Shapeshifter (6 page)

But I knew, knew as surely as if his rod loomed over my head.

I kicked my horse hard, making him leap to the bottom of the gully and take the next slope at a laboring run. But where was I running to? Not far ahead, I knew, the land opened up, returning to gently rolling plains and light woods all the way to the hill of Tara. It would not be long until I was overtaken.

At the top of the slope, I reined in, pulled my horse a little off the track and risked a look back.

Far Doirche, astride a huge war horse in full trappings, was leaning over the saddle to wrench his spear from Ciaran’s chest. Laisren was on foot, in combat with Far’s companion—a mighty man in full war harness. I was heartsick, but there was no time for tears, for even as I watched, Far seated his spear and looked up the track to where I lingered. A triumphant smile creased his face and his eyes sought mine, but this time I looked away before he could trap me. I slid from my saddle.

“Remember,” my father had told me, “your voice is not your only power. He cannot command the wild beasts.”

I was afraid I would have trouble turning, but once a thing is learned well, it is never forgotten. In a heartbeat the world turned amber and brown, and the acrid smell of blood filled my nostrils. I had no need for track nor horse. My own legs were long and strong and could penetrate the deepest forest. I turned south and east, into the mountains, and ran until my legs trembled and the breath rasped in my lungs, until it was too dark for even a deer to see.

SEVEN

F
or four days Sive wandered the mountains. Avoiding the bare summits that would allow a keen eye to spot the movement of a young doe picking her way through the heather, she kept instead to the heavily wooded slopes and ravines where sunlight hardly penetrated. At night she sheltered inside the skirts of sprawling junipers or behind deadfalls, ears flared, starting at every sound. She had never spent a night alone. Now she knew the uneasy sleep of a creature who is hunted day and night, for she heard the wolves singing to the moon and realized there was more than Far Doirche to be wary of.

Hunger finally drove her from the silent dark pine forest where she felt safest, to more open ground. It had become a constant, gnawing pain, as if her body was trying to eat itself from the inside. Food had always been an entertainment and a pleasure for Sive; now she was horrified to find herself light-headed and weak, to realize that her very survival hinged on clumps of grass and fallen hazelnuts.

She followed the flank of the mountain to its lower slopes, where the pines gave way to oak, birch and hazel trees. The woodland grew busy with wildlife: red squirrels stuffed their cheeks with nuts and seeds, robins gorged on hawthorn berries, hare crouched trembling under the ferns. Sive found a trail punctuated with delicate hoofprints and deer scat and followed it cautiously. She cropped tall autumn grass at the edge of a clearing, not noticing how odd it was to find such sweet relief in a patch of weeds, thinking only of filling her stomach.

In the late afternoon the land opened up to reveal a lake nestled between the mountains. In its waters the pale blue of the sky became a deep, brilliant indigo, startling in Sive’s vision after the tans and ochers of the woods. So peaceful and lovely it was that Sive could not resist its pull. She yearned to wade and drink in those blue waters, with the perfect reflection of the mountain peaks wavering about her legs, as though the hardships she had suffered could be washed away with the dried mud crusting her hooves.

She was halfway to the water when she smelled smoke, and no brushfire either. It was the tang of peat she smelled, and that meant a hearth. Heart tripping with mingled excitement and fear, Sive scanned the shore of the lake.

A thin plume of smoke rose into the sky, just a little way around the shore. Sive raised her muzzle and flared her nostrils, searching for the scent of the person who had made it. There—the faintest whiff, but a person, clearly. Just one, it seemed, not a settlement. Far Doirche
.
Sive almost leapt away at the mere thought, but something made her wait. Yet it must be him. Why else would a person be in such a lonely spot? Him, or a hunter. In either case she should be far, far away.

She jumped at a sudden bang, the skin over her shoulders rippling in alarm. A door? Was there a dwelling hidden behind the lakeside trees? Now the scent came clearly to her as the person—the
woman!
—was caught in the breeze. Sive watched, intent and curious, fear forgotten, and was rewarded with the sight of a small figure approaching the water’s edge. A woman, definitely, with a bucket in one hand which she filled at the shore. She was bent, though, and walked slowly. Sive wondered if she favored some injury.

Moments later the woman had disappeared from view, and the peat smoke grew rich with the scent of frying onions. Sive’s mouth filled with saliva even as the deer part of her urged her away.

Four days, and there had been no sign of pursuit. She must be far away from the Dark Man by now. Surely she would be safe here, at least for a time.

Even as she made the decision, her body was dissolving, streaming into the upright, slim shape of a woman. Green leapt into her sight, the lakeside foliage glowing in the slanting sunlight, and Sive straightened herself luxuriously. Such a pleasure, it was, just to take on her own true form and walk once again on two legs. Nervously, she patted her hands over her head and smoothed her gown. All seemed to be as it was before she changed, unaffected by her days in the wild.

With a deep breath, Sive began the walk around the shoreline.

“I HAVE HER!”

Far Doirche clutched the amber pendant hanging on his chest and closed his eyes, head cocked as though listening to a faraway whisper. “You’ve traveled far, little deer,” he murmured.

Then the green eyes snapped open, and their fierce will bored into Oran.

“She has turned, but she is deep in the mountains.”

“Shall I saddle your horse, master?” Oran’s heart had been stirred by Sive’s unexpected escape, and he was filled now with pity. His master had plucked a long auburn hair from Sive’s shoulder at their roadside meeting. That hair, preserved in resin and held against Far Doirche’s skin, would lead the sorcerer to the poor girl whenever she took her own shape.

Oran had long ago learned to keep his expression neutral and submissive. He did not show his dismay when his master waved away his suggestion with contempt.

“Horse is too slow. There is barely a footpath to Glendalough. I will require
other
means.”

Far Doirche’s features burned with predatory anticipation.

“Lay the fire and then bring me one of the captive crows. I will travel on the ashes of its wings.”

THE HOUS E WAS SMALL and poor, a squat round building with white walls and a tall thatched roof. Sive paused before the entrance, taking in the lack of windows and crude workmanship. Why would anyone choose to live like this?

Still, the memory of frying onions lingered in Sive’s nostrils. She glanced up at the smoke rising from the thatch, unaware of how she flared her nostrils, questing after an aroma that was too far for her human senses to capture.

She was saved from knocking or calling when the door abruptly opened, releasing a cloud of cooking odor, the onions joined now by meat and herbs. Sive stared at the woman standing on the sill.

She was as small and hunched as her house, her face wrinkled like a dried-out apple. Her hair was coarse and gray, a color Sive had never seen on any person. She had heard that a decay like this plagued the children of the Gael as they grew old, and wondered if this woman could be a visitor from the mortal lands. The woman laughed at Sive’s expression, the sound musical and merry.

“You wonder at my appearance. I must say I wonder at yours as well. It is not every day a woman wanders out of the wilds for a neighborly visit!”

She studied Sive up and down, her gaze sharp within the deep folds of skin. “It is a rough walk here from anywhere, yet you look as fresh as a spring bluebell. Though your eyes tell a different tale. Come in, so.” Sive’s strange host stood back to make room, and Sive ducked into the dim house. “We’ll share a meal, and then perhaps we’ll share our mysteries.”

HER NAME WAS MURIGEN, and she saved Sive the trouble of finding a polite way of asking why she lived in such a place.

“A hag in a run-down hut,” she said as she eased herself onto a wooden bench. “I don’t suppose you’ve ever seen the like.”

“I haven’t,” Sive admitted, pulling herself briefly away from her wooden bowl. Food had never tasted this good, she was certain of it.

“I have a fine enough form, and no lack of lodgings. But there are times when I grow weary of the din of the world, and of the attentions of men. Then I come here, to these waters that are my charge.”

Murigen flashed an amused smile, gesturing down her body. “I learned this from the mortal lands. When the women grow gray and wrinkled, the men leave them alone.”

Not me, thought Sive. Unless she could rip her voice from her very throat, one man would never leave her alone.

Murigen’s eyes fastened on Sive, alert as a bird’s. “Ah, now. There is a bleak look. What is it that haunts those pretty eyes and sends you to roam the mountains?”

There was a power pulsing through this woman. Sive had sensed it from the moment she entered the little house. A thin bright thread of hope unfurled in her breast. Perhaps there was true shelter here.

“There is a man,” she began. “A sorcerer.”

A wrinkled finger, thrust in the air, stopped her words. Murigen tipped her head to one side, her features attentive, as though she listened—but not to Sive.

“Someone is here.”

“Someone—where?” Sive was on her feet, looking wildly around the dim cabin, but Murigen flapped her hand toward the bench and Sive perched, reluctantly, at its edge. He couldn’t be here, so quickly. He couldn’t.

Murigen turned to Sive. She did not look pleased. “I have protections on this place. I know when its borders are passed. And this is the second time today that a person has appeared on my land well past the place where I should have sensed it!”

“Who—?” There was no interrupting her. She was intent, in charge.

“This sorcerer,” demanded Murigen. “Does he hunt you?”

Sive nodded. There was no need for more.

“Then it is him. You must flee now, for he is not far off.” She was walking as she spoke, pulling Sive to her feet and out the door, bent no longer but brisk and strong. The bright eyes fixed on Sive again.

“I assume you have better clothing for the wilderness than that silk dress.”

Again Sive nodded.

“Then change into it, and fly!” Her brisk manner softened, and the gnarled fingers rested on Sive’s shoulder. “My good wishes go with you, child.”

Sive’s shoulders crawled with the need to change, but she held off.

“Murigen, be careful. He has a staff—”

A bark of laughter cut her off.

“He cannot harm me with his little stick. I am far too old for such nonsense.”

Sive’s heart, already beating too fast, tripped into a canter, the hope unfurling into a bright ribbon.

“Then can you—could I not—?” Her words were halting and incoherent, unable somehow to ask now the possibility loomed. But Murigen understood, was already shaking her head.

“I am sorry, child, truly. I cannot protect you. Your man has no power over the likes of me, but neither can I stop him. My business is with the lakes and rivers, not with people. If he were foolish enough to swim in these waters, then yes. He would have some trouble, I think, were I to call forth the ancient creature who lurks in their secret depths...”

She became brisk again. “But he won’t. And you must be off. I’ll see you leave no prints to guide him.”

The panic of the hunt surged in Sive’s chest, and with it came the deer. The air rippled as her form streamed into hooves and legs and thrusting muzzle. The pale green silk was gone, replaced with a sleek auburn coat still daubed with the last remnants of a fawn’s white spots.

The deer sprang up the mountainside, pale rump flashing. Murigen stayed until the noise in the underbrush was almost too faint to hear; then she stumped into her house to tidy up. The sorcerer would be in sight at any moment. Just as well he find her at home—with the remains of
one
bowl of stew.

EIGHT

S
ive jolted awake, her body trembling with alarm before her mind understood the reason. Then the sound that had threaded through her dreams came clear: hounds. Their music was faint in the still air, floating up the mountainside from far away. But it was Sive they sang for, of that she had no doubt. The Dark Man was on the hunt.

Day after day the hounds quested for her. The mountains were vast, and at first it was not hard to stay clear of them. But each day more packs added their clamor to the air, and no matter how many false trails they followed after other deer, Far Doirche always set them back to their true quarry. It seemed to Sive the baying voices rang out from all directions now and she began to feel the net Far had cast about her feet slowly drawing tighter. She would have to go down and break past the dogs while there were still gaps between the packs.

Yet something else sought her on the lower slopes. It was the time of the rut, and not even the onslaught of hunters could stop the stags from gathering their harems. Their bellowing cries added a deep bass counterpoint to the yelping hounds. They guarded their does jealously, herding them to what seemed the safest spots, challenging any stag that dared approach. The first time Sive attempted to slip past the dog packs and escape into the long, tractless stretch of the mountains, she all but ran into a group of does huddled nervously together. They stamped and twitched their ears at the sound of the hunt but stayed in their group. Then Sive saw the stag. On a high outcrop of rock, a powerful form topped with a mighty rack of antlers, he was a magnificent sight. And his entire attention was fixed on her, as predatory as a wolf. The thick shoulders and great shaggy throat ruff seemed to swell as he took her in.