Shapeshifters

by Amelia Atwater-Rhodes

  The sky was well past dark and court had begun to tire when I politely followed Zane’s lead. I wanted to talk to him, but what would I say? I did care for him in a way; it had not only been a fear for the peace that had prompted me to drag the assassin away from him. But I knew that wary affection was not what he sought and would bring him little comfort.

  After several hours of tossing and turning in my own bed, I flew to the fifth floor and knocked lightly on Andreios’s door.

  Rei did not appear surprised to see me; he invited me into his study, bidding me to close the door behind me.

  “You’re worried about Zane,” he predicted before I attempted to raise the subject. I had confided in Rei most of my life; I valued his advice even more than my mother’s.

  “He’s been … tense for weeks,” I admitted, hedging around the real problem, “but never so moody as he was today. You two were speaking about something this morning, something that upset him. Can you tell me what?”

  “Fate,” Rei answered after a moment. I could tell that the conversation was eating away at him as surely as it had been Zane. He paused, took a moment to gather his words and then asked bluntly, “Do you love him?”

  The question startled me. “No.” I did not need to think about the answer, which sounded so brutal that I needed to add, “I do not hate him anymore, but love … I believe he deserves love. But I don’t know if I can be the one to give it.”

  “Do you trust him?”

  “I trust his intentions,” I answered, trying to be as honest as possible.

  “But do you trust him?” Rei pressed. “If you were falling, would you trust him to catch you? Would you trust him never to harm you, no matter what he could gain? Would you trust him to risk his own life for yours, without hesitation?”

  I had to shake my head.

  I respected Zane, which seemed odd, when for so many years I had only known his name as a curse. But I knew that while we danced with peace, we were both still prepared to fight. If I was falling, I trusted he would catch me—unless it was a choice between me or one of his own people. I trusted him to never harm me, because harming me would destroy this peace—unless I reneged on this deal and my death was necessary. As for risking his life for mine … his people needed a king.

  I found myself pacing in a most unladylike fashion. Then I stopped, not because Rei ever objected to my un-avian outbursts, but because I thought of Zane asking me not to hide.

  Rei sighed. “He said that you were passionate, that he was amazed by how much you could care even for someone you didn’t know but to fear.”

  “And he said,” Rei continued, as if the words came painfully to him, “that you deserved love. That you deserved someone … with whom you could cry or laugh without hiding your face.”

  I winced at the words, closing my eyes as they rocked me. I needed to speak to Zane. I might make a fool out of myself, but I needed to …. In the next moment I felt Rei’s arms around me, a warm comfort.

  “I love you.” He whispered the words against my hair like an apology, but within them was surrender. For him, the battle was already lost.

  I looked up, though I didn’t know what I wanted to say, and Rei’s lips gently caressed mine. Time hung suspended for long moments, during which my heart couldn’t decide whether to sink into my stomach or lodge in my throat, but then I started to pull away. Zane.

  The door opened behind me, and we jumped apart. I spun around, and heat flushed my cheeks as the expressions on both of the intruders’ faces made it very clear what they thought the situation to be.

  Karl quickly averted his eyes while he fought to control his shock. Adelina was furious.

  Karl spoke before any of us could. “She … I—” He swallowed heavily before deciding to ignore what he had seen and spoke to Rei. “Sir, Adelina is here. You wished to have her report to you immediately?”

  Adelina’s eyes flashed at Andreios. “I didn’t realize I’d be disturbing you.” Her voice was taut with anger. “Should I come back later?”

  “You didn’t interrupt anything,” Rei answered firmly. “Karl, please escort Shardae back to her rooms. Adelina, I can show you to your room if you would like to rest a bit, or you can have the full tour of the Keep now.”

  “I would prefer to know the layout of this place before I sleep,” Adelina replied caustically. “There seems to be no telling what goes on here.”

  I heard the words behind me as I walked out, suddenly feeling pale. Nothing had happened, and nothing would have happened, but I doubted Adelina would believe that.

  WE RETURNED TO THE SERPIENTE PALACE A few days later. I found myself watching Zane closely for signs that Adelina had told him what she had seen, but in the flurry of activity surrounding the upcoming holiday, she and the incident both seemed to fade into the background.

  I sought out the dancer A’isha during any free time I had, and she taught me a few simple steps, sensual and exotic dances that I doubted I would ever have the courage to perform—until the sun rose on the day of the fall equinox and the serpiente lands were suddenly perfumed with sweets and spices, and the air rippled with the sounds of flutes and two-toned drums.

  Unfortunately, the Namir-da was still far beyond me. A’isha’s words on the subject were, “Perhaps you might learn it, in more time. You have talent, but … not much practice.”

  Throughout the day, serpiente spilled into the marketplace, their bodies, skins and belongings decorated with enough color, scent and texture to boggle the mind.

  I had barely stepped into the market with Zane at my side before one of the dancers that A’isha and I had practiced with offered me a gold and crimson silk scarf called a melos, the ends of which were strung with dozens of tiny golden bells.

  According to A’isha, the melos was given to dancers as both praise for their skill and a request for a performance. Zane made a move as if to decline for me, not expecting me to know the meaning of the gift, but I tugged it from his grasp. Then I did a few steps from one from the dances I knew, and saw Zane’s eyes widen with shock.

  Laughing a little, I moved a few steps ahead; Zane answered the challenge, and within moments we had been ushered onto one of the many daises that stood in the market. Aside from A’isha, I had never performed for an audience before. Now I met Zane’s gaze and took a deep breath to steady myself.

  I inhaled the festive air of the Namir-da, and we danced.

  In a society that worships love, freedom and beauty, dance is sacred. It is a prayer for the future, a remembrance of the past and a joyful exclamation of thanks for the present.

  Zane and I danced several times in the marketplace throughout the day. When we ran out of dances I knew, we improvised. When we were hungry or thirsty, all we needed to do was step down from the stage and we were offered more than our fill.

  The day started to wane, and a circular dais was constructed in the synkal, ten paces across in every direction and a few inches higher than Zane could reach while standing on his toes. The dais had no railing, and as night fell it was lit only by the torches that burned on the floor all around it.

  Finally, as the last rays of the sunset faded, I took my seat with Charis at the back of the stage as Zane spoke to the assembled crowd. With words as vibrant as paintings, he told the story of Maeve and Kiesha, of the cult of Anhamirak, of Maeve’s seduction and of Leben’s gifts to her and her people.

  When he had finished, the doors opened in the back of the synkal. The children were escorted out to the market, where they would stay up late into the evening enjoying candies, games and magic.

  The adults stayed, and when the palace guard doused all the torches in the room but those around the dais, everyone turned to Irene and Galen as they prepared to dance—everyone except Charis.

  I felt her tense, but when I looked to her, she was staring off the stage at someone in the darkness. Abruptly she stood, dragging me up with her. Zane heard the movement and his head whipped around toward us.

  Ye
t every one of these actions was a second too late.

  I was struck with a pain so fierce I could not even cry out; a brutal tearing constricted my lungs and sent ripples of crimson across my vision.

  Charis collapsed beside me; I felt her weight on me, and I started to fall, but then Zane caught us both. In complete silence he carried us off the stage and into the relative safety of the hall.

  Beyond that, my memories are scattered.

  Zane’s telling the guard to make sure Irene and Galen were safe, and to lock the doors. The assassin was inside.

  Zane’s white face as he leaned over me, telling me I would be fine. Begging me to stay awake with him.

  Andreios’s normally bronzed skin, turned a sickly ashen green. His turning to Zane and shaking his head.

  “No.” Zane’s tone was flat, as if in shock. “That’s impossible.”

  Rei’s ordering, “Someone get him out of here.” The guards looking at each other, wondering who to obey. A figure being dragged away.

  “You can go to sleep now,” Irene said. She was still dressed in the glittering black and silver dress she had danced in. Her face was pale, and her hands were shaking.

  I slept, and when I woke next, the pain was less. There were bandages wrapped around my torso. Andreios was by my side.

  “Thank the sky you’re awake.”

  “I seem to keep being poisoned.” The words took all my scant air, and when I tried to draw a deep breath, the pain struck.

  “You’ll be okay,” Rei told me. “But it will take a while for you to heal. You’ve had a narrow escape—any higher, and the arrow would have hit your lung. Lower would have been just as bad.”

  “Arrow?”

  “It was avian-style, but it must have been shot from a serpiente bow—the wound is deep. You’ve been out for almost a full day now …. We weren’t sure you were ever going to wake.” On the last words his voice betrayed his fear.

  Suddenly my fuzzy mind put together those last painful moments. My mouth was dry when I asked, “Charis?”

  “It just barely nicked her arm, but …” He looked away. “She was unconscious before Zane carried the two of you to the hall, and she still hasn’t woken. I don’t think she will.”

  “Is Zane—” I stopped, needing to carefully draw more breath.

  “Sleeping, right now,” Rei answered. Wryly, he confessed, “The guard drugged him.”

  Someone knocked quietly on the door. “Come in,” Rei called. “She’s awake.”

  Irene Cobriana entered. Her steps dragged slightly, and her eyes were swollen as if she had been crying, but she held her head high.

  “Irene, you should be lying down,” Rei chastised lightly.

  “I can’t sleep anymore,” she answered. “I came to see how Danica was doing.”

  I tried a smile, but was not sure whether it worked. “Can’t get rid of me … that easily.”

  “Andreios was supposed to call me as soon as you were awake, but I suspected he wouldn’t,” Irene said, with what was supposed to be levity but did not quite make the mark. “If you think you can eat, there’s some rather unattractive green broth you’re supposed to try.”

  I looked at Rei, who nodded solemnly. “It’s very … healthy, I’m sure. The Keep and palace doctors worked together to concoct it. I suspect it will taste terrible.”

  He was correct.

  Lunch was another strange-colored liquid; this time it was gray. By dinnertime cooks had intervened, so it was a warm vegetable broth that the doctors had added their medicines to. It numbed the pain and allowed me to sleep.

  I woke at odd hours, ate what was forced upon me and then slept again.

  I had no idea how much time passed. I did not know what day it was when I finally woke to find Zane by my bedside.

  “Zane—”

  “How do you feel?”

  I paused to catalog my pains, which were few at that moment. There was a curious tingle around my injury, which I suspected would turn into a throbbing pain if I tried to move. “I don’t know.”

  Zane smiled wistfully, but then the expression faded. “My mother is dead,” he said without preamble. “She died last night.”

  I tried to form words, but nothing was enough. “She tried to save me,” I told him, knowing the words only spoke my own pain and could never heal his. “She tried to pull me out of the way.”

  “I know,” Zane answered, his voice dead of emotion. “If you had both remained seated, the arrow probably would have hit you in the throat, and then her in the side. It would have killed you both.

  “It doesn’t make any sense, you know,” Zane continued. “Even if they could have gotten into the synkal without being seen, and they didn’t intend for you to be hit, no loyal avian would have risked your life that way. And no one loyal to the Cobriana would have used poison that wouldn’t hurt you but would kill any of my family it nicked.”

  “Zane, are you all right?” Through the entire speech, his face had remained expressionless.

  “I’m quite sure I’m not,” he answered evenly. “But I’m alive, and uninjured, and—” I reached for his hand, and finally I heard his voice choke off, as his fragile shell cracked. “Danica, I’ve never been this frightened in my life.” The words spilled out in a flood of emotion. “The guard made the announcement about my mother this morning, and right now people are still in shock. I don’t know how they’ll respond when they wake up from it ….” He took a deep breath, and then said on a rush of air, “I think it must have been one of my guard who made the shot, or at least who organized it.”

  “What?” Instinctively I tried to sit up, and the pain returned abruptly, a spear driven into my gut, just below the left side of my ribcage.

  “Careful, Danica,” Zane cautioned, wincing.

  “Tell me … about the guard.” After that, he could get the doctors and they could drug me to sleep again, but first I wanted answers.

  “It would have been nearly impossible for an avian to be in the crowd unnoticed. Weapons aren’t allowed in the synkal anyway, and a serpiente bow is not easily concealed. Only one of my guards could have managed it.”

  “But the poison?” The question was short. Longer sentences took up more breath than I could get comfortably.

  Zane shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe they stole it.”

  “How?” As I asked the question, I knew the answer. Adelina and Ailbhe both had been to the Keep. Either of them could have sneaked a bow into the synkal. Either of them would have known when the lights would go out. “But Charis … They wouldn’t hurt her.”

  “There was bad blood between Adelina’s family and mine for generations. My mother was the first to allow one of them into the guard, the first to trust them, and for that they were more than grateful. I can’t imagine any of the guard being willing to hurt my mother, but I believe any one of them would before Adelina and Ailbhe.” Zane shook his head, running fingers restlessly through his hair. “Andreios tells me they weren’t allowed near the storeroom, anyway, and that the poison was too strong for them to have taken it from his people; it had to be mixed just for this occasion. Only someone in the Royal Flight would have had the access necessary to make the poison, but any of them would have used an avian bow. Besides, an avian who was willing to plot assassination would not have aimed at my mother; he would have gone for me.” He sighed and leaned against the bed, his entire frame drooping with fatigue. “As I said, it doesn’t make any sense.”

  My nurse, a shy little sparrow who had accompanied the Keep’s doctor here, interrupted us at that point. “Milady, would you like supper?” she asked politely.

  I tried to decline, but Zane would not let me. He sat on the opposite side of the bed and amused us with quaint stories as I swallowed every drop of the foul concoction. I was almost asleep before the nurse had closed the door behind her.

  Zane kissed my forehead lightly, as if I was a child. “Sleep, Danica.”

  THOUGH MY KIND HEALS AT A RATE THAT wo
uld seem miraculous to any human doctor, when one is bedridden, nothing ever seems fast enough.

  My mother was wary about coming to the palace herself and insisted that she needed to stay at the Keep, but she sent sparrow messengers at least once a day demanding reports on my progress. She also made sure that I had the best avian doctors in the land tending to me.

  Zane rarely left my side. Occasionally he would go out to the market while I slept and arrange for dancers, magicians and musicians to entertain me, but he was always beside me as I drifted into sleep and when I woke.

  Clothed in deep violet, the serpiente color of mourning, Zane was no less elegant than he had ever been. However, there was something fragile about his movements, a fatigue no amount of sleep could cure.

  Before his people, he put on a good front. Though somber, he still appeared strong and confident. I saw the mask every time someone came to visit me, and I watched it fall every time they left, as if it exhausted him to enact the play his position demanded.

  One evening I woke to a sound I could not quite place. When I finally recognized it, I felt a pain sharper then the arrow that had torn into me.

  Zane was crying. His back was to me, and he was leaning against the wall with his head in his hands. His shoulders shook as he tried not to make a sound.

  “Zane.”

  “I’m sorry.” His voice was muffled.

  “You’re allowed to cry.” He still didn’t turn toward me. “Zane, please, come here.”

  His chest rose and fell with each deep breath as he fought to gather his composure and put one foot in front of the other until he reached me.

  I pushed myself up, ignoring the twinge in my side. My pain was tolerable; his was not.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you,” he apologized again.

  Zane, whose face was smudged with shadows and wet with tears, hadn’t meant to wake me. I wondered when last he had slept a night through.