by Tanya Huff
“They think because my mage-craft was strong enough to get me into the university, it’s strong enough to attract a member of the Pack.”
“Have you told them you won’t be going back?”
Mirian frowned, and bent to grope among the folds of a sprigged muslin day dress.
“Miri?”
What she thought might be the pearl earrings turned out to be the two polished bone buttons that closed the top of the bodice.
“Miri!”
“No!” She straightened so abruptly that Lorela’s image flickered. Drawing in a deep breath, Mirian forced herself to concentrate. Forced herself to calm enough to anchor her end of the link. “No,” she repeated quietly, “I haven’t told them. It seemed a little pointless what with Emperor Leopald suddenly deciding this year would be all about conquest. Besides, you know how Mother thinks. I was tested, I was accepted, I was schooled. I can, therefore, attract a member of the Pack.”
“Well, you won’t,” Lorela said bluntly. “Not with only first levels. So, it’s the opera and parental disappointment tonight. What about tomorrow?”
Mirian kicked the portmanteau shut. Tomorrow she’d try again to get her parents to leave the city, to head to Trouge, higher up in the mountains where the land itself would give the Imperial army pause. Of course, as long as the Pack leadership remained in Bercarit, the odds were high her parents wouldn’t be moved and she’d be expected to smile and dance and pretend that disaster wasn’t on the doorstep. “Tomorrow,” she sighed, “never comes.”
* * *
“Tomorrow, I’ll take Jaspyr and Sirlin down to the border and have a sniff around.” Shifting the brass candlestick that held a curling corner in place, Ryder Hagen stared down at the map spread out over the sitting room table.
Danika sighed, set down the book she’d been trying to read, and stood, shaking out her skirt. Ryder had spent the afternoon studying the map, pacing, studying the map, arguing with his cousins, studying the map, changing, and pacing some more. Although her husband weighed the same in both fur and skin, an agitated wolf took up considerably more space and the room, even emptied of half of its owner’s overly fussy furniture, was not large.
“The Hunt Pack will have closed with the Imperials this afternoon,” he continued. “There should be news by morning. Tomorrow…”
“Tonight,” Danika interrupted, wrapping both hands around Ryder’s arm and tugging him around to face her, “we are invited out to dinner before the opera and a reception after. You’ll be expected to be in clothing.”
“My greatcoat…”
“That’s a field uniform and you know it.” She allowed him to pull her close, her hands sliding up and around his neck. “Tonight requires trousers…” She kissed him before he could protest, then continued kissing him after each piece of required clothing. “…and shoes and a shirt and a jacket and a cravat.”
Dark brows drew in. “If I have to change…”
“There should be no reason for you to change at either dinner or the opera, but if there is, I know for a fact you can get out of your clothing in…Ryder!”
“As I’m already out of my clothing, it seems a pity to waste this opportunity.” His grin, twisted by the scar he’d gained in the fight that made him Pack Leader, was distinctly wolfish as he carried her over to the settee.
Danika thought about protesting the time or the place but, as Ryder’s callused fingers began unbuttoning her bodice, she chose not to. She needed to begin dressing for their evening’s engagements and the unlocked sitting room door meant any of the Pack members in Bercarit with them could walk in, but in a very few months she’d be in no condition for semi-public lovemaking on an extremely uncomfortable piece of furniture, so she might as well enjoy it while she could.
As though he were reading her mind about the furniture, Ryder flipped them so she straddled his lap.
“Better?” he asked nuzzling her throat.
She buried her fingers in the thick, dark mass of his hair and tugged. “Much. Now get on with…Oh!”
After, lying on the wool carpet, not entirely certain how they got there, Danika turned her face into Ryder’s shoulder and murmured, “Why now?”
She felt as much as heard him laugh, a rumble deep in his chest. “I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific, love.”
“The empire. There’s been peace for four years, why did the emperor suddenly toss out the Treaty of Frace and decide to attack Traiton?”
“Why does that shit Leopald decide to do anything? Ego. He hates there’s still free people not kissing his ass.”
“It’s just…” She laid her hand on his where it cupped her belly, warm against her cooling skin.
“I know.”
They’d been married for almost seven years. Danika had begun to fear that she would never be able to bear a child of the Pack when Jesine—the Pack’s strongest Healer-mage and married to Ryder’s cousin Sirlin—had told her she’d finally caught. And now, with their first child on the way, the Imperial army was as close as it had ever come.
“Tell me they’ll be stopped in Pyrahn, that they won’t cross into Aydori.”
“They’ll be stopped in Pyrahn.” She felt his mouth against her hair, his lips warm, his breath warmer. “Would you be this close to the border if I thought differently?”
No. She wouldn’t be. As Pack Leader, Ryder’s duty was to Aydori; he could send the Hunt Pack into battle, but he couldn’t cross the border himself. Bercarit was his compromise. It would, after all, be the first city attacked should the unthinkable happen. He’d asked her to accompany him as much for politics as a dislike of being apart. Clearly, in spite of the Pack Leader’s presence, there could be no real danger or the Pack Leader’s wife and unborn child would be safe behind stone walls, high in the mountains in Trouge, the ancient Aydori capital. And she’d much, much rather be here, even considering the drift of dark hair she could see under the settee. If Ryder had shed that much since the housemaid had last swept the room, he wasn’t as sure as he sounded.
* * *
They’d left the bulk of the Imperial army before it had entered Pyrahn, had traveled quickly across country, and slipped across the border into Aydori about forty miles north of Bercarit. Their first day in enemy territory had been spent angling carefully toward the east road out of Bercarit to Trouge; toward the road a forced evacuation from Bercarit would have to take. The dense woods had made the men skittish, all of them familiar with the tales of the giant beastmen who kept Aydori safe. As the day went on, and the largest animal seen had been a small, white-tailed deer bounding away in terror, the men had begun to calm and, finally, to laugh at their fear.
“Cap’n?”
Pulled from his thoughts, Captain Sean Reiter shifted his focus to the man who’d fallen into step beside him. “Sergeant Black.”
“Scouts say there’s a river up ahead.” The sergeant shoved a branch out of the way with his musket and waited until the captain passed before he released it. “Not a deep river, like, but running fast. No way to avoid being seen while we cross if there’s anyone about.”
Reiter glanced up. The thick canopy prevented him from seeing the sky, and the shadows by the ground were either too constant or too broken to be of any use determining the time. He took a reading, mentally marked his path, tucked his compass carefully into a pocket, and pulled out his watch. Just past six. They’d lose the light soon.
“Can we cross after dark?” He snapped the case closed.
“Like I said, Cap’n, she’s running fast.” Black spat, cleared his throat, and spat again. “Wouldn’t want to risk it in the dark myself.”
“We’ll cross it by squad, then. No more than three men visible at once. You cross with the first squad. I’ll cross with the last.”
“Four men visible, then.”
“Thank you, Sergeant. I’d never have managed that math on my own.”
Black grinned. “I live to serve, sir. And Lieutenant Geurin?”
Reiter snorted and lengthened his stride to clear a fallen sapling. “Lieutenant Geurin believes he walks on water, so put him in the middle of the river directing traffic.”
They walked in silence for a few moments.
Lieutenant Lord Geurin, Viscount Tribuline, had been a pain in Reiter’s ass from the moment he’d been assigned to this mission. He resented that Reiter, his superior officer, had been promoted out of the ranks. He expected blind obedience from men with significantly more time in, men who’d been handpicked for this assignment by General Loreau because of their skills rather than their bloodline. Reiter’d be willing to bet serious money that Geurin had been the sort of boy who’d spent his school days bullying the weaker boys and snitching on the stronger.
Dumping him in the middle of the river sounded like a great idea.
However…
“He goes across with Four Squad. I’ll have him check that the tangles crossed safely when he gets to the other side. That’ll keep him busy until I get there.”
“Tangles affected by water are they, sir?”
“Could be.” Reiter knew Black could handle the young lieutenant, but that would lead to the men taking the sergeant’s side—more than they were naturally inclined to anyway and, eventually, that would lead to trouble. Inspecting the tangles, the ancient artifacts given to them to neutralize the mages, would suit the lieutenant’s sense of self-importance.
“Figure they’ll still work? Them being so old and all.”
“They’d better. Or it’s going to complicate things.”
“Complicate.” Black punctuated the word with another mouthful of saliva. “Murphy says there’s Soothsayers behind our orders.”
“Does he?” Murphy had a habit of stating the obvious. Shields were never deployed outside the empire and seldom outside the capital unless the emperor went on progression. The regiment acted as the palace guard, they supported the city guard, and they spent one fuck of a lot of time looking martial to impress the empire’s citizenry. But every man on this insertion team had been pulled from the Shields. Some of them, like Reiter himself, had only just been rotated in. All of them had been happy for a chance to be more than ceremonial soldiers, but the point remained—Shields were never deployed outside the empire. Only Soothsayers could convince the emperor to interfere to that extent with the natural order of the Imperial army.
“I’m thinking the lieutenant knows more than he’s letting on,” Black added. “Being part of the Court and a cousin of the emperor and all.”
Distant cousin by marriage, as Reiter understood it, but the little shit did have the smug air of a kid keeping secrets. He moved a dangling caterpillar out of the way with the barrel of his musket and realized he could hear the river. They must be close. “We have our orders, Sergeant.”
“Yes, sir.”
“When we capture these mages and return them to the empire, we control the beastmen. We control the beastmen, we spend fewer men taking Aydori. It’s as simple as that.”
Black’s snort spoke volumes about how they’d both been in the army long enough to know it was never as simple as that. But all he said was, “If you say so, sir.”
* * *
“Is that thunder?”
Mirian closed her mouth, reply cut off by her mother’s raised hand. With her head cocked to hear beyond the evening sounds of city outside the carriage, thin face bracketed by the emerald feathers trailing from her hairpiece, Mirian thought her mother looked a bit like a startled peahen.
She caught her father’s eye, realized he was thinking the same thing, and had to bite her lip to keep from laughing.
“Lirraka…” He leaned forward and placed a hand gently on his wife’s knee. “…the sky is clear. It’s only the wheels rumbling over the cobbles.”
“No.” A dismissive shake of her head set the feathers swaying. “I have mage-craft enough to know thunder when I hear it in the distance.”
“Ah, in the distance.”
“Yes, Kollin, in the distance.” She blinked, slowly, deliberately, drawing attention to her eyes and their few flecks of green. Given how very few they were, Mirian thought drawing attention to them wasn’t the best of ideas, but her mother clearly disagreed, having gone so far as to dust her eyelids with green powder. “But distant thunder may not remain distant. What will we do if it’s storming when we leave the opera?”
“There’s umbrellas in the door pockets, Mother, we can…”
“Oh, yes, umbrellas.” Lip curled, she made it sound as though she were expected to stand under a canopy of dirty rags. “We cannot carry umbrellas into the Opera House, Mirian, what would people think?”
“That we wanted to stay dry?”
“We would be perfectly capable of staying dry if you’d studied harder. It’s a simple, low level Air—stay dry in the rain—and yet you can’t seem to manage it.”
“I can blow out a candle from across the room.”
A disdainful sniff. “First level.”
“I can light the candle again,” Mirian pointed out, knowing she couldn’t win but was unable to stop herself.
“And again, first level.” Her mother’s thin fingers pushed a curl back over Mirian’s ear, then pulled it forward again. “You squandered your year at university. First levels in everything but Metals and no second levels at all? Honestly, Mirian, next year I expect you to pick a discipline and apply yourself. The Pack expects their mages to shine.”
This was not the time to explain why next year wouldn’t be an issue. Not in the carriage on the way to the opera. Not when her parents’ reaction would become fodder for the city’s gossips.
“Did you see how the Maylins were looking at their younger girl? I wonder what Mirian’s done to disappoint them now.”
“Oh, didn’t you hear? The university released her.”
“Poor Lirraka.”
“Poor Lirraka? Poor Kollin, he might as well close the bank.”
Definitely not the time.
“Mirian, stop slouching.”
She straightened and endured her mother twitching at her bodice—forcing the neckline lower, higher, then lower again. “The Imperial army is in Pyrahn,” she began.
“And the Pack Leader is in Bercarit,” her father pointed out. “I think we’re safe.”
“Pack Leader or not…” And honestly, it wasn’t like he could perform miracles. He was, when it came to it, flesh and blood, the same as everyone else. “…we’re only seventeen miles from the border. We should…”
“We need to use this opportunity the Lord and Lady have granted us. We have never had so many members of the Pack in Bercarit.” Her mother’s tone declared this was the final word on the matter. “Unless you know something no one else does?” The words hung between them, taking up all the extra room in the carriage, then her mother wrapped her hand around Mirian’s wrist and added, tone now speculative, “You don’t, do you? Your marrying into the Pack would be preferable, but if your father and I were able to provide them with a good Soothsayer, I’m sure they’d be grateful. In fact, as there’s no telling what member of the Pack you’d attract, that might…”
“I’m not a Soothsayer, Mother.” Her father, at least, looked relieved she didn’t face insanity. “And I’m not going to attract a member of the Pack.”
“Not with that attitude, you’re not. I’m not sure about this hairstyle on you.” She poked a finger into the mass of tousled curls. “It looks disheveled.”
“Isn’t it supposed to look disheveled?” Mirian sighed. Her mother’s maid had spent half an hour torturing her with a hot iron and pins, the chambermaid who usually assisted her having been declared too inexperienced for such an occasion.
“Artfully disheveled,” her mother sighed. “You look as though you just climbed out of bed. With Lady Hagen setting the fashion for golden hair and your hair so entirely unremarkably brown, we’ll have to use what we have. All things considered, a little suggestiveness can’t hurt. Once you’re part of the Mage
-pack, you can cut it all off, and I’m sure that will make you happy.” As the carriage came to a stop, she leaned in, a fingertip on Mirian’s right cheek, pulling her eye open wider. “Still gray. Paler if anything,” she sighed. “We’ll have to hold to the knowledge that your entrance tests were strong and I’ve made sure everyone knows that. Brush against them when you get the chance,” she added as the door opened. “The Pack is very tactile.”
Even if Mirian had been able to respond, her protest would have been lost as her mother emerged from the carriage, one hand in her husband’s as he assisted her down the step and the other trailing shawl, and reticule, and attitude. As Mirian stepped out a moment later, she was surprised to see her father waiting, and put her hand on his with a smile.
“Your mother has spotted one of her particular friends,” he said, with a nod toward the wide plaza outside the Opera House and familiar green feathers bobbing above a cluster of women.
“Father, if I can’t attract…”
“You can do anything you put your mind to, Miri, and my bank can very much use the Pack’s attention. Smile, be pleasant. You may not be this season’s fashion, but you’re a pretty girl; it’ll work out.” He tucked her hand in his elbow as the carriage pulled away, its place taken immediately by another. “So, why no first in Metals?” he asked as they started up the broad steps.
“Pardon?”
“Your mother said you had a first level in everything but Metals. Why no Metals?”
“The Metals-master…” Had been scathing about her inability to stay with one craft and had refused to examine her. “…felt I wasn’t suited.”
“Well, I’m sure he knows best.” He patted her hand then released her as her mother reclaimed him.