The Shapechangers

by Jennifer Roberson

  Alix closed her eyes. “You shame me, lady. I have said things no mother should hear.”

  Raissa laughed. “I know all of Finn’s faults, small one. And you fool yourself if you think Duncan has none.”

  “I have not seen any,” Alix said distinctly.

  The woman laughed again and smoothed back her shortened hair. “Only because you will not let yourself. Have you not lost most of your hair because of his jealousy?”

  Alix smiled through her exhaustion. “Perhaps that is one fault I can accept.”

  “Rest now, small one,” Raissa said gently. “He will come back to you.”

  Alix struggled for awareness a moment longer. “I am Hale’s daughter, lady. How can you show kindness to the daughter of the man who left you for another?”

  “It does not matter, Alix. That is all in the past.”

  “I know how Finn hates,” Alix said quietly. “I would not have you hate me like that.”

  “Hale was a Cheysuli warrior. He conducted himself according to his lights. It is the custom among us. Alix, you are welcome in my pavilion. If I can have Hale back through you, I am glad of it.”

  “Raissa—”

  “Hush. If you wish, we will speak of this another time. Perhaps there are things you would like to know about your jehan.”

  Alix slid farther into dreamless sleep, lost within the realization she would be Duncan’s woman after all.

  But she also wondered at the magic in Lindir’s soul to so ensorcel a man.

  And she wondered if she had not her own measure of it.

  Two days later she was installed in Duncan’s pavilion, propped up on her pallet by mounds of rolled furs. It seemed strange to be in his place, knowing it was now hers as well, but as he stood over her solicitously she knew only she was the happiest she had ever been.

  “I am well, Duncan,” she said softly.

  He looked down at her sternly. “Then tell me how you came by an arrow wound.”

  Alix laughed at him. “It was a young hunter. Ellasian, I must believe.”

  He frowned at her. “Tell me why a hunter would shoot you, rather than seek other things with you.”

  She looked down at her blanketed legs, wiggling her toes beneath the wool. Finally she glanced back up. “Because,” she said gently, “he thought I was a wolf.”

  Duncan’s brows lifted. “I hardly see how he could mistake you for a wolf, Alix. Perhaps he saw Storr, and simply missed.”

  The time had come for an admission. She had missed Council, when she would have shown her skill to them, and had not said anything to Duncan regarding the accident. She had cradled her knowledge to her like a child, keeping it secret and anticipating the joy in telling him. Now it proved more difficult than she had imagined.

  “He did not miss,” she said finally, fingering the healing wound in her shoulder. “He mistook me for a wolf because I was one.”

  Duncan made a skeptical sound and sat down at his low worktable, picking up his tools and a gold brooch she had watched him work on for two days. The lir-torque rested against her throat, warmed by her skin.

  “You do not believe me?” she asked.

  “You weave me a tale, cheysula.”

  “I am telling you the truth. Duncan…I can do more than speak with the lir. I take lir-shape, too.”

  For a moment he continued to work on the brooch. Then, when she said nothing more, he looked at her from beneath lowered brows.

  “Alix, would you truly have me believe—”

  “You had better!” she flung at him. “I would hardly lie about something so close to a Cheysuli warrior. I will even prove it to you.”

  She moved as if to get up. Duncan, rising rapidly from his cross-legged position as he dropped his tools, reached her bed and stood over her. “You go nowhere, cheysula, until you are better.”

  “I am better.”

  “Better than you are now.” He grinned. “It will not be long, I think.”

  She settled back against the furs. “I am not lying. Ask Cai. He and Storr taught me how to do it.”

  Duncan dropped to his knees beside her. “Is this true? Alix, you are unique enough that you converse with the lir. Can you truly assume lir-shape as well?”

  “Aye,” she said softly.

  He sank back on his heels. “But this has not been done for centuries. Our history says once all Cheysuli could assume any lir-shape, but since before my grandsire’s time this was only done by men. And then only when bonded by a single lir. It was the Firstborn who had the old abilities.”

  “Those who made the prophecy.”

  “Aye,” he said absently, eyes clouded with thought. “The Firstborn took any lir-shape at will, and conversed with them all. But their blood has been gone from us for a long time.” He looked at her sharply. “Unless, somehow, you have a measure of it.” Duncan got to his feet rapidly, startling her. “I will be back.”

  Alix stared after him, baffled by his sudden withdrawal, but she assumed he knew what he was doing. She pulled the blanket higher around her shoulders and snuggled down against the pallet, drowsily content. But part of her was still amazed at the new course her life had taken.

  Duncan returned with a Cheysuli Alix did not know; a much older man whose hair was pure white and held back by a slender bronze fillet. Alix, struggling to sit upright again, saw he did not wear the leather of the warriors; instead he clothed himself in a fine white wool robe, clasped with a leather belt mounted with bronze platelets. Like Raissa, he wore silver bells at his belt that sent a shiver of sound through the pavilion whenever he moved.

  Alix sent a puzzled glance at Duncan, who gestured with all deference for the man to seat himself on a brown bear pelt placed before the small fire cairn. The man did so with great dignity, carefully settling brittle bones into a comfortable position. He put a rolled deerskin on the pelt before him and waited.

  Duncan sat down at Alix’s side. “This is the shar tahl. He keeps the rituals and traditions for the clan, and passes the history down to each generation. Each child born learns his ancestors and what has gone before from this man. You have come late to your clan, but you are here now, and he will tell you what you must know.” He smiled faintly. “He may also have the answer to my question.”

  The shar tahl nodded to her, then untied the rolled deerskin. It was soft and supple, bleached white as snow, and as it unrolled before him Alix saw the runic symbols and lines twisting on the floor of the pavilion like a snake. He tapped the deerskin with a gnarled finger.

  “Your birthline,” he said. “You are here as surely as your jehan, and his jehan before him.” The finger moved. “All the way back to the Firstborn.”

  “But what does it mean?” she asked softly.

  His finger moved off the main line of runes and traced a second line, like the branch of a tree. Alix followed the movement until it stopped. The finger tapped again.

  “There.”

  “Where?” she asked.

  He looked at her sternly from rheumy yellow eyes. “There. The answer lies there.”

  She looked helplessly at Duncan. He maintained his solemn clan-leader demeanor, though she had come to know he had flashes of Finn-like irreverence. He simply kept it quieter.

  “If you know so little of your clan, you had best come to me for instruction,” the shar tahl intoned.

  Alix nodded meekly. “I will learn.”

  The shar tahl touched a red symbol gone dark with age. “It is here in the birthline. Five generations ago the Mujhar took a Cheysuli meijha, whose clan was so pure it could name members of the Firstborn as direct ancestors. All could assume lir-shape, even the women.” His thin shoulders stiffened. “That clan has since been destroyed by the qu’mahlin.”

  Alix ignored his controlled bitterness, counting back in her head. Then she shot the shar tahl a startled glance. “Shaine’s great-great grandsire?”

  “The woman who was meijha to a Mujhar bore him a daughter. She was raised at Homana-Mujhar a
nd wed to a foreign princeling, from Erinn. Shaine the Mujhar first took an Erinnish princess to wife, and so the blood came back.”

  “Then I am Cheysuli on both sides.” Alix sat upright. “There is Cheysuli blood in Shaine!”

  “It has been thinned,” the shar tahl said firmly. “Marriage with foreigners has overcome any Cheysuli traits left.” He pushed a wisp of white hair from his brow. “It is the women who have done this. It is in their blood. Ellinda bore Lindir, who has gifted you with the Old Blood long lost to us all.”

  Duncan touched her shoulder and pressed her down upon the furs. “Perhaps Lindir, unknowing, had her own tahlmorra. Perhaps Hale did not forsake his face for a Homanan princess, but followed what the gods have set for us.” He smiled. “If Lindir has passed this gift to you, you can bring it back into our clan.”

  She sank back. “I do not understand.”

  The shar tahl, surprising her, smiled. “It is time you learned the prophecy. If you will be silent, I will tell it to you.”

  She felt Duncan’s silent amusement and shot him a grimace of resentment. But she settled herself upon the pallet and nodded at the old man.

  “I am more than ready.”

  He sat upright before her, aged yellow eyes taking on the brightness of youth and wisdom. “Once, centuries ago, Homana was a Cheysuli place. This land was gifted to us by the Firstborn, who were sired by the old gods. Do you hear me?”

  “I hear,” she said softly.

  “The Cheysuli ruled Homana. It was they who built Mujhara and the palace of Homana-Mujhar. It was the Cheysuli who held sovereignty over all men.”

  “But the Mujhars are Homanan!”

  He fixed her with a stern glare. “If you will hear me, you must listen.”

  She subsided, chastened.

  “Mujhar itself is a Cheysuli word. So is Homana. This was our place long before it came into the hands of the Homanans.”

  Alix nodded reluctantly as he looked at her. A faint smile curved his creased lips.

  “The Ihlini rose up in Solinde and began to move against us. The Cheysuli were forced to use their own arts to defend the land. The Homanans, ever doubtful of such sorcery, began to fear.

  “Within a hundred years the fear turned to hatred; the hatred to violence. The Cheysuli could not convince the Homanans of their foolishness. We gave up the throne to them so they might know peace and security, and took up the bond of service to the Homanan Mujhars. Nearly four centuries ago.”

  Alix groped with the knowledge, unable to absorb it all. Finally she nodded to him, silently bidding him continue.

  “Until Hale took Lindir away, the Mujhar had ever kept Cheysuli advisors and councilors, and warriors who protected this land in battle. A Cheysuli liege man dedicated his life to the Mujhar. Such was Hale’s service.”

  “And Shaine ended it,” she whispered.

  “He began the qu’mahlin.” The shar tahl’s face tightened. “Even that was spoken of in the prophecy, but we chose to ignore it. We could not believe the Homanans would ever turn on us. We were foolish, and we have paid the price.”

  “What is the prophecy?”

  The bitterness vanished, replaced with pride and great dignity. “One day a man of all blood will unite four warring realms and two races bearing the gifts of the old gods.”

  Alix stared at him. “Who?”

  “The prophecy does not name a name. It only shows us the way, so we may follow it and prepare Homana for the proper man. But it seems we grow closer to the path.”

  “How do we follow it?” she asked softly.

  “We have the Old Blood in our clan again, because of you. The Prophecy speaks of a Cheysuli Mujhar ascending the throne of Homana again after four centuries. It is nearly time.”

  “But Carillon will be Mujhar,” Alix said.

  “Aye. It is his tahlmorra to prepare the way for the prophecy’s proper path.”

  “Carillon?” she asked incredulously. “But he distrusts all Cheysuli!”

  The shar tahl shrugged. “It has been foretold.”

  Duncan sighed. “This is what I meant when I spoke to him in Homana-Mujhar, cheysula. He must be turned from this hatred Shaine has put in him, and be made to see Homana’s need of us. It is time we served the prophecy of the Firstborn…as it was meant.”

  She looked at him blankly. “But what have I to do with it?”

  “It is up to you to give us back our pride and ancient magic.”

  “How?”

  He smiled gently. “By bearing more of us.”

  Chapter Two

  Alix, tongue clenched firmly between her teeth, wrestled with the knee-high furred boots. Duncan had brought her the black pelt of a mountain cat, cut it to shape with his knife, then handed the remains to her with instructions to begin a pair of winter boots. Aghast, Alix had stared at him and hoped he was teasing. He was not, she found, and now she cursed within her mind as she tried to work the thick hide and fur into something resembling boots.

  She worked until her fingers were awl-pricked and sore, troubled by her inability to fashion the boots. She was slowly learning her place within the clan and her responsibilities as a clan-leader’s cheysula, but her experience was sorely lacking. The warm gray wolfskin boots she wore had been made by Duncan for her when the weather turned cold, and she wished he would consent to making them all.

  But he has things of more import to concern himself with! she thought sourly, throwing her half-done black boot aside to stare at the pavilion across the way. He spends his time hunting or conversing with the Council, speaking ever of the war with Solinde!

  Instantly she was ashamed, for she knew as well as anyone how seriously concerned the Cheysuli were about the war. Increasingly alarming messages arrived from lir-couriers sent from Cheysuli secreted in Mujhara, seeking to learn of Shaine’s actions. The Solindish, buttressed by Tynstar’s Ihlini and troops guided by Keough, Lord of Atvia, had made inroads upon the Mujhar’s defense of Homana.

  And I said Bellam could never take this land, she thought hollowly. I, like all the others, have been too impressed with past victories.

  She sucked idly at a bleeding finger and recalled Duncan’s summing up of the threat to their homeland.

  “Homana will fall if Shaine does not commit himself to this war,” he had said one evening, staring gloomily into the flames of the pavilion fire cairn. “He recalls the victory against Bellam twenty-six years ago, and trusts to the might of his armies. But then he had the Cheysuli, and now he does not.”

  Alix had shifted closer to him, resting one hand upon his thigh. “Surely the Mujhar understands this Solindish threat. He has ruled for many years, and won many battles.”

  “He concerns himself more with the qu’mahlin than the Solindish war. I begin to think his fanaticism has made him mad.” Duncan’s hand idly caressed her arm. “He sends his brother, Fergus, into the field as commanding general, keeping himself safe within the walls of Homana-Mujhar.”

  “He has fought before,” she said softly. “Perhaps he realizes Fergus is a better soldier now.”

  Duncan leaned forward and placed more wood upon the fire. “Perhaps. But perhaps it is also he prefers to avoid the sacrifices a man makes in war. Shaine is not one who wishes to sacrifice anything.”

  Alix stared at the brown pelt beneath them and pushed rigid fingers through the bear fur. “To send your heir into battle is a sacrifice,” she said quietly, trying to hide from Duncan the fear it brought. “He has sent Carillon to fight.”

  Duncan was not fooled. “If Carillon is to be Mujhar, he must learn what it is to lead men. Shaine has trusted to his own council too long; he has neglected Carillon’s education.” He grimaced. “I think the prince could make a good Mujhar, but he has been given little chance to learn the responsibilities.” Duncan slid Alix a carefully blank glance. “It is no wonder he took to speaking soft words to innocent croft-girls in the valley, to while away his time.”

  Alix flushed deeply and withdrew h
er hand. But when she saw the glint in his eye she realized he only teased, and laughed at him.

  “But I am no longer so innocent, Duncan. You have seen to that.”

  He shrugged, purposefully solemn. “Better a clan-leader, I think, than a mere warrior.”

  “Warrior…what warrior?”

  “Finn.”

  “You beast!” she cried, striking him a glancing blow on the shoulder. “Why must you remind me of him? Even now he calls me meijha and torments me by suggesting I be his light woman.”

  Duncan arched his brows. “He seeks only to irritate you, cheysula. Even Finn knows better than to seek a clan-leader’s woman, when she is unwilling.” His brows lowered, “I think.”

  “Finn would dare anything,” Alix said darkly.

  He smiled. “But if he did not, small one, he would be a tedious rujholli indeed.”

  “I would prefer him tedious.”

  “You, I think, would prefer him slain.”

  She looked at him sharply, startled. “No, Duncan! Never. I wish death on no man, not even one like Shaine who would have all Cheysuli slain.” She recalled the guardsmen killed in her behalf. “No.”

  His hand was gentle on her head, caressing her shorn hair. It had grown, but still barely touched her shoulders. “I know, cheysula; I only tease.” He sighed heavily as his hand fell away. “But if we join this war, there may be many deaths.”

  “But the Mujhar will not have you with his armies. You have said.”

  “In time, perhaps, he may have to.”

  Alix, hearing the weariness of reluctant acceptance in his tone, leaned her head against his bare shoulder and tried to think of other things.

  Now, as she took up the black boot again, she wondered how Carillon fared.

  She had not lost her affection for the prince, even though she had spent nearly three months with the clan in Ellas. Carillon had been the first man she had fastened her fancy on; though it had been an impossible dream, she dreamed it with great joy. Duncan had replaced Carillon in her dreams, dominating her thoughts and desires, but she did not forget the first one she had loved. That love had been childish, immature and unfulfilled, but it had been true.