No, but taverns all the same—
And the women in them?
Kellin grinned; its suddenness startled a passing serving-woman, who dropped into an awkward, red-faced curtsy even as he went by. Is there something you have neglected to tell me? Is there more to a link between warrior and female lir than I have been led to believe?
That is vulgarity, lir.
Of course it is. You had best get used to it. No one has ever argued for my kindness and decency—have you not heard the stories?
Sima padded beside him, bumping a shoulder into his knee. I need hear nothing, lir. What you are is in your mind.
So I gave up privacy when I linked with you.
She yawned. When a warrior bonds with a lir, he no longer desires privacy.
It was true. He shared everything with Sima, save the intimacy his vulgarity implied. And while she did not climb into the bed he shared with a woman, she nonetheless was fully aware of what passed within it; she merely curled herself on the floor and slept—or pretended to. Kellin had gotten used to it, though he supposed there was gossip exchanged regarding a certain perverse affinity for a mountain cat as onlooker; and he was not certain he disapproved. Let them wonder about him.
He would sooner be of interest than taken for granted, as he believed the Mujhar was.
"Kellin! Kellin?" It was Aileen, silver threads more evident in fading hair. "Have you a moment?"
He paused as she came down the corridor.
"Now?" He displayed the warbow he carried, and the suede quiver full of white-fletched arrows. "I was bound for a hunt with my watchdogs." Kellin grinned. "They require activity. Of late I bore them, now I am reformed."
Aileen arched an ironic eyebrow. "You are not 'reformed,' my lad, merely diverted. And 'twill only take a moment; a letter has come from Hart. Brennan wants you in the solar."
"Bad news?"
Aileen touched a fingertip to her upper lip. "I'm thinking not," she said neutrally, "depending on point of view."
"On point of—" His suspicions blossomed as he saw the glint in green eyes. "Gods—'tis Dulcie, isn't it? Grandsire's put off Hart long enough, waiting for me to measure up ... and now that he believes I've done it, he begins a discussion about marriage!"
"There was discussion of it a decade ago," she reminded him. " 'Tis nothing new, and should not surprise you. You are both well-grown."
He put up a silencing hand. "Enough. I will go. Will you send word to the watchdogs I will be delayed?"
" 'Tis sent," Aileen said. "Now, go to Brennan. Whatever complaint you have to make is better made to him."
"Aye. You argued against the marriage that decade ago." Kellin sighed. "But now you are for it, undoubtedly; catch the feckless warrior before he becomes less malleable."
"You are not now and never will be malleable," Aileen retorted, "merely occasionally less inclined to defy." She pointed. "Go."
Kellin went.
The solar was less bright now that the sun had moved westward, but displayed no shadows. The Mujhar sat in his usual chair with his legs propped on a stool and a wine cup in his hand.
Against his thigh rested a creased, wax-weighted parchment held down by a slack hand-The door stood ajar. Kellin shouldered it open more fully and crossed the threshold, tapping rattling arrows against one knee. "So, I am to be wed. This year, or next? In Homana, or Solinde?"
Brennan smiled. He showed more age now; the healing of his grandson had left its mark. "Have you no objection?"
"A mouthful, but you will hear none of them."
Kellin tapped arrows again as he halted before his grandsire. "What does Hart say?"
"That there is no sense in putting off what must be done."
"How cognizant of tenderness is my great-uncle of Solinde." Kellin sighed. "I suppose it must, then. To link Houses, and bloodlines .. . and no doubt beget the child who will fulfill the prophecy." Irony spilled away. "Neither of us has a choice, grandsire. Neither Dulcie, nor me. Like you and granddame; like Niall and Gisella; like Donal and Aislinn."
"Nor did Carillon and Solindish Electra, through whose blood comes the proper match."
Brennan's mouth twisted. "So many years, so many marriages—all designed to bring us to this point."
"Not to this point, surely; to the birth, grandsire. Wedding Dulcie means nothing at all to the gods, only the son born of the union." Kellin gestured with the warbow. "Have it carved in stone, if you will, like the lir within the Womb: Kellin of Homana shall wed Dulcie of Solinde, and so beget the Firstborn."
Brennan's fingers creased soiled parchment.
"Left to your own devices—"
Kellin took it up. "Left to my own devices, I would doubtless waste my seed on a dozen different whores for the rest of the month, then turn to a dozen more." He shrugged. "Does it matter? I have known since I was ten it would come to this ... Dulcie knew it, too. It may as well have been settled as we soiled our royal wrappings; there never was a chance we could look another way."
"No," Brennan conceded. "We are so very close, Kellin—"
"Then be done with it. Have her come here, or I will go there. I do not care." He waved bunched arrows. "Write it now, if you will. Let me be about my hunt. My watchdogs wait."
Brennan's mouth compressed though the faint displeasure engendered by flippancy was less pronounced than resignation. "Be about it, then. I will have this sent tomorrow."
Glumly, Kellin nodded. "My last hunt in freedom."
Brennan barked a laugh. "I doubt Dulcie will curtail your hunting, Kellin! She is very much Hart's daughter, in spirit as well as tastes."
"Why? Does she wager? Well, then, perhaps we will make a match of it after all." But levity faded in the face of his future now brought so near. Kellin shrugged. "It will do well enough. At least she is half Cheysuli; she will understand about Sima."
"Indeed," Brennan said gravely; a glint in his eye bespoke the irony of the statement because but four weeks before Sima was sheer impediment rather than half of Kellin's soul.
Kellin, who knew it; who saw the look in his grandsire's eye and colored under it. lifted his arrows. "I will help replenish the larder." Erinn slid into his words. " 'Twill take a day or two—don't be expecting me back before then." He grinned, "And aye, I'll be taking my watchdogs; they'll be hunting as well!"
Spring had arrived fitfully, turning snow to slush, slush to mud, then freezing it all together in a brief defiant spasm before resolving itself to its work. Kellin felt an affinity for the season as he rode out with Teague and the others; now more than ever he longed to remember winter, because then there had been no cause to concern himself with a wife.
"Cheysula," he muttered.
Teague, next to him on a red roan, lifted inquisitive brows. "What?"
Kellin repeated the word. "Old Tongue," he said, "for 'wife.' "
"Ah." Teague understood at once. "That time at last, is it?"
Kellin knew the incident in the Midden tavern had sealed their friendship, though Teague was careful to keep a distance between them so familiarity did not interfere with service. The others also had relaxed now that their lord was easier in himself; he knew very well the prevailing opinion was that Sima had worked wonders with the prince's temperament. For all he had initially disturbed them the night he was trapped in cat-form, they did not in any way indicate residual fear.
"That time," he agreed glumly. "I hoped it might wait a year or two more—or three, or four—"
"—or five?—"
"—but they'll not wait any longer. I'll be wed before summer, I'll wager."
Teague laughed. "Then you know nothing of women, my lord. She will be wanting an elaborate wedding with all the Houses of the world invited so they can bring her gifts."
Kellin considered it. "She did not appear to be much concerned for such things when I saw her last."
"How old was she?"
"Twelve?" He shrugged. "Or thirteen; I have lost track."
The young watchdog
grinned. "Then she'll be just the age to demand such elaboration! You will not escape, my lord. But it offers you respite; it will take at least until next winter to prepare for such a feast!"
Kellin slanted a glance at Sima across one shoulder. "I do not know which is worse: wedding immediately with little ceremony—" he turned back to guide his mount, "—or putting it off a year so that so much can be made of it!"
One of the others joined in: a man named Ennis, who was Teague's boon companion. "Better now than tomorrow," he offered. "That way we can be done with our duty that much the sooner."
Kellin looked at him blankly.
Ennis grinned. "Do you think the Princess of Homana will desire our company?"
He had not considered that. Perhaps his marriage would offer him respite from the watchdogs, but Kellin was not convinced trading one for the other would prove so good a thing.
They left Mujhara and headed directly north, toward the woods that fringed the road. Because not so many people traveled the North Road, hunting was better. It did not take long for Kellin and his watchdogs to flush game. He hung back slightly, letting the Homanans do much of the work, and waited until they were so caught up in chasing down a hart that they forgot about him entirely.
Satisfied, he glanced down at Sima. Now we can test it.
She fixed him with an unwavering stare. Best to know now what the last four weeks have wrought.
Kellin dismounted and dropped reins over a limb thrust slantwise from a tree. He left the horse, quiver, and warbow and walked farther into the woods, conscious of the anticipatory flutter in his belly.
Be not so fearful, Sima suggested, following on his heels. We have time.
How much? he asked uneasily. What should happen if, driven to anger in the midst of political turmoil, I forget my human trappings and become nothing more than a beast?
Time, she repeated. What turmoil is there to be? You are prince, not king. You matter little yet for the turmoil to involve you.
A humbling reminder. Kellin sighed and beat his way through brush to a small clearing, then closed his hand on the wolf's-head pommel of Blais' knife. "Strength," he murmured, invoking his kinsman's memory. "You had your share of it, and of courage; lend a measure to me."
Sima pressed against one knee, then flowed away to take up position nearby. She sat with tail tucked over toes, ear-tufts flicking minutely. You have learned much in four weeks.
Kellin rubbed at too-taut shoulders, trying to ease the tension. I have learned advice in four weeks. The doing yet remains, and that is what I fear.
Be what you are, Sima said. Kellin. That is all you can be, regardless of your shape.
"More," he said. "I was more, twice."
Sima blinked. That was before.
"Before you?" He grinned. "Aye, and therefore did not count; I was lirless, and unblessed."
Humor spilled away. "Well enough- Let us see what I become when I trade my shape for another."
He squeezed the hilt once more, then let his hand fall away. With careful deliberation Kellin detached himself from the moment and let his awareness drift from the here and now to the there, with no sense of time, where the magic resided deep in the earth.
Power pulsed. At first it was coy, caressing his awareness so he knew it was there for the taking, then flowing away to tease him yet again with insubstantiality.
It was frustrating. Sima—
Yours to do, she told him.
He concentrated. Power flirted, seduced; he wanted it very badly. His body rang with tension that was almost sexual, an intense and abiding need- He let himself go into it until awareness of self became awareness of need, of what would satisfy him, and then Power uncovered itself like a woman shedding draperies and let him touch it.
—different—
It was. Before he had merely thought of the beast, neglecting to recall that he was a man with a man's distinct needs. The beast had overtaken all that was man, until he was helpless and unaware, beaten down from his humanity into animal instinct. This time he knew. His name was Kellin, not cat, and he was a man, A fully bonded Cheysuli warrior who had recourse to the magic that lived in the womb of the earth.
He touched it. It set his fingertips atingle.
Kellin, he whispered. Man, not cat—but lend me the shape, and I will do it honor.
Senses flared- Images broke up his mind. No longer human images of a human world, but the patterns of a cat.
Am I—?
Not yet, Sima said. There is more yet to be done.
More. He did not know more.
He fell. He was in the Womb again, empty of everything save a vague but burning awareness that he was a man who desired, but briefly, to give his human form to the earth so he might, for only a while, walk the world as a cat.
Not so much to ask.
Vision exploded. His eyes were open, but he saw nothing save a disorientation so great it threatened equilibrium. Kellin thrust out a staying hand intended to hold him upright, but it broke through the crust of the earth and sank deep into the river of Homana's Power.
Earth magic. There for the taking.
Kellin took it.
There, Sima said. Not so difficult after all.
Smells engulfed, replacing reliance on sight. In cat-form, Kellin exulted.
Let us run, Sima suggested. Let us run as cats, so you know what it is to honor the gods.
He did not think much of gods. But in this form, filled with the glory of lir-shape, Kellin could not protest.
If it was gods who were responsible, he would honor them.
Eighteen
Kellin ran through the sun-dappled forest with Sima at his shoulder, lovely, magnificent Sima—no other warrior's lir was half so beautiful!—and took joy in the pure, almost sensual freedom the cat-shape gave him. He explored it as he ran, marking the differences within his brain, yet the samenesses as well. His awareness of self was un-changed despite the body's alteration; he knew perfectly well he was a man in a borrowed form that would, when he chose, be exchanged once again for the proper body. There was no division in his soul other than that his awareness permitted; he did not wish himself one or the other. He simply was what he was: a Cheysuli warrior with magic in his blood, who could, when he desired to, become a mountain cat.You see? Sima asked.
Kellin exulted. He believed he understood himself at last, and the needs that lived in his soul; he could control himself in this shape as easily as he could in human form. He need only remember, to keep alive the spark of self-knowledge that recalled he was Kellin, and human, so as not to tip the balance from lir-shape into beast form.
Not so difficult. His muscled body stretched, fluid in graceful motion, stronger by far than the human shape. She has taught me much in the past weeks. I understand better. I understand what it is.
Sima interrupted. A stag. Just ahead. Fit for Homana-Mujhar?
He saw it; it was. A fine, huge stag with a magnificent rack of antlers.
Kellin slowed, then stilled even as Sima did.
The stag stood unmoving, poised in a patch of sunlight. Flanks heaved from exertion; was he prey to someone's hunt?
Kellin did not care. The stag was theirs, now, and indeed fit for Homana-Mujhar. He was large and would no doubt prove difficult to take down, but there were two of them. Together they could manage it.
First leap to you, Kellin said.
Sima was pleased. She crouched even as he did, tail barely twitching at the tip. She tensed in a perfect stillness, tufted ears motionless.
Now— She was instantly in motion: a black, sleek blur that sprang effortlessly from the ground and hurled herself through the air.
Sima screamed. For an instant Kellin pinned tufted ears, wondering why she would startle the stag into flight and risk losing the prey, then saw the feathered shaft of an arrow protruding from her flank as she twisted in midair and fell.
She screamed again, and so did he. Her pain was his own, and the shock that consumed her body. She wa
s down, twisting to bite frenziedly at the shaft.
Kellin heard a human voice shouting in fear and horror. A man burst through the bushes on foot.
His face was drained; when he saw both cats, his horror was redoubled- "My lord! My lord, I did not mean it! It was the stag—the arrow was loosed before I saw her!"
The lir-link was alive with Sima's pain. Kellin shuddered with it, and the hair along his spine stood up straight. The shout of rage that issued from his throat was not that of a man, but of the beast instead.
The arrow in Sima's flesh dug deeply into his own. Pain, shock, and weakness merged into fury, and the comprehension of hideous truth: his lir was dying; so, then, was he.
Kellin screamed, and leapt.
The man thrust up a warding arm, but made no effort to draw the knife that might have saved his life. His mouth warped open in horror, but he did not move. It was as if he did not believe that his Cheysuli lord, though bound now by lir-shape, would ever truly harm him.
The man went down beneath the cat and gave up his life in an instant. He did not even cry out as the throat was torn from his body.
Other men burst from the trees on horseback and drew up in a ragged, abrupt halt that set horses' mouths to gaping and men to swearing.
Kellin dared them to attack. He stood over the prey and dared them to take it.
The keening scream welted in his chest and burst from his throat. Their faces twitched and blanched. None of them moved.
"Teague," one said, though the word made little sense. "Gods—he has killed Teague.”
Sima panted behind him. Kellin turned his dripping head and saw her sprawled on her right side, feathered shaft buried deep in her left flank. It bore the Mujhar's colors, and the richer crimson of her blood.
She panted. Her tongue lolled. The gold eyes dimmed.
Lir! Kellin cried.
She was beyond speech. He felt only her fear and pain and the bewildered questioning of what had happened.
Anger burned fiercely. Kellin swung back to the others and took a single step toward them. Horses snorted uneasily; one jibbed at the bit.
"My lord," a man said; his hands shook on the reins. A companion broke and ran, then a third, then a fourth. The one who had named the prey remained behind. "My lord," he said again, and his young face twisted in a mingling of shock and outrage, "Do you even know whom you have killed?"
Roberson, Jennifer - Cheysuli 08 Page 26
