. No longer chained to the earth, she was a creature of wind and mist. Finding glory in her strength, she ascended, eager to test her limits. So far she had found none. Her wings responded to her slightest whim, reading the air slipping over her and acting instinctively. So enthralled was she with the day, she all but forgot her unwelcome companion, always beneath her, always a wing’s length away.
He’s old, she thought. He couldn’t catch her.
Almost contemptuously, she ceased her climb, allowing the old one to come level with her. Does he want to play? she thought, dropping into a steep dive, eager for a game of chase. She fell like a stone, drawing her wings close to keep them from damage. The air, once a force to move easily through, became a roaring wall of sound and feeling, exhilarating her. The ground, once distant, rushed to greet her. Unable to see if her rival still accompanied her, she adjusted her path so she skimmed over the ground at a break-neck pace, her impossible speed the result of her own strength supplemented by her fall.
She tucked her head beneath her wing to see her aged companion still with her. It was pleasing. Perhaps the morning would be fun. She shifted her balance and began to rise. Never hesitating, the old one followed.