Winds Of Fate

*Chapter Fourteen ELSPETH

Kata'shin'a'in was a city of tents.

At least that was the way it looked to Elspeth as she and Skif approached it. They had watched it grow in the distance, and she had wondered at first what it was that was so very odd about it; it looked wrong somehow, as if something about it was so wildly different from any other city she had ever seen, that her mind would not accept it.

Then she realized what it was that bothered her; the colors. The city was nothing but a mass of tiny, brightly-colored dots. She could not imagine what could be causing that effect-was every roof in the city painted a different color? And why would anyone do something as odd as that? Why paint roofs at all? What was the point?

As they neared, the dots resolved themselves into flat conical shapes which again seemed very strange.

Brightly colored, conical roofs? What kind of odd building would have a conical roof?

Then she realized: they weren't buildings at all, those were tents she was looking at. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of tents.

Now she understood why Quenten had said that Kata'shin'a'in "dried up and blew away" in the winter. Somewhere amidst all that colored canvas there must be a core city, with solid buildings, and presumably inns and caravansaries.

But most of the city was made up of the tents of merchants, and when trading season was over, the merchants departed, leaving behind nothing at all.

She glanced over at Skif, who was eyeing the city with a frown.

"What's the matter?" she asked.

"Just how are we ever going to find the Tale'sedrin in there?" he grumbled. "Look at that! There's no kind of organization at all-"

"That we can see," she interrupted. "Believe me, there's organization in there, and once we find an inn, we'll find someone to explain it to us.

If there wasn't any way of organizing things, no one would ever get any business done, they'd be spending all their time running around trying to find each other. And when in your entire life have you ever known a successful disorganized trader?" His frown faded. "You have a point," he admitted.

"I don't like this," complained Gwena.

"I am perfectly well aware that you don't like this," Elspeth replied crisply.

"I think this is a mistake. A major mistake. It's still not too late to turn back." Elspeth did not reply, prompting Gwena to continue. "If you turned around now, we could be in Lythecare in-" Elspeth's patience finally snapped, and so did the temper she had been holding carefully in check. "Dammit, I told you I won't be ~ into doing something, like I was the gods' own sheep! I don't believe in Fate or Destiny, and I'm not going to let you lot move me around your own private chessboard! I will do this my way, or I won't do it at all, and you and everyone else can just find yourself another Questing Hero! Do you understand me?" Her only answer was a deep, throaty chuckle, and that was absolutely the final insult. She was perfectly ready to jump out of the saddle and walk to Kata'shin'a'in at that point.

"And. Don't. Laugh. At. Me!" she snarled, biting off each mental word and framing them as single words, instead of an entire thought, so that her anger and her meaning couldn't possibly be misunderstood.

Absolute mental silence; then Gwena replied-timidly, as Elspeth had never heard her speak in her life with her Companion, "But I wasn't laughing." Her temper cooled immediately. She blinked.

It hadn't really sounded like Gwena. And she'd never known a Companion to lie. So if it wasn't Gwena who was it?" she asked. "If it wasn't you, who was it?"

"I-: Gwena replied hesitatingly, lagging back a little as Skif rode on ahead, blithely oblivious to what was going on behind him. "I-don't know." A chill crept down Elspeth's spine; she and Gwena immediately snapped up their defensive shields, and from behind their protection, she Searched all around her for someone who could have been eavesdropping on them. It wasn't Skif; that much she knew for certain. The mind-voice had a feminine quality to it that could not have been counterfeited.

And it wasn't Cymry, Skif's Companion; other Companions had only spoken to her once, the night of Talia's rescue. She could not believe that if any of them did so again that it would be for something so petty as to laugh at her. that was as unlikely as a Companion lying.

And besides, if it had been Cymry, Gwena would have recognized her mind-voice and said something.

Kata'shin'a'in stood on relatively treeless ground, in the midst of rolling plains. While there were others within Mindhearing distance-there were caravans both in front of and behind them-there was no one near.

Certainly not near enough to have provoked the feeling of intimacy that chuckle had.

In fact, it was incredibly quiet, except for the little buzz of ordinary folk's thoughts, like the drone of insects in a field.

The chill spread from her spine to the pit of her stomach, and she involuntarily clutched her hand on the hilt of her sword.

"You-: said a slow, sleepy mind-voice gravelly and dusty with disuse as she and Gwena froze in their places. "Child. You are... very like... my little student Wlyana. Long ago... so very, very long ago." And as the last word died in her mind, Elspeth gulped; her mind churned with a chaotic mix of disbelief, astonishment, awe, and a little fear.

It had been the sword that had spoken.

Skif looked back over his shoulder. "Hey!" he shouted, "Aren't you coming? You're the one who wanted to go here in the first place." But something about their pose or their expressions caught his attention, and Cymry trotted back toward them. As he neared them, his eyebrows rose in alarm.

"What's wrong?" he asked urgently. Then, when Elspeth didn't immediately reply, he brought Cymry in knee-to-knee with her and reaching out, took her shoulders to shake her. "Come on, snap out of it!

What's wrong? Elspeth!" She shook her head, and pushed him away. "Gods," she gulped, her thoughts coming slowly, as if she was thinking through mud. "Dear gods. Skif-the sword-"

"Kero's sword?" he said, looking into her eyes as if he expected to find signs that she had been Mindblasted. "What about it?"

"It talked to me. Us, I mean. Gwena heard it, too." He stopped peering at her and simply looked at her, mouth agape.

"No," he managed.

"Yes. Gwena heard it, too." Her Companion snorted and nodded so hard her hackamore jangled.

A sword?" He laughed, but it was nervous, very nervous. "Swords don't talk-except in tales-"

"But. I am a sword... from a tale. Boy." The mind-voice still had the quality of humor, a rich, but dry and mordant sense of humor..And horses don't talk... except in tales, either." Skif sat in his saddle like a bag of potatoes, his mouth still gaping, his eyes big and round. If Elspeth hadn't felt the same way, she'd have laughed at his expression. He looked as if someone had hit him in the back of the head with a board.

His mouth worked furiously without anything coming out of it. Finally," It talks!" he yelped.

"Of course I talk." It was getting better at Mindspeech by the moment, presumably improving with practice. "I'm as human as you are. Or I was.

Once"

"You were?" Elspeth whispered. "When? How did you end up like that? And why-" A long story," the sword replied. "And one that can wait a little longer.

Get your priorities, child. Get in there, get shelter. Get a place to sit for a while. then we'll talk, and not before." And not one more word could any of them get from it, although the Companions coaxed and cajoled along with the two Heralds. And so, with all of them wondering if they'd gone quite, quite mad, they entered the trade-city of Kata'shin'a'in.

The inn was an old one; deep paths had been worn into the stone floors and the courtyard paving, and the walls had been coated so many times with whitewash that it was no longer possible to tell whether they had been plaster, brick or stone. The innkeeper was a weary, incurious little old man who looked old enough to have been the same age as his inn. The stone floors and the bathhouse indicated that the place had once catered to prosperous merchants, but that was no longer the case.

Now it played host to a variety of mercenaries, and the more modest traders, who would form caravans together, or take their chances with themselves, their own steel, and a couple of pack animals.

Their room was of a piece with the inn; worn floor, faded hangings at the window, simple pallet on a wooden frame for a bed, a table-and no other amenities. The room itself gave ample evidence by its narrowness of having been partitioned off of a much larger chamber.

At least it was clean.

Elspeth took Need from her sheath, laid the sword reverently on the bed, and sat down beside it-carefully-at the foot. Skif took a similar seat at the head. The Companions, though currently ensconced in the inn's stable, were present in the back of their minds.

So now is the time to find out if I'm having a crazy-weed nightmare.

"All right," she said, feeling a little foolish to be addressing an apparently inanimate object, "We've gotten a room at the inn. The door's locked. Are you still in there?"

"Of course I'm in here," replied the sword acerbically. Both she and Skif jumped. "Where else would I be?" Elspeth recovered first, and produced a wary smile. "A good question, I guess. Well, are you going to talk to us?"

"I'm talking, aren't I? What do you want to know?" Her mind was a blank, and she cast an imploring look at Skif. "What your name is, for one," Skif said. "I mean, we can't keep calling you 'sword." And"Hey, you' seems kind of disrespectful."

"My holiest stars, a respectful young man!. the sword chuckled, though there was a sense of slight annoyance that it had been the male of the two who addressed her. "What a wonder! Perhaps I have lived to see the End of All things!"

"I don't think so," Skif replied hesitantly. "But you still haven't told us your name." Trust a man to want that. It's-: There was a long pause, during which they looked at each other and wondered if something was wrong. "Do you know, I've forgotten it? How odd. How very odd. I didn't think that would happen." Another pause, this time a patently embarrassed one.

"Well, if that doesn't sound like senility, forgetting your own name! I suppose you'd just better keep calling me"Need." It's been my name longer than the one I was born with anyway." Skif looked at Elspeth, who shrugged. "All right-uh-Need. If that doesn't bother you." When you get to be my age, very little bothers you." chuckle "When you're practically indestructible, even less bothers you. there are advantages to being incarnated in a sword." Elspeth saw the opportunity, and pounced on it. "How did you get in there, anyway? You said you used to be human."

:It's easier to show you than tell you,: the blade replied :that's why I wanted you locked away from trouble, and sitting down.: Abruptly, they were no longer in a shabby old that was long past being first quality. They were somewhere else entirely.

Another dry mental room in an inn A forge; Elspeth knew enough to recognize one for what it was. Brick-walled, dirt-floored. She seemed to be inside someone else's head, a passive passenger, unable to do more than observe.

She rubbed the sword with an oiled piece of goatskin, and slid it into the wood-and-leather sheath with a feeling of pleasure. Then she laid it with the other eleven blades in the leather pack. three swords for each season, each with the appropriate spells beaten and forged into them.

A good year's work, and one that would bring profit to the Sisterhood.

Tomorrow she would take them to the Autumn Harvest Fair and return with beasts and provisions.

Her swords always brought high prices at the Fair, though not as high as they would be sold for elsewhere. Merchants would buy them and carry them to select purchasers, in duchys and baronies and provinces that had nothing like the Sisterhood of Spell and Sword. But before they were sold again, they would be ornamented by jewelers, with fine scabbards fitted to them and belts and baldrics tooled of the rarest leathers.

She found this amusing. What brought the high price was what she had created; swords that would not rust, would not break, would not lose their edges. Swords with the set-spell for each season; for Spring, the spell of Calm, for Summer, the spell of Warding, for Fall, the spell of Healing, and for Winter, the spell that attracted Luck. Valuable spells, all of them.

Daughter to a fighter, and once a fighter herself, though she was now a mage-smith, she knew the value of being able to keep a cool head under the worst of circumstances. Spring swords generally went to young fighters, given to them by their parents. the value of the spell of Warding went without saying; to be able to withstand even some magic was invaluable to-say-a bodyguard.

With one of her Summer swords, no guard would ever be caught by a spell of deception or of sleep. Wealthy mercenaries generally bought her Fall swords-or the noble-born, who did not always trust their Healers. And the younger sons of the noble-born invariably chose Winter blades, trusting to Luck to extract them from anything. the ornamentation meant nothing; anyone could buy a worthless Court-sword with a mild-steel blade that bore more ornament than one of hers. But her contact had assured her, over and over again, that no one would believe her blades held power unless they held a trollop's dower in jewels on their hilts. It seemed fairly silly to her; but then, so did the fact that most mages wore outfits that would make a cat laugh.

Her forge-leathers were good enough for her, and a nice, divided wool skirt and linen shirt when she wasn't in the forge.

Once every four years, she made eleven swords instead of twelve, and forged all four of the spells into a single blade. those she never sold; keeping them until one of the Sisterhood attracted her eye, proved herself as not only a superb fighter, but an intelligent and moral fighter. those received the yearswords, given in secret, before they departed into the world to earn a living.

Never did she tell them what they had received. She simply permitted them to think that it was one of her remarkable, nearly unbreakable, nonrusting blades, with a simple Healing charm built in.

After all, why allow them to depend on the sword?

If any of them ever guessed, she had yet to hear about it. there was one of those blades waiting beneath the floor of the forge now.

She had yet to find someone worthy of it. She would not make another until this one found a home. that's what I was," whispered the sword in the back of Elspeth's mind.

The scene changed abruptly. A huge building complex, built entirely of wood, looking much like Quenten's mage-school. There were only two differences that Elspeth noticed; no town, and no stockade around the complex. Only a forest, on all four sides, with trees towering all about the cleared area containing the buildings. Those buildings looked very old-and there was another difference that she suddenly noticed.

Flat roofs: they all had flat roofs and square doorways, with a square-knot pattern of some kind carved above them.

She was tired; she tired often now, in her old age. A lifetime at the forge had not prevented joints from swelling or bones from beginning to ache-nor could the Healers do much to reverse her condition, not while she continued to work. So she tottered out for a rest, now and then, compromising a little.

She didn't work as much anymore, and the Healers did their best. While she rested, she watched the youngsters at their practice with a critical eye. there wasn't a single one she would have been willing to give a sword to.

Not one.

In fact, the only girl she felt worthy of the blade wasn't a fighter at all, but was an apprentice mage-now working out with the rest of the young mages in the same warm-up exercises the would-be fighters used. All mages in the Sisterhood worked out on a regular basis; it kept them from getting flabby and soft-as mages were all too prone to do-or becoming thin as a reed from using their own internal energies too often. She watched that particular girl with a measuring eye, wondering if she was simply seeing what she wanted to see.

After all, she had started out a fighter, not a mage. Why shouldn't there be someone else able to master both disciplines? Someone like her own apprentice, Vena, to be precise.

Vena certainly was the only one who seemed worthy to carry the year-blade.

This was something that had never occurred in all the years she'd been forging the swords. She wasn't quite certain what to do about it. She watched the girls stretching and bending in their brown linen trews and tunics, hair all neatly bound in knots and braids, and pondered the problem. the Sisterhood was a peculiar group; part temple, part militia, part mage-school.

Any female was welcome here, provided she was prepared to work and learn some useful life-task at the same time. Worship was given to the Twins; two sets of gods and goddesses, Kerenal and Dina, Karanel and Dara; Healer, Crafter, Fighter, and Hunter. Shirkers were summarily shown the door-and women who had achieved self-sufficiency were encouraged to make their way in the outside world, although they could, of course, remain with the Sisterhood and contribute some or all of their income or skills to the upkeep of the enclave.

All this information flashed into Elspeth's mind in an eyeblink, as if she had always known it. those girls with Mage-Talent were taught the use of it; those who wished to follow the way of the blade learned all the skills to make them crack mercenaries. those who learned neither supported the group by learning and practicing a craft or in Healing-either herb and knife Healing, or Healing with their Gifts-or, very rarely, taking their place among the few true Priests of the Twins at the temple within the Sisterhood complex. the creations of the crafters in that third group-and those mages who chose to remain with the enclave-supported it, through sales and hire-outs. the Sisters were a diverse group, and that diversity had been allowed for. Only one requirement was absolute. While she was with the Sisterhood, a woman must remain celibate.

That had never been a problem for the woman whose soul now resided in the blade called "Need."

Interesting, though-in all her studies, Elspeth had never come across anything about the "Twins" or the "Sisterhood of Sword and Spell." Not that she had covered the lore of every land in the world, but the library in Haven was a good one-there had been information there on any obscure cults.

On the other hand, there had been nothing in any of those books about the Cold Ones, and Elspeth had pretty direct experience of their existence.

She'd never found any man whose attractions outweighed the fascination of combining mage-craft with smithery. Of course, she thought humorously, the kind of man attracted to a woman with a face like a horse and biceps rivaling his own was generally not the sort she wanted to waste any time on.

She sighed and returned to her forge.

The scene changed again, this time to a roadway running -through thick forest, from a horse-back vantage point. The trees were enormous, much larger than any Elspeth had ever seen before; so large that five or six men could scarcely have circled the trunks with their arms. Of course, she had never seen the Pelagiris Forest; stories picked up from mercs along the way, assuming those weren't exaggerated, had hinted of something like this. the Fair was no longer exciting, merely tiring. She was glad to be going home.

But suddenly, amid the ever-present pine scent, a whiff of acrid smoke drifted to her nose-causing instant alarm. there shouldn't have been any fires burning with enough smoke to be scented out here. Campfires were not permitted, and none of the fires of the Sisterhood produced much smoke.

A cold fear filled her. She spurred her old horse which shuffled into a startled canter, rolling its eyes when it scented the smoke. the closer she went, the thicker the smoke became.

She rode into the clearing holding the Sisterhood to face a scene of carnage.

Elspeth was all too familiar with scenes of carnage, but this was the equal of anything she'd seen during the conflicts with Hardorn. Bodies, systematically looted bodies, lay everywhere, not all of them female, none of them alive. The buildings were smoking ruins, burned to blackened skeletons.

Shock made her numb; disbelief froze her in her saddle. Under it all, the single question-why? The Sisterhood wasn't wealthy, everyone knew that-and while no one lives without making a few rivals or enemies, there were none that she knew of that would have wanted to destroy them so completely. they held no secrets, not even the making of the mage-blades was a secret.

Anyone could do it who was both smith and mage, and willing to spend one month per spell on a single sword.

Why had this happened? And as importantly, who had done it? that was when Vena came running, weeping, out of the forest; face smudged with ash and smoke, tear-streaked, clothing and hair full of pine needles and bark.

Again the scene changed, to the forge she had seen before, but this time there was little in the way of walls or ceiling left. And again, knowledge flooded her.

Vena had been out in the forest when the attack occurred. She had managed to scale one of the smaller trees and hide among the branches to observe. Now they both knew the answer to her questions.

"Who" was the Wizard Heshain, a mage-lord who had never before shown any notice of the Sisterhood. Vena had described the badges on shields and livery of the large, well-armed force that had invaded the peaceful enclave, and she had recognized Heshain's device.

"Why?

His men had systematically sought out and killed every fighter, every craftswoman, every fighter apprentice. There had been mages with them who had eliminated every adult mage.

Then they had surrounded and captured every apprentice mage except Vena. They fired the buildings to drive anyone hiding into the open and had eliminated any that were not young and Mage-Talented.

The entire proceedings had taken place in an atmosphere of cold efficiency.

There were no excesses, other than slaughter, not even rape-and that had struck Vena as eerily like the dispassionate extermination of vermin.

Afterward, though, the bodies of both sides had been stripped of everything useful and anything that might identify them. There had still been no rapine, no physical abuse of the apprentices; they had been tied at the wrists and hobbled at the ankles, herded into carts, and taken away. Vena had stayed in the tree for a full night, waiting for the attackers to return, then she had climbed down to wander dazedly through the ruins.

Vena had no idea why the wizard had done this-but the kidnapping of the apprentices told her all she needed to know.

He had taken them to use, to augment his own powers. To seduce, subvert, or otherwise bend the girls to his will.

They had to be rescued. Not only for their own sakes and that of the Sisterhood, but because if he succeeded, his power would be magnified.

Considerably. Quite enough to make him a major factor in the world.

A man who sought to increase his power in such a fashion must not be permitted to succeed in his attempt.

He had to be stopped.

Right. He had to be stopped.

By an old, crippled woman, and a half-trained girl. this was a task that would require a fighter of the highest skills, and a mage the equal of Heshain. A healthy mage, one who could ride and climb and run away, if she had to.

But there was a way. If Vena, a young and healthy girl, could be endowed with all her skills, she might well be able to pull off that rescue. One person could frequently achieve things that an army could not. One person, with all the abilities of both a mage of some strength-perhaps even the superior of Heshain-and a fighter trained by the very best, would have advantages no group could boast. that was their only hope. So she had sent Vena out, ostensibly to hunt for herbs she needed. In actuality, it was to get her out of the way. She was about to attempt something she had only seen done once. And that had not been with one of her bespelled swords.

She took the hidden sword, the one with the spells of all four seasons sealed to it, out of its hiding place under the floor of the forge. She heated the forge, placed it in the fire while she wrought one last spell-half magic, and half a desperate prayer to the Twain.

Then, when the blade was white-hot, with fire and magic, she wedged it into a clamp on the side of the forge, point outward-And ran her body onto it.

Pain seared her with a white-hot agony so great it quickly stopped being "pain" and became something else.

Then it stopped being even that, and what Elspeth felt in memory was worse than pain, though totally unfamiliar. It was not a sensation like anything Elspeth had ever experienced. It was a sense of wrenching dislocation, disorientation-Then, nothing at all. Literally. No sight, sound, sense of any kind.

If she hadn't had some feeling that this was all just a memory she was re-experiencing, she'd have panicked. And still, if she had any choice at all, she never. ever wanted to encounter anything like this again.

It was the most truly, profoundly horrifying experience she had ever had.

A touch. Connection. Feelings. sensations flooded back, all of them so sharp-edged and clear they seemed half-raw. Grief. Someone was weeping. vena. It was Vena's senses she was sharing. The spell had worked! She was now one with the sword, with all of her abilities as mage and as fighter, and everything she had ever learned, intact.

Experimentally, she exerted a bit of control, moving Vena's hand as if it had been her own. The girl plucked at her tunic, and it felt to her as if it was her own hand she was controlling. Good; not only was her knowledge intact, but her ability to use it. She need only have the girl release control of her body, and an untrained girl would be a master swordswoman.

Vena sobbed helplessly, uncontrollably. After the first rush of elation, it occurred to her that she had probably better tell the child she wasn't dead.

Or not exactly, anyway.

The sword released its hold on them, and Elspeth sat and shook for a long time.

It was a small comfort that she recovered from the experience before Skif did. She had never been so intimately one with someone's thoughts before. Especially not someone who had shared an experience like Need's death and rebirth.

She had never encountered anyone whose thoughts and memories were quite so-unhuman. As intense as those memories were, they had felt old, sounded odd, as if she was listening to someone with a voice roughened by years of breathing forge smoke, and they contained a feeling of difference and distance, as if the emotions Need had felt were so distantor so foreign-that Elspeth couldn't quite grasp them. Perhaps that made a certain amount of sense. There was no way of knowing quite how old Need was. She had gotten the distinct impression that Need herself did not know. She had spent many, many lifetimes in the heart of the sword, imprisoned, though it was by her own will. That was bound to leave its mark on someone.

To make her, in time, something other than human? It was possible.

Nevertheless, it was a long time before she was willing to open her mind to the blade again, and to do so required more courage than she had ever mustered up before.

"I wish you wouldn't do that," the sword said, peevishly, the moment she reestablished contact.

"What?" she replied, startled.

"Close me out like that. I thought I made it clear; I can only see through your eyes, hear through your ears. When you close me out, I'm deaf and blind."

"oh."' She shivered with the recollection of that shared moment of pain, disorientation-and then, nothing. What would it be like for Need, in those times when she was not in contact with her wielder?

Best not to think about it. "Can you always do that?" she asked instead. "As long as you aren't closed out, I mean." Skif showed some signs of coming out of his stunned state. He shook his head, and looked at her, with a bit more sense in his expression, as if he had begun to follow the conversation.

"Once I soul-bond, the way I did with Vena, and most of my other wielders, yes. Unless you deliberately close me out, the way you just did. I had forgotten that there were disadvantages to bonding to someone with Mindspeech." Need seemed a little disgruntled. "You know how to shield yourselves, and unless you choose to keep me within those shields with you, that closes me out." Given some of what Kero had told her about her own struggles with the sword, Elspeth was a little less inclined to be sympathetic than she might ordinarily have been. Need had tried, not once, but repeatedly, to get the upper hand and command the Captain's movements when she was young. And she had taken over Kero's grandmother's life from time to time, forcing her into situations that had often threatened not only her life, but the lives of those around her. Granted, it had always been in a good cause, but-But Kero-and Kethry-had occasionally found themselves fighting against women, women or things in a woman's shape. Creatures who were frequently the equal in evil of any man. And when that happened, Need had not only not aided her wielder-she had often fought her wielder.

More than once, both women had found themselves in acute danger, with Need actually helping the enemy.

Given that, well-it was harder to be in complete sympathy with the sword.

Poor Kero, Elspeth thought. I'm beginning to understand what it was she found herself up against, here...

And that made something occur to her. "Wait a minute-Kero had Mindspeech Why didn't you talk to her before this?"

"I was asleep." the sword admitted sheepishly. "there was a time when all I could bond to were fighters, with no special abilities whatsoever. During that rather dry spell, there was a long period between partners. I am not certain what happened; I didn't get a chance to bond properly, because she didn't use me for long. Perhaps my wielder put me away, perhaps she sold me--or she might even have lost me. I don't know. But my bond faded and weakened, and I slept, and my wielders came to me only as dreams."

"What woke you?" Skif asked. He sounded back to his old curious self.

"I think, perhaps, it was the one before you. Kerowyn, you said? She began to speak to me, if crudely. But because I had been asleep for so very long, I was long in waking. Then, as I gradually began to realize what was going on and came to full wakefulness, she brought me to your home." Need fell silent, and all of them-Elspeth Felt Gwena back with her again-waited for her to speak. Gwena finally got tired of waiting.

"Well?" she snapped. "what then?" Elspeth clearly felt the sword react with surprise. what then? I stayed quiet, of course! The protections about your land are formidable, horse. Someone has changed the nature of the vrondi there. they-"

"The what?" Elspeth asked, puzzled by the strange reference.

"The vrondi, child," Need responded, impatiently. "You know what they are! Even though you have no mages within your border, you use the vrondi constantly, to detect the truth!" Unbidden, the memories of first learning the Truth-Spell sprang into her mind.

"Think of a cloud with eyes," said Herald Teren. "think of the spell and concentrate on a cloud with eyes." She must have spoken it aloud, for the sword responded. "Exactly,..

Need replied with impatience. "Clouds with eyes. those are vrondi. Did you think they were only creatures of imagination?" Since that was precisely what she had thought, she prudently kept that answer to herself.

:Someone, somehow, has changed the nature of the vrondi, and they are not the same in your land,: the blade said peevishly :they look now, they look for mage-energies. when they see them, they gather about the mage, and watch, and watch, and they do not stop watching unless they see that the mage is also a Herald, and has one of your talking horses with him.: If a sword could have produced a snort, this one would have. :So I kept silent. What else was I to do? I did not wish to call attention to myself. that was when I drifted back to sleep again.:

:Not as deeply, I trust,: Gwena responded, dryly.

:Well, no. And I waited, not only to be able to leave your land, but to be passed to the one I had sensed-you. Not only a fighter, but one with Mage-Talent as well, and Mindspeech.:

"Then I took you out-"

:And I woke. just as well, I think. If you will forgive me, child-you need me.: Elspeth groaned inwardly, though not at the pun. The last thing she had any use for was yet another creature with an idea of what she "should" be doing.

Oh. gods, she thought. just what I wanted. Another guardian. Someone else with a Quest.

That was not the end of her troubles, as she soon learned.

Both she and Skif were exhausted, but Skif seemed a little more dazed than she. Possibly it was simply a matter of sex; Need had shown herself to be a little less than friendly to males, and Elspeth had no doubt that the sword had not made mental contact easy on him.

Skif lay down on the bed, his face a little dazed. Elspeth, though she was tired, also felt as if she needed to get on with her plans quickly, before Need could complicate matters.

It was possible, of course, that Need could prove to be the magic-teacher she so eagerly sought. Possible-but a last resort, to be considered only when she had exhausted all others. Including seeking the Adept in Lythecare. She wasn't certain of Need's powers, and she wasn't certain if the blade was entirely to be trusted. If she would run roughshod over Skif, what would she do to handicap other Valdemaran males?

Would she actually sabotage their training? Elspeth couldn't be sure, so she wasn't going to take the chance.

When the sword had been put in her sheath, with a promise that Elspeth would not again block Need out of her mind without ample warning and cause, she went out for a breath of air, and to begin to explore the tent city. As she had been expecting, there was a logical pattern to the "streets" of Kata'shin'a'in. The farthest tents, those all the way downwind, belonged to the beast sellers. Near to them were those who sold the things one would need for a beast, everything from simple leads and halters for sheep and collars for dogs, to the elaborate tack for parade horses.

Then came leather workers in general, then the makers of glass, metal and stonework.

Then textile merchants, and finally, nearest the core city, sellers of food and other consumables.

The core city itself contained a very few shops. It consisted mostly of the dwellings of those few who remained here all year and the inns.

There were dozens of those inns, ranging in quality from a mud-walled, dirt-floored, one-room ale house, to a marble palace of three stories, whose supposed amenities ranged from silk streets through mage-crafted delicacies to the very personal and intimate attendance of the servant Of one's choice.

The innkeeper had not gotten any more explicit than that, but Elspeth reckoned wryly that a whore by any other name still plied his or her trade-presumably, with expertise.

It might be nice to experience service like that, one day-though without, she thought with a little embarrassment, anything more personal than a good massage.

But for now, she had a great deal more on her mind than that. For one thing, she had to find Shin'a'in. This was Kata'shin'a'in, "City of the Shin'a'in," after all. Once she found Shin'a'in, she had to get them to talk to her. Then she had to find someone willing and able to put her in touch with Tale'sedrin, Kero's Clan.

And she reckoned that the best place to find the Shin'a'in would be in the beast market. They not only bred horses, after all, they also had herds of sheep and goats; presumably they bought and sold both.

Failing that, she would try the textile merchants. The Shin'a'in were great weavers and among those who treasured such pieces of art, their carpets, blankets, and other textiles and embroideries were famed all the way up into Valdemar.

So she went out to scout the beast market first.

She had hoped to slip away without disturbing Skif, who had fallen asleep on the bed, exhausted by the strain of the strange day.

But no matter what Need claimed about her own powers, evidently "attracting Luck" was no longer one of them. She had no sooner gotten outside the door of the inn when Skiff came panting up behind her.

She sighed and kept from snapping at him. It was fairly obvious that he was not going to let her go out alone. And it wasn't simply more of his mother-henning. The peculiar look in his eyes told her all she needed to know.

He was infatuated with her.

And I ought to recognize infatuation when I see it, since I've suffered under it myself.

He undoubtedly had convinced himself that he was in love with her.

Wonderful, she thought to herself, as she headed determinedly toward her goal, despite having him trailing along behind her. _just wonderful My partner thinks he's in love with me, my Companion wants me to become some kind of Foretold Hero, my sword has a mind of its own, and I'm going to have to find someone from an elusive tribe of an elusive people all on my own, in a city where I don't even speak the language.

No, somehow I don't think that attracting Luck is on the list of active spells...Chapterr Fifteen DARKWIND

Treyvan roused his feathers, fluffing his crest and shaking his head, his claws digging long furrows into the thick weedy turf. He held his head high, his muscles stiff with impatience. Darkwind glanced sideways at him and smiled a little.

A shadow passed over the scout, and he looked up automatically, but it was only a cloud passing across the sun. Vree was waiting for him back in the forest, away from the temptation of Treyvan's crest feathers.

"How long have you and Hydona been mated?" he asked, with pretended innocence.

"Twelve yearsss," the gryphon replied, rousing his feathers again, and casting his own glance upward. "What'sss that got to do with anything?"

And you've made quite a few mating flights, haven't you?" the scout continued, his smile broadening. Treyvan was so preoccupied he didn't even realize that Darkwind was teasing him.

"Well," Treyvan said, with a sidelong glance at Hydona. Hydona only roused her own feathers, watching him coyly. "Yesss."

"If you've got so much experience at it," he laughed, reaching up to scratch behind Treyvan's ear-tufts, "don't you think you ought to be able to take your time about this one?" Treyvan closed his eyes, wearing an expression of long-suffering patience." You, a human, alwayss in ssseason, with matesss ambusshing you even when you are bathing-you tell me that? You crrreaturess neverrr ssstop.

Hydona made a choking sound; her mate pointedly looked away from her. Darkwind knew that faint gargling from past exchanges with the pair; she was trying not to chuckle. He raised his eyebrows at her, then gave her a broad wink. She hid her head by turning it to the side, but her shaking shoulders told him she was stifling outright laughter.

"Anyway," Treyvan continued, in an aggrieved tone, "you know very well that I casst the initial ssspell thiss morrrning. And you know verrry well that until we complete it with the sssecond ssspell, it'sss going to make me itchierrr than a plague of sssand-fleasss. I explained it to you often enough." He shook his head and made a grinding sound with his beak. "I feel asss if my ssskin isss too tight," he complained.

Darkwind bit his tongue to keep from making a retort to that particular complaint. "In that case," he said, soothingly, "I had probably better leave you two alone."

"oh, he'll live," Hydona countered, controlling herself and her humor admirably. "Trrruly he will. You're rrready for what we'll do thisss time, I hope? Not like the lassst time?" He flushed at the memory of the "last time," when he had been much younger. He had been close enough to them, and unshielded, so that he had gotten caught up in the extremely potent magic of their mating spell.

The first spell that Treyvan had mentioned was what actually made the mating fertile; otherwise their sexual activity was purely for enjoyment.

The second would ensure conception. And despite Treyvan's acerbic comment about "humans always being in season," the fact was that the gryphons were at least as active in that area as any humans Darkwind knew.

"I'll be fine," he told her. "I'm not fourteen anymore." Hydona laughed. "I'd notisssed," she teased. "Essspecially around Dawnfirrre. When will you be picking a mate?"

"Uh-" the question took him by surprise, so he settled for a gallant answer. "When I find a mate as magical as you are."

" Flattererrr," she replied, dryly. "Well, when you do, perhapsss we'll all be rrready to ssssettle a new place together, ssso that we can keep eyesss on each other'sss sssmall onesss." She looked over his head a moment, off into the distance. "That isss the ultimate goal of ourrr being herrre, you know," she said thoughtfully. "We'rrre pioneersss, of a sssort. Our kind came from sssomewhere about herrre, you know, very, very long ago, and Trrreyvan and I are here now to sssee if it isss the time to rrreturn."

" So you told me," he said," A long time ago.

She nodded as Treyvan sighed and lay down in the long grass with a long-suffering look.

Oh, yesss," she said, ignoring her mate, with a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. "We arrre herrre to sssee if we can raissse little ones, brrring them into the magic of the land, and prosssper. If we do well, more will come. You know, ourrr people and yoursss arrre ancient parrrtnersss, from the daysss of the Kaled'a'in. The hertasi, too, and othersss you may not have everrr ssseen beforrre. It would be good if we could be partnersss again." Another surprise; this time, a much greater surprise. He'd been astonished to learn that the gryphons were fluent in the ancient tongue of Kaled'a'in, a language so old that very few of either the Tayledras or the Shin'a'in could be considered "fluent," despite the fact that both their current languages were derived from that parent. But this revelation was a total surprise, for there was nothing in the Tayledras histories to indicate that the two species had been so close.

While he pondered the implications of that, Hydona reached over and gently bit Treyvan's neck. The male gryphon's eyes glazed and closed, and the cere above his beak flushed a brilliant orange-gold. Obviously, her mind was no longer on the far past, but on the immediate future.

And from the look on Treyvan's face, his mind had been there for some time.

Darkwind coughed. "Uh-Hydona?

"Hmm?" the gryphon replied dreamily, her own eyes bright, but unfocused, her thoughts obviously joined to Treyvan's.

"Who's watching the little ones?" he asked. "I can't; I've got to be out on patrol. I don't trust this quiet."

"They'll be fine," Hydona replied, releasing her mate long enough to reply. "They've been told not to leave the nessst, and if they called, nothing could get to them beforrre we'd be on top of it."

"Are you sure?" he persisted, but Hydona was nuzzling Treyvan's neck again and he knew there was no way he was going to get any sense out of her at the moment.

"They'll be fine," she mumbled, all her attention centered once more on her mate.

Despite being under shielding, the sexual euphoria began penetrating even his careful defenses. This was obviously the time to leave.

As he picked his way through the ruins, a feeling of light-headedness overcame him for a moment. He looked back over his shoulder to see the two of them surging up into the cloudy sky, Hydona a little ahead of Treyvan. Even as he watched, they began an elaborate aerial display, tumbling and spiraling around each other, in a dance that was halfplanned and half-improvisation. This "dance" itself was part of the spell; the rest-Treyvan's extravagant maneuvers-were designed to inflame himself and his mate.

And judging by the faint excitement he was feeling, even through his shields, it was having the desired effect.

As he turned his eyes back toward the ground, another moving speck caught his eye. Though it was very high, long experience enabled him to identify it as a red-shouldered hawk, one of the many breeds often used as bondbirds by the Tayledras.

That made him think reflexively of Dawnfire, whose bird was a redshouldered.

And that-given all that he'd been exposed to in the past few moments-made his thoughts turn in an entirely different direction than they had been tending.

Dawnfire rode the thoughts of her bondbird with the same ease that the bird commanded the currents of the sky. Theirs was a long partnership, of seven years' standing, for she had bonded to Kyrr at the tender age of ten. Darkwind's Vree had been with him only four or five years; the bird he had bonded to before that had been a shorter-lived shriekowl, gift of his older brother.

A shriek-owl was not a practical bird for a scout, but the tiny creatures were perfect for a mage, which was what Darkwind had been in that long-ago, peaceful time. Shriek-owls in the wild seldom lived beyond three years-the bondbird breed in general tripled that lifespan. That was nothing near like the expected lifespan of the scouts' birds-twenty-five to fifty years for the falcons, larger owls, and hawks, and up to seventy-five years for the rarer eagles. And shriek-owls were tiny; scarcely bigger than a clenched fist. They ate mostly insects, flew slowly, and generally flitted from tree to tree inside a very small territory. They could hardly be counted on to be an effective aid either on a scouting foray or to aid in an attack. But the owls were charming little birds, by nature friendly and social-in the wild they nested several to a tree-and the perfect bird for a mage who only needed a bird to be occasional eyes and ears and to pass messages. A mage did not necessarily need to bond to his bird with the kind of emotional closeness that a scout did, nor did he need a bird with that kind of long expected lifespan. All of the mages that Dawnfire knew that she aed, personally, did bond closely with intelligent birds, but it was not as necessary for them as it was for scouts.

Scouts had to develop a good working, partner-like relationship with their birds, and that required something with a long anticipated lifespan.

Scouts spent as much as a year simply training their birds, then it took as much as four or five more years to get the partnership to a smooth working relationship. Like the scouts, the lives of the bondbirds were fraught with danger. There had already been casualties among the birds, and Darkwind had warned his corps to expect more. Their enemies knew the importance of the birds, as well as the impact a bird's violent death had on his bondmate, and often made the birds their primary targets.

Dawnfire tried not to think about losing Kyrr, but the fact was that it could happen.

Darkwind's father Starblade had lost his bird in circumstances so traumatic that the mage had returned to the Vale in a state of shock, and actually could not recall what had occurred. Since he had been investigating a forest fire ignited by firebirds, and since the birds themselves seldom reacted so violently that they set their homes aflame, the other Tayledras assumed that whatever had frightened the firebirds had probably caught and killed Starblade's perlin falcon. That had been a set of very strange circumstances, actually; Dawnfire remembered it quite vividly because her mother had been one of the scouts who had found the mage and had talked it over one long night with friends in her daughter's presence.

There had been a sortie that had drawn most of the fighters off when word of the fire had reached the Vale. Starblade had gone out to take care of it.

He had then vanished for many days. He was found wandering, dazed, within the burned area, near nightfall on the third day. His bondbird was gone, and he himself could not remember anything after leaving the Vale. Injured, burned, dehydrated, no one was surprised at that-but when days and weeks went by and he still could not remember, and when he chose to bond again with a crow, from a nest outside of the Vale-some people, like Dawnfire's mother, wondered...Darkwind had once said something after another of his angry confrontations with his father-something about his feeling that Starblade had changed, and was no longer the father he had known. He blamed the change on the disaster, Dawnfire wasn't so sure.

Starblade had not been that close, emotionally, to Darkwind's mother, though Darkwind had never accepted that. Dawnfire was not at all certain that Starblade would have been so badly affected by her death that his personality had changed. She blamed the change on the death of Starblade's bird. It seemed to her and her own mother that Starblade had become silent and very odd afterward. And that crow he'd bonded to was just as odd...She pulled her thoughts away from the past and returned them to the present. She was off-duty today and had decided to indulge her curiosity in something.

Darkwind's gryphons.

She had been terribly curious about them for a very long time, and had even gone to visit them a time or two. But the gryphons, while still being cordial and polite, had made one thing very clear to her: the only visitor they truly welcomed was Darkwind.

That-had hurt. It had hurt a very great deal, and not even Darkwind knew how much it hurt. She brooded on that, as Kyrr neared the the ruins, coming in high over the forest.

I've never had anyone rebuff me like that, she thought resentfully. Every other nonhuman I've ever met seems to think I'm a good person to deal with and to have as a friend. Tervardi, kyree, dyheli, hertasi-even firebirds, teyll-deer, wolves, the nonsentients... why don't the gryphons want me around?

She'd asked that question any number of times. Darkwind wouldn't tell her a great deal, citing the gryphons' desire for privacy. That had only inflamed her curiosity-at the same time, she felt she had to respect that need. But why wouldn't they be willing to meet with her, once in a while, away from their nest? Why was it that only Darkwind was worthy of their attention?

Over the months and years, the unfulfilled questions ate at her, and she had slipped over to the ruins more than once to watch the gryphons and their offspring from a distance. Darkwind had never forbid her that; in fact, he said once that she had eased one of his worries, helping to keep an eye on the young ones while the adults were off hunting.

They had to spend a great deal of time in hunting; they were very large, flighted carnivores, like the birds-of-prey they resembled, and they needed a lot of meat. They ranged very far in order to keep from overhunting any area, and they often spent an entire morning or afternoon away from the nest. Dawnfire had taken this tacit approval as permission to watch them whenever she wasn't otherwise occupied, so long as she did it from afar, feeling that she might be able to earn the acceptance of the adults with her unofficial guardianship of their offspring.

But then, a week or so ago, Darkwind had specifically forbidden her to go anywhere near the ruins today, without giving any explanation.

And that had driven her curious nature wild, as well as rousing resentment in her that he had simply ordered her as if it was his right.

He probably shouldn't have told me, she admitted to herself, as her bird soared just at the border of the gryphons' territory. If he hadn't told me, I probably wouldn't be doing this-But then anger at him and his authoritative attitude burned away that thought-an anger nearly a week old, born of resentment, and nurtured on his continued silence. How dare he forbid her to go where she wanted to go on her own time? He had no authority over her, over her freedom!

He hadn't asked her, simply and politely, he'd demanded that she promise, then and there, refusing to answer any questions, either before she reluctantly promised, or after. He refused to explain himself, or even talk about it. Her anger smoldered, hot, and grew hotter with every day that passed.

Following anger had come suspicion, slowly growing over the course of several days; a feeling that he was hiding something, and nothing had alleviated it since.

Her suspicions centered around the Changechild. He was always with the gryphons-he was with them, and with that Changechild. He wouldn't talk about either. It was not unreasonable to suppose that the two were connected-and that there was something about the Changechild that Darkwind didn't want her to know.

He'd never hidden anything from her before. There was no reason why he should want to start now.

Or so she had thought. Until this morning, when an overheard comment told her something very important that Darkwind had somehow left out of his few stories about the Changechild.

"Has Darkwind said anything more about the Changechild?" Iceshadow asked someone. "Is she ready to leave, yet?" She? This Changechild, neuter in her mind, suddenly took on a different face. "It" was a she.

Suddenly the senseless questions had sensible answers. And there were plenty of reasons why Darkwind would want her kept in the dark about this female. Especially if she was attractive.

And Dawnfire's imagination painted her as very attractive. Most Changechildren were. And there were the attractions of the exotic, of course...Not that I care if he's enamored with the girl, she told herself, as Kyrr soared a little closer to the gryphons' nest. It's not as if we're lifebonded or something. We haven't even traded bondbird primary feathers. I would if he offered, but we haven't, just coverts. I don't exactly have a hold on him...Excuses, excuses, and none of them meant anything, not really.

Damn him, anyway.

She had given a promise, and she never broke one-no matter what.

Even if the person she had given the promise to turned out to be a worthless sneak.

So she had spent most of the morning trying to think of a way around that promise, so that she could see what Darkwind was really up to when he slipped off to his gryphon friends. She wasn't entirely certain why she was tormenting herself, it was as if she kept biting at a sore tooth.

It hurt, but she just couldn't seem to stop doing it.

Then the answer to her dilemma had occurred to her; she had promised that she wouldn't go near the gryphons, but she hadn't promised that Kyrr would stay away. And what Kyrr saw, she could see. Kyrr could be her way to see just what Darkwind was really up to.

The only problem was that to do that, she would have to hole up in her ekele and go into a full trance. That was something she was secretly ashamed of; that she could not make full contact with Kyrr's mind unless she performed a full bonding. She didn't know why; scouts generally had no trouble using their bird's senses. There were one or two others who had the same trouble, but no more than that. Darkwind had speculated that she found the experience of having her consciousness split to be too traumatic to deal with unless she was in a full trance-since in a full trance, her consciousness wasn't really split.

Normally this wasn't a handicap; her communication with Kyrr was otherwise excellent. The big hawk was one of the most intelligent of all the scouts' bondbirds, and had no trouble with simply telling her what she needed to know. Kyrr could "speak" in full sentences, she had a sense of humor, and had no trouble in cooperating with her bondmate.

There had never been any rebellion or any real disagreements with Kyrr.

But Kyrr could not read facial expressions; she could not pick up the nuances of behavior that Dawnfire needed to know. She wanted to know how he really felt about this Changechild. Kyrr only understood things as they related to raptor feelings and instincts. And she didn't want Kyrr to misinterpret things that she saw in light of those instincts. After all, it was entirely possible that Darkwind had other reasons for keeping her away, legitimate reasons.

It's entirely possible that pigs will fly, too, she thought sourly.

Darkwind wasn't at the gryphons' nest, and neither were the gryphons.

Surprised, she sent Kyrr ranging out to find them. After a bit of searching, she spotted them, near the edge of the ruins, where the forest began; she must have passed them at a distance when Kyrr flew in.

Darkwind's figure blended into the landscape of tumbled stones and overgrown hillocks, rendering him very difficult to see, but the gryphons stood out against the ruins very clearly. More clearly than she remembered, in fact; their feathers shone with color, gold and red-brown, and they seemed to capture and hold the sunlight, shining in all the colors that Kyrr could see and she couldn't. For a moment, their striking beauty drove all other thoughts from her mind.

Then she wrenched her attention away, to look for anything that might be the Changechild. But there were only the gryphons and Darkwind, with no sign of anyone else, nor any of the signs that several days of occupancy would put around a hiding place in the ruins. Unless they were trying to conceal it-and they had no reason to-there would be distinctive signs of habitation.

Her anger faded and died, giving way to embarrassment.

Was I wrong? she wondered, as the gryphons fanned their wings in the sun, and she and Kyrr circled nearer. She had never felt so stupid in her life. She was just glad that she hadn't made this blunder in public.

Was I just a suspicious, jealous bitch? Was I overreacting to something that hadn't even happened?

It certainly looked like it. As Darkwind bade farewell to his two friends and slipped into the shadows of the forest, she very nearly sent Kyrr home. But sheer curiosity kept her aloft, circling above the two gryphons, and something about their colors nagged at the back of her mind, reminding her of a memory she couldn't quite put her finger on.

Then it came to her, as the larger of the two gryphons bit the neck of the smaller one in an unmistakable act of sexual aggression.

Gods and ancestors-they're going to mate. that's why he didn't want me around them.

For a moment, that was even more embarrassing. She felt as if she'd been caught watching the dyheli stallions and their mares for the sheer, erotic amusement of it...

But they'd had mating-flights before, lots of them, and Darkwind had never forbidden her to go near. What was it that was so different this time?

Curiosity overcame embarrassment. Whatever it was, she was going to find out.

As first one, then the other of the gryphons launched themselves into the air, she circled the sky around them, keeping them in sight at all times.

The male-Treyvan-wheeled and stooped and circled his mate, who hovered as he circled, followed him in his dives, and climbed beside him as he dove upward again. This was not simply "flight"-this was an aerobatic dance, breathtaking and beautiful, and as impressive as anything she had ever witnessed.

The gryphons moved higher with every turn of the dance, gaining altitude as the dives grew shallower, the climbs steeper, and the circles more fluid and sensuous. They came even with Kyrr, then climbed above her, continuing to climb higher as she tried to follow. Finally they climbed into regions where she couldn't follow, leaving her gazing in wonder from below...Then there was just one single dot in the blue. And it was growing larger.

Dear gods-they mate on the wing, like eagles-For two minutes they fell together, claws locked in ecstasy-plummeting toward the earth so fast that the wind whistled in their feathers, eyes closedthey aren't going toat the last possible moment they broke apart, spreading their wings with a crack as they caught the air and shot upward again, side by side, beauty so incredible that she couldn't breathe-When the beauty of the moment was shattered by the thunk of a heavy crossbow firing, and a bolt streaking toward Hydona.

Dawnfire was watching the female at the moment that the broad-bladed bolt ripped through the air, changing its arc to meet the wing and shred it..

The female screamed as the wing collapsed; the uninjured wing flailed wildly as she fell in a barely-controlled spiral towards the ground.

The male's scream of rage echoed his mate's scream of pain; he did a wing-over and turned his climb into a killing dive, claws extended, as he followed his mate down.

The female crashed into the trees at the edge of the forest and was lost to sight; the male followed an eyeblink behind her.

Then a sudden flare of light from beneath the trees enveloped him in a tongue of white flame; he screamed again, but this time in pain, not in rage. The light held him suspended for a moment, as he went limp.

Then he simply dropped, unconscious, through the leafy roof of the forest.

All that saved him from a broken neck was the fact that it was a relatively short drop. anger filled her, white-hot anger, and the urge to kill.

Without stopping to think, Dawnfire sent Kyrr in a near-vertical stoop down after them; Kyrr's instinct was to shriek with rage, but Dawnfire clenched the hawk's beak shut. No point in warning whoever it was that had perpetrated this-outrage.

As she dove through the branches, snaking through the obstacle course with desperate adjustments of her wings, Kyrr's blood boiled with rage.

It was all that Dawnfire could do to keep her under control and quiet.

The bondbird wanted blood, she wanted it now, and she wasn't going to accept less.

"Kill!" she shrilled in Dawnfire's mind. "Kill them all!" Dawnfire gritted mental teeth, and held to her tenuous control as they penetrated the last of the branches and broke out into the clear air beneath the forest canopy. If I lose her now, I lose her for all time. I'll never be able to control her in a rage again-There were two men with the unconscious gryphons; she saw that in a moment. One, the one with the crossbow, was standing guard over the unconscious male who lay in a pathetic and boneless heap at his feet.

The other was beside the female, who was, at least, semiconscious.

He was unarmed, dressed in close-fitting leather-and he was without a doubt a mage, one of the Others, who had manipulated himself into a form that was scarcely more than half human.

And he was doing something to the female gryphon.

Dawnfire barely had time to take that all in; at that moment, the female gryphon sent up a shriek of heartrending agony. The scream goaded Kyrr into a rage that tore her loose from Dawnfire's control.

Not that it mattered, because Dawnfire herself was so angered that she released control to Kyrr, to give her all the edge she needed.

Screaming outrage, they dove together in a full-scale attack, claws extended and aimed for the mage's eyes.

He looked up-And his eyes were all Dawnfire could see-just before something slammed into her, and darkness swallowed her. His eyes-his slitted eyes...And his hate-filled, sharp-toothed smile...Chapterr Sixteen

ELSPETH

Elspeth swore silently as she caught a familiar profile out of the corner of her eye. Skif was following her again.

The turbaned merchant implored her to examine the clever workmanship of the leather pouch she was holding, conveying grief that his profit margin had already been slashed to nothing. Elspeth lingered over her purchase, haggling a few more coppers off the price of the belt-pouch, as she watched Skif ghosting around the edge of the crowd, keeping an eye on her. He was very good; it was unlikely that anyone around her realized that he was shadowing her. In a bazaar full of foreigners of all shapes, sizes and costumes, neither of them stood out from the crowd.

Trade season was at its height, and the crowds of small traders, mercs, and the occasional pleasure traveler filled the aisles between the tent-booths.

It was not the easiest thing to spot Skif as he skillfully used the crowds to cover his movements, but he had trained her, and she knew his moves better than anyone else could.

It was just a good thing that she was conscientious enough to keep her own watch out for other followers. He could easily be distracting her enough to put her at hazard.

The scent of fine leather rose from the pouch in her hands as she pretended to examine it further. The merchant swore she was impoverishing him.

This was getting annoying. No, it had gotten annoying already. She had begun to lose her patience with him.

Twice now, she had gotten close to someone who had hinted he might know a Shin'a'in or two-and twice, it had come to nothing. The Clansmen were proving incredibly elusive.

"Alas, you should have been here in the spring," said the folk in the fabric bazaar. "They are only here in the spring. But I have some fine Shin'a'in rugs, and you couldn't get a better bargain on them from a Clansman herself..."oh, you should wait until the fall," said the horse traders. "They never come here except in the fall. Now, I have some outstanding Shin'a'in saddle mares...

"Well, they were just here," said the shepherds, in a dialect so thick she could scarcely make out what they were saying. "Tale'sedrin, you say? That's the blonds, no? Ah, you just missed them; here last week, they were, buying up them new long-haired goats." Here last week, here last season, not here yet-the herders were the closest she had gotten; at least they knew that Kero's Clan had a number of blond members, legacy of Kero's grandmother Kethry.

But the Shin'a'in were proving horribly hard to find. It seemed that no matter where she went, they had either been and gone, or they had not yet appeared.

"Cakes yesterday, cakes tomorrow, but never cakes today," she muttered to herself, keeping one eye on Skif as she paid for the leather pouch and attached it to her belt. Clever pouch; well worth having, with a catch designed to foil pickpockets, and a belt loop with woven wire glued between two layers of leather, to outwit cutpurses.

Well, she wasn't going to get anywhere today. The leather market was as empty of contacts as any other. It was time to try something else.

But before she did that, she was going to have to deal with Skif. Before he drove her to give him a bloody nose.

The crowds hadn't thinned any; sometimes she wondered what they were all doing here, they couldn't all be selling to each other, or there wouldn't be anyone in the booths. But there were smaller merchants who had no booths, picking up bargains for the luxury trade; there were plenty of people who seemed to be here just to shop and enjoy themselves.

Kata'shin'a'in seemed to provide a kind of ongoing Fair that lasted for months. The security provided by the discreet bazaar guards encouraged folk to wear their finery and indulge themselves. She headed back to the inn with her other purchases, fruit and cheese and fresh bread, in a string bag at her side. She moved through the crowd briskly, at a fast walk, taking Skif by surprise so that she managed to lose him around a corner.

Well, while he had been busy following her, she had been paying attention to the layout of the bazaar. She took a shortcut through the saddlers, coming out in the midst of the rug sellers; from there it was a another skip across to the food vendors. She stopped just long enough to buy a parchment bag full of sugared fried cakes; her nose caught the scent and she discovered she couldn't resist the rich, sweet odor. Then she cut down the aisle of the scent sellers and from there, she strolled directly into the inn.

She unlocked the door of their room; and as she had expected, she had beaten him back. Since he was supposed to have been taking a nap" I wish you'd take me with you," Need said querulously, from beneath the bed. "It may be just a bazaar, but you know very well there are people who are out there looking for you." Wonderful. Another mother hen. "I can't take you with me," she said, trying to keep her patience intact. "It's bazaar rules; no long weapons in the bazaar, nothing longer than a knife, unless it's a purchase, and then it has to be wrapped up.

:You could carry me wrapped,: the blade suggested hopefully :there wouldn't be any problem then.:

"Then you'd do me about as much good as a stick," she snorted. less; you're not much good as a stick, you're too awkward and[ not long enough." Before the sword could retort, there was a sound of a key in the door, and it opened as soon as the lock disengaged.

"Welcome back," she said dryly.

"Uh. Hello," Skif said, first startled, then sheepish.

"I suppose you couldn't sleep, hmm?" She put her purchases on the rickety little table that was supplied with the room. "You know, there's a little story I've been meaning to tell you-I wonder if you've ever heard it? It's about Herald Rana and her old suitor from home." He shook his head, baffled.

"You're a cruel child," said Gwena.

"I'm getting tired of this," she replied.

"Herald Rana went back home for a visit last year, and a young Man who wouldn't give her a second glance back when she was the cheesemaker's daughter decided that she was the most wonderful woman he'd ever seen." She shrugged. "It might have been the Whites, it might have been that she'd matured quite a bit since the last time he saw her.

It really doesn't matter. He followed her back to Haven and then out on her circuit. He got to be such a nuisance that she decided to do something about him. So the next time he came up behind her in a market and put his arms around her, she put him to the ground." She raised one eyebrow at him. "That wasn't enough for him, apparently, because he kept following her, but at a distance. So she waited until he followed her out into the forest when she went to hunt a little fresh meat." She paused, significantly.

"Well?" Skif finally responded.

"She ambushed him and planted an arrow right between his legs. I'm given to understand that she came close enough to his assets to shave them." Skif gulped.

"I trust you take my point." She turned away from him, drew her knife, and lopped off the tip of the cheese roll with an obvious enthusiasm that made him wince. She stabbed the piece and offered it to him.

He declined.

"You are a very cruel child." Gwena sounded more amused than accusatory.

Very practical," Need retorted, with a chuckle.

"Very weary," she replied to both of them. And took the cheese herself.

"Let's hope he gets the point-before I have to give it to him." The sword and Gwena joined in laughter. "oh, I think he did," Gwena chuckled. "I'll have a talk with Cymry and see if she can't have a word with him."

"She'd better do something," Elspeth replied grimly. "Or I will. And this time, Herald or not, I'll be more direct."

Priests and other religious travelers had their own special camping ground reserved for them away from the bazaar, on top of a rise. Shaman Kra'heera shena Tale'sedrin looked out over the crowded tents of the bazaar from his vantage point above it and smiled a little. Somewhere down there was a young woman, accompanied by a tall young man, who was looking for them.

Not them, specifically. just the Tale'sedrin. Since he and Tre'valen had arrived late this afternoon, no less than four traders had come strolling up to their tent with the casually proffered information that someone was looking for Tale'sedrin.

To each of those four, Kra'heera had said nothing. He had simply gone about his business of raising their tent. His apprentice, Tre'valen, had thanked them politely, but when he had shown no further interest in the subject, the four had strolled onward, ostensibly to visit some other tent dweller farther on. But Kra'heera read the set of their shoulders, and knew that they went away disappointed because he had not been interested in buying the rest of their information. There was as much traffic in information in the bazaars of Kata'shin'a'in as there was in material goods.

He had not bought their intelligence because he did not need to. And he let them know by his manner, since they were no fools, that he had his own ways of information. Reinforcing the shamans' reputation for uncanny, timely knowledge never hurt.

As sunset touched the tops of the tents with a sanguine glow, another visitor reached the encampment of the Shin'a'in, but this visitor had no interest in selling her information. Not to folk of the People of the Plains. not when her own son rode with them, adopted into the Clan of Tale'sedrin by marriage.

This scarlet-clad visitor was welcomed within the newly-pitched tent with jokes and news; the brazier was fired for her, and cakes and sweet tea were offered and accepted. And when all the civilized amenities were completed, and only then, did rug seller Dira Crimson say what she came to say.

She, Kra'heera, and Tre'valen sat comfortably on overstuffed cushions, placed on a carpet any of the rug traders would have offered their firstborn offspring for. "There is a girl," the woman said, her plump, weathered face crinkling with a smile as she arranged the folds of her scarlet skirt about her feet. "She is a stranger, and speaks with an accent that I would not know, had I not journeyed once into Valdemar with the Clan-where we had much profit, the gods be praised." Kra'heera's lips curled up in his own smile, and he filled her cup with more tea. "I think that the gods had less to do with that than your own wit and fine goods, trade-sister She waved the suggestion aside. "Na, na, one does one's best, and the gods decree the rest. So. There is a girl. There is a young man with her. She looks for Tale'sedrin. He watches her with the eyes of a young dog with his first bitch." Kra'heera laughed at the old woman's simile. There was no repressing Dira; she told things as she saw them, and if anyone objected, why, she felt they need not listen.

"Young men are ever thus. What of this girl of Valdemar, who seeks the Children of the Hawk?" he asked.

"Well, it is said that she comes from Kerowyn, on whom be peace and profit, if such a thing is possible for one whose livelihood is by the sword. It is said that she bears the mage-sword given her from the hand of Kerowyn as a token of this." The old woman's black eyes peered at him sharply, from within a nest of wrinkles. "This is the sword of Clanmother Kethryveris, the blade called"Need."

"It is said?" Kra'heera pondered the information. "You have seen this?" Dira shook her head. "No, not with my own eyes. Nor have I heard her claim this with my own ears. I have spoken with her but briefly, a few words at most. She seems honest. That is all I can say." Kra'heera nodded, and Dira smiled her satisfaction. No Shin'a'in ever moved on purely hearsay evidence. No Shin'a'in dared move on hearsay.

But Dira had reported what she knew, and Kra'heera would not be caught by surprise.

The last of the light faded, and Tre'valen lit the scarlet lamps that marked the tent as priestly and not to be disturbed. They exchanged a few more pleasantries, and Dira took herself back to her own tent, somewhere in the labyrinthine recesses of the rug seller's bazaar.

Kra'heera nodded to his apprentice to take her place beside the brazier. The elder shaman sat in thought while his apprentice seated himself. "Will you do nothing about this Outlander?" Tre'valen wondered aloud. "Will you seek her out?"

"Perhaps." Kra'heera studied the bottom of his paper-thin porcelain teacup. "Perhaps. She may be of some use to us, whether she speaks the truth or no. But we have a more urgent appointment, you and I."

"We do?" Tre'valen asked, surprised, his black brows arching upwards in surprise. Tre'valen was one of the pure-blood Shina'in-by no means the majority among the mixed-blood Clan of Tale'sedrin. His iceblue eyes were startling to an outsider, set beneath his raven-black hair, in an angular, golden-skinned face.

"Surely you did not think that we came riding over the Plains in the heat of summer for the pleasure Of it?

Kra'heera responded wryly. C'If that is so, you have an odd notion of pleasure." Tre'valen flushed a little but held his tongue. Kra'heera's wit sometimes tended to the acidic, but his apprentices had to grow used to it.

That was part of becoming a shaman; to be able to face any temperament with calm.

"We go out now," Kra'heera announced, standing up from his crosslegged position with an ease many younger men would envy. That took Tre'valen by surprise; the apprentice scrambled to his feet awkwardly, just in time to follow his superior out into the night. To Kra'heera's veiled amusement, Tre'valen first turned toward the bazaar, and only altered his steps when he realized that the shaman was heading into the Old City.

And not just the Old City, but the oldest part of the city. The city swallowed them, wrapping them in a blanket of sound and lights.

Kata'shin'a'in did not sleep in trade season; business went on as usual after nightfall, although the emphasis shifted from the general to the personal, from the mundane to the exotic. In the bazaar the perfume sellers, the jewelers, the traders in mage-goods would be doing brisk business. In the Old City, within the inn walls, food, drink, and personal services were being sold. Kra'heera wondered if his apprentice felt as odd as he did, moving silently between walls, with the sight of the land and much of the sky blocked out by masonry. The wind could not move freely here, and the earth beneath their feet had been pounded dead and lifeless by the countless hooves of passing beasts.

Yet the Shin'a'in had once known cities-or rather a city, one that had once stood in the precise middle of the Dhorisha Plains. Once, and very long ago, that had been the home of the Kaled'a'in.

Kra'heera led the way confidently between the walls of alien stone' through the scents and sounds that were just as alien, the evidences of Outlanders conducting further business-or pleasure. He moved without worry, for all the fact that he wore a sword at his back, for the rule of the bazaar did not apply to Shin'a'in; not here, in their own city, where they only visited, but never lived.

The deeper they went into the core city, the darker and quieter it became-and the stranger grew the scents and the sounds. Voices babbling in chaos became voices chanting quietly in unison; raucous song became the sweet harmony of a pair of boy sopranos. The mingled scents of perfume, wine, and cookery gave way to the smoke of incense and the fragrance of flowers. This was the quarter of the temples, and the doors spilling forth yellow light yielded to those with lanterns on either side, held invitingly open for the would-be worshiper.

Yet these were all Outlander places of worship, not places that belonged to the Shin'a'in. Kra'heera continued past them as Tre'valen gazed about in interest. The lanterns at the temple doors became fewer; the doors, closed and darkened, until there was no light at all except what came from the torches kept burning at intervals along the street.

Sound faded; now they heard the dull scuff of their own boot soles along the hard-packed dirt of the street.

Finally they reached their goal, near where the street ended in a blank wall; a single, closed door, with a lantern burning low beside it. ir m'heera knocked in a pattern long familiar to his apprentice as the beginning of one of the drum chants.

The door opened, and Kra'heera again hid his amusement to see Tre'valen's shock. She who opened the door for them was Kal'enedral, Swordsworn-and at first glance, she looked to be garbed in black, the color of blood-feud.

A closer look as she closed the door behind them, however, showed Tre'valen what Kra'heera already knew; the color of her costume was not black, nor brown, but deep midnight blue.

Which was not a color that Swordsworn ever wore.

"What-" said Tre'valen.

"She is special," Kra'heera said, anticipating his question. "She is Sworn, not only to the Warrior, but the Crone as well. She bears her blade-but she uses it to guard wisdom. There are a dozen more like her here, and this is the only place where you will find them." The Kal'enedral led them down the corridor, into a single, square room, with a roof made of tiny, square panes of glass set in a latticework of lead. The full moon had just begun to peer through the farther edge of the window-roof. Tre'valen stared at it in fascination; glass windows were a wonder to a Shin'a'in, and a glass roof a marvel past expectation.

He almost stumbled onto the weaving carpeting the floor of the room; Kra'heera caught him before his foot touched the fragile threads, and steadied him as he looked down in confusion.

"It is too old to hang," he explained. "And besides, as you know, there are things that need the moon to unlock." The Kal'enedral slipped out of the room unnoticed; Kra'heera took a seat on one of the many cushions placed around the woven tapestry at the periphery of the room. After a moment's hesitation, Tre'valen joined him.

"You know the story of our people," Kra'heera said softly, as he waited for the moon to sail above the walls, shine down through the window, and touch the threads of the weaving. "Let me remind you again, to set your mind upon the proper paths." Out of the corner of his eye he saw Tre'valen nod, and waited for a moment, absorbing the silence-and the dust of centuries rising from the weaving.

"In the long-ago time, we and the Hawkbrothers were one people' the Kaled'a'in. We served and loved an overlord, one of the Great Mages, and when he became drawn into a war, so, too, did we. The end of that war brought great destruction, so great that it destroyed our homeland.

The mage himself had great care for his people, and he gave the warning and the means for us to escape before the destruction itself was wrought.

It took us many years to return from whence we had escaped; when we came here, to this very spot-" The moon crept through the roof-window; it had been edging down toward the weaving. He had paced his words to coincide with it reaching the first threads of the border, as he reached with the power She gave her shamans, and invoked the magic of the weaving.

"-this is what we saw."

Shaman Ravenwing passed her hand over her eyes, wishing she could change the reality as she blotted out the sight. ir way here, the flattened trees, IWE debris that they had encountered on the complete absence of animal and bird life, the closer they came to the site, had given them some warning. The ridge of earth they had approached had told them more. But nothing prepared them for the reality.

There was no homeland. Only a vast crater, as far as the eye could see, dug many, many man-heights into the ravaged earth. So intense had been the heat of the blast that had caused it, that the earth at the bottom had been fused into a lumpy sheet of glassy rock.

Ravenwing took her hand from her eyes and looked again. It was no better at second viewing, and Ravenwing reached out blindly for the two Clansfolk standing beside her. She stood with her arms about their shoulders, theirs about hers; and her eyes streamed tears as she forced herself to face the death of all she had ever known.

She sat inside the hastily-pitched Clan Council tent. erected to provide shade-and to block the sight of the destruction. With her sat the shamans, the Clan Elders, every leader of every Clan of the Kaled'a'in. They were here to make decisions-and possibly, to settle a rift that was threatening to split the People in twain.

The dispute centered about magic. Five of the Clans used it, four did not.

Traditionally, the four who tended and bred the horse herds were the Clans which avoided the use of magery; Hawk, Wolf, Grasscat, and Deer. the five Clans which-among other things-actually manipulated the breeding of the horses, as well as other creatures, did so by means of magic. These five had fielded many mages and Healers to their overlord, Mage Urtho. Falcon, Owl, and Raven Clans were protesting that they were not going to give up their powers, as the previous four were insisting. Two more Clans, Eagle and Fox, were ambivalent, but were disturbed by the idea of sacrificing something so integral to their lives.

Ravenwing's own Clan, Taylesederin, was foremost in demanding that magic be eliminated from their lives.

"Our warsteeds are everything anyone could wish; there have been no changes made to them for generations. the bondbirds are not entirely all one could wish, but is it worth holding such a dangerous, double-edged power simply to improve them a little more?" That was Ravenwing's Clan Chief, Silverhorse, the foremost opponent of magic in all its shapes and colors.

Firemare Valavyska, Elder for the Owls, widened her eyes with contempt.

"What, you think that is all magic does? Precisely what do you intend to do about those who do not share your scruples, our enemies who would use any weapon they have against us? Who will protect you from the attacks of mages if you banish magic from our lives?"

"Who protected us this time?" Silverhorse shouted, gesturing wildly at the desolation beyond the tent flap. "Is it worth a repetition of that simply to have a little more Power?"

"Magic protected you this time by giving you the means to escape, little brother," rumbled Suncat Trevavyska, of Falcons. "Magic has saved you before, and it will again. Besides, how do you propose to cleanse this land if not by magic. ~ Only magic can undo what magic has done.

It was but the opening blow of a dispute that was to continue for days ...The last member of the Five Clans vanished into the north, and Ravenwing dried her eyes on her sleeve, swallowing the last of her tears. In the end, the dispute could not be healed, not by the softest words of the most reasonable and coolest heads in the Clans nor by any appeals to brotherhood and solidarity.

the Five Clans-now calling themselves "Taylesederas," or "Brothers of the Hawks," for their association with the corvine and raptor bondbirds they had been developing-had determined to split from the Four Clans who wished to banish magic from their lives for all time. The Four Clans had no name for themselves at the moment-and no home, no purpose. their only plan had been to do away with magery. Now that was done, and they had no idea of what to do next.

But Ravenwing and her fellow shamans-from all of the Nine Clans had been in separate consultations after they had determined that there would be no compromise. And Ravenwing had been chosen to present their thoughts to the Elder of Hawks.

Silverhorse stared after the departing ones long past when the last of the dust had settled. His face was blank, as if he had not truly expected that the People could be sundered. It seemed as good a time as any to approach him.

"Well?" she asked, jarring him from his entrancement. You have succeeded in this much; there is no longer magic among the People, other than that She and He give the shamans. Now what is your plan? Where do we go? what do we do? Will we find a homeland? Do we seek a new overlord?" He turned eyes upon her that were bleak and sad. "I do not know," he confessed. "this land is torn and poisoned by magic turned awry; there is nowhere for us to go that we may claim without displacing someone else. Yet we cannot remain here-"

"We could," she offered. He answered with a short bark of a laugh.

"What? And eat rock? Drink our own tears? Watch our little ones warped and changed by the magic gone wild and twisted in this place?" He laughed again, but the pain in his laughter tore at her heart. "Is that all you can offer me, shaman of the Hawk?" He continued to laugh, but it was becoming wild and hysterical.

She silenced him with a single, open-handed slap. He stared at her-for in all her life, she had never once raised her hand to anyone, Clansman or not. She had been known as one of the softest and gentlest women in all the Clans-certainly among the shamans.

But the past days had hardened and toughened her; and the days to come would only mean more of the same. This she knew, though she was no Seer.

"You told me when you urged that we forsake magic, that we must trust in the Powers for our protection. Are you telling me now that you no longer believe that?" She let the acid of her words drip into the raw wound of his soul without mercy. "If that is true, then perhaps I should take my beasts and ride out after my Sundered brothers!"

"I-" his mouth worked for a moment, before he could produce any words.

"I believe that... but... "

"But what?" Ravenwing looked down her long nose at him, from beneath half-closed lids. "But you do not believe they would answer if we called on them? Or is it that you are not willing to pay the price they might put on our aiding?"

"Would they answer?" he asked, hope springing into his eyes. "Have YOU done a Seeking, shaman of the Hawk?" She nodded, slowly. "I have done a Seeking and a Calling, and I have been answered. But the price of their aid will be in blood.

He took a deep breath. "whose?"

"the Elders of each Clan that is left," she replied with authority. "Yours, and the other three." She watched his face change as her words struck him. It was not an easy decision that he was being asked to make. He was a relatively young man; as yet unmated, with all of his life before him. And that was part-and no small part-of the sacrifice. Yet when he had taken the Oath of the Elder, he had pledged just this thing; to lay down his life for his people at need.

But he had, no doubt, thought if it came to that, it would be in the heat of battle-not the cold loneliness of self-sacrifice.

His eyes widened in a glazed shock, turned inward, then focused on hers again. She nodded as she saw his attention return to her.

"It is not an easy question," she said quietly. "Your three brother and sister Elders are being posed the same question even now. We do not expect you to answer at once-but it must be soon. the People, as you pointed out, cannot remain here long." '"And if I decline this-honor?" he asked, with a touch of painful irony.

"then I spill my blood in place of yours," she replied steadily, having faced this possibility herself, and made her own decision. "It must be one or the other of us."

"Leaving Hawk without a shaman.

She shrugged. "It must be one or the other of us. that is the Price the Calling named. We four chief shaman have spoken, and agreed. All of the apprentices have promise, but none is fit or trained to function on his own. If any of the chiefs must go, that Clan must live without a shaman until an apprentice is ready." She stepped away from him, and turned to go. "I will leave you to think on this. Come to me by moonrise with your decision.

He touched her shoulder as she turned away, stopping her.

"I do not need until moonrise," he said, in a tone that made her heart usore. "It is not all that difficult a choice to make,, after all." He smiled, a smile sweet and without fear, and she held back her tears.

"When will you require me?" he asked.

It had taken a full moon for the Clans to position themselves about the glassy crater that had been their homeland, one to each prime direction. It had been hardest for Cat Clan; they had to make the half-circle around the rim to position themselves in the West.

At sunset-in whatever manner they chose-the four Elders gave themselves for their people. Silverhorse had simply stepped off the top of the ridge, vanishing into the darkness of the crater without even a sigh. Now Ravenwing stood above the place he had fallen, her arms spread to the sky, calling on the Powers with every fiber. Behind her in a rough half-circle stood the rest Of the Clan, from the infants in arms to the oldest grandsire, adding their prayers to hers.

And with the moon, She came.

Her face changed, moment to moment, from Maid to Crone, from stern Warrior to nurturing Mother, and back again. She filled the sky, and yet She stood before Ravenwing and stared deeply and directly into the shaman's eyes.

She spoke, and Her voice filled Ravenwing's ears and mind so completely that there was room for nothing but the experience.

"I have heard your prayers," She said, gravely, "as I have heard the prayers of your Sundered brothers. There was a price to be paid for what they asked, and there is a price to be paid for what you ask."

"In blood?" asked a quiet voice, which Ravenwing recognized as that of Azurestar, shaman of Cat Clan. A tiny bit of her was left to wonder that she could hear the voice as clearly as if Azurestar stood beside her.

She shook Her head. "Not in blood-in your lives, all of you. I shall give you back your homeland, but the price is vigilance." She held out Her hand, and cupped within it was the crater. In the center of the crater, and scattered about it, beneath the slag and fused stone, were shapeless things that glowed an evil green.

"Three things destroyed the homeland," She said gravely. "the destructive spell of an enemy, the self-destruction of the Gate that you fled through, and the Final Strike of your master Urtho's death by his Champion, meant to remove his enemy as he himself died. Yet despite all this, there are many weapons of Urtho's making that still remain and could be used, buried beneath the slag and rubble. There are weapons there that are too dangerous even for those with good intentions to hold. But you have forsworn magic for all time-they will be no temptation to you." Ravenwing nodded, and felt the agreement of the rest.

"Here, then, is the price. You must guard your new land, which you shall call the Dhorisha Shin'a-the Plains of Sacrifice, and yourselves the Shin'a'in-the People of the Plains. You must keep strangers out at all cost, unless they pledge themselves into the Clans, or are allies that you, the shamans, must call on Me to judge. Those will be marked in ways that you will recognize. You will never swear to any overlord again, but will remain always sworn only to each other and to the Powers. You have forsworn magic, and you must keep that vow. Any of your children that are born with Mage-Gift, you must either send to your Sundered brothers, bring into the craft of the shaman, or permit the shaman to block the Gift for all time." It was a sacrifice indeed; of freedom, and to a small extent, of free will-and not just for them, but for all generations. They would swear to an endless service, an endless guardianship.

But the gain was their home.

She felt the assent of her people, and added her own to it. the Goddess smiled. "It is well," She said, and spread out Her hands, stepped down into the crater, and began to walk. where Her feet touched, a carpet of flowers, grass, and trees sprang up, and spread, flowing over the ruined earth like a green flood, as She walked westward...Kra'heera blinked, and smiled faintly. He had forgotten how powerful the memories knotted into this weaving were. Ravenwing had been a formidable, strong-minded woman, and had managed to weave in not only the memories, but the emotions she had felt at the time.

That, of course, was the secret of the shamanic weavings; they held the memory of every shaman who worked upon them. This weaving held not only Ravenwing, but the half dozen who had followed her in those eventful days. Other weavings held the memories of more shamans than that; often in the Plains these days, there was little to record for years or even decades.

The most significant weavings were kept here, where all the Clans could have free access to them. There were more than four Clans now, and it was part of the training of a shaman that he come here, to experience the beginning of the Shin'a'in, the People of the Plains, for himself.

Ravenwing was responsible for making a great deal of the early training of shaman a part of the education of every Shin'a'in, so that every Shin'a'in could invoke the Powers at need. In the event of a Clan losing their shaman, it would be less of a problem to wait on the training of another than it had been in the old days.

She had also been responsible for insisting that whenever possible, more than one shaman and apprentice be resident with each Clan. And she had been the shaman who created the first of the Kal'enedral, those warriors who served, not any one Clan, but all of the Clans together.

Altogether a remarkable woman, indeed.

Kra'heera turned slowly toward his own apprentice, and waited for the memories the shaman had invoked to release the younger man. Finally Tre'valen blinked, and shook his head slightly.

"All that is left is for you to learn the unlocking of these memories, and the weaving of them yourself," Kra'heera told the apprentice. "But that was not why I brought you here now. Have you guessed why?" Tre'valen, who had already recovered from the affect of the alien memories on his own mind, nodded. "It is because of the rumors, I think," he said. "There are rumors that the Plains have been disturbed.

You wanted me to see for myself why it is the People guard them." Kra'heera considered moving-but the memory-trance relaxed one rather than leaving one tense, and there was nowhere more secure from listeners than this place.

"The rumors are true," he said. "There have been intruders on the Plains, intruders that only the shaman have been able to detect. The border guards cannot stop them, indeed, they have only recently caught sight of them at a distance. They are some kind of magic-made creatures from past the Tale'edras lands, and they have entered from the northern side of the Plains, where the Plains meet the territory of the Tale'edras Clan k'sheyna."

"The Falcons?" Tre'valen said, curiously. "I do not know them.

"I know a little, but not a great deal," Kra'heera admitted. "I know this much of the enemy: the things that have been looking about have an incredible ability to vanish and have never been seen clearly. They have been sniffing out magic, I think, and when they find it, I think they will call that which created them."

"They could find many things," Tre'valen said grimly.

"And worst case, they could find the remains of the stronghold of Mage Urtho." Kra'heera nodded agreement. "I do not know if it would be possible for an attack to be mounted against the center of the Plains-but I do not know that it would not be possible."

"What of k'sheyna?" Tre'valen asked anxiously. "Are the Hawkbrothers not pledged to help us when dangers come from out of their lands?"

"Yes, but k'sheyna, from the little I know, is a Clan with troubles of its own," Kra'heera responded, after a moment to gather his thoughts.

"I do not think they are capable of repulsing a single Adept just now, and if these creatures are the servants of not one, but an alliance of Adepts-well, I do not think there is much hope of aid from them." Tre'valen grimaced. "So. What is it we need do?" Kra'heera mentally congratulated his apprentice; the youngster had cut to the heart of the matter, without wasting time on things that might or might not be.

"We need to bring together the shaman of two Clans, at least. Then, we must invoke the Kal'enedral-the leshyae-Kal'enedral, as well as what physical Swordsworn we can muster."

"The spirits?" Tre'valen said in surprise. "We can invoke the spirit Swordsworn?"

"If needs must, yes, we can," Kra'heera told him. "It must be done through the living Swordsworn, but it is not done lightly. I think, however, we have little choice at this moment. The spirits bring with them some of Her power, Her magic, and with these, I think we can withstand these intruders. But to accomplish all this, there is one thing more we must have."

"Time," Tre'valen responded promptly.

"Time," Kra'heera agreed. "And to gain time, we need a distraction for these things."

"Hmm." Tre'valen's face grew thoughtful, and Kra'heera felt a lifting of his heart. He had not been mistaken in this young man. Tre'valen did not simply wait to do what he was told-he looked for answers.

"The young woman that Dira spoke of-" Tre'valen said, slowly.

"Just what is she? Why would she seek us?" Kra'heera wondered for a moment why Tre'valen's mind had turned to the strangers, but the younger man was Gifted with the ability to sift through bits of information and extract unusual solutions. So here, in this safest of all places, the elder let his own mind range for a moment, asking for a vision that would sum up what these strangers were.

In a moment, he had that vision; the young woman and her friendwith white uniforms, and leshyae horses.

They were Heralds of Valdemar. He had no trouble recognizing the uniform; his cousin Kerowyn had one-though she seldom wore it willingly.

Only one Herald had ever entered the Plains-the great and good friend of Tarma shena Tale'sedrin, long before Kra'heera had ever been born. Herald Roald was something of a minor legend among Tale'sedrin, with his spirit-horse, and his undeniable charm. Other Clans' children envied Tale'sedrin, who had hosted the verkal'enedral, the "White Swordsworn," who brought them presents and took them for rides on his beautiful spirit-horse. Kra'heera's father had been one of those so honored, and for years thereafter he had told the children and grandchildren his tales, of the wind-swift horse that had the understanding of a man.

"They are Heralds, from the Queen in Valdemar," he told his apprentice. "I do not know what brings them, but since our cousin Kerowyn is also one of them, I think that everything Dira told us could be true."

"Hmm." Tre'valen nodded thoughtfully. "That must be tested, of course. As they must be tested."

" But not by us." Kra'heera reminded him. "She must test and mark them. But-what were you thinking?"

"That they might prove worthy allies, perhaps enough to help us with these intruders." Tre'valen blinked, owlishly, in the moonlight. "Did you have any other thoughts?" I"Yes," Kra'heera responded, smiling slowly. "I have in mind that they might become our distraction. They have to be tested in any case; why not make their testing a matter of seeing how they respond to these intruders?" Tre'valen frowned, which surprised his teacher. "Is this fair?" he demanded. "They do not know what it is they will encounter, nor do they know the Plains. We know the girl carries a magic thing, the spiritsword. If these hunters are seeking out magic, will they not sniff it out? And what then?"

"Then they must defend themselves if the hunters come for them," Kra'heera said with a shrug. "They are outsiders, are they not? They must prove their worth, must they not? If She finds them worthy, perhaps She will aid them."

"But what of us?" Tre'valen asked. "Should we not aid them?"

"Why?" Kra'heera responded. "I see no reason to aid them. If they survive, very well. If they survive and grant us the time we need, we will aid them. If they do not?" He shrugged. "The Plains are ours to guard. She never told us that we were to take in random strangers who come looking for help from us. In fact, by allowing them to cross the Plains, we are granting them more than any other in all of our history.

It is only because they are Heralds, and because they come from our cousin, that I allow this at all." Reluctantly, Tre'valen nodded. "It is in the interest of the Clans," he admitted. "But I cannot like it."

"That which does not overcome us, strengthens us," Kra'heera replied callously. "This will be good for them. And here is what we shall do... Elspeth knew by a sudden change in the air that she was no longer alone in her little room.

Tonight she had demanded another room, separate from Skif's. She was not going to share a room, much less a bed, with him anymore. She had hoped that would make it clear to him that she was not going to put up with his nonsense any more.

Skif had protested, but she had overruled him. Now she was sorry she had.

There was an intruder in her room, and if she was very lucky, it would only prove to be a thie She risked a quick mental probe, and met a block as solid as a wall of seamless marble.

Crap. It's not a thief-She started to reach for the knife under her pillows, and started to call for Gwena-only started; no more. She was frozen in place by a sudden flare of light.

It was the candle at her bedside, lighting itself. And at the foot of her bed was a sinister shadow, arms folded.

Clad in black from head to toe, veiled-there was no mistaking that costume. Kero had described and sketched it in detail, and no one here in Kata'shin'a'in would dare counterfeit it. Not here, not on the edge of the Plains.