“Raids, at least. Skirmishes. Not like me.”
“But then, perhaps she’ll know the countryside better.”
“That could be,” Cathal said and turned back toward the path.
They were approaching a clearing now, smaller than the one where they’d gathered herbs and kissed, but still of decent size. The trees that ringed it were larger than the others she’d seen, and there was less snow on their trunks than those of their fellows. The snow on the ground was shallower too, and Sophia could actually spot patches of dirt and brown grass. As they got closer, those patches shaped themselves into patterns: too smudged at the edges to be very clear, but definitely the marks of something large.
“Stand there,” Cathal said and left her side to walk into the middle of the grove. “I’ll not hurt you. You’ve my word on that. I’ll ask yours now, that you won’t scream or run.”
“I swear it,” Sophia said, raising a hand and not quite holding her breath.
She did her best to keep looking at Cathal while he changed. Only a handful of people in any generation likely saw the transformation, if that many. She would probably never have the chance to do so again in her life, and she wanted to etch every detail into her brain. Sophia clasped her hands and watched, intending not even to blink if she could help it, and not to look away no matter how grisly the process.
Watching was harder than she’d expected, and without a drop of blood or a glimpse of bone. Cathal shifting wasn’t revolting, it was simply…difficult to watch. Part of the hardship was speed, for his form changed very quickly. The rest was that the human eye didn’t want to follow what happened. She remembered the things beyond in the beginning of her nightmare. The change of form was a lesser version, a little more comprehensible and not exactly painful to look at.
Realizing the implication there made Sophia wrap her arms around herself for protection, or perhaps only to reassure herself that she was still solid flesh.
What she did see was a blurred series of images. The closest thing in the mortal world that Sophia could think of was the way air shimmered on a hot day. Cathal stood in front of her, handsome and human. The air waved and fractured. His outline bent at the edges, not to accommodate any concrete change of bodily form but reflecting light outward in rays, like a mirror.
A gust of wind blew suddenly past her. The air had been still, with only the faintest of breezes, but this was strong enough to send her cloak billowing out behind her and her skirt with it, to snatch pins from her hair and bring tears to her eyes. And it was hot. Sophia felt for those few moments as if she’d just stepped into the kitchens.
The hair on her arms and the back of her neck stood up. For only a second, there was a low humming in her ears.
Then Cathal wasn’t standing in front of her any longer—not the way she knew him. The air stopped shimmering, and she could look at him again, but her mind, even hers, even as prepared as she had been, stuttered and produced only impressions.
Scales: dark green, almost the color of the evergreens around them. Shiny. Claws: the size of her hand. Tail: spiked and pointed at the end. Wings: wide, bat-like. Head: horns, squarish muzzle, huge eyes without pupils, the same lighter green as Cathal’s eyes in human form. Huge: three or four times the size of the largest warhorse Sophia had seen.
Dragon. The word felt strange at first, not quite connected properly to the creature in front of her. She’d never truly thought to see one, she realized, and certainly not up close and living. The pages of bestiaries had done very little justice. Dragon, she thought again, and this time it seemed to make more sense. Cathal.
Unmoving, he watched her, and she thought he was waiting to see what she did next, if she would keep her word. Until that moment, it hadn’t occurred to her that she might not.
Stepping toward him did raise a touch of unease, the same kind of gut-and-spine wariness that one felt when looking down over a high precipice—even if the ground was stable and the edge a way off—and just as easy to ignore. She was not her body; she was its mistress, and not vice versa.
“Are all of you this large?” she asked.
In response, Cathal stared at her. Then his back rippled, puzzling Sophia briefly. When she realized that the movement was his attempt at a shrug, she realized a more important fact as well. “You’re not capable of speech in this form, are you?”
The great head swung back and forth.
She had to laugh. “One of us, perchance, could have thought to broach that subject beforehand, could we not? Oh well…I’m more attentive to detail in my experiments, I promise you.”
Laughter rumbled through Cathal’s chest. Sophia supposed it was laughter, at any rate, and devoutly hoped so. Taking another step forward, she clasped her hands behind her back and studied him, beginning to walk a circle in order to get a better look.
Her mind had immediately jumped to warhorses, the largest animals she’d seen at all close to her, for comparison. In truth, Cathal’s dragon form was shaped more like an outsize dog or cat, closer to the ground and built to spring. Predatory, of course: she’d seen the results of that after his hunt, and the claws, large as they were, looked very sharp. So did the teeth. The tail, currently still behind him, was long and articulated; she could see it snapping around like a whip, but with far greater force than a man’s arm could provide.
Circling, she examined his wings, now folded at his sides. Without scales, they still had thicker skin than a bat’s and a sheen of their own where the sun caught them. The geometry was difficult, especially in her mind, but she thought that, extended, they’d fill half the clearing. “You are,” Sophia said thoughtfully, emboldened by Cathal’s silence, “a terribly vast creature. And yet…lack of ambition isn’t the only check on your kind, is it? I would wager there are beings as powerful, or greater.”
He nodded, a motion like the swaying of the great pines in the wind.
“But then, there would have to be, of course,” she said, wrinkling her nose at her own lack of thought and going on. “But worldly beings, or as worldly as you are.”
Now she was coming back around, by the other side of his face. Around his eyes and his mouth, the scales lightened in color, becoming a gold-green like spring leaves, and they were smaller. They still looked both shiny and hard, though.
On impulse, she held out a hand, near the base of his head but not yet touching him. “May I?”
Cathal swung his head around to look at her: startled, maybe? Thoughtful? She couldn’t tell. Then he nodded again.
Feeling slightly embarrassed, Sophia closed the distance between them and laid her palm on his neck. The scales were smooth beneath her fingers, and very warm—well, that stood to reason. “Does it… Do you feel that?”
Again he made an attempt at shrugging and finished by shaking his head: not really.
She smiled. “It’s no wonder that you don’t wound easily.” One shape, of course, lent its qualities to the other, and Cathal’s dragon form looked as if nothing but a mounted charge would have left any impression.
Stepping back, she folded her arms again. “It begins to feel awkward,” she said, “when you can’t speak. If we were to do this often, we would likely need to make a series of signs.” Then she felt ridiculous—of course they wouldn’t do this often. Why would they? Sophia fought the urge to look away. “If you don’t wish to change back, of course… That is to say, I could find my way back to the castle by myself, most likely, or wait out here, as you prefer. You could, ah, cough once for the former option or twice for the latter, or—”
The world blurred again. The transformation seemed faster the other way around, though that might have only been because Sophia wasn’t trying to watch this time. She saw a shimmer; then she saw Cathal, running a hand through his tawny hair and half smiling, as if surprised by the last few minutes.
“Truly,” she said, laughing, “if either of us is to look so astounde
d, I would claim the right far sooner than you.”
“You do.” Cathal crossed the distance between them and put a hand under her chin, tilting it up so that he could look into her eyes. “You did.”
The pose and the touch were both most improper. Sophia made no objection. Her whole body hummed with feeling, and even drawing breath to answer made her aware of Cathal’s scent—metal, leather, and wine, woodsmoke and man—and of the way her breasts rose and fell with the action. Cathal didn’t watch them, though. His eyes stayed fixed on hers.
“And?” she asked, breathless, struggling to find words. “Is there any wonder in that?”
“You weren’t afraid.”
“Oh.” She was slow to grasp the sense of it, and when she did, it made her laugh—and she laughed more as he looked startled again. Not all of the humor was pleasant. “My lord MacAlasdair, you’re a Christian, a man, and a lord of men. This place is yours, and more than remote. What danger would your malice hold for me in that form that it wouldn’t in this?” She touched the sleeve of his tunic.
The touch or the thought, or both, held him frozen for a moment, eyes narrowed. The hand on her chin tightened, not unpleasantly, and then quickly dropped back to Cathal’s side. “Truly?”
Sophia shrugged. “Fire might be less pleasant from a dragon than from a mob, I suppose. Claws or teeth might hurt more than the edge of a blade. I cannot say I’ve heard much comparison, and I doubt I’d have much time to make it.” Reluctantly, she stepped back, away from his touch. “And I think we should be returning.”
“Yes. Duties.” He shook his head, like a dog shaking off water, and bent down to the edge of the spot where he’d lain as a dragon. Turning back to her, he held out his cupped hands, with three green scales in the midst. “Here.”
“Truly?” It was her turn to ask, but Sophia was reaching for them as soon as she saw them. She thought of experiments, of the plans she’d made before reaching Loch Arach and the possibilities that they might open for Fergus.
She stopped, looking at Cathal and waiting for his answer.
“There are always a few after we transform. Usually we bury them.” He shrugged quickly. “I’ve owed you these for a while.”
Nineteen
After that, Cathal kept thinking about danger. He’d thought he understood it, both the rare instances when it applied to him and the more general principles of keeping the mortals in his charge safe. He knew his responsibilities; he’d done his best as a soldier and then as a lord to fulfill them.
He hadn’t considered what it must be to be always at risk, even without weapons drawn or battle declared, even without a specific enemy. Consciously putting himself in harm’s way was familiar—that was the duty of everyone from a general to a pikeman—but living in harm’s way as a part of life, one that he’d never signed up for save for being born, that he could barely grasp.
When Sophia came to him and told him of her second nightmare, she was composed, almost as detached and interested as she had been when speaking of her alchemical experiments. She stood in the hall with her hands clasped in front of her, a small, neat figure in black like the queen on a chessboard, and told Cathal about the same fall-through blackness that she’d experienced before, the same forest and shadowy creatures.
“I ran more quickly this time,” she said with a little smile, “and the branch held my weight much better than it had done before. And I believe these things to have been reflections of my will. But that was not the real test.”
Around them, the life of the castle went on. A few of the servants walked around them; a few others glanced their way before continuing, unconcerned, with their duties; one or two of Cathal’s men-at-arms lurked further out in the hall, playing dice with one of the stableboys. Cathal noticed these things with the edges of his mind, the part of him that had over long years learned to take a high-up view of any situation, lest it suddenly turn violent. The rest of him saw only Sophia’s smile.
“You see, one of them grabbed for me as I climbed. Like it did before, you know…reaching for my ankle. I could have moved more quickly, I suppose,” she admitted with another quick smile that chilled Cathal, “but I wanted to confirm my theory. So I let it reach, and then I pushed it away, or back, with my mind.”
“And?” he asked.
It wasn’t a bad idea. In his time he’d ordered men to scout enemy territory or to expose themselves in order to draw off ambushes. He couldn’t justify objections. Sophia was being intelligent, as usual. Cathal forced his hands to uncurl and listen.
Her third smile was downright brilliant. “It worked. The shadow-thing staggered a little bit even, and its arm dropped back down. And then, when I reached the top of the tree and could go no further, I woke myself up without Alice.”
“Good. That’s very good.”
Sophia nodded. “I couldn’t make the shadow-things vanish, nor give myself more of a road, but that’s to be expected. I think perhaps if I had more information, or perhaps just more practice… And I begin to have some theories about the space through which I fall too. It might the World of Causes, or perhaps the World of Making, but”—she bit her lip—“I am not permitted to know as much about those. It certainly resembles a place one of the Mussulmen told me about, between life and death. A place where the soul and the body are separate. I don’t think it’s only a dream.”
“Then your soul’s being drawn elsewhere,” he said flatly.
“I believe so. We already know that Valerius can do this. Perhaps the forest is a trap of his shaping, or at least initially. But anything constructed in that other world must, I think, be vulnerable to…” She hesitated, brow wrinkling as she tried to put it into words, or perhaps to translate it for a simple-minded layman. “If he’s learned to influence the…the world of souls, it says a great deal for his power, but…it’s a world, yes? And it’s not entirely his. It’s as though he built a keep there, and anything built may be overcome, or at least infiltrated.”
Her face, turned up to his, was almost shining, her eyes large and filled with the wonder of new discoveries.
“Plenty of men die,” Cathal said, “trying to take keeps.”
“All men die in the end. All women too.” She gave him a gentler look then. “But I will be careful. I’ve no wish to perish just now. There are my experiments, and Fergus, and…” Sophia stopped and for the first time in their conversation looked disconcerted, her cheeks turning red and her long lashes dropping over her eyes. “And I have a great deal more to learn, I expect. But it is a good sign, don’t you think?”
“It is,” said Cathal, and he smiled back at her for the first time, unable to deny either her logic or her enthusiasm.
It was well, he thought, that they stood in the middle of the hall, and that there were plenty of people around who would see and comment. It kept him from cupping Sophia’s face in his hands and kissing her, or from pulling her into his embrace and proving her wholeness and her safety to himself in the most direct way imaginable.
When he let himself be drawn away, he ached for her, his cock hard and barely concealed by robes and hose, his heart wondering at her courage and at the sort of vision that saw and rejoiced at knowledge even in the midst of peril. Neither would find satisfaction—she was not for him, and she had pulled away since that afternoon in the forest, their conversation having perhaps made her newly aware of that—but Cathal looked over his shoulder and stole a last glance at her, treasuring it throughout the rest of his day’s errands.
Sleep took a long time to come that night. He knew Valerius likely had to wait between his attacks. He was glad that Sophia could fend them off, and that every nightmare held potential advantage to them now. He closed his eyes and saw Sophia’s face, calm and still with sleep: not a helpless target, but a target nonetheless.
War was much easier.
It was amusing, in its way, that the next development c
ame during one of the few hours when Cathal wasn’t thinking of Sophia at all. He was sitting with his steward, going through the long and tedious process of accounts and plans—so much grain, so many beasts, laying in fish for Lent, anticipating the soon-to-come day in spring when the villagers would meet him to submit their taxes.
At first, Cathal thought the touch of cold air near his face was simply a draft. Then he heard the faint sound of music, too soft for mortal hearing to catch: the signal they’d trained into the air spirits for times when they shouldn’t simply appear. A message awaited him, almost certainly from one of his family.
He kept his mind on the task at hand and even believed himself to make a good job of it, but it was fortunate that the conference had been winding to a close already—fortunate too that he didn’t know the source of the message. Once freed, he made his way up to the roof, read Moiread’s name on the parchment, and shouted with relief.
Her hand was as plain as ever, and her wording as sparse. She started by admitting that she’d probably be home soon. She cursed Artair and Douglas affectionately, the rest of the surrendering lords less so, the concept of diplomacy in general boldly, and the English in terms that should have burned holes in the page, using language Cathal had mostly heard in taverns and surgeons’ tents.
But we did as well as we could. You gave me good men and, by the grace of God and my own wit, I’ll be bringing most of them home alive. Unless the bloody English drop the sky on us after I finish this letter, that is.
I mentioned your “Valerius” to the prisoners.
Yes, I gave quarter. I can see you looking doubtful, and I’ll clout you for it when next we meet. I’m only merciless where family’s concerned.
A couple had heard of the man. Runs a muster of the worst scum you can find outside the hangman’s noose. A few of those are as uncanny as you say. He can summon hellfire with a gesture, might ride with the devil himself. I doubt the last one. The English think too much of themselves. No decent man wants to serve under Valerius, and even Longshanks keeps him well away from court. You don’t hold a brand too close to your body.
Highland Dragon Warrior Page 13
