Mistwood (3 page)

“I decided this long before I met Daria.” Rokan thrust his jaw forward. “My parents didn’t love each other. My children’s parents will.”

“How does Clarisse feel about that?”

Rokan rolled his eyes. “I think you can guess.”

Isabel said, with a completely straight face, “I would have to draw upon all the Shifter’s wisdom to do so.”

Rokan chuckled. She smirked back at him, but wasn’t sure what to do after that. She was vastly relieved when his dark eyes turned serious. “About Clarisse. I know she’s been…unwelcoming to you. But she’s on your side.”

Her relief vanished as quickly as it had come. “Is she.”

“I’m the first to admit that she can be a little difficult—”

“Really?” Isabel murmured. “The first?”

His smile came and went, very briefly, and not until it was gone did she realize she had been trying to elicit it on purpose. “All right, maybe the second or third. But it’s not entirely her fault. Our father didn’t treat her very well.” He sat down on the bench next to her, tilting his head so he could see her better, squinting against the sunlight. “No matter what she says, though, she loves me. And I her. Even if we don’t like each other very much sometimes. You can trust her.”

Before Isabel could think of how to respond, a large group of guards and noblemen entered the practice grounds. Among them was Albin, accompanied by his apprentice, a dark-haired young man wearing a short red cloak. The high sorcerer scowled at them, and Isabel lifted her chin and stared back. The apprentice, unlike his master, gaped at her with wide eyes.

Rokan got to his feet. He hefted his sword, bowed to her with a wry grin, and walked out into the square.

Today’s practice consisted of a series of matches between Rokan and the guards. After several tense minutes, Isabel realized that not only were none of Rokan’s opponents going to threaten him with serious harm, they were all going to great lengths to make sure he won. She could tell by the suppressed mirth in Rokan’s eyes that he knew it, too.

Once she was sure enough of his safety to relax, Isabel turned her attention to Daria. The object of Rokan’s affections was medium height and slender, with soft brown hair and softer brown eyes, and she spent the entire practice session watching Rokan with breathless attention. She wasn’t the type of girl men were usually smitten with—you had to watch her for a while before you noticed how pretty she was—but that, Isabel supposed, was Rokan’s business. There was an air of straightforward sweetness to her, a sincerity devoid of intensity, that might hold great appeal to someone raised in a swirl of courtly intrigue.

“He’s completely smitten,” said a voice on Isabel’s right, and she turned sharply to stare at the speaker: a foppish young nobleman with an elaborate lace collar that he obviously, and mistakenly, thought made him look dignified. By his lilting accent, he was from the south. “If you were hoping to make a try for our prince yourself, I’m afraid you’re out of luck.”

Isabel stopped herself just in time from giving him her deadliest glare. Instead, she pouted. “I’ve heard people say the match is ill-advised.”

“Oh, it is; no doubt about that. If the king were alive, it wouldn’t be happening.” The nobleman bit his lip and lowered his voice, a pattern Isabel had noticed before. Everyone seemed reluctant to talk about Rokan’s father. The few times Isabel had brought him up, people had slipped away from her and found someone else to talk to, even when that required a break in the smooth finesse so prized among courtiers. “Samorna needs southern trade more than it needs northern armies. The prince should be seeking his wife among the southern noblewomen.”

Wood thudded on wood behind her. Isabel started to turn around, then realized that she didn’t have to. She could feel the air bouncing off swords and bodies behind her, allowing her to draw an accurate image in her head of every person in the practice ground. She felt rather than saw Rokan sheathe his sword and bow to the guard he had defeated. The discovery startled her so much that she nearly forgot to uphold her end of the conversation. “Er—the northern dukes tend to be more difficult, don’t they?”

“Nothing new about that. They like to think of themselves as honorable and loyal subjects”—he rolled his eyes—“but I believe history has shown them to be more protective of their own privileges than of their king’s honor. In any case, Prince Rokan isn’t going to make them any less troublesome by marrying some noblewoman’s by-blow.”

Isabel simpered. “Well. Maybe his mind can be changed.”

“You think so?” The nobleman eyed her skeptically, which Isabel supposed would have been insulting if this were her true form. She smiled at him, and something in her smile made him turn his attention suddenly to the new round of sword fighting about to begin.

Later that night Isabel made her way to Clarisse’s suite and knocked loudly on the door.

She was surprised when Clarisse opened the door herself. The princess was wearing a long, clingy dressing gown and reeked of perfume. She stared groggily at Isabel without quite focusing on her. Isabel hadn’t seen Clarisse at the evening’s banquet, but there had certainly been wine enough there to explain the princess’s state.

Then Clarisse blinked, and her eyebrows slanted downward over suddenly hard green eyes. “What do you want?”

Isabel had prepared herself for coy, faked politeness. She dropped that idea hastily. “I want to talk to you.”

“You can’t,” Clarisse said, and began to close the door.

Isabel stretched out one arm and shoved the door open. The princess staggered back a few steps as Isabel walked in.

She saw at once why Clarisse had opened the door herself. The room was empty, with not a single maidservant to help the princess dress or pull her bed drapes closed before she slept. Isabel could not have been more shocked if she had found Clarisse living in squalor. But the room was large and grand, and cluttered with so many expensive chairs and tables that there was no straight line of space that went more than two yards.

Clarisse crossed her arms over her chest, and Isabel followed suit. Clarisse was the person most likely to know the source of the threat to Rokan—the threat that nobody else seemed to know about but that had sent him riding after a legend to seek protection. The challenge lay in getting that answer without letting the princess know she needed help. Fortunately, Clarisse had just handed her an excellent place to begin.

“I’m mildly curious,” Isabel said, “to know why you hate me.”

Clarisse’s scowl lifted. “I’m a bitter, hateful person,” she said in an almost friendly tone. “I hate everybody.” She took two steps back and sank onto a plush chair, keeping her eyes on Isabel the whole time.

“You don’t hate Rokan,” Isabel pointed out.

“Are you serious? Of course I hate Rokan.”

“I see. Is that why you hate me—because I’m here to help him?”

Clarisse began to look away. Then she snapped her head back and said, suddenly and sharply, “
Is
that why you’re here?”

Impasse.

I don’t know.
Isabel almost said it. Instead she raised one eyebrow and said, “Why do
you
think I’m here?”

Clarisse considered her for a long moment, then lifted a slender hand to her mouth and stifled a yawn. “What did you want to talk to me about, Shifter?”

“I have a name.”

“Do you have any objection to my calling you ‘Shifter’?”

No answer she gave to that could be right. Isabel took a deep breath, feeling something close to panic. This conversation was already spinning out of her control. Or rather, Clarisse was pulling it out of her control. She was very good at it.

Isabel should have been better.

The silence stretched, and every passing second was a point in Clarisse’s favor. Finally the princess yawned, stretched, and put her arms on the armrests of her chair.

“If you’re going to stay there and stare at me,” she said sweetly, “why don’t you do it sitting down? It’s much more comfortable.”

Isabel forced herself to take the three steps toward the closest chair, and even then she couldn’t bring herself to sit. For a moment she thought of a deer backed into a hard spot by wolves, turning in panic with nowhere left to run. The idea felt familiar; she could almost smell the wolves and hear their low, panting breaths. But something about the memory—if that was what it was—felt wrong.

Clarisse looked her up and down and smiled, the assured smile of a predator. “All right,
Isabel
. You came here in the middle of the night to talk to me. I assume it’s important.”

Isabel attempted a haughty chuckle. “It’s not quite the middle of the night, Clarisse.”

“Maybe not to you, but it’s pretty late for humans.”

Isabel had enough control to keep even a flicker of emotion from crossing her face, and Clarisse stretched her arms overhead. “I’m tired,” she said, “so if you have anything to say, I suggest you hurry up and say it.”

Isabel realized suddenly why the image of the deer felt wrong. She had been there, but not as a deer. She had been one of the wolves.

Blood pulsed through her with the memory, laced with the thrill of the chase. She took two quick strides forward and grabbed Clarisse’s arm, jerking her up from the chair. She was surprised to find Clarisse ready for that, braced against it—but the princess’s resistance made no difference. Isabel pulled her up effortlessly.

In a voice like ice, Isabel said, “I came here to ask you who’s trying to kill your brother.”

There was a short pause. Clarisse’s mouth tightened, but instead of another snide remark, she said, “Is someone trying to kill him?”

“I believe so,” Isabel lied. “I thought we might work together to find out who.”

Clarisse pulled her arm away, and Isabel let her do it. The princess’s cold green eyes were only inches away from hers. “Sorry. You’re on your own. I wouldn’t dream of getting in your way.”

“Have you heard any rumors—”

“
Completely
on your own.”

“Why?” Isabel said.

Clarisse took two steps back, but she didn’t turn, and she didn’t take her eyes off Isabel. “How many people get the chance to watch the Shifter at work? I couldn’t possibly pass up the opportunity. It’s going to be absolutely fascinating.”

“Sure of me, aren’t you?”

“The Shifter is a legend.” Clarisse rubbed her arm where Isabel had grabbed it. “Although I’m beginning to wonder why. You’re blundering already, giving too much away, making too many assumptions.”

Her words hurt, because they were true. As steadily as she could, Isabel said, “Like what?”

Clarisse turned her back. “Like assuming I would want an assassination attempt stopped.”

Isabel laughed, and Clarisse swung back around to face her. “You think I’m not serious?”

“If you were serious,” Isabel told her, “you would never be stupid enough to say it in front of me. I’m sworn to protect him, and I could kill you right now.”

“Why? I’m not a direct threat. I wouldn’t plot to kill him myself.” Clarisse sat on the same chair, her expression daring Isabel to pull her up again. “But maybe I wouldn’t mind if someone else did it for me.”

Isabel stepped closer, arm muscles clenching. Clarisse pressed herself against the back of the chair, but didn’t lower her eyes. “I’m not going to help you. I want to have as little to do with you as possible. And I always get what I want. So why don’t you go do something useful? Shift into a cat or something and—”

“Shift into a cat?” Isabel repeated.

Clarisse sneered. “What’s the matter—did you forget how?”

She had forgotten that she was able to. Isabel stood still as a statue, cursing herself for being so stupid. What had she thought
Shifter
meant? No wonder the prince was willing to rely on a slip of a girl for his protection, when that girl could at a moment’s notice take the form of a tiger or a wolf.

Sudden confused memories flooded her mind—air streaming beneath her wings, warm flesh dying between her jaws, earth sliding around her scales. Living with an immediacy that deepened every moment.

Isabel focused on Clarisse, who was watching her with faint suspicion. Suspicion of what? With an effort, Isabel smiled.

“It’s not something you forget, Princess. It’s what I am.”
What I am, and I didn’t even remember it.
“I meant—why a cat?”

Clarisse shrugged. “It’s said the Shifter preferred the shape of a cat.”

“I
am
the Shifter,” Isabel said, the memories going straight to her mouth without touching her mind. “I know what I did.” She leaned forward. “And I didn’t prefer the shape of a cat. I just wanted everyone to think I did.”

Clarisse blinked, and suddenly Isabel had the upper hand. She turned toward the door. “I’ll leave in human form. But I might not return that way—and you’ll never know, will you?”

“I knew Rokan shouldn’t have brought you here,” Clarisse spat at her back. “You’ll be his ruin.”

Isabel turned her head. “Don’t make me laugh, Princess. You’re not worried about Rokan. You’re afraid I’ll be your ruin.”

There was a moment of silence. Then Clarisse said, her voice unreadable, “Will you be?”

Something in her tone caught at Isabel. She almost said, “Not if you don’t stand in my way.” But she remembered who she was, and what she was here for. Not to make friends, and not to be kind. Keeping Clarisse off balance was the best way to deal with her for now.

“I might,” she said. Then she left Clarisse’s room and made her way through the corridors to her own.

The decorated walls and ornate furniture seemed alien to her, closing her in, obstructing her freedom to move. She went to a window and pushed the heavy green drapes aside. Beyond the courtyard, invisible in the darkness, black mountains rolled across the horizon in gentle waves. Her bedroom was on one of the highest floors of the castle, but a bird could fly right out into the cool night. She closed her eyes and tried to shift her shape.

No, she didn’t. She tried to
try
. She didn’t have the faintest idea of how to begin. She formed the image of a bird in her mind and tried to will herself into it. She thought of her legs changing, shriveling, her arms flattening into wings and growing feathers. She gave up on the intermediate steps and simply willed the change into being.