Zylas laughed, dropped his bundle, and headed toward the cave.
Collins recognized the cloth as a crude dress and leggings before limping after his friend. "I should have thought about bringing her clothes." Gradually, the ache in his shin subsided, and his walk became less wobbly.
Apparently reading the guilt in Collins' tone, Zylas shrugged off the words. "You're just not used to switchers and switch-forms."
Collins did not let himself off so easily. "Actually, I was looking forward to talking to Falima. I just wasn't thinking about the… whole nude thing."
Zylas gestured Collins through the opening. "All, so you knew you were hovering. I thought you might have been doing it without thinking."
Hovering? Collins had considered his choosing to study the outdoors near Falima's switch time a coincidence; but, before he could say so, he caught sight of Prinivere.
The ancient, withered woman was sitting, eating with a vigor that belied her primeval appearance. She wore no clothing. Her skin was carved into wrinkles, loose upon her bony frame. Her breasts sagged into her lap. Fine, white hair dangled to her shoulders. Her eyes were green, contrastingly vibrant, and catlike, with slitted pupils. She had no nose to speak of, just a pair of slitlike nostrils lost in the creases beneath her eyes.
"My lady." Zylas made a short bow.
Collins pried his gaze from the dragon in human form and copied Zylas' gesture of respect. The stark contrasts that composed this woman drew his attention like nothing else in either world. She seemed so far past death, as though she could crumble to dust at a touch, yet strangely vivid and alive. She was utterly asexual, yet the oddities of her appearance brought no feelings of revulsion. Had Collins caught his grandmother so exposed, he would have covered his eyes, to purge the image from memory; yet Prinivere gave him no such urge. Her nakedness simply was, a phenomenon of nature and without shame. Clothing the dragon matriarch of Barakhai, even in his mind, seemed insolent.
Prinivere returned a nod of acknowledgment, barely glancing up from her meal.
Aisa hummed softly as she moved with slow deliberate-ness around the cave, serving Prinivere and tidying up around her. Ijidan occasionally crept in to swipe a piece of the dragon's bounty. Korfius remained huddled miserably in the corner, his snores rising and falling in regular rhythm.
Zylas dragged Collins to a back corner of the cave, speaking softly. "All right. We've got less than a day to learn strategy, mannerisms, and voices, so pay attention."
"Don't I always?" Collins grinned maliciously.
Zylas dropped to a crouch. "Sure. You learn in your sleep." Without awaiting a reply, he launched into the discussion. "Here's the general plan: Orna and Narladin are off duty tomorrow. We've got moles set up to-"
Collins had to interrupt. "Moles?"
Zylas blinked in obvious confusion. "Not moles. Moles."
Collins lowered himself to the floor beside Zylas, legs curled up beside him. "Oh, that clears it right up."
Evidently catching Collins' obvious sarcasm, Zylas crinkled his brow. "We must have hit a snag in the translation magic. Are you really hearing "moles'?"
Collins nodded, trying to unravel the mystery. The Barakhains rarely used animal slang, which brought a rush of understanding. "You mean informants? Spies?"
Zylas nodded vigorously, removing his hat in the cool shade of the cave and running it through his fingers. "Right. They have a game of dice set up and… " He glanced at Collins, clearly anticipating another translation problem.
Collins gave another encouraging nod. "We have dice." He doubted the ones in Barakhai resembled the hard plastic black and white ones in his childhood board games, nor the translucent rainbows, speckles, and opaque colors of the gamers' dice. Recalling the ancient term "bones" for the game, he guessed, "You must make yours from bone? Am I right?"
"Bone?" Zylas shivered. "Heavens no. That would be… disgusting… dishonorable to the dead."
Missed that one. Collins tried again. "Don't tell me. You use something more palatable. Like… dung."
"Shed antlers," Zylas corrected. "Carved into cubes. They engrave figures on each side: star, moon, sun, fire, water, and lightning. They're thrown. Depending on how they land in conjunction, you win or lose." He could not help adding, "Using dung for toys? That would be wasteful."
Collins tried not to think about proper uses for excrement, but he could not quell his curiosity. "Fertilizer?"
"And fuel. It burns nicely, depending on the type."
Not wishing to get involved in a conversation over the most useful forms of poop, Collins returned to the subject at hand. "So you've got some spies to distract these guards…"
"Orna and Narladin."
"Orna and Narladin," Collins repeated, knowing the names would have to flow properly off his tongue. "Orna and Narladin. So we can move in in their places."
"Right." Zylas dropped deeper into his crouch. "It's a good-sized game, and they'll keep it interesting. What do you think is the best time to get in the royal rooms without being seen?"
"What do I think?" Surprised at having his opinion considered, Collins forgot to think. "Night? When they're asleep?"
"Guards," Zylas reminded. "Everyone always expects problems at night. And don't forget about switch times."
Collins forced himself to remember the last time he had infiltrated the castle. Then, he had moved in at mealtime, while nearly everyone gathered in one place, leaving the hallways essentially empty. The royalty made a production out of meals, all meeting together at the head table, while guards and servants occupied rows of tables in the dining hall. Collins had made it into their bedrooms without incident and might well have escaped undetected had he not stopped to pet a cat who, in his nervousness, he had forgotten would also be human. "During dinner?" he suggested next. "I could excuse myself early, and you could watch for anyone who might compromise me. It shouldn't take me long to check out a few rooms. It's not like they could hide dragons in a foot locker or under the bed." He paused, considering. Scientists believed the largest dinosaurs hatched from eggs the size of footballs. "Or could they?"
Zylas seemed surprised by the question. "Not in one piece. Even young dragons are huge."
The answer reminded Collins that Prinivere had once surprised him with the assertion that dragons gave birth to live-born young, not eggs. He revised his expectation to compare baby dragons to mammals rather than reptiles. Though much smaller than their parents, even newborn elephants and whales would overwhelm the capacity of most furniture.
Apparently unaware of Collins' distraction, Zylas returned to the plan. "Dinnertime sounds good to me. Now all we have to do is learn to pass for the guards we're impersonating."
Collins groaned. That seemed like an impossible task. His one maternal uncle shared only his mother's maiden name, which she never used. He looked like their mother, she like their father. They even lived in different states. Nevertheless, a new employee at Collins' mother's workplace had pegged them as siblings based only on mannerisms. He did not believe most people were quite that observant, but basic changes in his friends' demeanors or behaviors might raise some red flags. Yeah, but would I assume imposters? Collins shook his head. I might accuse them of becoming pod people, but I wouldn't really believe it. "All right," Collins said, resigned though filled with doubts as to why he had allowed himself to get talked into doing this. Again. "How do I become Orna?"
To Collins' surprise, he found the ride to the lowlands more exhilarating than frightening. To decrease their chance of being discovered, Prinivere glided low over the mountaintops and hills, skimming the tops of the trees and using her wings mostly for balance and banking. She made the occasional leathery flap with a slow solidness that barely stirred the air around them. Clinging to her back, rather than suspended from a claw, Collins settled into a sturdy crevice between back and wing muscles and enjoyed the view. The ground did not seem that far below him; he believed he could survive a fall. The wind felt like gentle fingers
rushing through his dark brown hair and caressing his face. Bathed in twilight, the world seemed vibrant with magic, the greenery a vivid emerald untainted by smog or artificial light.
In rat form, Zylas planted his forepaws on Collins' knee to look out over the landscape without losing the safety of the inner crook of the American's jeans. Falima settled into another niche in Prinivere's musculature. Korfius sat between the humans, doggy head outstretched to catch the wind in his face, tongue lolling, ears flying like streamers. Aisa perched near the base of Prinivere's tail, flapping her wings and squawking every time a movement off-balanced her.
They touched down on an outcropping that jutted into dense forest. Prinivere folded her wings and lowered her head, her breathing a heavy wheeze beneath the rustle of autumn leaves in the wind. Still in place, Collins looked out over the trees. Leaves in myriad shapes and sizes clung to the branches, their green shot through with amber, shades of ginger, and brilliant slices of scarlet. He especially liked the star-shaped leaves of a gnarled tree that did not exist in his world, and he wondered if he could drive the botany professors wild by claiming to have found it on one of Algary's walkways.
With a squeak, Zylas leaped over Collins' leg and slid down Prinivere's side, a reminder for Collins to do the same. Careful not to hurt the dragon, he scooted across her scales on his buttocks, not daring to stand on her back. When they had all dismounted, Prinivere wordlessly trudged into a cave, leaving Collins, Falima, Korfius, Aisa, and Zylas outside. The animals scampered after the old dragon, leaving Collins and Falima alone, both studying the vast expanse of forest.
Falima cleared her throat. "I'm going to switch again soon and won't be back until after you and Zylas… go."
Collins turned to look at her. The twilight sparked a rainbow of highlights through her ebony hair, including blue and green. It brought back a long lost memory of a fifth-grade babysitter who had watched him after school while his mother worked. The sitter had a black Labrador retriever named Shelby who was very shy around adults but loved and protected the children. One day, an anxious three-year-old girl who was the sitter's only African-American charge approached a Caucasian preschooler with a deep tan.
"Look," the first girl started, excitedly comparing their arms. "You're black, just like me."
"No." The second one glanced at the two arms, brow scrunched, obviously thinking deeply. Collins recalled holding his breath, wondering what a guileless preschooler might blurt out when it came to a child of a different race. "Shelby's black," she finally said. "We're brown."
And, Collins realized now with an adult biologist's perspective, the girl was right. The racial differences that seemed so important to some people came down to little more than the quantity of melanin in their skin. All humans, except albinos like Zylas, were some shade of brown. Human hair, too, varied only in the amount and intensity of its brownness, which was why so many elderly men appeared to have smeared shoe polish on their heads when they tried to recapture the "black" of their youths. Falima's long tresses, however, defied the rule: true, deep, animal in their blackness. It was only one of several exoticisms that might make her seem freakish in his world, that made her consider herself unattractive in her own. Too animal, she had once told him, too much overlap between her horse appearance and her human one.
The timing of Falima's change also made her less desirable to the men of Barakhai, as daytime humanity was considered superior. The conventions seemed arbitrary to Collins, who found her beauty nontraditional yet definitive. He enjoyed her solid, sinewy curves, though they did not resemble the gaunt perceived perfection of American models. Her unaugmented breasts, though not huge, complemented her figure; and the width of her hips and boy-roundness of her buttocks might turn away the men of his world. Collins found her attractive despite the flaws she noticed in herself, and even the unnaturally golden skin added an interesting touch to an already extraordinary appearance.
Falima's voice broke the reverie. "You've got that look again."
"The one where I stare at you and look… hungry?"
Falima nodded. "Yes. That one."
Collins wondered if she still worried that he wanted to eat her. He had tried to convince her that no one in his part of the world consumed horsemeat and that he never wanted to try it. "Can't help it. You're beautiful."
Falima looked away demurely. "I don't believe you, but I like when you say it."
"Believe it," Collins said, meeting and holding her gaze. Her eyes glimmered like sapphires in the dawn light, the windows to a soul equally charming. He knew he and Zylas could not leave for another six hours; Prinivere needed the albino's man-face on which to cast her illusion. He also realized that, if they planned to attend the castle's midday meal, they could not have touched down far from the palace. It was an enormous risk, but a necessary one. If they waited, Falima would have become a horse, difficult or impossible for Prinivere to carry. Everything they did had to revolve around switch times, and Collins realized again how inconvenient that became and how much power it granted full-time humans like Barakhai's royalty. And me.
Falima took Collins' hands. "Be careful," she whispered.
The interaction had grown too intense for Collins, who resorted, as usual, to humor. "Careful? Naah. Far more interesting to dive in there, battle-screaming, guns blasting, and go down in a blaze of glory."
Falima blinked slowly. "I-I didn't get everything you just said, but it sounds dangerous. Foolish."
Falima's hands felt warm and sturdy. Collins laughed. "Tome, too." He stroked his chin in a mockery of thought. "So I guess I'll go with your way. Careful, wasn't it?"
"Be careful," Falima repeated emphatically. She leaned forward and kissed him.
Surprised, Collins could do nothing but stand there, enjoying the moist, spongy softness of her lips against his. Then, before he could move, before he could even think, she vanished into the cave, leaving him with the lingering taste of sweet clover and a smile creasing his face.
Collins sat on a rocky outcropping and looked out over the forest. The sun turned fiery, intensifying the colors of autumn. Not long ago, he would not have needed to ponder the significance of a beautiful woman's kiss. It meant good luck and, if things went awry, good-bye. He had another year and some months under his belt: his scrawny little bespectacled self transformed to a more average height and weight, his glasses more stylish, his dark hair cut to a proper length rather than the shaggy disarray his lack of time and cash usually left it in. He dared to hope Falima's kiss meant something more.
The thought practically banished itself. What am I thinking? If I brought her back to Algary, she'd be a full-time horse. Miserable. And what kind of a relationship could we have? The mere contemplation of it struck Collins as silly, and he rolled his eyes at his own attempts to create an attraction where, surely, none existed. We're friends, nothing more. And it's perfectly normal to kiss a friend about to go off on a life-threatening mission. Finally, he headed into the cave with the others.
Korfius greeted Collins with a bark and excited prancing. He patted the dog, then, remembering the biscuits, pulled off his pack. He rummaged through it blindly, fingers gliding over toiletries and blundering into the towel. He identified shapes by feel: the mini tape recorder, the Snickers bars, his mag light. His groping fingers stopped there a moment, and he closed his eyes with a grimace of self-deprecation. Many of the conveniences he had packed relied on whatever stale batteries they contained, and he had no fresh ones. Had he planned to stay in Barakhai longer than a few hours, he might have searched for extras, though he rarely kept spares in his room. He relished the two-minute walk to the student union even on the coldest nights, and batteries tended to get lost or ruined in the junk drawer.
Finally, Collins found the dog biscuits. He worked his fingers into the hole in the plastic and emerged triumphantly with one. Anticipating the command, Korfius sat, tail waving with excitement.
Collins gave the biscuit to the dog, who accepted it with
a groan of gratitude, then slid down to a comfortable position to eat it. Korfius had switched at 7:00 P.M. by Collins' watch, instead of his usual 8:00 P.M. Falima had ascribed that to the long time he had spent in dog form and his lesariat mindset. Collins saw it as proof that the boy preferred his dog form and found solace in the boy's happiness and desire to stay in Collins' world.
Collins glanced around the cave for Falima. The buckskin horse lay on a flat area of the cave on top of her shed clothing. She snuffled at a vein of moss lining a crack in the cave wall hut made no attempt to eat it. Aisa perched on a crag, head turned backward and tucked against her wing. Zylas lay beside Prinivere, his rat form shockingly tiny beside the hulking mass of greenish black that took up most of the back of the cave. Ijidan had remained behind, his job to guard and supply the hideaway in the mountains.
Prinivere's voice touched Collins' mind.*Come get some sleep before, your trip.* Though she chose a neutral word for a possible suicide mission, the emotion in her sending made her concern obvious.
Collins nodded, feeling a bit jet-lagged by the time difference. He searched for a comfortable spot, doubting he could sleep on the uneven stone floor. *Over by me,* Prinivere suggested.*Use my leg as a pillow.* She raised a foreclaw, then replaced it on the ground.
Collins hesitated. It seemed almost dishonorable, as if his comfort was more important to him than Prinivere's. *It's all right.* The dragon glanced at the white rat snuggled against her.*If I'd let a dirty old rat do it, why not you?*
Apparently aware of the conversation, Zylas jerked up his head. "Hey!" He sounded more amused than affronted, but Collins flinched. In Barakhai, vermin actually had the intelligence to understand their low station. The law even forbade their mating to create Regular offspring. Few wanted more rats or mice in Barakhai, and even snakes and frogs were considered vermin. Since everyone ate insects here, reptiles and amphibians did not serve the grand purpose they did in Collins' world.
"I don't think she meant any offense about you being a rat and all," Collins said with a wink and a grin to show he was joking. "She just meant you stink."
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