Valdemar 09 - [Mage Winds 01] - Winds of Fate

by Mercedes Lackey

  But before he could resolve his own battle, the balance of power below him shifted. The magic-wielder won; the mist parted, held firmly away from a clear tunnel down the middle of the valley, with only the thinnest of wisps seeping in.

  But he could feel the strain, the pressure of the mist on the walls of that tunnel, threatening to collapse it at any moment.

  It can’t hold for long!

  But again, before he could move, the balance shifted. The ground trembled under his feet, and for a moment he thought it was another effect of the battle of mist and magic being fought in front of his very eyes. But no—something dark loomed through the enshrouding mist, something that tossed and made the ground shake.

  The dyheli!

  Now he dared a thought, a Mindspoken call.

  It didn’t matter that someone or something might overhear ; they had been started, or spooked, but without direction, they might hesitate, fatally. :Brothers-hooved brothers! Come, quickly, before the escape-way closes!:

  There was no answer except the shaking of the ground. But the darkness within the mist began to resolve into tossing heads and churning legs—and a moment later, the dyheli bucks pounded into sight, a foam of sweat dripping from their flanks, coughing as the fumes hit their lungs. And behind them—something else.

  Something that ran on two legs, not four.

  It collapsed, just barely within the reach of the mist. And as it collapsed, so did the tunnel of clear air.

  He did not even stop to think; he simply acted.

  He took a lungful of clean air and plunged into the edge of the roiling, angry mist. His eyes burned and watered, his skin was afire. He could hardly see through the tears, only enough to reach that prone figure, seize one arm, and help it to its feet.

  He half-dragged, half-carried it out, aware of it only as lighter than he, and shorter, and still alive, for it tried feebly to help him. There was no telling if it was human or not; here in the borderland between k‘Sheyna and the Pelagirs, that was not something to take for granted. But it had saved the dyheli, and that was enough to earn it, in turn, aid.

  The mist reached greedily for them; he reached clear air at the edge of it; sucked in a lungful, felt his burden do the same. Both of them shuddered with racking coughs as a wisp of mist reached their throats.

  He stumbled into safety at the same moment that the other collapsed completely, nearly carrying Darkwind to the ground with him.

  Him?

  At that moment, Darkwind realized that this was no male. And as he half-suspected, not human either.

  :Run!: Vree screamed from overhead, with mind and voice, and Darkwind glanced behind to see the mist licking forward again, reaching for them, turning darker as if with anger.

  From somewhere he found the strength to pick her up, heave her over his shoulder, and stumble away at a clumsy run.

  He ran until exhaustion forced him to stop before he dropped the girl, fell on his face, or both. Vree scouted for him, as he slowed to a weary walk, muscles burning, side aching. He figured he must have run, all out, for furlongs at least; he was well out of sensing range of the evil mist, if that still existed and had not been dissipated. That was all that mattered. By the time he came to a halt, in the lee of a fallen tree, he was sweating as heavily as the dyheli bucks.

  He knelt and eased his burden down into the grass beside the bark-stripped trunk of the tree, and didn’t bother to get up. He sat right down beside her, his legs without any strength at all, propping himself against the tree with his back against the trunk.

  For a long time he just sat there, his forehead against his bent knees, wrists crossed over his ankles, every muscle weak from the long run, relying on Vree to alert him if anything dangerous came along. Sweat cooled and dried, his back and scalp itched, but he was too tired to scratch them. He was only aware of his burning muscles, his aching lungs, the pain in his side.

  After a while, other things began to penetrate to his consciousness as his legs stopped trembling and the pain in his side and lungs ebbed. Birds called and chattered all around, a good sign, since they would have been silent if there had been anything about to disturb them.

  He began to think again, slowly. His mind, dull with fatigue, was nevertheless alert enough to encompass this much; as a nonhuman and an Outlander, she was not going to be welcome in k‘Sheyna. She was not, as he recalled from the brief glimpse he’d had before he had to pick up and run with her, a member of any of the nonhuman races k’Sheyna had contact with. And unknown meant “suspect” in the danger-ridden lands beyond the borders of the Vale.

  Now what am I going to do with her? he wondered, exhaustion warring with the need to make a quick decision. I’d better take a closer look at her. We aren’t inside the Vale yet. If she isn’t badly hurt, maybe I can just leave her here, keep an eye on her until she comes around, then make sure she takes herself off, away from the Vale.

  He raised his head and turned his attention to his silent companion—still unconscious, he saw. As he turned her over to examine her, everything about her set off ripples of aversion.

  Not only was she nonhuman, she was only-too-obviously one of the so-called “Changechildren” from the Pelagirs, creatures modified from either human or animal bases—at their own whims, frequently, if the base was human; or that of their creators if they were modified from animals. It was what the Tayledras had done with the bondbirds, and what they had done to horses on behalf of the Shin‘a’in, taken to an extreme. An extreme that many Tayledras found bordering on the obscene—perhaps because of the kinds of modifications that had been done at the time of the Mage Wars. It was one thing to modify; it was quite another to force extreme changes for no good reason, be the base human or animal.

  His experienced eye told him which it was; there was only so much that could be done with an animal base. You couldn’t grant equal intelligence with humans to an animal, except over the course of many generations. It had taken the hertasi many generations to attain enough intelligence for a rare mage to appear among their ranks, and that event itself had been centuries ago. Human base, modified to cat....

  Even unconscious, she oozed sexual attraction, which made him both doubly, uneasy and pitying. That attraction—it was a common modification, based on smell and the stimulation of deep, instinctual drives in the onlooker. Whether he decided ultimately on pity or revulsion would depend on whether she’d had it done to her, or done it herself. If herself—

  Already he felt a deep, smoldering anger at the idea. I may pitch her back into the damned mist.

  Those who modified themselves for sexual attractiveness were generally doing so with intent to use themselves and their bodies as a weapon. And not an honest one, either.

  On the other hand, if she’d had it done to her—it was likely with the intent of her master to use her as a kind of sexual pet. That was as revolting to Darkwind as the first, but it was not a revulsion centered on the girl.

  For the rest, the overall impression was of a cat, or something catlike. Her hair was a dark, deep sable, and rather short, with a subtle dappled effect in the direct sunlight, like his own dyed hair-camouflage. Her face was triangular, with very little chin; her ears, pointed, with furlike tufts on the ends. Her eyebrows swept upward, her eyes were slanted upward, and when he pulled an eyelid open to see if she really was conscious, he was unsurprised to see that her golden-yellow eyes had slit pupils. Which were dilated in shock; her stunned condition was real.

  She wore the absolute minimum for modesty; a scanty tunic of cream-colored leather, and skin-tight breeches that laced up the side, showing a long line of dark golden-brown flesh beneath. Not practical garb for woods running.

  Even unconscious, she lay with a boneless grace that echoed the cat theme, and her retractile fingernails were filed to sharp points, like a cat’s claws.

  Whatever she had been, she was not even as human now as the Tayledras. The changes had been made to her from birth; possibly even before. In fact, in view
of the extensiveness of the changes, it was increasingly unlikely that she’d done them to herself. Unless she was born in one of the contaminated areas, the poison twisted her in this direction, and she decided to continue the shift.

  She was barefoot, but the tough soles of her feet convinced him that she had spent most of her life without wearing foot coverings. Again, not practical for woods running, which argued that she had run away from something or someone.

  Then he saw the patterns of old and new bruises over much of her body, as if someone had been beating her on a regular basis. Nothing to mar the pert perfection of her face—but everywhere else, she was marked with the signs of frequent blows. The darkness of her skin had hidden it from him at first, but she was covered with the greenish-yellow of old, healing bruises, and the purple-black of fresh ones. Some of them, on her arms, were as big as the palm of his hand. He could only wonder, sickened, about the parts of her hidden under her clothing. The evidence was mounting in her favor.

  She was thin—too thin, with bones showing starkly, as if she never had quite enough to eat.

  Darkwind sat back on his heels, no longer certain what to think. The Changechild was a bundle of contradictions. If she was, as she seemed, the escaped chattel of an Adept-level mage, how was it she had commanded the power to free the dyheli herd? No mage would have permitted a “pet” to carry the Mage-Gift, much less learn how to use it.

  But if she was an enemy, why did she bear the marks of beatings and semistarvation? And why had she freed the herd in the first place?

  She represented a puzzle he did not have enough information to solve.

  I have to give her the benefit of the doubt, he decided, after pondering the question for a moment. She did save the dyheli. Whatever else she is, or is not, will have to wait. But I can’t make a decision until I know what she is. He thought a moment more. I have to see that she stays safe until she wakes. I do owe her that much, at the very least—and I owe her the protection of a place to recover afterward.

  At a guess, she hadn’t breathed enough of the poison to have put a healthy creature into the unconscious stupor she lingered in. But she had not been healthy, and she had depleted her resources considerably in fighting that evil mist. She was not Adept-level; that much was obvious. She was not even a Master; no Master would have exhausted herself in fighting the mist directly. A Master would have transmuted the mist into something else; an Adept would have broken the spell creating it and holding it there. Both would have involved very powerful and difficult spells and would have alerted every mage within two days’ ride that there was another mage plying his powers. That was what Darkwind would have done—before he swore that nothing would ever induce him to wield magic energies again. Before it became too dangerous for him to draw the attentions of other Adepts to the depleted and disrupted Clan of k‘Sheyna.

  She had not—probably could not—either break or change the spell. She could only fight it. That meant she was Journeyman at best, and that the energy to create the tunnel of safety had come directly from her. It was what made Journeymen so hard to track; since the only disturbances in the energy-flows of mage-energies were those within themselves, they couldn’t be detected unless one was very nearby. And, thank the fourfold Goddess, that was what had kept her magics from attracting anything else. Probably he had been the only creature close enough to detect her meddling.

  But that was also what limited a Journeyman’s abilities to affect other magic, and limited his magical “arsenal” as well. When the energy was gone, the mage was exhausted, sometimes to the point of catatonia depending on how far he wanted to push himself, and there was no more until he was rested.

  That was what brought the Changechild to this pass; depleting herself, on top of her poor physical condition, then taking one whiff too many of the poison mist. She might be a long time in recovering.

  But Darkwind could not, in all conscience, leave her where she was. It wasn’t safe, and he could not spare anyone to protect her. And even if it was safe, she might not recover without help; he didn’t know enough of Healing to tell.

  He rested his chin on his knee and thought.

  I need someplace and someone willing to watch her and keep her out of mischief. But I can’t take her into the Vale; Father would slit her throat just for looking the way she does. I need a neutral safe-haven, temporarily—and then I need a lot of good advice.

  He knew where to find the second; it was coming up with the first that was difficult.

  Finally with a tentative plan in mind, he hefted her over his shoulder again—with a stern admonition to his body to behave in her proximity, as her sexual attraction redoubled once he was close to her.

  His body was not interested in listening.

  Finally, in desperation, he shielded—everything. And thought of the least arousing things he could manage—scrubbing the mews, boiling hides, and finally, cleaning his privy. That monthly ordeal of privy-scrubbing was the only thing that ever made him regret his decision to move out of the Vale....

  The last worked; and with a sigh of relief, he headed off to the nearest source of aid he could think of.

  :Vree!: he called.

  The bondbird dove out of the branches of a nearby tree; he felt the gyre’s interest at his burden, but it was purely curiosity. The Changechild—thank the stars—was of the wrong species to affect Vree.

  If she‘d’ been tervardi, though—she’d have gotten to both of us. And I don’t think Vree’s as good at self-control as I am. I would truly have had a situation at that point.

  :Where?: the bondbird replied, with the inflection that meant “Where are we going?”

  : The hertasi, Vree,: he Mindspoke back. :The ones on the edge of k‘Sheyna. This-one hurt-sleeps.:

  :Good.: Vree’s Mind-voice was full of satisfaction; the hertasi liked bondbirds and always had tidbits to share with them. He could care less about Darkwind’s burden; only that she was a burden, and Darkwind was hindered in his movements. :I guard.:

  Which meant that he would stay within warning distance just ahead of Darkwind, alert at all times, instead of giving in to momentary distractions.

  Unlike his bondmate....

  Latrines, he thought firmly. Cleaning out latrines.

  Nera looked up at Darkwind—it was hard for the diminutive hertasi to do anything other than “look up” at a human—his expressive eyes full of questions.

  :And what if she wakes?: the lizard Mindspoke. He turned his head slightly, and the scales of the subtle diamond pattern on his forehead shifted from metallic brown to a dark gold like old bronze. Nera was the Elder of the hertasi enclave and an old friend; Darkwind had brought his burden—and problem—straight to Nera’s doorstep. Let the mages discount the hertasi if they chose, or ignore them, thinking them no more than children in their understanding and suited only to servants’ work. Darkwind knew better.

  :I don’t think she will,: Darkwind told him honestly. :At least not until I’m back. I risked a probe, and she is very deeply exhausted. I expect her to sleep for a day or more. :

  Nera considered that, his eyes straying to the paddies below, where his people worked their fields of rice. The hertasi settlement itself was in the hillside above a marsh, carefully hollowed out “holes” shored with timbers; with walls, floors and ceilings finished with water-smoothed stone set into cement, and furnished well, if simply. The swamp was their own domain, one in which their size was not a handicap. They grew rice and bred frogs, hunted and fished there. They knew the swamp better than any of the Tayledras.

  That had made it easy for Darkwind to persuade the others to include them within the bounds of the k‘Sheyna territory. The marsh itself was a formidable defense, and the hertasi seldom required any aid. A border section guarded by a treacherous swamp full of clever hertasi was something even the most stubborn mage would find a practical resource.

  Though they knew how to use their half-size bows and arrows perfectly well, and even the youngest were t
rained with their wicked little sickle-shaped daggers and fish-spears, the hertasi preferred, when given the choice, to let their home do their fighting for them. Enemies, for the most part, would start out chasing a helpless-looking old lizard-man, only to find themselves suddenly chest-deep and sinking in quicksand or mire.

  The hertasi were fond of referring to these unwelcome intruders as “fertilizer.”

  Nera was still giving him that inquisitive look. Darkwind groaned, inwardly. There were some definite drawbacks to a friendship dating back to childhood. Old Nera could read him better than his own father.

  Thank the gods for that.

  The Changechild’s attraction didn’t work on Nera, any more than it did on Vree—but Darkwind had the feeling that the hertasi knew very well the effect it was having on the scout. And he was undoubtedly giving Darkwind that look because he assumed the attraction was affecting his thinking as well as—other things.

  Darkwind sighed. :All right,: he said, finally. :If she wakes and gives you trouble, she’s fair game for fertilizer. Does that suit you?:

  Nera nodded, and his flexible mouth turned up at the corners in an approximation of a human smile. : Good. I just wanted to be certain that your mind was still working as well as the rest of you.:

  Darkwind winced. Nera was so small it was easy to forget that the hertasi was actually older than his father, and was just as inclined to remind him of his relative youth. And hertasi, who only came into season once a year, enjoyed teasing their human friends about their sus iceptibility to their own passions.

  It didn’t help that this time Nera’s arrow hit awfully near the mark.

  :I’m still chief scout,: he reminded the lizard. :Anything that comes out of the Pelagirs is suspect—and if it’s helpless and attractive, it’s that much more suspect.:

  :Excellent.: Nera bobbed his muzzle in a quick nod. :Then give my best to the Winged Ones. Follow the blue-flag flowers; we changed the safe path since last you were here.: