“Tantamount to crowning you heir in Annfwn,” Astar finished.
She nodded gravely. “Even though the rulership of Annfwn doesn’t work that way, and even though the Star has nothing to do with it.”
“Still,” Gen replied thoughtfully, “it’s a powerful vote of confidence in you as at least her heir in sorcery.”
“She also said it would be best to keep it hidden unless I needed to use it.” Stella glanced at Astar in apology. “Lena and I used it to combine our magic at Gieneke. That’s how we vanquished the giant, and the intelligence behind it.”
Astar nodded, understanding more how they’d managed that feat. “Can you use it to help Lena and Zephyr?”
“I don’t know how I could,” she admitted. “I thought maybe I should tell you I have the Star, in case you have ideas.”
Unfortunately, he didn’t. What he should’ve done was kept Lena safe to begin with. They were out here in the middle of nowhere, with no guides, two missing people, and the potential to be attacked at any moment. Clenching his hands into fists, he wanted to crush skulls. Which also would do nothing to solve their problems. Some leader he was.
Stella slipped her hand into his, thawing his frozen fist, her cool green presence flooding him. “It’s not your fault.”
He looked into her grave gray eyes, wishing that was the truth, the panic for Zephyr like frantic wing beats in his heart. “I don’t know what to do,” he confessed subvocally.
“You’re not supposed to always know.”
“Ursula always does.”
Stella shook her head slowly. “Remember that I can sense Auntie Essla’s heart the same as I can anyone’s—and she is often afraid or angry or uncertain. She’s simply learned to hide those feelings.”
That made sense. Though Harlan always knew how she felt—and he was the one she turned to when she needed to talk. Astar had seen that often enough, had stepped away to give them privacy. Zephyr could be that for him. Was that for him. He’d give anything at that moment for Zephyr’s irreverent commentary and canny wisdom. But he didn’t have her, so he could only wait for her to return with Lena.
Better to do something than nothing at all, Ursula said in his head. When in doubt, making a decision—even a wrong one—is better than waffling. Fortune favors the bold, my boy.
“All right, then,” Astar announced. “None of us have the ability to follow Zephyr, which is why we sent her after Lena. We have to trust in that.” He would have to trust her to return safely. “So we continue as we’d planned, down to the manse at the lake level. Stella and Gen, take wing, keep a sharp eye out for anything unusual, report it to me immediately, but stay in contact with each other, too. Jak and I will drive the carriage down.”
Without protest, Gen took the form of a snowy owl, Stella a nighthawk—taking the Star with her—and they soared into the sky. Quickly, they formed a pattern of ever-widening and interlinking circles that allowed them to cover a large amount of territory, while putting them in regular, predictable contact. Astar silently blessed Gen’s father, Marskal, who insisted on drilling all shapeshifters—at least the ones he could tempt, browbeat, or corral—in these tactical maneuvers. They’d all complained that they weren’t soldiers and would never need to know… and look at them now.
Jak clapped him on the shoulder. “They’ll be fine. Climb aboard—but I’m doing the driving.”
Astar scowled at him. “I know how to drive horses.”
Jak snorted. “Yeah, and I can shapeshift into a grizzly bear.”
“Oh, now those are fighting words,” Astar pretended to growl, seizing on the mock argument as a welcome diversion from worrying. The sun had nearly set, and shadows gathered at an alarming rate. Guiding the horses down that perilous, winding road to the bottom would be no picnic.
“Nevertheless, Your Highness,” Jak replied cheerfully, climbing with agile grace to the high seat at the front of the covered carriage. “I’m trained in this. You’re not.”
“You’re trained in steering a sailing ship, not a carriage,” Astar pointed out, climbing up beside him. He was not going to ride inside the carriage.
“How different can it be?” Jak grinned and studied the long reins. “Now, where is the rudder…”
“Give those to me,” Astar demanded.
“Kidding!” Jak protested, adjusting his grip expertly and clucking the nervous horses into motion. “Danu’s tits—just trying for a bit of levity here.”
“Yeah, but—”
A clap of wings had him jerking up his head, sword leaping to hand, the bear threatening to burst forth. Jak cursed in Dasnarian, fighting to control the horses as they reared in their traces. Astar recognized the raven barely in time to abort his swing—right as the huge bird became Rhyian, manifesting a slight bit above ground so he landed hard enough to send up a burst of dust and gravel from even that frozen ground. With wild eyes, Rhy leapt onto the carriage, seizing Astar by the collar of his furry cloak, his contorted face looming and spittle flying as he roared. “Where is she? What have you done with her?”
~ 27 ~
“Cousin!” Astar roared back at Rhy, more than a little grizzly in it. “Calm your shit down!” Grasping Rhy’s wrists, he wrenched the slighter man off of him.
Rhy fought back, his long body stronger than even most shapeshifters, freeing one arm to take a swing at Astar—who caught the incoming fist in one hand, holding and squeezing hard so the pain would penetrate Rhy’s frenzy. “Stop the horses!” he yelled to Jak as the carriage jolted and bounced over the rougher ground off-road, careening perilously toward the cliff’s edge.
“Trying,” Jak gritted back.
Astar focused on quelling the frenzied Rhy, a problem he finally solved by essentially sitting on his cousin. Rhy might have that long-limbed slippery strength, but Astar still outweighed him. By then, Jak had control of the horses, steering them back toward the road, and Astar let out a breath of temporary relief. Very temporary, as one wheel gave with a mighty crack! and the carriage jounced once, twice—then abruptly capsized, throwing them all to the rocky ground and twisting the traces around the horses.
Winded—beyond dispirited—Astar lay there a moment staring up at the purpling sky. Much the same shade as the bruises he’d have all over his body, no doubt. If he survived the night. Still pinned under him, Rhy groaned, so Astar shifted to the side and sat up. Jak was already with the horses, singing them a soothing song in Dasnarian—who knew the Dasnarians had lullabies?—and freeing the trapped steeds from the wreck of a carriage. He caught a few words, about baby birds and nests. Then, deciding Jak had the situation well in hand, Astar turned his attention to Rhy, who was sitting up also, but hunched over, gripping his skull in his hands like he was keeping it from coming apart.
“What the fuck, cuz?” Astar demanded.
Rhy’s head snapped up, and he glared at Astar, still feral, his deep blue eyes catching the meager light and reflecting it like a cat’s would. Or a wolf’s. An odd combination of relief and trepidation washed over him. Rhy wasn’t like Astar, limited only to his raven First Form, but he tended to cling to it, ever wary of attracting Moranu’s attention by trying more forms. Not that there was any evidence that the goddess paid any more attention to Her children with multiple forms than She did to those with only First Form, or even the ones who couldn’t shift at all, like Ash. Still, the Tala were a superstitious lot, and they tended to believe multitalented shapeshifters like Zephyr, Gen, and Stella were favored by the many-faced goddess.
Having qualities of alternate forms show up while Rhy was in human form was both good and bad. Good because it was about time Rhy quit worrying and hiding; bad because whatever was making him finally crack open didn’t bode well.
And yes—Astar was grimly and fully aware of how similar his own situation was to his cousin’s.
“Where is Salena?” Rhy demanded in return, sounding slightly more sane.
At least, until Astar told him the truth. “How are you e
ven here?” he countered. “Did you fly from—”
In a flash, he was on his back again, Rhy pinning him to the ground with sheer fury and clawed hands around his throat, throttling the breath from him. With his black hair whipping in the biting wind, face harsh with fury and anguish, Rhy looked like a true avatar of Moranu, of the goddess in full vengeance. “Not. One. More. Word.” Rhy nearly screamed it. “Until you explain why Salena isn’t in this world anymore.”
Astar tried to answer, but had no breath. He clawed at Rhy’s hands, trying to free himself, but his cousin possessed a sudden and unexpected strength far beyond his usual. With no choice, Astar became the grizzly bear, throwing Rhy off him with the sheer change in size. Rhy whipped into wolf form, leaping for his throat with jaws snapping.
Then Jak arrived, hurling himself through the air with acrobatic ease, wrapping his arms around the snarling wolf and taking them both to the ground. Astar, knowing words would be needed more than brute strength, went back to human, helping to pin the wolf before it savaged Jak further. Kneeling with his full weight on Rhy, Astar grabbed the wolf’s snapping jaws in both big hands, holding them closed with desperate determination and more than his own usual strength, too.
“Rhyian,” he snarled. “Listen to me. Shift back and listen. Lena needs you. And she needs you rational. Shift back for Salena.”
The wolf stilled, then became Rhy in human form. “I know Salena needs me. That’s why I’m here. Now stop fucking around and tell me.”
Astar held up his palms in a peacemaking gesture. “Short answer is: We don’t know, but Zephyr is looking for her. Let me make sure you didn’t kill Jak, and I’ll tell you the whole story.”
Rhy tensed as if he might fight, and for a moment, Astar braced for it, but then Rhy sagged and ran a hand over his face. “Yeah. Sorry, man, I—See to Jak.”
With a nod, Astar crawled off Rhy and over to Jak. “You all right?”
“A mere flesh wound,” Jak replied, but his grin looked pained.
Rhy crawled over, too. “I’m sorry. Shit—I really tore you up.”
“The nature of battle,” Jak said, clapping a hand on Rhy’s shoulder. “Sometimes you take friendly fire.”
“I don’t know as I’d call that attack friendly,” Astar corrected sourly.
“I know, I know.” Rhy raked his hands through his hair, rubbing his scalp. “I don’t know what came over me.”
Something about those words caught Astar’s attention. Someone else had said that very thing, not long ago. Gen—when she’d become the saber cat. In fact, Astar had said the same thing to Zephyr, when he’d been so rough with her. And she’d been acting so aggressive and territorial—something he’d put down to her gríobhth nature and maybe congratulating himself that it was all about him, but what if it wasn’t?
“Should I call Nilly down to heal you?” Astar asked.
“Nah. I got it.” Jak began ripping strips of cloth from the bottom of his shirt. “If she’s up to it later, she can catch anything that might leave an ugly scar. I’ll keep the ones that add to my rakish good looks,” he added with a cocky grin.
“Here’s what we know about Lena,” Astar said to Rhy, and related the events with neutral formality, much as he’d report to Ursula. “Now, how and why are you here?”
Rhy visibly struggled to contain himself, holding up a staying hand. “Salena is just … gone?”
“Zephyr believes she can locate Lena, and I believe in Zephyr,” Astar replied firmly, adding an internal prayer to any deity who might be listening to bring them back safely. “Gen and Nilly are aloft keeping an eye out. Meanwhile, we wait. Now: talk.”
“Yeah, I saw the girls as I came in.” Rhy cast a jaundiced eye at the sky. “I could join them, but ravens aren’t great in the dark.” At Astar’s impatient movement, Rhy cocked his head. “Fine, I’ll answer your questions. I know you don’t want me here, but I couldn’t stay away. I reported to Ordnung as ordered, then went back to Annfwn.” He glared at Astar defiantly. “It was killing me,” he ground out, “knowing you all were up here doing something important—”
Jak made a scoffing sound through his teeth, which were clenched around one end of a scrap of cloth he was tying over a bleeding wound on his upper arm. “If you count kicking our heels at the Elderhorst court important, though I did win some decent coin.”
“You were doing that for a reason,” Rhy insisted. “Whereas I was kicking my heels in paradise for no good reason at all. So, I flew to Elderhorst to find you, maybe try to make amends.”
“This is how you make amends?” Astar asked incredulously, gesturing at Jak’s wounds and his own.
Rhy shrugged in the elaborate Tala style and gave them a lopsided smile. “Mistakes were made?”
They all snorted with laughter at their standard excuse from boyhood to explain the many scrapes the three of them had gotten into.
“Let me help with that,” Rhy said, taking another scrap of cloth from Jak and deftly tying it over another bleeding wound. “So, I flew to Elderhorst. Figured I might as well, since you’d made me memorize those bleeding maps. But when I arrived, I found out you’d all headed up here.” He shook his head. “I was flying up here when… I don’t know how to explain it, but I felt something. Like claws on the inside of my skull. And I… I heard Salena cry out for me, begging me for help. Then she…” His voice cracked, and he looked at them bleakly. “She disappeared from the world. I thought she was dead.”
They sat in silence a moment, Moranu’s crescent moon silvering over the shining black water of the lake below. “I didn’t realize you and Lena were so connected,” Astar finally said. If he had, would he have treated Rhy the same way? Probably.
Rhy made an incoherent sound of frustration and regret. “You didn’t know? I didn’t know! I don’t know when or how that happened, but I can tell you that I spent seven long years apart from Salena without ever feeling her voice tug at me like that. And I feel sure Salena would tell you that I’m the last person she’d call out to for help,” he finished bitterly.
“Zephyr heard her, too,” Astar told him, musing over the puzzle pieces. “I’d say it was shapeshifters, but Lena isn’t one, and Gen, Stella, and I didn’t hear anything.”
“Something is going on with you shapeshifters, though,” Jak informed them. “Lena and I discussed it. You’re all acting more animal than usual. I mean that in the nicest way,” he added cheerfully.
Rhy threw Jak a vicious look. “You and Salena were discussing me, you mean.”
Jak rolled his eyes, stood, and dusted himself off—without much effect, given how much frozen mud had been ground into his clothes. “You, my friend, have your head so far up your ass that you think you’re the center of the universe because you can’t see anything else.”
With a growl, Rhy leapt for him, claws erupting from his human hands. Astar moved too late to stop him, but Jak needed no help. In an agile blur, he was behind Rhy, twin daggers crossed under Rhy’s jaw, ready to slice. “Careful,” Jak said in a lethal tone, all vestige of the jokester gone. “I went easy on you because I know you’re out of your head, but you will be a good dog or I’ll put you down. The moment I feel you shift, I’m cutting.”
Rhy snarled, twisting—and subsided when one blade pierced his skin, a line of blood trickling down.
“You’re not good at healing,” Jak warned, “and Nilly is too far away to help you if I cut too deep. Don’t make me upset her.”
“Jak,” Astar said in a smooth voice. “Let him go.”
Jak raised a brow at Astar, lifted one shoulder and let it fall, then withdrew his knives and planted a kick in the small of Rhy’s back—all in one smooth movement—sending Rhy flying to his knees. Astar tensed, ready to shift and stop Rhy if he tried to attack again, but his cousin remained on hands and knees, spitting out dust and blood. “Fuck me, you Dasnarian lightweight—when did you get so freaking fast?” he gritted out.
Jak smiled thinly. “I may be a lowly mossback, but
that doesn’t mean I can’t learn how to manage shapeshifters. All the more reason, in fact.” He spun his twin blades and sheathed them. “Now, I may be able to kick shapeshifter ass, but I can’t see in the dark like you two. What’s the revised plan?”
Astar eyed the decimated carriage, decided it was a total loss. “Jak can ride one of the horses. My grizzly form sees well in the dark, so I’ll guide us down the road to the manse. If we can find it quickly—since our guides abandoned us—we can be there in a couple of hours. Rhy—ride or fly, your call.”
Rhy snorted. “You forget that these aren’t shapeshifter horses or ones that have been tamed by Tala wizards to ignore big nasty predators. No way are these horses following a grizzly bear. We can take turns walking and riding, and I’ll guide us. I saw the manse on the map, so I know where it is.” Rhy glanced at Jak. “And that way we can keep Jak company.”
Jak snorted. “You just want to know what Lena said about you.”
Unexpectedly, Rhy grinned and pounded Jak on the back. “So she did talk about me. Spill, bro.”
“No way. I can keep a confidence.”
“A confidence? Is that a euphemism for you seducing my woman?” Rhy demanded.
“Lena is not your woman,” Jak returned hotly. “You had your chance there and blew it.”
Astar sighed mentally as he shifted into bear form. It was going to be a long couple of hours.
~ 28 ~
The moment Zeph found the gateway and slipped through, she marveled that she hadn’t seen it before. Maybe it was being in gríobhth form—which, as Stella had pointed out, was more sensitive to half-states of all kinds and magic in general—but the threshold between one realm and the next stood out like a crease in a silk gown. Not a rift so much as a fold, and once she found it, the space between the upper edge and the bottom became markedly apparent.
As was the nothingness where they intersected.
If not for Lena’s cries still echoing soundlessly in Zeph’s head, she would’ve hesitated to enter that weird space that didn’t seem to be anything at all. To her gríobhth senses, the narrow slit had no color or substance, no scent or feel. It was noticeable entirely because it defied rational explanation. In some ways, it reminded her of the fleeting sense of nonexistence that sometimes infiltrated her mind when she was shapeshifting. Though all shapeshifter children learned not to dwell on that non-space, lest they become trapped there.
The Golden Gryphon and the Bear Prince: An Epic Fantasy Romance (Heirs of Magic Book 1) Page 27