by Dawn Cook
“I know.” Heavy-hearted, Alissa puffed at a flower as it fell, and it went whirling away to lose itself with the rest.
“I’ll wait,” Strell assured her quickly, almost desperately. “You know I will.” His eyes shone defiantly as if expecting her to deny his claim.
“I know.” She sighed again as she felt tears threaten. It just wasn’t fair. Strell had done so much. She would have remained feral if not for him.
“But I can’t stay,” he said. “Talo-Toecan won’t allow it. It’s not safe.”
“Talo-Toecan,” she thought fiercely, her frustration spilling into anger. “Talo-Toecan! I’m sick of what he says!”
“He is the architect of the Hold,” Strell said gently. “He has a right to make the rules.”
Alissa’s head rose in protest. “You spent all winter!” She desperately grasped at any excuse, but she knew it was a losing battle. Strell wasn’t even trying. He had already resigned himself to leaving.
Shaking his head, he placed his now small-looking hand upon hers. “Yes, and see what happened? Since I’ve met you, I have nearly lost my life—what—nearly half a dozen times?”
Alissa drew her head back in surprise. “It hasn’t been that bad.”
Strell began ticking off his fingers. “Let’s see. I was attacked by a raku . . .”
“No,” she objected, her eyes wide.
Smiling faintly, he nodded. “Yesterday, by you.”
“Oh.” Crestfallen, she dropped her head back down.
“Nearly fell to my death freeing Talo-Toecan, suffered a concussion when you blew the wards off your window.”
“Sorry,” she quietly apologized.
“Broke my ankle, lost my finger, burned my hand—”
“I can fix that now,” she interrupted, forcing herself to sound cheery. “Or will soon,” she added, remembering that Useless hadn’t actually given her permission to try the difficult ward yet.
Seeming to ignore her, Strell continued. “Suffered Bailic’s wards—completely at his mercy.” Pursing his lips, Strell frowned. Blinking, he came back to the present. “We all could have died last night.”
“He’s gone now,” she said in a small thought as Talon arrived in her usual suddenness. Alissa had heard the wind slipping under her wings, but Strell jumped.
“Oh, yes,” he added, “and attacked by your feathered defender here.” For a moment they fussed over Talon’s catch, a fine little shrew.
“Talon would never hurt you now,” she crooned as she tossed Talon’s breakfast to her. Snatching it, the kestrel flew only a short distance before tearing into it with gusto.
“I’m not complaining, mind you,” Strell said, picking up his earlier thought, “but you get the idea. The rules are strict for a good reason. It was only because there were no Keepers that I lasted as long as I did. Talo-Toecan says a new, raw batch of students will begin to show up now that Bailic is gone. He says they will be all fire and temper, and he thinks I won’t survive more than a week once they begin to experiment with their newfound skills.”
“It’s not that dangerous,” she muttered petulantly.
Shrugging, Strell met her gaze. “You’re right, but try convincing him of that. I spent all night and got absolutely nowhere.” He turned to where Useless and Lodesh were strenuously arguing in the distance.
Positively miserable, Alissa looked down. She couldn’t bear the thought of him leaving. Not now. Not ever. “How long can you stay?” she found herself asking, her throat tight with grief.
Strell pushed the petals aside with the toe of his boot. “A few days. The lower passes have been open for weeks.
Maybe come fall, I could show up and get conveniently snowbound.”
The thought cheered her somewhat, and she returned her sorrowful eyes to Strell.
“I don’t care if you have little white feet, or large clawed ones, Alissa,” Strell pleaded. “I just want to be with you. In ten years or so, perhaps . . .” He stopped and looked at the ground.
Ten years, she thought, her sight beginning to swim. It was a long time.
“Oh, here,” Strell said awkwardly as he began to search his pockets as if looking for a distraction. “Lodesh thought I should give this to you.” Digging deep, he pulled out a fold of yellow cloth and opened it to reveal a round bit of gold lace. He placed it in her hand. “I don’t really need it,” he explained. “He thought you might like to have it.”
Looking at it so small and frail in her hand, she frowned. “It’s a love charm,” she said, her thoughts full of wonder that such an exquisite thing existed. “You made this?”
Strell dropped his gaze to his feet, his ears reddening. “Yes, well, I had some extra, and well—you know.”
“Extra?” she asked with a stirring of hope. “Extra hair?”
Strell smiled faintly. “Remember your luck charm? In order to be most effective, you need to craft a charm from a lock of hair.”
“Whose?” she breathed.
“Well, yours of course!” Strell began to look worried.
“It’s mine!” Alissa exclaimed as her hand went up to her nonexistent hair and she stood in a flurry of petals.
Strell’s eyes widened in alarm. “I’m sorry,” he apologized as he rose as well. “I didn’t think—” The rest of his thought went unvoiced as he watched, openmouthed, as the small bit of gold winked out of existence.
“No! Wait!” Useless shouted in exasperation from across the clearing.
“What!” Strell cried, backing up as she winked out of existence in a swirl of pearly white. “What did I do?”
Excess mass reverted easily back to energy and flowed to her source as she accessed her original cellular pattern, her memory of it triggered by Strell’s love charm, never to be forgotten again. Strell was ill prepared when she coalesced back into reality and beaming, threw herself into his arms. Her old clothes were gone, replaced by a too-large, gold-colored robe, tied loosely about her with a black sash. It was so big, she was lost among its folds, but at least it covered her. She didn’t care where it had come from. She only knew she was back, and Strell was here, and he could hold her.
“Oh, Strell,” she sobbed into his shoulder. She wasn’t sure if they were tears of joy or sadness. He still had to leave, only now it was a hundred times worse. Clearly bewildered, Strell held her tightly as she cried. In the distance, Alissa could hear Lodesh and Useless approach.
“Come on, Talo-Toecan,” Lodesh cajoled. “I know you aren’t cold blooded. Show me your heart isn’t, either. Just look at that pitiful display. You can’t say no now. Let the piper stay.”
Her head buried against Strell’s shoulder, Alissa caught her breath in hope. The sudden throbbing of her broken hand was all but unnoticed. Strell, too, was still, and together they waited as first Useless grimaced and then finally sighed. “I cannot hope to prevail when you begin to scheme against me, Warden,” he said dryly. “The piper may stay.”
Overjoyed, Alissa turned a tear-wet face to Strell’s and smiled expansively up at him. “You can stay. . . .” she breathed, absolutely elated.
“Provided,” Useless continued sharply, “he agrees to several stipulations, which I will come up with in the very near future.”
“Anything,” Strell whispered, and he held her close.
Useless’s eyes narrowed. “Tell me, Lodesh. What was it he gave her?”
“A love knot, of course.” Lodesh chuckled, drawing her teacher unwillingly away.
“Made from her hair?” Useless asked, craning his head back over his shoulder at Strell and Alissa.
“What else?” The Warden of Ese’ Nawoer took Useless’s elbow firmly and led him off through the slowly drifting blossoms. “I must admit,” Lodesh said slyly, “the robe was rather thoughtful of you. A little big for her though, isn’t it?”
“I only know one size,” came his voice, beginning to go faint with the distance. “I will not have my student wandering about naked to the wind. I’m just glad you got
us back before she completed her shift.”
Losing herself in Strell’s embrace, Alissa barely heard Lodesh’s merry laugh. “That,” he cried, “was the easy part. It was, after all, only a matter of timing, old friend. Only a matter of timing.”
First in the new series by
Dawn Cook
FIRST TRUTH
Alissa didn’t believe in magic—
not until she was sent on a journey to an endangered
fortress known as The Hold.
There she discovered the gifts within
herself to save it.
0-441-00945-X
“Rich with vivid detail...impossible to forget.”
—Deborah Chester
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