Trickster's Choice (27 page)

Dove shook her head. “Female. She can’t inherit under luarin law. Hazarin doesn’t have children—and the way he lives, nobody expects it. His only heir is Prince Dunevon, and he’s just three. He’s the only child of Oron’s third queen. She’s dead. I suppose Oron would put Dunevon under the guardianship of Hazarin or Imajane and her husband. Or just Imajane and Rubinyan if Hazarin was king.”

Aly smoothed the reins over her hand. That matched reports on the kingship of the Isles she had read at home. “And if something happened to Hazarin and Dunevon?”

“No, they’re healthy enough,” Dove said automatically. Then her golden cheeks paled. “Papa. Papa’s next in line.”

“Sarai would be a crown princess,” Aly pointed out, her voice soft. “So would you, and Petranne. Elsren would be a prince.” Aly hesitated, then continued, hoping she did not make a mistake with this girl. “Rubinyan married into the royal family,” Aly reminded Dove. “Maybe Bronau wants to do the same.”

Dove chewed her lower lip. “This is too deep for me. We need to tell the duchess. Though if she likes Bronau …”

So Dove, at least, now thought of her stepmother as an ally. Aly was relieved to hear it. “She likes him, but she knows he is not as careful as she would like,” she told Dove. “Her Grace would listen.”

“Why did he come?” Dove whispered, glaring at Bronau. “We’re in trouble enough with the Crown. We don’t need more of the king’s attention.”

“I don’t believe the prince thought about that,” Aly replied. “Only about what he wants.”

Supper that night was over in the main hall. The conspirators, Nawat, and Aly had just finished their night’s meeting. Aly was about to leave to report to the Balitangs when Ulasim grabbed her arm.

“Just what did you think you were doing, in Pohon today?” he asked quietly. “You gave Junai the slip. You left your companions to walk through a notoriously hostile village alone, for what reason? To learn they have nothing? That under the luarin they are nothing, when once they gave birth to queens?”

Aly glanced at the hand on her arm, then looked at Ulasim and raised an eyebrow. He met her gaze, his grip still firm.

“Surely Junai told you I can take care of myself,” Aly said very gently.

“Not against a group,” Ulasim told Aly. “Why? The god cannot watch you always. No god can. And you are too wise to take foolish chances, Aly of the crooked eye.”

“Don’t call me that,” Aly replied. “It hurts my feelings. And Pohon isn’t so badly off, not with five arms caches that I could see on a casual walk. There is also that herd of very fine horses recently moved outside the wall. I am assuming that was so we couldn’t notice how well mounted the Pohon raka are. I didn’t get into any of the barns, but blaze balm has a distinctive smell.”

Ulasim’s eyes went wide. His hold on Aly tightened.

Aly sighed and grabbed his little finger, forcing it back against its normal curve. “Now, be nice. You might startle me into breaking your finger,” she pointed out as beads of sweat formed on Ulasim’s forehead. “Think how unfriendly that would be. It’s not like you don’t trust me, after all. I
am
the god’s chosen.”

Ulasim let her go. She released his finger. “I’m Tortallan, remember?” she asked. “As long as the Balitangs and I live out the summer, I don’t care what the raka are up to. I’d move the blaze balm, though. Bronau’s served in combat. If he smells it the Pohon folk will be in trouble with the Crown.
I
was looking for a mage.”

Ulasim massaged the finger she had bent, eyeing her with respect. When she said “mage,” his eyebrows shot up. “Junai said you’d been at her about that. We told you, there isn’t one.”

“And I took it as a nice, polite lie between allies,” Aly said reasonably. “But our guest’s presence makes me uneasy. The longer he stays, the more likely he’ll draw attention this way, attention nobody wants. My task here is quite simple, Ulasim.
I’m to keep this family safe.
That doesn’t mean dealing with a threat when it actually comes; it means preparing for them in advance. For that, I require a true mage, not a healer with a few extra spells, like Rihani. The raka have one. I need her.”

Ulasim sighed, and rubbed his forehead. “She doesn’t live in Pohon. And you must be patient. Junai is working on her.”

Aly leaned against a nearby wall and stuffed her hands into her pockets. “
Junai
is working on her?”

“And others,” mumbled Ulasim.

“Why is Junai important enough that this recluse will speak with her?” Aly pressed, knowing there was a secret here, and wanting it.

Ulasim smoothed his hand over his short, neat beard. “Because Ochobu is her grandmother. But I wouldn’t count on her help, Aly. I really wouldn’t. She said when she disowned me that it would take a miracle for her to even come downwind of me again.”

Now Aly knew the secret. “Your
mother
?”

“Who cast me out,” Ulasim explained. “My father was dying, and she summoned me home. I didn’t feel I could leave the young ladies. Mother never forgave me.”

Aly straightened and dusted off her tunic. “Well, we’ll just have to think of a miracle, then,” she told Ulasim. “Or rather, I will. You think of what to say to her when you see her again.”

Ulasim grabbed Aly’s arm, gently this time. “Don’t ask the god,” he begged. “You don’t know what he might do.”

Aly smiled grimly. “Don’t worry,” she reassured the tall man. “I already know better than to call on gods casually. But there are miracles, and there are
miracles.
I just need to think of one.”

Midsummer’s Day, June 22, 462 H.E.
*
Trebond, in northern Tortall*]

It was another of those not-quite-dreams that Aly knew Kyprioth had sent. The Kyprioth dreams always felt like everyday life, except that she was a ghost and the dream ended before dawn in the Copper Isles.

This dream had a familiar background: the towers of her mother’s former home, Trebond, rising on a bluff just to the west. The ghost Aly stood in a woodland clearing that was filled with creatures one expected to see in dreams. A handful of Stormwings, one of them a glass-crowned queen, perched in the trees. Beside them stood a basilisk, a seven-foot-tall lizard-like immortal with skin like beads of different shades of gray, lighter on its back, darkening to thunderhead gray on its belly. A gray pony stood beside the basilisk, thoughtfully cropping grass. On her back perched five tiny monkey-like creatures, pygmy marmosets, nibbling on raisins as they looked around. Wolves, squirrels, golden eagles, horses, ponies, and dogs lined the edges of the clearing, the squirrels and the dogs tucked behind the horses, where they kept an eye on the wolves.

Among the humans Aly recognized her foster uncle Coram, Baron of Trebond, and his wife, Aly’s aunt Rispah. With them stood a tall older man with silver-blond hair and tanned skin. A peculiar creature Aly knew as Bonedancer—a kind of bat-bird skeleton—rode on his shoulder, peering this way and that, fascinated with its surroundings. As Aly watched, the skeleton took flight, soaring on bone wings with invisible feathers, to land on the pony with the marmosets. One of them politely handed the skeleton something to eat.

Present also were Onua Chamtong and Sergeant Ogunsanwo of the Queen’s Riders, the former Rider commander, Buri, and her new husband, Raoul of Goldenlake and Malorie’s Peak. Aly saw her own mother, and Lord Wyldon of Cavall, one of the commanders of the northern armies. Lord Wyldon stood on the far side of the clearing from Alanna and eyed her much as the squirrels eyed the wolves. Aly’s grandmother Eleni was at the center of the clearing, dressed as a priestess of the Great Goddess. Aly’s grandfather Myles was there, too.

Near Eleni were Numair and Daine, dressed in their finest clothes. Between them they held a blanket like a hammock, each of them gripping two ends of it. The blanket writhed as if a score of creatures did battle for room inside it. Once a pair of hooves thrust through an opening. A moment later a snake’s tail fell out of one end.

Aly’s father rode into the clearing on a lathered horse and slid from the saddle. He rushed over to kiss Daine’s cheek and clap Numair on the shoulder, then looked at his wife. Aly’s mother eyed her husband strangely, her violet eyes cold. She jerked her chin up in some kind of challenge. George frowned, then went to her. He leaned down and whispered something in her ear; Aly saw her mother’s mouth shape the words “Not now.” George straightened, puzzled. Aly, too, was puzzled. Why was her mother angry with Da?

“I’m sure they’ll be here any moment,” Daine told Eleni. “Ma said the Great Gods ag—” She and Numair buckled, the weight in the blanket hammock suddenly large and rounded. A moment later they could raise the hammock again. Daine smiled apologetically at Aly’s grandmother, who eyed the surging blanket as if it were dangerous. “Baby river horse,” Daine explained with a blush.

“I can’t begin to imagine nursing her—him—it,” Eleni said, fumbling.

“It’s a challenge,” replied Daine, determinedly cheerful as she and Numair struggled to keep the squawking contents of the blanket steady.

The air behind Eleni shimmered silver. Two people stepped through. One was a man, over six feet in height, clad only in a loincloth. His skin was green-streaked brown; from his curly brown hair sprouted a rack of antlers that would have made an elk proud. His companion was gowned all in green, with a mist-fine green veil over her hair and face.

These were Daine’s parents, Aly realized in wonder. These guests were divine ones: the hunt god Weiryn, whose territory included the mountains of Galla and Scanra, where Daine had grown up, and his wife, Sarra, Daine’s mother, known as the Green Lady. After she had joined Daine’s father in the Divine Realms, Sarra had become a minor goddess of healing. She appeared to those who lived in and around the village where, in her mortal days, she had raised Daine and served as a midwife. Since the two were restricted to the Divine Realms after their involvement in the Immortals’ War, Aly could only guess that they had gotten special permission to cross over on Midsummer’s Day for the naming of their grandchild.

The gods nodded to Eleni, who curtsied deeply to them. The other humans in the clearing bowed or curtsied as well. Daine and Numair could do nothing but nod. Their child’s latest shape change had sent quills shooting through the fabric of its blanket.

“Now, this will not do.” The Green Lady raised her veil, revealing a pretty face crowned by blond hair. Aly could see how, as a mortal, Sarra had won the love of a god. Sweetness shone from her face and eyes and turned her voice into music. “Really, dear, you must be firm with children.”

Daine’s mouth curled down wryly. “It’s hard to reason with a six-week-old, Ma.”

“We did try,” added Numair, his gaze sharp as he looked at his mother-in-law. “Every way that we could.”

Sarra walked over and reached into the hammock blanket, pulling out a wolf puppy. It turned instantly into a young giraffe, then a gosling. Whatever shape it took, Sarra held it firmly. “Now see here, youngster,” she informed her grandchild, “you ought to be ashamed, wearing your parents out all the time. And this kind of thing isn’t good for you. You’ll exhaust yourself before you’re ten. Enough. Choose a shape and a sex and stick to it, right now.” She listened for a moment, then shook her head. “Five years at least. Learn the limits of one body. Then, if you’re good, you may try others. Now
choose.
”

A moment later she held a human baby girl in her hands. The child looked up at her with wide, solemn eyes. Sarra gave her to Daine. “She’ll be good now,” the goddess told her daughter. “And in the future, don’t shape-shift while you’re pregnant. It gives them the wrong idea.”

The naming proceeded from there.

Sergeant Ogunsanwo, Onua, and Aly’s mother and father served as godsparents for the new child. Afterward the guests came with gifts and good wishes for the baby. Numair and Daine stood as if a boulder had been lifted from their shoulders, beaming like the happy parents they were. Aly couldn’t imagine what it had been like for them, with a newborn that changed shape so often. Aly had cared for human and animal babies and had been exhausted by them even when they didn’t shape-shift.

Throughout the ceremony and the party, Aly watched her parents. Alanna was stiff near her husband, though obviously happy for her friend Daine. When George touched her elbow and they wandered off under the trees, Aly followed them, worried. What had vexed her mother
this
time?

“Lass, what is it?” George asked once they were out of earshot of the others at the naming celebration. “You seem angry.”

“Angry?” Alanna glared up at her husband. “How would you feel if you found out one of our children had disappeared and I was keeping it from you?”

George’s shoulders slumped. “You heard.”

“I should have heard it from
you,
George! Not the king! She’s my only daughter, you knew she was missing—”

George rested his hands on her shoulders. “You were in combat. I want you to concentrate on staying alive. I thought for sure I’d have found her by now. I thought—”

“But you’ve asked?” Alanna’s anger evaporated. She gripped her husband’s tunic. “Sent out your whisperers, asked for a girl of her look?”

“I dare not.” Aly’s father’s voice was soft. “I dare not, my darling. If our enemies knew she was out there—we cannot risk it. The king’s been scrying for her, but it’s as if she’s clean vanished.”

Alanna rested her forehead against George’s chest. “I’ve been scrying, every night, every morning, any moment I can. But if she were dead, surely His Majesty or I would have seen it.” She looked up. “Have you asked Alan? Twins often know if the other’s in trouble. He—”

George laid a gentle finger over her lips. “I did. He only knows she’s not hurt or frightened. Alanna, what of the Goddess? She’s your patron.”

Alanna shook her head. “I’ve prayed, without a whisper of a reply. Nothing. Perhaps she’s busy elsewhere, I know I’m not her only supplicant—”

Aly flinched. A few tears rolled down her mother’s cheeks. George gathered Alanna into his arms. Alanna dried her face on his tunic, then turned her head so that she could speak and he would hear. “I want to hunt for her myself.” She cut off her husband as he drew breath to speak. “I know. I said I
want
to, I didn’t say that I could. I’m noticeable. And there’s still a war to fight. Maggur’s like a rabid wolf, at his most dangerous when he’s cornered. But then I think of our Aly—”