Fey 02 - Changeling

by Rusch, Kristine Kathryn

  "Jewel doesn't care if we die for her," Veil said.

  "No," Burden said. "But I do."

  THIRTY-NINE

  Arianna slept in her crib, tiny fist pressed against her cheek, her breathing soft and regular. Solanda sat on the windowsill, her long legs extending to the floor, the robe she wore warm. The sill was not comfortable when she was Fey, but she had no choice. Arianna was the most playful baby she had ever seen. The girl Shifted on a moment's notice, and not all of her Shifts were part of the same animal. Mostly she had Shifted into a cat, like Solanda, but once, she had mimicked the tree outside her window, and another time she had tried fire.

  Solanda had stopped that one quickly, but not before the baby blanket was scorched. She had sent the nurse in search of another blanket, and the nurse had brought back Domestic weaves which Jewel must have gotten for the lump. The weaves kept Arianna calmer, but didn't stop her from experimenting.

  No wonder so many Shifters died in their first weeks of life. Their own mothers strangled them from frustration.

  Fortunately the late morning was clear and cool. The air was refreshing. Solanda had let the fire burn out, and she had turned the crib so that Arianna only saw blank wall when she was alone.

  Although Solanda didn't know if that was the answer either. She worried that Arianna would turn to stone if given the chance.

  But at least Solanda had a momentary reprieve. The nurse and the lump had left the nursery, to visit the garden and enjoy the sunshine. Solanda had let them go. She could only be feline so long and pretend that no one else existed. At times she absolutely had to be alone.

  With Arianna asleep, this was as alone as she would get.

  Solanda leaned her head against the chill stone of the window frame. The depth of her own loyalty surprised her. Normally, once the frustration of any task started, she left. But although the frustration, the hours, and the confinement wearied her, she had no real desire to leave. Her destiny was tied to this child. She would stay at Arianna's side as long as necessary.

  Suddenly the door opened. Solanda was on her feet beside the crib almost before the door swung against the wall.

  "You have no right —" she started and then stopped herself.

  The Shaman stood at the door.

  "No right to be here?" The Shaman asked. She looked twice as old as she had a few days before. Jewel's death had affected them all.

  "Forgive me," Solanda said. "I didn't know it was you." The Shaman's presence had Solanda's heart pounding. The Shaman never left Shadowlands without a good reason, never came visiting without notice, never appeared suddenly for fear of her own life.

  "I came to see the child," the Shaman said. She entered the room and closed the door. The Shaman's walk was slow, her skin ashen. Perhaps more was happening here than Jewel's death.

  "Are you all right?" Solanda asked.

  The Shaman smiled. "I'm fine, child, and relieved you are here with Arianna."

  Solanda almost asked how the Shaman knew the baby's name, then paused. Of course the Shaman knew. The Shaman knew everything.

  The Shaman peered into the crib. Arianna looked like a little innocent, docile and undemanding. Her cheeks were flushed with sleep, her long lashes resting on her dark tan skin. She was one of the most beautiful children Solanda had ever seen — and Solanda had seen a lot of children over the years.

  "She's stunning," the Shaman said.

  "When she's asleep," Solanda said.

  "Chafing already?" The Shaman had a bit of judgment in her tone. Didn't any of the Fey believe Solanda could be constant? She could. She could do any task they asked of her. The problem was that they never really asked.

  "I can't leave her side," Solanda said. "She Shifts at whim."

  The Shaman tucked the blanket under the baby's chin. "A morning or two to yourself wouldn't matter," she said.

  "It would," Solanda said, "if she Shifted while I was gone."

  "You worry too much, child. Shifters have grown without round-the-clock care."

  Shifters had grown. Of course they had. But they weren't like Arianna. Solanda didn't know how she would convince the Shaman of that. The Shaman clearly didn't listen to what Solanda was saying.

  The Shaman's gnarled fingers played with the baby blanket. Arianna was so tiny. It was so hard to believe something that small could totally control another person's life.

  "I don't complain too much," Solanda said. She walked to the corner, picked up the burned blanket and tossed it at the Shaman. The Shaman caught it with her other hand. She gazed at it for a moment, noted the brown tinged holes through the middle and ran her fingers along them. "Last night, she was fire. A day before that, she was half cat --the wrong half. A day before that, water. She Shifts whenever she's awake, and she does so based on what she sees. You and I may think she is too young for this, but the fact is that she does it. The Islander nurse and I guard her. I can only sleep when the nurse is in the room."

  The Shaman let the burned blanket fall to the floor. She bent over the crib until her face was as close to Arianna's as she dared. She touched the baby's cheek. Arianna cooed, and brushed at the Shaman's finger with her small hand.

  "Don't wake her," Solanda said softly.

  The Shaman stood, wonder on her ancient face. "She hums with magic. It flows around and through her as if she were the bed for a river."

  "Please don't give her that image," Solanda said tiredly. "She might try it."

  The Shaman walked to the window. Her back was bowed. She looked out. "The garden extends around the palace?" She sounded surprised.

  "It's large," Solanda said, wondering at the Shaman's change of subject.

  The Shaman placed her hands flat on the sill and stared out, much as Solanda had been doing the last few days. "It seems that the wild magic here is stronger than we thought."

  "I know," Solanda said.

  "It will require a deep commitment from you, one that will last until this child can control her Shifts and maybe beyond."

  Solanda said nothing. She didn't have to. She had already made the commitment in her heart.

  "You cannot allow this child into Shadowlands," the Shaman said.

  "I may not be able to control that," Solanda said. "She already has a mind of her own."

  "Never," the Shaman said. "It will ruin us all."

  "If she can't go there," Solanda said, "then I need help here. I need a Domestic, someone to assist me. The Islander nurse tries, but what if I'm asleep and Arianna decides to become fire again?"

  The Shaman sighed and pulled away from the window. "You will have to trust in the Powers and Mysteries," she said. "They gave you to Arianna. You are up to the task."

  "I did not ask for this duty," Solanda said.

  "You were destined for it the moment you boarded a ship for Blue Isle," The Shaman said.

  "I had no choice in boarding," Solanda said.

  The Shaman stared at her for a moment. "No," she said. "I suppose you did not. But you need to make choices now."

  Solanda shook her head. "You just told me I had no choice."

  The Shaman leaned against the sill as Solanda had been doing earlier. "We are not speaking of Arianna now. We're speaking of Rugar. You can no longer do as he says."

  Solanda smoothed the hair on Arianna's forehead. The girl's skin was warm with sleep. "He doesn't know I'm here. I won't come back when he calls."

  "I know, child, but it is more than that. He will try to steal Arianna to Shadowlands as he did her brother. He cannot succeed."

  "Why can't she go to Shadowlands? She is part Fey."

  The Shaman stared at Solanda for a moment. A flush built in Solanda's cheeks. She had asked a rude question of the Shaman. The Shaman often spoke in riddles. It was the duty of the Fey to abide by those riddles, not to question the riddles, but to live with the future that the Shaman spoke of, to allow the Shaman to lead in the small, yet important things.

  Then the Shaman reached up and pulled the tapestry over
the window. She went to the other two windows and did the same, leaving the room in darkness. Only the glow of the fireplace provided any light at all.

  The Shaman walked toward it and sat beside it, her face in profile. "I am a young Shaman," she said, "far from my peers and learning as best I can. Jewel died because I was not clear to her father about his role in the future of the Fey. I will be as clear to you as I know how. On some of this I do not have clarity. I have only knowledge."

  Solanda stayed beside the crib, unwilling to leave Arianna unguarded in the darkness. Once, in a Shift, Arianna had made no noise at all.

  "Arianna is a Shape-Shifter, born to a Visionary. Such a birth is rare, but would be thought part of the Mysteries if not for two other things. Her brother had his first Vision this year, and nearly died with his mother, so their Link was strong. He was saved by the child you rescued."

  "Coulter?" Solanda asked. She remembered the trail of grief she had followed, the trail Coulter had left when he was not much older than Arianna, a trail he hoped would guide his parents to him. His parents had died the same day he was rescued by a kind old woman whose heart Solanda shattered. One of the few completely cruel acts Solanda had ever committed, and the only one she regretted.

  "The boy has the ability to Enchant."

  "But he's not Fey."

  "Exactly," the Shaman said. "We have traveled halfway across the world before we meet a people like our own."

  "But they can't Shift. They have no Doppelgängers or Warders."

  "They have no need," the Shaman said. "They are the most protected peoples we ever encountered. They only had to defend themselves against each other. They did that through their religion."

  "The poison," Solanda said.

  "And their god, the Roca."

  "He isn't a god," Solanda said. "But a man they claim was Beloved of God."

  "Who ascended, but still lived."

  "Like a Power," Solanda said as the realization sank in.

  "Which creates a Mystery we may never solve."

  The baby sighed and rolled over in her sleep. Solanda kept a finger on the baby's shoulder, to make certain nothing changed when she wasn't paying attention.

  "But if they're like us," she said, "then this child is not unusual."

  The Shaman bowed her head. "If the races intermingle, we will have even more powerful children."

  "So we should be encouraging that," Solanda said. "We are always to follow the magic."

  "As long as we have the approval of the Black Throne," the Shaman said.

  "The Black King is in Nye. We don't need his approval."

  "Then the approval falls to his son."

  Her words hung in the room. A log snapped in the dying fire and sparks scattered like red Wisps.

  "Rugar doesn't understand this, does he?" Solanda asked quietly.

  "Rugar is a warrior," the Shaman said. Her hair caught the firelight like cobwebs. She might be a young Shaman, but she was an old woman, with an old body that was carrying the weight of Fey on its shoulders.

  "Rugar has always been a warrior," Solanda said. "But you no longer trust him."

  "I —" the Shaman's voice broke. She turned her head away from Solanda, toward the fire. "I never trusted him. Never. I only came along because I could not get out of it. I was the youngest of the Shaman, and the Black King decreed that one had to go on this trip."

  "Do you think he knew that Rugar was Blind?"

  "I think he knew that we would be trapped on Blue Isle," the Shaman said.

  Solanda shuddered. No wonder Rugad had opposed Jewel's travel here. No wonder he had let Rugar go so easily. No wonder he had insisted that Solanda come as well. "Does he know, then, of Arianna?"

  "I can only guess," the Shaman said. "And my guess is that he could not See past the loss of Rugar. If the Black King had known of the magic here, he would have come himself."

  "But to send his own son away, to almost certain death …" Solanda shook her head. "It seems wrong somehow."

  "It's been done before."

  The Shaman spoke softly. It had only been done a handful of times before, each time to prevent the Blood turning on itself. Murder within the Black King's family, his legitimate family, was unspeakable.

  "You don't think Rugar's crazy enough to kill for the Black Throne, do you?" Solanda asked.

  "What I think doesn't matter," the Shaman said. "What the Black King thinks is all that is important."

  Solanda longed to pick up Arianna and hold her tightly. Instead, she wrapped her forefinger around the baby's fist. "So Rugar truly didn't care when we thought Gift died. And all he wants Arianna for is her power."

  "And what she can give him." The Shaman folded her hands together and looked away from the fire. The side of her face nearest Solanda was in darkness. The Shaman appeared to be a shadow of herself, surrounded by a halo of light.

  "But if he's Blind, she can't give him anything," Solanda said.

  "She's a baby. He can make her what he wants. That's the power of adulthood. If he has that powerful little soul to mold, her brother who is already his toy, and the Islander Enchanter, he will have more power than I do, more power than anyone else on this Isle, and probably more power than his father. Even now, he may have too much power. But that baby would make matters worse."

  "So let me steal Gift from Shadowlands," Solanda said. "Nicholas will care for him."

  The Shaman shook her head. "Jewel should have stolen the child back, but she never Saw what happened. I Saw it, but I did nothing. Another of my mistakes. Gift has lived three years among the Fey. He is Fey now. All my Visions of him show that he cannot leave Shadowlands."

  Solanda was silent. It always felt wrong to be near the lump. It would have been nice to tell Nicholas, to bring the real child here. But if the Shaman said Gift belonged in Shadowlands, then in Shadowlands he would stay.

  The Shaman apparently took Solanda's silence for disapproval. "The boy has already given his Visions to his grandfather," the Shaman said softly. "We have no idea what Rugar has learned. All we can hope for is that he never holds Arianna, that she never speaks to him, that she never even sees him."

  The baby stirred, as if the words had disturbed her. They certainly disturbed Solanda. "Shamans are supposed to support the Black Throne," Solanda said. "You should be helping Rugar."

  "Rugar's father cast him from the Black Throne. Rugar lost all of my support when he allowed Jewel to die. My support now goes to the heirs to the Throne."

  "Jewel's brothers are in line," Solanda said.

  "Jewel's brothers don't stand a chance if the Black King learns of Arianna's powers," the Shaman said. "Jewel had more potential than anyone born into Rugad's family. Jewel had no powers at all when compared with her own children."

  "She made the right choice then when she married Nicholas."

  The Shaman nodded. "Who knew how her Vision led her, but it led her to the best place possible. If Rugar had let King Alexander live, we would already be in a better world."

  "Jewel could never have tended this child," Solanda said.

  "You never got along with Jewel," The Shaman said.

  Enough. Solanda had heard enough. She had been giving everything to Arianna. "I have had to Shift twice in order to save this child. Jewel could never have done that. Without you, without the Domestics, and with only Island healers, Arianna would have died in the middle of her birth and you know that."

  "Are you saying Jewel's death was the wish of the Powers?"

  Solanda paused. She wasn't certain if she was saying that. She thought for a moment, rubbing her thumb against the soft skin of Arianna's wrist.

  "No," Solanda finally said. "I'm saying that the Powers decreed that we could have Jewel or Arianna. We were not allowed to make that choice. But Rugar made it for us."

  "Do you think he made the right choice?" The Shaman sounded subdued, as if she were testing Solanda.

  Solanda bent over and kissed Arianna's head. If Rugar hadn't made th
at choice, Arianna would not exist. But if Rugar hadn't made that choice, Solanda would still have her freedom.

  "How do you value one life over another?" Solanda asked. "Jewel is dead. We cannot change that. Arianna is alive. We must make sure she remains that way."

  "Exactly," the Shaman said. "We must forever keep Rugar from this child."

  Arianna's grip had tightened on Solanda's finger. She wished it weren't so dark. She couldn't tell if the baby was awake or not. But the Shaman had closed down the room so that no one would hear them talk, and to make conversation easier. Confidences were always easy in the dark.