Changer's Daughter (6 page)

His voice low, his tones measured and without any trace of his usual humor, Anson continues, “This shrine is to Shopona, the God of Smallpox. In modern times, Nigerian government has made his worship illegal. They feared that priests might actually be spreading the disease. You see, the priests of Shopona’s cult would claim for themselves the goods of those who died of the disease.”

“Nice job if you can get it,” Eddie says.

Anson remains serious. “The government may have been right to forbid worship of Shopona, but here is a shrine to the King of Heaven, decked with offerings.”

Eddie frowns. “But I thought that smallpox had been wiped out. I’m certain that I read a World Health Organization report to that effect in the early 1980s.”

“Apparently that is not so,” Anson says, straightening, “for all that I have seen since we have come here indicates that smallpox is precisely what the people of Monamona fear.”

Long, thick brown lashes are the first thing anyone ever notices about Frank MacDonald; afterward one feels his calm, soulful presence, like that of a saint in a Renaissance painting. Average in height, weathered and muscled from a long life spent mostly out of doors, Frank stoops a little as if under the great burden he bears, though that burden is self-assumed and welcome.

At the main gate of the OTQ ranch, Frank meets the van. He is dressed for riding, a Stetson atop his long brown hair. Waving to them, he leans down from the saddle of his black quarter-horse mare to unlatch the gate before waving them through.

“Hello, folks. Have a good drive?”

“Easy,” the Wanderer answers as if she has not been driving for the better part of two days.

The Changer nods agreement. “Had to lock the pup up, though. She hasn’t enjoyed the trip at all.”

“Why not let her out?” Frank suggests, locking the gate. “She can’t get off of my land from here. Once she runs herself tired, I’ll have a couple of the jackalopes chase her up to the house.”

“Good idea,” the Changer says, “but she’s grown quite a bit. Sure the jackalopes can keep up with her?”

“They can.”

The Changer asks no further questions. What Frank MacDonald doesn’t know about the capacities of animals—natural and otherwise—he has the wisdom to ask.

Once the young coyote is nothing more than a ruddy golden streak disappearing into the near distance, they drive up to the ranch house. It is set well back from the public roads, back even from those private roads a trespasser might venture upon. Built of local fieldstone and shingled with cedar, it blends into the landscape, as do the surprising number of outbuildings: the barns, sheds, coops, and stables that house a portion of the reason this isolated ranch exists.

The Other Three Quarters Ranch may be listed on the Colorado tax rolls as a horse farm raising fine blood quarter horses, but in reality the OTQ Ranch is a haven for what might be the least fortunate of all the athanor: the athanor animals. These, gifted with long life but with no greater intelligence than is the wont for their species (though many survivors learn cunning), are the least fit to adapt to an increasingly human-dominated world.

The OTQ Ranch is also a haven for some of the athanor who, though not strictly animals, closely resemble them. Among them are unicorns, jackalopes, griffins, hydra, and cockatrice: creatures who survive in a world where their kind has become myth.

These athanor for whom Frank has made himself guardian are the “other three quarters” for which the ranch is named.

When they arrive at the house, Frank dismounts, pulls off the blanket which had been the mare’s only trappings, and sends her off with a grateful slap on her shoulder.

“I’ll groom you later,” he promises, then turns to his guests. “What did you think of her?”

“Pretty,” the Wanderer says, sliding open the side door of the van to haul out the luggage. “Looks like good stock.”

“Yeah,” Frank says, a satisfied smile on his face. “You’d never recognize her for a unicorn, would you? She’s wearing one of Lovern’s new illusion disguises.”

The Wanderer makes astonished noises; the Changer grins slightly.

“I knew what she was by her scent,” he admits, “but no human would.”

“But her scent isn’t right?” Frank asks, concerned. “I wonder if I should complain to Lovern?”

“I wouldn’t,” the Changer says. “Humans don’t use their sense of smell, and smelling like a unicorn may protect her from those predators who have learned to respect a unicorn’s horn.”

“True,” Frank admits.

He leads them into a stone-flagged great room, offers them seats, and comes back bearing a tray laden with a variety of drinks and snacks.

“This is just to hold you until dinner,” he says. “Changer, will you eat vegetarian?”

“Yes. Shahrazad shouldn’t though. She’s still growing.”

“Don’t worry. Either she can hunt, or I can feed her from the freezer.”

“Let her hunt, then.”

“You let hunting go on here?” the Wanderer asks, accepting a cup of hot cinnamon-laced apple juice and gathering up a handful of butter cookies. “You’ve never served me nothing but cheese and stuff like that. I thought it was policy.”

“I did ask if you minded eating vegetarian the first time you came,” Frank reminds her.

“Yeah.”

“I must allow hunting,” Frank continues. “Many of my charges must eat meat. However, I prefer not to do so, though I keep a store for the carnivores against lean times.”

“Frozen?” the Wanderer asks.

“And some live,” Frank admits. “Mostly rodents for those birds and reptiles who will only eat live food. I try not to talk with them, and, fortunately, your average white mouse doesn’t have much to say.”

“Speaking of rodents”—the Changer’s body language is now subtly alert—“there were two rodents given into your custody last September. Are they still here?”

Frank’s expression is guarded. “If they were, they would be as much my guests as you two are.”

The Changer glances at the Wanderer, who nods. “We respect that,” he says.

“They are here,” Frank admits, “still a mouse and a ground squirrel. I keep them caged, in a locked room.”

“Prisoners?” the Wanderer asks, almost sympathetic. Like many athanor, she has an antipathy to being kept enclosed.

“Not really,” Frank explains. “These two are... incompetent, for lack of a better word. Now, after about six weeks in their current shapes, they are doing better.”

“Incompetent?” the Wanderer asks.

“That’s right.” Frank sighs, poking the fire into a blaze as he continues to speak. “At first, they didn’t know how to act as their shapes demanded—didn’t know how to groom themselves or how to use their whiskers properly. Yet they didn’t act like humans either.”

“I have seen those shapeshifted by sorcery behave in a similar fashion,” the Changer says, “but something of the human usually came through in the body language.”

“This time the human didn’t come through,” Frank says. “The main thing motivating them seemed to be fear. They have adapted somewhat and, currently, there is little to separate them from the rest of the rodent kingdom.”

“But you keep them locked up,” the Wanderer prompts.

“Their passivity could be a trick,” Frank answers. “Remember, not long ago, Louhi and the Head were among the two most potent sorcerers the athanor possessed.”

The Wanderer raises a hand, remembering too well the pain of the Disharmony Dance.

“Hey, I’m not saying you should take any chances!”

“I don’t plan to,” Frank assures her.

“Have you spoken with them?” the Changer asks.

“I have tried, but even in the best of times a mouse or ground squirrel doesn’t have much to say.” Frank grins. “Talking to the animals is often highly overrated.”

His grin fades. “Neither of them discusses anything but what one would expect from a somewhat retarded rodent. Food. Water. Shelter. They express fear or hunger, can identify a cat or a hawk. The female—Louhi the Mouse—does not appear to have come into heat. I haven’t offered the Head a mate.”

“Don’t,” the Wanderer advises. “He gave me the creeps.”

“Yes,” Frank admits as if it is a failing, “me too.”

A silence falls as they remember a human head grown by sorcery to be a wizard’s tool, a tool that had turned against its maker and had nearly destroyed them all.

“And has anyone heard from Sven?” the Changer asks into the silence. “He may have escaped that night.”

Frank shrugs. “I haven’t heard anything, and I’m certain he hasn’t come here. My tenants would know. I trust them to miss nothing smaller than a mouse.”

“Sven’s a rat,” the Wanderer says with a coughing laugh. “Literally, as well as figuratively.”

“If he’s even alive at all,” Frank agrees. “The Cats of Egypt hunted on the night he escaped, not to mention several hawks, eagles, and owls, and a few human-form as well. There was great slaughter that night, but whether Sven was one of the rats slain down in the bosque is open to question.”

“Has anyone tried scrying for him?” the Wanderer asks.

“I know that Lovern did,” Frank replies. “Lil as well. No one has found him, but that doesn’t mean he is dead. Sven has had wards in place for a long time. They would have been crafted to survive shapeshifts.”

The Changer frowns. “Once, upon Ragnarokk’s battlefield, I thought that I had slain Loki. I was wrong. He is one I will not believe dead until I see the body—and maybe not even then.”

3

What though youth gave us love and roses,
Age still leaves us friends and wine.

—Thomas Moore

“
S
hahrazad,” says Frank MacDonald, standing on the patio outside of his house, “I want you to introduce you to the two athanor who are going to be your chaperons during your stay here at the Other Three Quarters Ranch.”

He speaks calmly, in English, and the young coyote seems to understand him perfectly. The Changer and the Wanderer, watching from the shelter of the kitchen, trade glances.

“If you’re going to ask me if she understands him,” the Changer says
sotto voce
, “I can’t say. She is only my daughter. I do not know her limitations. That is one of the reasons why I have brought her here.”

“Well, everyone does say that Frank can talk to the animals.” The Wanderer giggles. “I guess the real question is do they listen?”

Frank motions forth two jackalope from the shelter of the brush, where they have been waiting. They resemble jackrabbits except for the antlers, similar to those of an antelope, that sprout from between their long ears. Larger than the cute “bunny rabbits” with which most humans are familiar, long-limbed and lean, they are colored (as Shahrazad herself is) to blend into the brownish golds that dominate the landscape, even in the height of summer.

“This,” Frank continues, indicating the buck, “is Great Trimmer of the Tall Greens. This is his mate, Singer to the Moon of the Sweetest, Most Ancient of Songs.”

The doe, whose antlers are slightly shorter than her mate’s, rises on her hind legs to inspect Shahrazad. From the rapid wiggling of her nose, she seems to find the young coyote wanting. Looking up at Frank, she lets her ears drop limp.

Frank, swallowing a chuckle at a joke only he among the human form understand, continues his introductions. “Since their names are rather long, they permit me to call them ‘Hip’ and ‘Hop.’ You may do likewise.”