by Anne Logston
“Does the food not please you?” Lahti asked, smiling mischievously as she popped a berry into her mouth.
“It was good enough,” Valann said quickly. “But I can eat no more of it.”
“Is there something else you want?” Lahti asked, and Val fancied he could hear almost a chuckle in her voice. “We could call for Spark.”
“I don’t need anything from Spark,” Val said, a little more sharply than he intended. He wondered irritably why none of the clan’s women had offered to share his pallet for the night. It would have been unthinkable to deny any guest of Inner Heart that most basic courtesy. Was it because of his part human blood, or just—
He glanced at Lahti again and sighed. Of course. Why would the Hawk’s Eyes offer him a bed partner when his ripe mate needed him? Val sighed again and crawled over to the pallet, pulling a fur over him despite the warm hut.
“Are you ill?” Lahti asked, concern in her voice, but one eyebrow arched knowingly.
“I’m only tired,” Val said gruffly. “It’s been many days since we slept well.”
“Of course,” Lahti said apologetically, putting down the bowl of berries. “I’ll bank the fire.”
Val grunted and turned away so he would not have to watch the soft glow of the fire on Lahti’s skin as she carefully piled ashes over the glowing logs, but he could not help but feel her warmth and smell her scent as she curled up against him on the furs. He pulled as far away from her as the pile of furs allowed, but a moment later he froze as Lahti’s warm hand touched his shoulder. Then there was nothing to do but roll over and face her. To Val’s utter disgust, she was still smiling that secret little smile.
“For days you’ve wanted my warmth beside you, and now you hide under the furs and pull away from me,” Lahti mocked gently. “Did you like me better when I was smudged and dirty and clothed in smelly leathers?”
“Well, you might have spared me Dusk’s scent tonight,” Val retorted crossly. “No Hawk’s Eyes are going to invade our tent this night while we sleep.”
“I know.” Lahti propped herself on his chest, to Val’s utter agony, all the worse for her smile. “And that’s why I applied none of the salve he gave me.”
Val scowled.
“But I can smell it.”
Lahti raised one eyebrow.
“The salve is in my pack, and our packs are between you and the wall, where the Hawk’s Eyes placed them,” she said mildly. “I would have had to pass you or walk through the fire to reach them.”
Utter shock, followed by incredible joy, paralyzed Valann as he realized what Lahti was saying; then he rolled over, pulling her close.
“But when?” he asked incredulously.
“I’m not certain,” Lahti chuckled. “This is all very new to me, and I was always so tired and hungry, and stiff and sore, too, from sleeping on the ground every night. I thought I was becoming ill, perhaps. I’ve never ripened before, you know, to recognize the feeling.”
“But—” Sudden leaden despair swept away Val’s delight as if it had never been. “We must return to Inner Heart immediately. You haven’t taken your passage to adulthood.”
“No.” Lahti shook her head, her eyes warm. “I haven’t. But by the time we journey all the way back to Inner Heart, my time of ripeness will be past.”
“If you ripen once, you’ll ripen again,” Val said, trying to tell himself that a few more days were nothing after months of waiting. The thought felt like a lie.
“Some women ripen only once,” Lahti said softly. “But perhaps I’ll ripen again, many decades from now. Perhaps half a century.”
The thought passed between them in a lightning flicker of understanding—Lahti might ripen five decades from now, but would Valann in fact be alive then? Humans lived such pitifully short lives, and Val was partly, at least, human. He had grown so quickly. He might well be dead, or past his years of siring a child, before Lahti ripened again.
Emotions warred in Val’s heart—pride that she wanted his child so badly despite his mixed blood, enough to risk the Mother Forest’s disfavor by coupling with him before she had passed her trials of adulthood; fear for the consequences to Lahti; desire, oh, yes, desire and love, too; and a sort of dismay—What if I don’t give her a child, and she has made this terrible choice for nothing?
“You should return to Inner Heart and take your trials of passage,” he said reluctantly. “It’s forbidden that I should touch you while you are still a child.” Yet he could well understand why she might choose to ignore that law; what elven woman would pass by a chance to bear a child?
“And if I choose otherwise?” Lahti asked, her eyes sparkling.
“Then—then you should do as Spark suggested, and choose among Hawk’s Eye males for your High Circle, to give you the best chance of bearing a child,” Val said, forcing the words out.
“Indeed I will not,” Lahti said indignantly, pulling back a little. “You’d have me dance the High Circle for my very first coupling, and with these strangers?”
“No. Oh, no.” Val gave in and pulled her close again, burying his face in the softness of her hair as he had longed to do so many times. By the Mother Forest, she was so tiny, so slender, her small breasts and barely swelling hips so unformed that, although she was almost a decade his elder, she seemed very much a child still. Had Doeanna felt this sense of awe at the trust that had been placed in her? No; more likely she’d felt mildly amused and perhaps vaguely curious at the odd creature she’d been asked to initiate into the pleasures of coupling: a half-human oddity who’d gone from child to man in hardly more than a decade and a half, too tall and too broad, with hair springing from his face and body in places where it ought not to be.
“Are you certain?” he whispered, pausing to look into Lahti’s eyes soberly.
Lahti laughed and reached down to touch him.
“You are, and no doubt of it,” she said, her eyes twinkling. “Do you remember what Silence said? Learn to speak with your heart, and to listen with it, too.” She took Val’s hand and laid it over her heart. “Can you hear my heart calling to you?”
Val laughed and laid his head on her breast, turning to kiss the soft flesh.
“Indeed I do,” he said joyfully. “And I pledge the Mother Forest Herself can hear mine answer.”
Chapter Seven—Ria
“But I’m sick of my room,” Ria complained, shifting carefully so that her leg lay more comfortably on the cushions.
“That’s too bad.” Lady Rivkah did not look overly sympathetic. “Unfortunately, bed rest is one of the results of having a poisoned arrow shot into your leg.”
“Now that the poison’s gone, it could be healed,” Ria said sullenly.
“Yes, it probably could.” Lady Rivkah laid the tray of salves on the bedside table and began unwrapping the dressing. “I think, however, that a little discomfort and forced bed rest is appropriate enough punishment for all the worry you caused us, and with you confined to your bed, I don’t have to make sure there’s always a guard outside your door. You’ll be on your feet again in a day or two, anyway.”
Ria ground her teeth but resolutely did not wince as Lady Rivkah carefully cleaned the wounds and reapplied the salves and dressings.
“You know, Sharl wants contact with the elves just as much as you do,” Lady Rivkah said mildly, tying fresh bandages into place. “I don’t doubt that we would have taken you to the forest as soon as we found a safe place to enter it and some elves who would wait long enough to find out who we were before shooting, in the hope that if the elves wouldn’t talk to us, at least they’d talk to you.”
Ria said nothing. She was sure they probably would have taken her to the forest—after she was safely married to Cyril, and under heavy guard, and with Lady Rivkah ready to cast a spell to track her, if necessary.
“If you’d paid any attention to the historical accounts,” Lady Rivkah continued, “you’d have known that the Blue-eyes have been a hostile clan since long before the in
vasion. You might even have supposed that since they were so fierce and hostile, they might have expanded their territory in the sixteen years since the invasion, and since the border lands were often abandoned by other clans. You might have picked a safer spot to try to enter the forest.”
“I thought I’d use the road,” Ria said sullenly. “The same road you used.”
Lady Rivkah nodded.
“That wasn’t a bad idea,” she admitted. “It might have worked at one time. But Sharl has had the guards in the city looking for that road for years. They haven’t found it, and I imagine their poking around the edge of the forest hasn’t made the Blue-eyes any more hospitable.” She laid the jars of ointments neatly back on the tray. “Sharl and I agree that at this point our best course of action is to wait. Perhaps the elves will attempt to make contact with us. At least the Blue-eyes will have time to settle down a bit, and perhaps we can manage to learn the full extent of their territory so we can avoid it.”
Ria scowled and said nothing. Lord Sharl and Lady Rivkah could spare the time to wait; nobody was forcing them to marry against their will.
“I don’t have to be a thought-seer to know what that scowl is for,” Lady Rivkah said, shaking her head. “Ria, I can’t understand this attitude you’re taking. We’re not marrying you to some brutal monster; this is our son Cyril, and you’ve been friends all your life. It might make some sense if you’d found someone else, but we know you haven’t. Sharl and I have been hoping you’d eventually start showing a little maturity and responsibility. I think it’s disgraceful that we even have to think about steps such as confining you to your rooms and stationing guards to watch you. But if you insist on acting like a child, you’ll be treated like one.”
Ria fought hard to swallow an angry retort; she had nothing to gain by making her foster mother more annoyed than she already was, and nothing to say that would change Lady Rivkah’s mind.
“Perhaps your mother did make a mistake in giving you to us,” Lady Rivkah said unexpectedly. “I can’t imagine what mistake Sharl and I made in your raising to cause you to be so selfish. Ria, your mother’s folk lived centuries upon centuries, and you likely will, too. Is it so terribly much to ask that you spend a few decades of your life to give Allanmere a High Lady and an heir?”
“So when is the wedding?” Ria asked, trying to keep her voice level.
“Sharl had suggested month’s end,” Lady Rivkah said, and Ria’s heart sank. That was less than two weeks away. “But Cyril suggested that Allanmere has never had a midsummer festival, and that that would be a good occasion for a combined celebration. I think he’s right. That will give Lord Emaril’s supply ship time to reach Allanmere, and that’s a cause for celebration by itself.”
This time Ria found herself stifling a smile of triumph. Midsummer—almost a month away! Cyril must have truly meant what he’d said to her, and he was buying her time to think.
When Lady Rivkah had gone, Ria took the crutch from its place beside her bed and clumsily swung herself upright, hobbling slowly over to the window ledge where she could look out. Now the jumble of masonry and the tantalizing nearness of the forest seemed mocking in their false promise of hope. The forest might as well be leagues away for all she could reach it; even if her injured leg would bear her well enough to attempt the long walk and the climb over the wall, the guards would be watching for her, if indeed there weren’t any stationed outside her door! Cyril had promised to help, but somehow it felt wrong to ask him to find a way to smuggle her out—too much as if she was agreeing to some implicit bargain she wasn’t certain she was prepared to honor.
Ria suddenly yelped as her leg twinged painfully; looking down, she saw Jenji sitting on her foot, pawing at her ankle for attention. Ria hurriedly reached down and scooped up the chirrit before he could do any further damage.
“Mage’s familiar,” Ria grumbled. “What good does that do me if I’m no mage? It’d be nice if you could manage to give me a little magic.”
Jenji chittered agreeably, jumping to his favorite perch on Ria’s shoulder. Ria wondered idly if her don’t-see-me was actually magic or not; it seemed different, somehow, from the spells Lady Rivkah or Yvarden cast. Lady Rivkah had, of course, tested Ria when she was much younger, and if Ria had shown enough magical ability, she’d have been taught magic along with Cyril. Ria certainly didn’t cast any spells, not even gestures or chants. And she had no idea how to use a familiar anyway. But—but perhaps Cyril would.
Ria limped back to the bed and pulled the bell cord. There was no chance she was going to open that door and see if there were guards standing outside. It would be too humiliating if there were.
The maid told Ria that Cyril was at his studies, but that she’d see that he knew that Ria wished to see him. There was a bit of a smirk on the maid’s face when she delivered this announcement, and Ria wondered how much amusement the servants were enjoying at her expense thanks to her aborted escape attempt, recapture, and subsequent confinement. Ria privately resolved that that particular maid was first in line for a particularly nasty prank when Ria was up to running speed again. Then there was nothing to do but go back to bed and fume privately until Cyril came.
It was, in fact, suppertime before Cyril arrived, when he brought his supper and Ria’s on a tray.
“Marliss said you asked for me,” he said cheerfully. “So I thought I’d spare myself supper with my parents and the inevitable wedding plans.”
“Lady Rivkah said you were the one who suggested putting the wedding back to midsummer,” Ria said shyly. “Thank you.”
Cyril shrugged a little uncomfortably.
“Well, it is a better time,” he said. “Besides, how do you think I’d look if the only way I could get you to marry me is to have you dragged before the priest while you’re too crippled to get away?”
Ria poked disinterestedly at her fish baked in nut milk.
“Cyril, do you know any healing spells?” she asked.
“Well—” Cyril hesitated. “I have Mother’s grimoire, and there are healing spells in it. I just haven’t gotten that far in my studies. Why? Mother said your leg was healing well.”
“Well, it could be healed by now,” Ria said crossly. “And it hurts. And I can hardly walk. I know your mother’s angry with me, but I think it’s cruel to leave me unhealed just so she doesn’t have to worry that I’ll run away. If you have the spell, you can do it, can’t you?”
“Ria, it’s just not that simple,” Cyril protested. “Some spells don’t involve controlling as much magical force. Others are far more complex. I don’t know how difficult the healing spell is, and I won’t know until I try it, not unless I ask another mage. And my mother’s the expert on healing spells.”
“What if it’s too complex, and you do something wrong?” Ria asked cautiously.
“The spell might just not work,” Cyril said. “That’s if I’m lucky. Otherwise it could go wrong, do something I didn’t mean to do. I wouldn’t want that to happen, especially not on a healing spell on a person.”
Ria shivered. Even getting away from her wedding wasn’t worth being lamed for life.
“What about if you had a familiar?” Ria suggested.
Cyril started to shrug, then glanced at Jenji, his eyebrows raising.
“It’s not the same thing,” he said slowly. “I’ve studied the theory of familiars, and a properly trained familiar can channel some of the magical energies, freeing the mage to handle the rest. But that’s when a mage has been working with a familiar for a long time, maybe years. Still—”
“Still?” Ria prompted.
“Chirrits are intelligent,” Cyril said thoughtfully. “Mother used to say that her teacher’s chirrit could speak a little. If Jenji’s intelligent enough, it could work. But it still requires a preliminary spell initiating mental contact between the mage and the familiar, and another spell to set up the magical lattice for the framework of—”
“Huh?” Ria asked blankly.
“Sorry.” Cyril shrugged. “Anyway, working with a familiar takes two spells I also haven’t used. I know those spells are simple enough, though, because Yvarden’s talked about getting me a familiar. Mother wouldn’t have it. She calls them a poor mage’s crutch, despite the fact that her own teacher used one.”
“Well, I’m not offering you my chirrit to be your familiar,” Ria said hurriedly. “I just thought you might—well, borrow him.”
Cyril was silent for a moment, considering, but Ria could tell he was tempted. At last he shook his head slowly.
“I’ll give it a try,” he said. “I’ll need to study the spells, filch all the stuff I’ll need. Then I’ll try to link up with Jenji. If all that works, then I’ll try the healing spell.”
Ria was disappointed. “When?”
“Maybe tomorrow night,” Cyril said after another moment’s thought. “Yvarden will be working with the stonemasons rebuilding the wall tomorrow, so I’m to study on my own. She didn’t say what I had to study in particular. While she’s gone I can get the supplies I need. And depending on how difficult it is to set up a lattice between Jenji and me, I may not be able to do the healing spell until the next night.”
Ria stifled her disappointment. She’d hoped irrationally that Cyril could heal her that very moment, or at worst that night. But it wasn’t Cyril’s fault; he was only an apprentice mage, after all, and after what he’d told her, she’d much prefer him to take his time and do the spell properly.
As intrigued as Cyril might be by the possibilities of the use of a familiar, however temporary, he was not distracted from other concerns.
“Have you thought about what I said?” he asked with poorly feigned casualness.
