Tales of the Golden Judge: 3-Book Bundle - Books 13-15

by Hart, Melissa F.

  Aja was just resigning herself to facing the other people in the settlement at the communal cook fires when there was a knock at the door. Frowning, she answered it, and to her surprise, she saw Ina, the white-haired young woman who had greeted her so warmly the night before.

  Ina held a wooden plate in her hands piled high with food, and when Aja's belly rumbled again, the other woman laughed.

  “I take it I have come right in the nick of time,” she said teasingly. “Shall we breakfast together?”

  Aja nodded eagerly, and together, they found cushions on the floor where they could sit comfortably and share the food. Aja had been doing most of her own hunting while she was on the road, occasionally trading the odd pelt for food from human travelers. The food that Stefan's clan had was far better, and she delighted in trying everything that Ina had brought her.

  She couldn't get enough of the spicy roasted chicken, she ate all she could of the raw greens, and though she approached the black salty fruit that Ina called olives dubiously, she soon developed a taste for them as well.

  “So how nervous should I be around you?” Aja asked when the first sharpness of her appetite had worn off.

  “What do you mean?” Ina sat cross-legged on the cushion across from Aja, her back straight. She was a strikingly beautiful young woman with white hair that fell down her back, her face was perfectly heart-shaped and set off with large gray eyes that shone like gems.

  “You were engaged to be married to Stefan before he announced our engagement,” Aja said bluntly. “A jilted woman is hardly meant to be sneaking into her rival's home and offering her food.”

  “Well, it's not so surprising when you realize that the food's poisoned,” Ina said reasonably, and Aja choked, making the other woman laugh and pound on her back.

  “I didn't poison you,” she said, grinning. “I suppose I just wanted to get to know you.”

  “But you and Stefan...”

  “Were never more than a political ploy by my father,” Ina said firmly. “I'm not saying that he's beneath me or that I couldn't grow to love him. All I know is that I do poorly when my hand is forced, and I think he is the same way. That way lies pain and a lifetime of misery for both of us, so I suppose you can imagine the relief I felt last night.”

  Aja nodded slowly, and she felt herself warming to this extraordinary woman. There was something about Ina that reminded her of her own cousin Tonna, who led the fox clan in the northlands, and suddenly and with a fierce emotion, she wished that she could bring the two of them together.

  “Do you know this area very well?” Aja asked. “I know that you are not in this territory.”

  “I know it reasonably well, I suppose,” said Ina dubiously. “I've roamed most of the country when I was younger, and my mother was a healer. She went to all sorts of places when people needed her, and I often followed her.”

  “I...” Aja hesitated, wondering how much she could tell this woman, but still she held her tongue.

  “What is it you need?” Ina asked, and Aja could see how Ina had been a healer's daughter, trained in ferreting out secret ills and things that people never wanted to talk about.

  “I need to get out to the countryside, away from the settlement,” Aja said with a rush. “There is something that I am looking for, and I... I cannot be here and find it.”

  Ina's extraordinary gray eyes were calm, and as Ina looked at her, Aja felt as if the other woman could see straight to the core of her.

  “All right,” she said with a nod. “I'll show you how to get away from the settlement, and I'll take you out to the open country. You need to let me do something in return, though.”

  “What's that?” asked Aja, a little nervously. It had come to her more than once that both of the wolf clans were wealthier than she, as a ragged wanderer could ever be. There was nothing she could offer Ina, but Ina's smile was kind.

  “You need to let me give you a bath, because you smell distractingly of a certain wolf chief, and you need to let me put something on your cuts and bruises that will actually allow you to walk without pain, yes?”

  Aja laughed, and nodded, and she watched as Ina got to work.

  Ina left the small house for a moment, and when she came back, her arms were full. She carried a small basin of water, and in a bag hung around her neck, she removed a number of jars and bottles. She directed Aja to strip to the skin and seated her on a small wooden stool nearby.

  Aja's clan members were free with their bodies, and it didn't bother her to be naked in front of another woman. Ina was treating her with a kindness that made her eyes sting with homesick tears, and even the white-haired woman's orders reminded her of her cousin.

  Using a small washcloth, Ina wiped down Aja's entire body with water, though there was something sharp and pine-scented in it that made Aja's nose wrinkle approvingly. When she was damp, a bristle brush was used to scrub her skin until it glowed, and then a final wash with the water left her feeling beautifully clean.

  “All right, now let's see about those bruises...”

  Ina had her stand, and then she applied a sharp-smelling ointment to all the spots she could find. Though the cream stung at first, the sting faded and left a cooling, healing sensation behind. Aja sighed, and she realized that some of her muscles had been held tense for a long time, trying to deal with the pain from her trip through the river.

  “That's amazing,” she said, surprised.

  Ina smiled, a little sadly. “My mother's recipe. But now you're done, and shall we see our way to sneaking out of the settlement?”

  Aja put her tunic back on and nodded. She was without pain, and she felt her spirits lift up again. She thought of Stefan again, thought about the way his bright eyes had lit up when he saw her, about the intensity of what they had shared together that morning and the night before. She knew that she couldn't give in to the pull that he had on her; there were other duties that she had to see to first, and she followed Ina out into the settlement.

  ***

  Ina led Aja out the back of the settlement's wooden fence, where there was a gap between the slats that allowed the pair to slip out. Anyone larger than the two slender women would have been caught, but they were able to escape with little concern.

  “Can you do your searching from here?” Ina asked, and Aja shook her head.

  “Can you find me a high hill?” she asked. “I need a place that is tall and has lots of winds traveling around it.”

  Nodding, Ina showed her a tall hill less than an hour's hike toward the west. When Aja grew a little tired, Ina shifted down to her wolf form, and gratefully, Aja steadied herself on her new friend's shoulder. At the end of the climb, Aja sat panting on top of the hill, but she could see for miles around. She could see the fires of Stefan's encampment, the river where she had taken her tumble, and the shifting colors of the land, which was browner and redder than the lush deep greens she was used to in the northlands.

  “Are you going to look for your quarry from up here?” asked Ina, and when Aja bit her lip, she shook her head gently.

  “Aja, you need to remember that I am the daughter of a healer who has traveled a long way with her mother. There are very few things that shock or frighten me. You will not lose me or upset me. Please, all I need is for you to be honest.”

  Aja hesitated for another moment, and then she gave in. This woman was so much like Tonna, and she knew that she simply couldn't go on not believing in anyone and not trusting anyone.

  The edge of Ina's tunic was decorated with a small bright red feather, and with a quick hand, she plucked the feather away. Before Ina could protest, she laid it on the palm of her hand and blew, sending it spinning off on the wind.

  “Oh, I liked that feather!” Ina said with surprise, but then she watched, mouth open as the feather whirled a deliberate circle around them before landing safe again on Aja's hand.

  'Show me again,” Ina said, a note of astonishment in her voice, and with a small laugh, Aja sent the feathe
r dancing through the wind again, this time manipulating the wind until it performed tight loops and curves that no regular wind would do. This time, she laid the red feather on Ina's hand, and Ina looked at it as if it were a miracle.

  “What are you?” she asked in wonder, and Aja laughed.

  “Nothing more than what you are,” she said, “but where you have magic in that salve of yours, I have the magic I learned from books. My mastery over the wind is an ancient art, Ina, one that the shapechangers have forgotten. I and my cousin and my cousin's fiancé have simply managed to learn it again.”

  Ina looked at her shrewdly. “Does this art have something to do with the thing that you are hunting?” she asked, and Aja nodded.

  Because she was tired and the sun was warm, she slouched on the ground, staring up at the cloudless sky. She felt comfortable here and safe, and there was a traitorous part of her that asked her why she simply did not give up her quest and remain here. Then she remembered the terror of her captivity, and that it was her own blood that had been used to give form and shape to the monster, and she realized with a feeling of resolve that it would not be over, not until she had captured the beast.

  “Do you think that people who hunt the impossible will ever get any kind of rest, Ina?” she asked, turning to look at the woman she was fast coming to realize was her friend.

  Ina glanced at her with a slight smile on her face. “I believe that there will be an end to all things, but I also know that the impossible is nothing but. All impossible means is that no one's done it yet, or at least that's what my mother always used to say about it.”

  “I wish I could have met your mother.”

  “I think she would have liked you enormously.”

  When she had rested enough, Aja stood again, and Ina watched with fascination as she summoned the winds to her. They came from every corner of the sky, and the temperature around the two women dropped significantly as they jostled around Aja like puppies looking for her attention.

  Aja closed her eyes so that she could better concentrate, and she manipulated the winds until they fell into a kind of order. She could tell them apart, at least a little, and she had an idea which winds came from the warm and dusty south and which ones came from the east, where the sea gave the air a salty savor.

  She was just about to give up and let them go when her eyes flew open wide.

  There it was.

  It was faint, it was so very, very faint, but she quickly realized that it was only faint because it was such a little wind. It was a small breeze, but she brought it back in front of her again, and now the smell was unmistakable. Dusky scales, wet places, an unwholesome wetness and dampness. It was her quarry, and now she knew where it was.

  By her side, Ina stiffened, and she realized that her friend could scent it, too.

  “What is that thing?” she whispered, and Aja squeezed her hand comfortingly.

  “It is my prey,” Aja said softly, and she knew it was close, close enough that she could not afford to lose it now.

  “Our prey.”

  The words were spoken by a male voice, and both Ina and Aja yelped when they heard it.

  Stefan, with his hunter's grace, had come upon both of them unawares. He gazed at both of them with a gaze that was simultaneously amused and frustrated, and he shook his head.

  “What am I to think when Rudolfo's daughter and my betrothed escape the bounds of the settlement that is meant to keep them safe, and then I find them perched on top of the mountains like eagles?”

  “You should think that we have business that carries us away,” Aja said tersely, and she rose to confront Stefan. “You have treated me well, but there are things that are more important than your settlement or your war with Rudolfo.”

  “And more important than what you and I share?” he said challengingly, and at that, her eyes had to drop.

  “I... I don't want there to be,” she said softly, and he took her in his arms.

  “I think we need to talk,” he said, and she shook her head.

  “There's too much to say, there's... there's a monster down the slope. I can smell it, Stefan, and I know that I cannot let it get away. Not again.”

  Stefan stared at her for a long moment, but then he nodded. “I will believe you,” he said. “I will believe you right now, because I know you are true, and after this, I will have an explanation.”

  Aja grinned tightly; she couldn't explain to him that there might not be a later; there might not be a time when she could stop and explain to him what was going on or where the monster they were going to fight came from.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, and they started following the scent.

  ***

  The trail was not fresh, but the wind that they followed was accommodating. Whenever Ina and Stefan lost the scent, Aja summoned the wind back, and they found it again.

  “You're a wizard or a sorcerer,” Stefan muttered to her, and Aja shook her head. There was so much that she had to do, so much that she had to think about, that she couldn't explain it to him.

  “I learned,” she said painfully. “This is just one gift that the shape-changing people have forgotten, and now, I and my cousin and her fiancé will return it to them.”

  The scent lead them to a cave half-hidden by a bush, and from where they stood, Aja could see a stream trickling into it. Aja was already tired, but she knew what she had to do, and she turned to Ina and to Stefan.

  “This monster is unlike anything you have ever fought before,” she said bluntly. “All you can do is distract it. One of the fiercest warriors that I have ever known tried to take it on, and it nearly killed him. What I need from you two is a distraction.”

  “Why would you do that?” Stefan asked, his voice fierce. “I don't want you anywhere near the thing if I can help it.”

  Aja smiled wryly. “I can imagine. But what I have in mind is more than simply killing the thing. I'm not even sure that it can be done. No, you both know that I have mastered the winds, but what I have not told either of you is the extent of my power.”

  She took a deep breath, because what she was going to say was the culmination of months of research.

  “I have found a wind that was lost to time,” she said softly, and when Stefan and Ina looked at her in confusion, she continued.

  “There is a wind that once roamed the world, and it was changed, harnessed by the great sorcerers of old. They used it to do a great many things, but what I need it to do is comparatively simple. I need it to wrap itself around the monster, and I need it to carry it away, somewhere far away, and keep it from ever hurting someone again.”

  “This spell,” Ina said slowly. “What does it need?”

  Her sharp eyes fell to the scars on Ina's wrists, where once a sorcerer had bled her to create the monster they were now hunting.

  “Not my blood, just my will. The problem is that the incantation is quite long. I cannot be interrupted, or it won't work. I... I'm sorry to say that I need you both to keep the monster off of me while I chant...”

  Stefan nodded, and after a moment, Ina did the same.

  “We know what's at risk,” Stefan said softly, and he pulled Aja to him. “I know you. You are brilliant, brave and bold, and I know you would not risk your life on something foolish.”

  He started to say something else, but then Aja sealed her mouth over his. It was a simple gesture, but one that held all of the love she had for him. She could feel that love welling up in her heart, but she couldn't say it, not when she was asking him to bet his life in a desperate gamble.

  If I survive this, I will tell it to him every day for the rest of our lives...

  There was no thought in her head that Stefan and Ina wouldn't survive. They were strong and smart, and she would be the one who was vulnerable. She knew that if one of them failed, it would be her, and she accepted it.

  She realized that if they were going to go into the cave, they had to do it now, or the siren call of a life with Stefan, with hi
s clan and the promise of it all, would hold her back. She took a deep breath, and nodded.

  “All right,” she said. “We have a monster to kill.”

  ***

  The path down into the cave was wet, and as they ventured on, it only grew damper. Soon they were sloshing through water that was knee deep, and the only thing that allowed them to see was the fact that occasionally there was a break in the cave roof that let in the hot afternoon light.

  Aja watched the water warily, stopping every few steps to scent for the monster again. Her nerves were stretched taut because of the three of them, only she knew how deadly the monster was, and how fast it was. Its natural habitat she suspected was water; it had been given life in a cistern, where her cousin Aeson had been sacrificed to it.

  After they had been walking for a good hour, they found a sandy bank where they could stop and rest.

  “I can't hear or smell anything in here,” Stefan muttered, and Ina agreed.

  “I think the only reason I can is that the wind is leading me,” Aja said. “I think that on top of that, it's getting weaker.”

  “Are we going around in circles?” Ina wondered. “Will we be able to get back to the opening of the cave?”

  “It looks like we can still go up,” Stefan observed. “After all, we can—”

  “Hush!” Every muscle in Ina's body was tense, and she immediately transformed into her wolf form, a gorgeous animal with thick white fur. That fur was now standing almost straight up, and her lip was lifted in a fierce snarl.

  The smell hadn't changed, but now, when Stefan and Aja strained their ears, they could hear it, too. It was the sound of a faint scrape of scales on rock walls, of a soft splashing that was so quiet it was almost undetectable in the caves.

  Then, where there had been silence, there was noise, and with a great rush, the monster broke the surface of the water, lunging at the trio who huddled on the sandy bank.