The Prophet of Panamindorah, Book One Fauns and Filinians (8 page)

Corry drew in breath, but something seemed to
have happened to his lungs. Long after they should have reached
capacity, he kept drawing air, filling and filling. The world
blurred. He could see each of the shelts around him only as a red
silhouette, more orange in the limbs and brightest red in the torso
and head. Corry gulped, and a dizzying array of taste-smells
flooded his brain. He seemed to have gained height. Lyli was
standing below him, but he had difficulty distinguishing her sword
until she moved it. Everyone had gone very still, and he wondered
whether he had just died. Then someone screamed. There were shouts.
The noises came to him like sounds underwater.

Lyli seemed to be running from him. Sham and
Sevn were backing away. Fenrah held her ground a moment. Then he
heard her breath one word. “Arrows!” All the wolflings turn and
ran.

Next moment the world slid back into focus.
Corry stood with his hand clutching his chest. “What happened?” he
gasped.

Syrill was grinning at him. “Why did you wait
so long?”

He was running now, and Corry had to sprint
to keep up. “That horn was my soldiers looking for us. With any
luck, they’ll find us before the Raiders do. Make some noise.” He
began to shout, occasionally whistling between his fingers.

Very shortly this sound was answered by a
bugle-like snort. Corry nearly stumbled, but Syrill laughed aloud
and whistled again. Corry heard hoof beats, and then Syrill’s stag
bounded into view. Seconds later, they were on his back.

“What did you become?” asked Syrill as they
bounded away. “I know you shifted, saw the blur as I turned, but at
the moment I was afraid to take my eyes off Sevn.”

“Do you mean I changed shape?”

“Yes. Was it an accident? Panicked, did
you?”

“I suppose. I don’t really know how I did it.
You didn’t see me?”

“No.” Syrill sounded disappointed. “You still
don’t know what shelt blood you carry?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

Syrill didn’t seem to hear him. “Well, you’re
no faun-blood. They’d never run from a deer. From their
expressions, you’d think they’d seen a monster.”

“If I had faun blood, I would have shifted to
a deer?” asked Corry.

“Yes, of course,” muttered Syrill, thinking.
“Perhaps a bear? A very large one? No, I still can’t imagine her
fleeing that way from a bear. Perhaps a…” He licked his lips in
disgust. “A cat. They say an iteration lives a long life. Still,
I’d have thought you too young, even for an iteration. Cat shelts
were gone before my grandparents’ time.”

Corry sat silent while Syrill discussed his
possible lineage. “Syrill?” he interrupted.

“Hmm?”

“I saved your life back there, didn’t I?”

“Yes.”

“And I helped you get the key?”

“Yes.”

“Then do me the kindness of not telling
anyone that I shifted.”

“Ah. Corry, it is not necessarily a mark of
dishonor to have a wizard’s talents. It’s only distrusted, because
wizards mistreated shelts in the past.”

“Until shelts killed them all?” asked Corry
sarcastically.

“I think they mostly killed each other.”

“Whatever. Wood fauns won’t trust me if they
know I can shift. The less like a wizard I seem, the better I’ll
get on here. Syrill, if I’ve been any help to you, do this for
me.”

Syrill inclined his head. “I will not
disclose your talents without your permission. However, you should
consider the possibilities. As you’ve just seen, the ability to
shift could be very useful. I would not be at all opposed to having
an iteration in my army…even if your true form is a cat. Yes, come
to think of it, that might be most useful of all.”

Corry laughed. “Are you inviting me to become
what you accused me of being: a spy?”

“They’re only bad when they’re on the other
side!” quipped Syrill. “Laylan has done some work for me. His
cheetah’s tracks don’t attract attention from enemy scouts. The pay
is excellent. Of course, there are drawbacks. If you think the
Raiders are fierce, then the cats may give you a green turn. We got
a prisoner back last red month whom they’d tortured. He died
yesterday. The cats had licked all the skin off one arm.”

* * * *

Capricia Sor watched the sunrise from the
window of her study, high in the tower where she’d taken Corry two
days ago. A plate of breakfast sat untouched on a tray beside her.
The pot of tea on her desk had received more attention. She’d drunk
all of it and had not slept. Words and phrases run together in her
mind—the scholarly commentaries, so scant and confusing, the
partial interpretations of the ancient language, her own notes from
interviews with a few very old cliff fauns, the last to have spoken
with anyone who knew the old writing.

The princess was deeply troubled.
“Corellian…” She rolled the name around on her tongue. “Yes, it is
possible. I thought the pronunciation different, but it is
possible.”

Boom!
A servant banged open the door
without knocking. Capricia turned with an angry reprimand, but
stopped when she saw the excitement on his face.

“They’re back!” exclaimed the servant and
then remembered to bow. “Syrill has returned safely, your highness,
along with your iteration friend, Corellian. All Laven-lay is
talking about him. Syrill reports that he could not have escaped
without Corellian’s help, and they have rescued the master trap key
from Raider hands! They will enter the castle in a moment. Your
father wants to greet them himself.”

Capricia frowned as the messenger scampered
away.
How will I ever get rid of him now?

* * * *

Corry felt giddy during the parade through
Laven-lay. The whole city seemed to be attending their progress up
the street. He wished Syrill would hurry inside out of the press,
but Syrill was preening and kept his stag’s pace to a stately walk.
They dismounted on the steps of the castle and entered the
antechamber, carried along by the throng, only escaping when a cry
of, “Make way for the King!” forced the crowd apart. Corry saw
Meuril in the entrance to the throne room, beckoning them
nearer.

Syrill strode forward, and Corry followed
more hesitantly. “My dear general,” said the King, “my nation’s
debt to you grows ever larger.”

Syrill bowed. “I did no more than my duty,
Sire.”

“And you,” Meuril turned to Corry, “your
reception into my realm makes this act even greater. If I am to
believe my general’s message, he and the key would not be here but
for you.”

Meuril turned to the throng. “Friends, we
have averted disaster because of this young iteration. Who among
you would be so prejudiced as to deny him citizenship?”

A chorus of approving cheers erupted, and
Meuril smiled. “Corry, you are hereby granted citizenship of
Laven-lay and all the rights of trading, traveling, and protection
it affords. To ensure that all shelts honor my decision I am
entrusting you with a ring bearing the sign of my own house. Wear
it, and you are one of us.”

As Corry took the bit of gold from Meuril, he
caught sight of two scowling brown eyes amid the smiles.
Capricia.

“Do you want to get out of this?” Syrill
bellowed over the noise. Corry nodded and followed him as he edged
his way to one of the small side doors leading off of the
antechamber. Syrill shut it, and the sound diminished instantly.
“How does it feel to be a hero?”

“Safer,” said Corry, thinking of
Capricia.

Syrill gave him an odd look.

“I mean,” Corry improvised, “now I don’t have
to worry about fauns torturing me.”

Syrill grinned. “You had to turn the blade
one more time, didn’t you? Well, that won’t happen again, Corellian
of Laven-lay.”

Corry glanced at the circlet of gold. On one
side it bore the leaf and buck’s head of Laven-lay, on the other
side the image of a diving falcon. “The insignia of the House of
Sor,” explained Syrill. “That’s Meuril’s personal sign. He’d never
have given it to a faun, but prejudice against iterations is so
strong I suppose he thought it was the only way to ensure your
safety.”

They were in the garden now, moving beneath
the living archways of flowering vines. Corry tried to put the ring
on, but found it too large to stay on his finger.

Syrill chuckled. “You’ll have to have it
fitted by a goldsmith.”

They walked for a moment in silence. “What’s
your deer’s name, Syrill?”

“Blix.” Corry could hear the pride in his
voice. “I raised him.”

“He’s magnificent.” Corry hesitated. “What
will happen to the wolflings now?”

Syrill glanced at him curiously. “Nothing, I
suppose.”

“But won’t the fauns—”

Syrill snorted. “We’re speaking of Fenrah’s
Raiders, not common thieves. Of course my soldiers will follow our
path of retreat and try to find them, but I’m sure they’ll fail.
The Raider’s mobility is their most peculiar talent.”

“But they must have gone somewhere.”

Syrill shrugged. “The Raiders are very
mobile. Some say they have no den. Others say it’s impossible to
operate so efficiently, to stash plunder so well, and to disappear
so completely without a permanent den.”

Corry looked thoughtful.
If the Raiders
were involved with Capricia’s finding the flute, perhaps their den
holds more clues about my past.
“I suppose everyone has
searched thoroughly?”

Syrill laughed. “Of course! If the Raiders
have a home, they can be trapped...along with the mountain of
treasure they have supposedly accumulated.
If
they have a
home—”

“They do.”

Faun and boy turned together. In the path
behind them stood a shelt who had come up without sound of
footfalls.
This has to be Laylan
, thought Corry. The bounty
hunter had red-furred legs and black canine paws. His bushy,
white-tipped tail hung a full foot below the hem of his brown
leather tunic. He had red hair the color of his fur, pulled back in
a loose ponytail that was oddly reminiscent of his real tail. A
black, wide-brimmed hat threw a shadow across his face. From the
place where other hats might have carried a feather, dangled a limp
wolf tail.

“They have a den,” he said.

Syrill grinned. “Laylan! This is Corellian,
the iteration who helped save your key.”

Laylan’s eyebrows rose. “You have saved me a
great deal of trouble. Thank you.” He turned to Syrill. “I have
news about Lexis’ movements that may interest you.”

“Certainly. Good day, Corellian.”

Corry watched them walk away—Syrill with his
swinging gait and Laylan on gliding paws that never crunched a
leaf.

Chapter
10. The
Agreement

A promise is always a shackle. Made well, it
will anchor you to life and reason. Made poorly, it will be to you
a ball and chain.

—Archemais,
Treason and Truth

Corry soon learned that Meuril had assigned
him a suit of rooms in the castle. While he was exploring them, a
servant arrived to return his backpack. Corry had not seen it since
Syrill confiscated his possessions in the wood. Grinning, he
brought out the orange cowry.

“Where did you get that?”

Corry turned to see Capricia in the
doorway.

“I brought it from Earth. It’s money, isn’t
it? You use them for money here.”

Capricia’s mouth twisted. “We…used to.”

“Ah. What do you use now?”

She didn’t say anything.

Corry sat down at a little table. “Aren’t you
happy that I helped save the master trap key, Capricia? Or would
you rather the Raiders have killed me?”

To Corry’s surprise, Capricia left the
doorway and came to sit across the table from him. “No, of course
not. You remember that I told our archers not to shoot at you.”

“It would have seemed odd to everyone if you
hadn’t. Capricia, why don’t you want me here? I know that you say
the flute could have given me the language, but you don’t really
believe that.” He leaned closer. “Here’s something the flute won’t
explain: Fenrah’s wolf recognized me! After I escaped, I ran into
him in the forest. He was friendly to me. He never said a word, but
I know he can talk. I remember him. Or something about him.”

Capricia looked skeptical.

“I thought,” continued Corry, “that I’d
skipped forward in time. I left Panamindorah and came to Earth, and
only a year passed on Earth, but hundreds of years passed here.
That would explain why I know your language, and yet it sounds a
little strange to me. Languages change. It would explain why
everyone says my speech is old fashioned, why I think cowries ought
to be money.”

Capricia nodded wearily. “I understand what
you think, Corellian, but—”

“
But
,” he continued, “that doesn’t
explain Dance. How could he know me? How could Dance possibly have
been alive long enough for the language to change?”

“By all reports, Dance is just a wolf like
any other. No faun has ever heard him speak. He’s large, and that’s
what started the rumor that he’s a durian wolf, but Chance and
Laylan don’t think so. There are many reasons why he might have
seemed friendly towards you. Perhaps your scent reminded him of the
wolflings. You had been with them recently, after all. Perhaps you
unwittingly gave him a signal that he recognized—a hand sign or a
gesture that the Raiders use.”

Corry looked out the window, annoyed. “You’re
wrong.”

Capricia started to speak again, but he cut
her off. “I know the Raiders had something to do with your getting
the flute. Did you really ‘find’ it, Capricia? Or did you steal
it?”

She stared at him. “How did you—?”

“Syrill told me you began your study of the
wizards after becoming ‘lost’ in the forest during a Raider attack.
He thought it was me you’d found, but I’m sure it was the flute. I
want to know how you got it. I’ll tell Meuril if you don’t—”