The Changespell Saga

by Doranna Durgin

  “I was there,” Renia spat at her. “I didn’t do it.”

  “You didn’t stop them,” Jess returned without hesitation. “You let them beat me.”

  “What makes you think I could have done anything about it?” The wizard flipped her thin braid back behind her, squared her shoulders. “I was there,” she repeated. “That’s all.”

  “Fine, you were there.” Jaime stepped into the confrontation, her sympathy for Renia gone. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Running,” Jess said derisively. Renia only glared resentfully, until Jaime suddenly realized Jess had in fact answered for her—and correctly at that.

  “I’ve had enough,” she decided. “Let’s go. Arlen’s going to want to talk to you, all right.”

  “Just as I tried to tell you.” The woman resumed her quick march along the road, as uneasy as she was determined—eyeing the sky as though it might fall on her.

  Jess snorted with disdain, letting her go.

  “Be interesting to hear why she’s here,” Jaime told her, frowning at the woman’s back. “But she shouldn’t go in the hold before Arlen checks her out. She could still be connected to the others.”

  Jess held out her hand to Jaime, and kicked her foot out of the stirrup. “Then we’ll get there first.”

  Jaime mounted up, settling in on top of the saddlebags. She wrapped her arms around Jess’s waist as the gelding’s haunches bunched beneath her; Jess had cued him straight to canter. They quickly passed Renia, though her dogged little jog never faltered. Ander cantered beside them, watching Renia over his shoulder.

  Arlen waited for them at the inconspicuous front entry, far from the stable entrance along the base of the hold. Hands on hips, eyebrows raised, explanation clearly expected. “I do have windows in my workroom, you know. The garden is well within sight.”

  Now this was what a wizard should look like, Jaime thought. Today Arlen wore black trousers and a deep, clear blue tunic with embroidered sleeves and collar, understated and impressive at the same time. No longer shaggy, that hair, but trimmed into submission long with his full mustache. The mustache twitched, and Jaime suspected it hid a smile at her sudden consternation.

  He held out his arm, and Jaime took it, sliding to the ground as gracefully as possible. “Never mind the garden,” she told him, turning back to the road. “There’s this woman—good God, what’s that?”

  “I thought I saw—” Ander started, casting another worried look behind; Jess swung her horse around. The wizard was running, now—or running as best as she could—but Jaime didn’t think it was likely to be good enough.

  Behind her, bringing its own dark cloud of dust and debris, a wall of wind roared down upon her.

  “Get inside,” Arlen ordered them, as the first wisps of a breeze plucked at Jaime’s hair. “I don’t know if I can stop this—”

  “She’ll never make it,” Jaime whispered, watching the woman flounder. Renia had been terrified that Willand would find her, that Jaime’s intractability would cost her more than time.

  She’d been right.

  Jaime hadn’t thought anyone would hear her horrified realization—not above the rising sound of the winds, or the alarmed shouts from the stable entrance at the end of the hold.

  But Jess did. Suddenly her gelding was charging down the road, closing in on the wizard and the savage windstorm that rushed in behind her.

  “Jess, no!” Jaime cried after her, knowing it to be futile and far too late. There was hardly time for cold fear to hit her stomach before Ander galloped out in Jess’s wake, bent over the saddle to duck the winds.

  Arlen’s eyes closed in concentration, his fingers moving, and Jaime ignored his command to get inside—someone had to drag him back if he sank so far in his efforts that he lost sight of danger.

  Squinting against buffeting gusts, she watched Jess reach Renia, barely in control of her gelding. The woman reached for Jess’s hand, trying to get her foot in the stirrup Jess offered—but the gelding skittered around in the wind like a leaf about to lose its grip on a tree, and Renia was simply too heavy, too tired, to manage.

  A section of road popped out of the ground some distance behind them, sucked up by the vacuum of abruptly changing wind—spattering them with dirt and stone, sending the gelding into a rear. If the full strength of that storm reached them—

  Jaime whispered, “Oh, hurry—” even though the words were snatched out of her mouth before they made it into sound. Something pelted her—a rock, a small stick, who knew—and she cringed, unwilling to leave Arlen, and unwilling to drag him away from his efforts while Jess and Ander fought time and wind.

  Ander reached Jess and flung himself from the saddle, choking his reins up brutally short to hold his horse while Renia tried to mount; Ander gave her a healthy shove on the bottom and she plopped into the saddle—he released the reins and smacked the horse, and it bolted for the stable.

  Jess’s hair whipped in the wind; her cap dangled from her teeth. Ander flung himself up behind her and Jess let the gelding go. The horse galloped for the far stable entry, neck outstretched and ears pinned back, staggering once when a substantial piece of debris bounced off his haunches. The road popped behind them again, closer, and then Jaime couldn’t help it, she screamed at them. “Run, run run.”

  Someone—Arlen—snatched Jaime’s arm and dragged her away, and the wind buffeted her until she fell through the unassuming doorway. Arlen dove in behind her, slammed the door, and sealed it with a quick gesture and a flare of visible power.

  “The stable,” Jaime said hoarsely. Even if Ander and Jess had made it inside, the huge doors would take more than human muscle to secure them against this storm.

  He didn’t so much as nod before sprinting down the hallway, careening off the wall as he regained his own windblown balance.

  She wobbled after him and soon got her legs sorted out. Deep in the hold she couldn’t hear or feel the wind, but she knew it was there, and she threaded the hallways to the stable at a dead run.

  But the scene she found there was nothing like she’d expected.

  She’d thought she’d find chaos, and wind-damage, and injured and panicking horses. She thought she’d find her friends struggling to close the massive stable doors, and to hold them that way.

  Instead she found silence.

  And she found Arlen facing off against Renia, in no way friendly.

  Jess, her hair a wind-blown mess, stood beside a cluster of horse and human—Carey, Ander, the two geldings, and a handful of couriers and grooms. Beyond them, the stable door sat snugly closed—and Arlen clearly hadn’t done it. He hadn’t had the time.

  Renia?

  Jess had a peculiar look on her face, perhaps just now realizing how much she’d risked for this woman who’d participated in her captivity; she watched Renia and Arlen as if she hoped to discover her near-sacrifice had been worth it.

  But it was Arlen’s expression that held them all silent—the glitter of his anger, and the offended stiffness in his shoulders. And there, in his eyes—in the quizzical, miniature lift to his brows—Jaime saw that he wasn’t sure who would prevail if he pushed his anger past Renia’s breaking point.

  Jaime wanted run and throw her arms around him—as if she could make everything all right. That would, of course, be the worst thing in the world. So instead she stayed where she was, feeling the surprise that lingered on her own features.

  Renia flipped her braid back over her shoulder and tugged at the tear in her blouse so it didn’t gape quite so widely over the slope of her ample breast. “I tried to get here before something like that could happen,” she said, as though continuing a conversation in progress. She glanced meaningfully at Jaime. “I was delayed.”

  Jaime kept her voice level. “I had no intention of bringing you into this hold until Arlen said it was safe.”

  Arlen nodded. “As it should be. And since—thanks to Jess and Ander—you’re here despite that little windstorm, I think y
ou’d better explain yourself. That storm was shielded, or I would have detected it long before it became such a problem. And there’s only one group with the ability to shield such major magics.”

  “Here?” Renia said, glancing around the stable with a touch of scorn. “You want me to tell you all? Here?”

  “No,” Arlen snapped. “I want you to dig deep and find the manners your mother taught you, and then I want you to follow me.”

  Jaime had to suppress a smile at the look on Renia’s face—which wasn’t hard, when she thought of how close Jess and Ander had come to being hurt or killed along with the rude new arrival. She glanced at Arlen, wanting very much to be included even if it was clearly Council business.

  Arlen nodded at her—the slightest tilt of his head—but his wary attention remained on Renia.

  And would, Jaime suspected, as long as the wizard sheltered in his hold.

  ~~~~~~~~~~

  Chapter Sixteen

  Arlen and Renia stared at one another across the conference table, high on the third floor of the hold.

  It would take more than the quick pass of Arlen’s fingers to tame his hair, and Renia’s wind-burned cheeks flushed red in her otherwise pale face. Her blouse was torn in several places, her hands scraped and bruised.

  But her face held the look of a wizard who’s neatly shown up a colleague.

  Jess didn’t see it that way. Arlen could have closed and shielded the stable doors, too, if he’d been there instead of at the side entrance. He simply hadn’t been.

  She sat on the floor in front of Carey as Renia looked around the meeting room. “We might as well have had this conversation in the stable, for all the privacy we’ve got here.”

  They’d gathered in one of the secondary workrooms until recently being utilized by Dayna’s team. Jess knew this room could be sealed and isolated from the rest of the hold, and wondered if Renia could tell.

  But Renia had busied herself by looking at the non-nonsense furnishings of the spartan room—a long wooden table and lightly cushioned, straight-backed chairs, the walls bare of decoration save the same stylized version of Arlen’s name that branded Jess and sealed all his messages.

  Clearly, Renia had expected more from the hold of a top Council wizard like Arlen—and clearly, she resented the presence of Jess, Ander, Jaime, and Carey.

  But Arlen drove straight to the point. “Thanks to Willand’s activities, everyone here,” Arlen said, and nodded around the room, “already know plenty about what’s been happening in Camolen. They deserve to hear what you what you’ve got to say.” He leaned back in his chair at the head of the table. “There will be two more. We’ll wait until my apprentices arrives.” He reached to the pitcher of cold tea in the center of the table and poured several glasses, pushing one of them at the wizard. “You must be thirsty after your run.”

  Renia took the tea, downing half of the glass without pause. Jess leaned against Carey’s legs and gave the woman a hard look, still uncertain she should have risked herself to save this woman.

  Carey ran his hand over Jess’s hopelessly tangled hair. “We may have to cut it, Jess.”

  “No,” she told him. She’d been in worse shape, especially that time when she was a yearling and had rolled in some burr bushes.

  She heard the rustle of material that meant he’d shrugged. “All right,” he said. “I’ll try not to pull, but...”

  Jess didn’t say anything. Having him groom her in human form was a luxury, whether he was pulling at tangles or not. And it was the one time he seemed perfectly willing to touch her—because, she thought, he always seemed to be distracted by something else, and simply let his hands do what they wanted. What they should, as far as she was concerned.

  Natt hustled into the room, more than a little harried. He was old for an apprentice—in his twenties, and a distinct contrast to Kesna’s habitually uncertain presence.

  “We saw it coming,” he told Arlen, after a quick glance at Renia. “We tried to seal off the workroom, but there’s some picking up to do. Kesna’ll be right here—she’s still getting damage reports from other parts of the hold.” He stopped, obviously thinking about the windstorm, and shook his head. “I’ve never even heard of a spell that powerful.”

  Arlen said, “Check your history. There were plenty of such things set out in the border wars between Therand and Solvany, before they became precincts.”

  “No doubt you have spells for air circulation that make checkspells for that sort of thing impossible,” Jaime said dryly.

  Arlen gave a regretful nod. “We use one in this hold, as a matter of fact—in the stable area, especially.”

  Jess winced as Carey’s fingers snagged in a little tangle, and his hand rested on her shoulder in brief apology. She glanced at Jaime and her recently shortened hair, and wondered what such a style would look like when she was Lady—then decided she didn’t want to find out.

  Kesna slipped into the room, closing the door behind her with a series of clicks—one from the latch, and one from the magic that now sealed them all in. Renia glanced at the door with a startled look, as if she hadn’t counted on Arlen to be so cautious after his casual beginning. She was trapped here, now, until he decided to release her.

  “The hold held up well,” Kesna said quietly. She sat in the chair closest to the door. “The garden is completely destroyed, of course. And Carey... they got the stallion in before the storm, so he’s all right, but half his fence is down. I’m sorry to say one of this spring’s foals was killed by flying debris—the groom who was trying to save him was hurt, too, but she’ll be all right.”

  Carey’s hands stilled a moment, hesitating in the midst of a tangle. Jess heard the small noise he made in his throat; after a moment, he cleared it. “Thank you, Kesna. It... could have been worse.”

  “It could have been better, too,” Jaime said fiercely, looking at Renia through suddenly reddened eyes. “Why are you here? Why is Willand after you? And why do you have such a Guides-damn bad attitude?”

  Yes. Answers Jess wanted, as well.

  “I didn’t come here for verbal abuse,” Renia said coolly.

  Arlen rubbed a finger down his mustache and said quietly, “What did you come here for?”

  His tone made it as much of a threat as a question; silence fell as everyone looked at Renia. She looked back at them, resentful; Jess thought she saw a spark of fear in the woman’s small eyes.

  Good.

  The silence stretched out; Carey’s fingers worked through Jess’s hair, an intimate and comforting touch. Kesna, glancing at them, held her hand over Jess’s head—and suddenly the comb met less resistance. Jess glanced up her thanks and discovered Renia looking at her with unpleasant mixture of envy and resentment.

  Jess returned the look with her own hard and unyielding gaze; it was Renia who looked away.

  “Let me guess,” Arlen said, breaking the silence. “I’ve seen what you can do—it was no small thing, closing the stable door and shielding it against that wind. And since I already know everyone in Camolen with that sort of power, and I don’t know you, you must be in with the group that’s been hiding itself. And that means Jess had good reason for going after you in that garden.”

  Renia looked, if anything, slightly more sullen—and slightly less certain.

  “You wouldn’t be here without some reason to leave them—not a friendly one, or we wouldn’t have faced that distinctly unnatural windstorm. And I suppose you thought you’d be welcomed with gratitude, and our relief that you’ve come to bestow your explanations on us.” Arlen leaned over the table, weight on his elbows. “The thing is, we’ve already pretty much got things figured out. And we’re really not very happy with you. So this little reception of cheerful, grateful faces is about as good as you’re going to get.”

  They pretty much had it figured out? Jess tilted her head to look back at Carey. The glance he gave her was eloquent in its hard, silent request—say nothing.

  Renia must h
ave decided the same.

  Arlen tapped the corner of his mustache. “You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t have something to gain. What is it you want, Renia?”

  Renia fidgeted briefly. “Sanctuary!”

  “In exchange for?” Arlen’s voice was as hard as Jess had ever heard it.

  Renia fell back into silence, hesitant this time.

  “Did you think it would come for free?”

  She looked at him, looked away, bit her lip, and started to cry.

  “Oh, stop it,” Arlen said. “You got yourself into this. And you broke some of the most stringent Council rules to do it.” His voice was brusque, but this time Jess heard a note of sympathy in it. “Let me make a suggestion. You tell us what you know—and you tell us everything. You can leave things out, you can lie—but you’ll never know if I already know better.” He leaned back in his chair, fingers laced over his stomach, and said matter-of-factly, “If you do lie, and I do happen to know better, that’s the end of sanctuary.”

  She hesitated only a moment. “I intended to tell you everything anyway, so that’s not much of a concession. But I want your word that you won’t suck me dry and then toss me back to the others if things get a little tough. They didn’t think much of me; they may not bother with me after that little windstorm fit. But if they do, I want to know you won’t betray me. I want your official oath on it.”

  Carey’s hands stopped moving through Jess’s hair. Kesna sucked in a breath. Natt made a sound of dismay. And Jaime looked uncertainly at them all. “I take it that’s pretty serious stuff.”

  Arlen nodded. “Usually it’s a ceremonial thing. To be done under these circumstances is... a tad insulting. But I can’t say as I blame her.” He looked directly at Renia. “We don’t like her, and she knows it.”

  She scowled back at him.

  “When we finish here, we’ll go up to my workshop and take care of the oath—assuming we don’t have to reconstruct the room first. But I want you to start talking now.”

  Renia shook her head; her voice was tight. She was, Jess realized, truly frightened. “The oath.”