Alix fingered the thick black fur absently, lost within her thoughts. Duncan had showed her what it was to be a woman; what it was to be Cheysuli; what it was to have a tahlmorra. Already her roots had twined themselves around his own so deeply she knew she could never be herself again without him. She wondered if that was what it was to have a lir.
The adjustment had not been easy. Alix missed Torrin and the croft; missed the green valleys she had ever known. At times she awoke in the night sensing an odd disorientation, frightened by the strange man at her side, but it always faded when full awareness came back. Then she would press herself against Duncan’s warmth, seeking comfort and safety, and always he gave it; and more.
She thought again of Carillon. She had heard only that the prince was in the field with his father, fighting the Solindish and Atvian troops. Duncan—sensing her loyalty—was unusually reticent with her when speaking of Carillon. Finn was not. He taunted his brother with the fact the prince had shared a place in Alix’s heart first, and relished giving her news of Carillon if only to tease Duncan. His attitude irritated Alix, but it was a way of getting news.
As if hearing her thoughts, Finn walked up to her and sat down on the gray pelt spread before the large fire cairn. Alix glared at him, expecting his normal mocking manner, but she saw something else in his face.
“It has come, Alix,” he said quietly.
“What do you say?” she asked in dread.
“It is time the Cheysuli defied the qu’mahlin and went again into Mujhara.”
“Mujhara!” She stared at him, shaken by his somber tone. “But the Mujhar…”
Finn smoothed the nap of the pelt absently, staring at his hand. “Shaine will be too occupied with real sorcerers to waste much time on us.” His eyes lifted to hers. “The Ihlini have broken into the city.”
“No…oh, Finn! Not Mujhara!”
He stood. “Duncan sent me for you. Council is calling all into the clan pavilion.” He put out a hand to help her up. “We go to war, meijha.”
Silently she took his hand and rose, shaking out her green skirts. She looked at Finn for more information, apprehensive, but he said nothing else. He merely led her to the Council pavilion, a huge black tent painted with every lir-symbol imaginable.
Duncan sat before the fire cairn on a spotted pelt, watching his clan file into the black interior in pensive silence. At his right lay an ocher-colored rug, and it was to this Finn took Alix. The heaviness of the silence fell on her like a cloak. She sat down on the rug, watching Duncan’s face closely. Finn sat beside her.
Duncan waited until the pavilion was filled, ringed with dark faces and yellow eyes. Then he looked to the shar tahl, seated across from him, and nodded to himself. Slowly he got to his feet.
“Vychan, in Mujhara, has sent his lir to us. The message is one we have expected these past months. Tynstar has led his Ihlini sorcerers into Mujhara, and they have taken the city.”
Alix, sickened with fear, swallowed against the foreboding in her soul. The others, she saw, waited mutely for Duncan’s words.
“The western borders fell three months ago. Keough of Atvia fights for Bellam, marching toward Mujhara where the Ihlini await them, Only Homana-Mujhar has not fallen.”
Alix closed her eyes and conjured the Great Hall with all its candleracks and rich tapestries.
And Shaine…
“If Homana-Mujhar falls, Homana herself falls. We, as the descendants of the Cheysuli who built both palace and city, cannot allow it to happen.”
Finn shifted. “So you will send us into the Mujhar’s city, rujho, and have us fight two enemies.”
Duncan shot him a sharp glance. “Two?”
“Aye,” he said briefly. “Do you forget Shaine? He will set his guardsmen against us, when he would do better to use them against the Ihlini.”
Duncan’s mouth was a thin line. “I do not forget Shaine, rujho. But I will set aside our personal conflicts to save Homana.”
“Shaine will not.”
“Then we will give him no choice.” Duncan looked slowly and deliberately around the pavilion, marking each attentive face. “All of us cannot go. We must leave warriors to defend the Keep. But I have need of strong men willing to go into the city and fight the Ihlini with any method at hand. We are not many. Any force we send will have to be selectively efficient. Open warfare will result in too high a death toll. We must answer the Ihlini with stealth of our own.” His eyes returned to Finn. “I send the best and the strongest. And some will be lost.”
Finn smiled crookedly. “Well, rujho, you say nothing I do not already know. It is ever so, I think.” He shrugged. “I go, of course.”
Other warriors echoed Finn’s words, committing themselves to a war the Mujhar would not welcome them to. Alix, listening blankly to them, realized why Duncan had wanted to remain solitary. He had known all along the Cheysuli would risk their few numbers to save their ancestral home.
It is tahlmorra, she whispered within her mind. Ever tahlmorra.
Alix walked back to the pavilion alone, lost within fears and worries. In her time with Duncan she had learned of his strength of will, determination and selfless dedication to serving the prophecy. Nothing would deter him from leading his warriors into Mujhara. She knew better than to ask him to remain in safety with her, and though she wished he did not have to involve himself so deeply, she also knew he would lessen himself in her eyes if he did choose to stay. Duncan was, perhaps, less aggressive than Finn in his desire to fight, but his pride ran just as deep.
The fire cairn had burned itself to ash, so Alix spent her time rekindling it for warmth and illumination. The pavilion was her security now, as much as Torrin’s croft had been. Even the tapestry meant much to her, for Duncan had carefully explained each runic device and the designs stitched within the patterning of rich blue yarns. The tapestry contained much of Cheysuli lore, highlighting the strengths and traditions of the race. She wondered, as she knelt by the fire, if more history would be added with the warriors’ return to the city.
Duncan came in softly, easing aside the doorflap. Alix, seeing the quietude in his eyes, met him with a measure of her own solemnity.
“Duncan,” she began softly, “how soon do you leave for Mujhara?”
He went to his weapons chest and took out his war bow, a compact instrument of death similar to his plain hunting bow. But this was dyed black, polished, inlaid with gold and tiger-eye. The string also was black, humming tautly as he strung the bow and tested it.
He dug his black arrows out of the chest and sat down cross-legged, beginning the laborious examination of each one. The arrows were fletched with yellow feathers, and the obsidian heads gleamed.
Alix waited silently, patiently, and finally he answered her. “In the morning.”
“So soon…”
“War does not wait for men, cheysula.”
Carefully she smoothed her green skirts over her thighs as she knelt upon the spotted pelt. “Duncan,” she said at last, “I wish to go.”
He meticulously inspected the fletching of each arrow. “Go?”
“To Mujhara.”
“No.”
“I will be safe.”
“It is no place for you, small one.”
“Please,” she said clearly, not begging. “I could not bear to remain here, waiting out each day without knowing.”
“I have said no.”
“I would not hinder you. I too can assume lir-shape. I would be no trouble.”
He studied her impassively a moment, half his attention on his arrows. Then he smiled. “You are ever trouble, Alix.”
“Duncan!”
“I will not risk you.”
“You risk yourself!”
He set down one arrow and picked up another. “The Cheysuli,” he said slowly, “have ever risked themselves. For Homana, it is worth it.”
“But for Shaine?”
“The Mujhar is Homana. Shaine has held these lands safely for mor
e than forty years, Alix. Our race has not benefited from him, perhaps, but all else have. If he requires help to hold the land now, we must give it to him.” His eyes dropped. “And we must think of the one who will succeed him.”
Alix took a trembling breath. “Let me give my aid as well. Shaine is my grandsire…and Carillon my cousin.”
He set the arrow aside and clasped his hands loosely in his lap. Alix found herself avoiding his eyes, focusing instead on the heavy gold banding his bared, bronzed arms. She saw the embossed, incised hawk-shape of his lir and the runic designs worked into the gleaming metal on either side of the hawk. When she could look at his face again, she saw pride and warmth in his eyes.
“Cheysula,” he said gently, “I know your determination. I am thankful for it. But I will not have you risking yourself, especially for the man who cast you out at birth and then again so many years later.”
“Yet you risk yourself,” she repeated hollowly, sensing defeat.
He sighed minutely. “It is a warrior’s place, cheysula, and a clan-leader’s tahlmorra. Do not deny me it.”
“No,” she said. She reached for the bow and picked it up, caressing the smooth patina and gleaming ornamentation. She slid careful fingers down the taut bowstring, testing its tension and vibrancy. “Will you be careful?” she asked in a low voice.
“I am usually little else, as Finn often tells me.”
“Very careful?”
He smiled wryly. “I will be very careful.”
Alix gently set the bow in front of him. “Well, I would not want your first son born without a father.”
He was silent, Alix, eyes downcast in a submissive position unfamiliar to her, waited for his astonishment and joy.
But Duncan reached out and grabbed her shoulders, jerking her upright onto her knees. He glared at her wrathfully.
“And you would risk that by coming to an embattled city?”
“Duncan—”
“You are a fool, Alix!” He released her abruptly.
She stared at him open-mouthed as he rose stiffly and stalked from her, halting at the open doorflap to stare out.
“I thought you would be pleased,” she told his rigid back.
He turned on her “Pleased? You beg to go to war and then tell me you have conceived? Do you wish to lose this child?”
“No!”
He glared at her. “Then remain here as I have said, and conduct yourself as a clan-leader’s cheysula.”
Alix, driven into speechlessness by the intensity of his anger, said nothing at all as he turned away from her and left the pavilion.
She shivered once, convulsively, then folded both arms across her still-flat belly and bent forward, hugging herself tightly.
She let the tears come unchecked and rocked back and forth in silent grief.
Chapter Three
When the doorflap was pulled aside Alix sat up hastily and wiped the tears away. She was prepared to meet Duncan with dignity, but when she saw Finn staring in at her she lost her composure.
“Duncan is not here,” she said shortly.
Finn studied her a moment. “No, I know he is not. He passed me but a moment ago, black of face and very black of mood.” He paused. “Have you had your first battle, meijha?”
She scowled at him, fighting back the impulse to cry again. “It is none of your concern.”
“He is my rujholli; you my rujholla. It is ever my concern.”
“Go away!” she cried, and burst into tears.
Finn did not go away. He watched her in ironic amazement a moment, then stepped inside the pavilion. Alix turned her back on him and cried into her hands.
“Is it truly so bad?” he asked quietly.
“You are the last person I would tell,” she managed between sobs.
“Why? I have ears that hear as well as anyone’s.”
“But you never listen.”
Finn sighed and sat down next to her, carefully avoiding any contact. “He is my rujho, Alix, but it does not make him perfect. If you wish to tell me how abominable he is being to you, I will listen readily enough.”
She shot him a repressive glance. “Duncan is never abominable.”
His brows lifted. “Oh…he can be. Do you forget I grew up with him?”
Something in the lightness of his tone broke her down farther, destroying her last reservation. Most of the tears had gone, but she was still upset.
“He has never been angry with me before,” she whispered.
Finn’s mouth twitched. “Did you think Duncan beyond it? Most of the time he loses himself in the burdens of being clan-leader to a dwindling race, but he is like any other. He has ever been more solemn than I, but he has just as much anger and bitterness. It is only he hides it better.”
She thought of the cause of Duncan’s anger, but could not tell Finn. It was too new; too private.
“It is too hard,” she said, pushing away the last of the tears.
“Being his cheysula?” he asked in surprise. “Well, there was a way out of that…once.” He grinned sardonically. “You had only to be meijha to me.”
“I did not mean that,” she said sharply. “I spoke of learning new customs, and conducting myself the way a Cheysuli woman does.”
Finn thought about it. “Perhaps that is true. I had never thought of it.” He shrugged. “This is the only life I know.”
“I know two,” she told him heavily. “The one you stole me from, and this. There are times I wish you had never seen me.”
“So you could dally with the princeling and grow up to be his light woman?”
Alix glared at him. “Perhaps. But you ended any chance of that.”
“You had best not say that where Duncan can hear it,” Finn said tonelessly.
Alix was startled. “Duncan knows how I felt about Carillon. How could he not?”
Finn dragged at his boot, as if delaying his answer. Then his mouth twisted. “He still fears you may go back to the princeling.”
“Why?”
“Carillion offers more than we can.” His eyes were expressionless. “The magnificence of Homana-Mujhar, wealth, the honor in being a prince’s light woman. It is more than any Cheysuli can give.”
“I do not take a man for what he gives me,” she said firmly. “I take him out of love. Duncan can say it was tahlmorra that brought us together—perhaps it was—but it is not that which keeps us together.”
Finn seemed suddenly uncomfortable. “Then you will remain with the clan?”
“Duncan would not let me go; nor, I think, would you.” Alix held his eyes. “I have no real wish to go back…now. My place is with Duncan.”
“Even though it be hard to learn our ways?”
Alix sighed resignedly. “I will learn…eventually.”
Finn lifted her hand, encircling her wrist with his fingers as he had done so long before. “Does what you feel for him pall, Alix, or he dies in this war we face…you may come to me.” He silenced her before she could protest. “No. I do not mean it out of my own desire for you, though that is unchanged.” He shrugged, dismissing it. “I mean for you to come to me in safety, should you ever need it.”
“Finn—”
He released her wrist. “I am not always so harsh, rujholla. But you never gave me the chance to show you otherwise.”
He left before she could say anything more. Alix, staring after him, wondered if perhaps she had done him an injustice in her thoughts.
Duncan said little to her in the morning as they parted. Though he had come back to the pavilion sorry he had frightened her and much less angry, he was still determined she would do nothing to endanger the child or herself. Aloud she agreed with him, admitting her foolishness; inwardly she calmly considered when would be the best time to assume lir-shape and go by herself.
But when Duncan bid her farewell she clung to him in helpless anguish, silent, and made no reference to her secret plans.
Alix found, to her anguish, Cheysuli women did not
say good-bye in the privacy of the pavilion. Instead a cheysula or meijha stood outside, before the tent, bidding her warrior safe journey in the open. The custom, Duncan said, came from a wish to make parting easier on the warriors. It was difficult to leave a sobbing woman with any degree of confidence.
She stared fiercely after them as they rode out of the stone Keep. The winged lir flew ahead, scouting; the four-footed beasts paced beside the horses. Alix saw Cai swoop above the treetops, Storr lope easily beside Finn, and the others go silently with their lir.
And I will be them all, she thought in grim satisfaction.
She was calm in her decision, acknowledging the difficulties. She had been a wolf only twice, and then with disastrous results, but that was hardly her fault. She would do better. Yet she was concerned with the knowledge she would have to go as a bird, an unknown shape, for a wolf would move too slowly for her to catch up to the party of warriors.
I wish Cai were here to teach me to fly, she thought uneasily. It must be frightening to seek the air for the first time, trusting your life to fragile wings.
But she knew she would go.
Alix prepared rapidly, wanting to leave no later than afternoon. She drew a pair of Duncan’s worn leggings and soft jerkin from a chest, cutting both garments to her smaller size. The jerkin she put on over the top half of the gown she had worn at Homana-Mujhar, using it as a rough shirt to cover her arms and hide her figure. A leather strap served as a belt, and she pulled on her wolfskin boots, cross-gartered to the knees. Grimly she looked down at herself.
I look no more a warrior than some Cheysuli boy playing at it Well, it will have to do. I cannot go to war wearing skirts.
She sat down on the spotted pelt by the fire cairn and stared sightlessly into the coals.
How to make oneself a bird… ?
Carefully Alix detached her mind from her surroundings, dismissing the familiarity of soft pelts and colored tapestries and the mundane tools of daily life. The coals blurred before her eyes into a collage of rose and gray, transfixing her mind.
She thought of treetops and fields and clouds. She thought of a falcon, swift and light; of feathers and talons and hooked beak; bright eyes and hollow bones and the marvelous freedom of flight.
The Shapechangers Page 18