Fey 02 - Changeling (31 page)

Charissa shuddered.
 
"Tis no great wonder then why he canna be with her."

"Be with her?
 
Girl, dinna be so sure a yerself.
 
The boy loves her, he does."
 
The cook said.
 
"Methinks tis his curse."

"Loves her?
 
But tis said twas done ta stop a war."
 
Charissa had always believed him reluctant.

"Her idea. An his.
 
Both das said twas wrong.
 
But they dunnit anyway.
 
And ta see the looks they have for the other.
 
Tis love.
 
Always was something."
 
The pastry chef opened one of the brick oven doors.
 
The heat in the room rose.

"Group Six," someone said.

"Aye, and tis trouble we'll be in if'n we're not back soon," said Lis.
 
"Let's go, Charissa."

She nodded.
 
She wasn't sure she wanted to hear more of this conversation, not after feeling his soft touch on her hand.
 
She wanted to dream about him.
 
Maybe, now that he was King, he would come to her more often.

Lis paced her as they left the kitchen.
 
They dropped back from the others and Lis took her arm.
 
"He dinna see more than a pretty wench when he looks at ye."

Charissa shook her arm free.
 
"He talked ta me before.
 
He says he will guard me.
 
Tis a promise years old, and still he mentions it.
 
Na me."

"A promise to a serving maid.
 
He's King, Charissa."
 

Charissa straightened her shoulders.
 
"He always liked me."

"And always will.
 
Ye'll never be more than an afternoon's fancy."

"Ye do na know him.
 
Ye work for Enford."

"I know enough," Lis said.
 
"Ye asked me history.
 
History built that ugly Hall we clean, and history rules him like he rules us.
 
He canna do more than tumble with ye.
 
Ta do more is ta deny history."

Charissa bit back her first response.
 
Lis was trying to help.
 
"We ha na tumbled.
 
Tis a friendship, na more."

"Good," Lis said.
 
She lowered her voice to a whisper.
 
"Cause all he'll give ye is a babe.
 
And I dunna wanna be near his wife when she learns ye gave him a bastard.
 
The woman has killed fer less."

"She'll na kill me," Charissa said.
 
"He'll see to that."

"I hope yer right," Lis said.
 

FIFTEEN

The stables were clean, and smelled of horses and fresh hay.
 
Tel took a deep breath.
 
The stalls were empty, waiting.
 
The King's — the former King's — prized stallions were in the other stable near the servants' quarters.
 
Tel had done most of the work himself.
 
Two of the other grooms had been taken indoors to help with the cleaning of the Coronation Hall.
 
Tapio, who had become head groomsman after everyone learned of Miruts' death, had worked as hard as Tel to make the stables and the yard clean for the Coronation guests.

The day had dawned clear and beautiful.
 
The sunlight sparkled on the raindrops scattered from the night before.
 
The rain had been a light one, leaving the ground damp, but not muddy.
 
Tel and Tapio had been able to move the stallions without worrying about grooming them again.

Tel had volunteered to stay with the stallions, but Tapio wouldn't hear of it.
 
Tel had become Tapio's most valued assistant, a liability on a day like this.

Tel swept the last bit of hay away from the stable doors, then propped them open.
 
Soon the sun would reach its midway mark, and the guests would start arriving for the ceremony.
 
Tel wanted to be gone when they did.

He had thought of disappearing altogether, but he had come back to the stable because he loved it here.
 
Here he could deal with horses and not think about his life.
 
Most of the time, he even forgot he was Fey.
 
He got up at dawn, tended the horses, and went to bed long after sunset.
 
The job didn't leave time for thinking, and he liked that.
 
He looked like an Islander, but he wasn't.

He was a Doppelgänger, a special tool in war.
 
Doppelgängers used the blood of a kill to absorb the life force out of a victim and to, in essence, become that victim.
 
They absorbed the victim's memories, the victim's culture, and the victim's appearance.
 
Tel had been a groom before, but years ago had been ordered to learn the secrets of Rocaanism.
 
He had become an Elder in the Tabernacle and had been present on that horrible day the old Rocaan died.
 
His fellow Doppelgänger, the one who had overtaken the old Rocaan, had melted in a long drawn out way.
 
Only Tel's appearance, and his luck, prevented him from dying that day.
 

That had been the last straw.
 
He didn't want to return to Shadowlands where he would be ordered to go back to the Tabernacle.
 
So he came back to the stable, where he had been happy, and absorbed another groom. He had lived here, as an Islander, ever since.

If the Fey discovered that he still lived, his punishment would be unspeakable.

Tel didn't want the Fey to catch him, nor did he want to change again.
 
His last change had been particularly horrible.
 
He had snuck onto the palace grounds, still looking like the Elder.
 
Then he had killed a servant, bathed in his blood, and grabbed a young groomsman.
 
The groom screamed as Tel leaped on him like a spider, wrapping his legs around the man's torso to hold his position, his elbows into the man's neck to brace his arms.
 
Tel stuck his fingers in the groom's eyes and his thumbs in the groom's mouth, prying the teeth open and pushing hard against the back of the throat.

Then he pulled and pulled and pulled until the man's essence broke free and fluttered between them for a moment like a frightened child.
 
Tel bit into the mist and sucked it inside, feeling rather than hearing the man's screams.
 
Then he felt his body mold and twist and expand until it became the body of the groom, slender, square, and Islander.

The body between his legs and arms vanished, and he nearly lost his balance before remembering to put his own feet on the ground.
 
The bones clattered to the ground.
 
He sat on a bale of hay as his personality melded with the groom's.

Images mixed in his mind, memories not his own.
 
In those last moments, Ejil — the groom — had thought Tel a demon, come to steal his soul.
 
He had not been far off.

Tel had been weak when he took over Ejil, and he felt a bond with the boy he had never felt with any of his previous victims.
 
Sometimes Tel woke at night, apologizing as if Ejil were there.
 
Tel owed Ejil a lot.
 
He had lived Ejil's life for nearly five years, and they had been the best five years Tel had ever had.

But now he had to be careful on two fronts.
 
Last night, Tapio had told him that the Rocaanists would come early.
 
Then Tapio had told him that Jewel's family would be coming.
 
The Rocaanists could kill Tel by accidentally brushing him with their holy poison.
 
The Fey could spot Tel — any Doppelgänger — by looking closely at his eyes.
 
Transformed Doppelgängers look like their hosts, except for the gold flecks in the pupils.
 
Those were the only distinctively Fey markings left, and all that was needed.
 

If the Fey caught him, it would be worse than the instant death he would suffer from the holy water.
 
If the Fey caught him, the Shaman would speak his punishment.
 
Tel had seen a Doppelgänger punished for abandoning his duties just once.
 
The Doppelgänger was forced to go through a dozen Nye prisoners, changing into one after another in rapid succession until his own being broke under the strain.
 
Then he was whisked away by the Spell Warders to be used in their strange and secretive experiments.

No one ever heard from him again.

Tel would rather live out the rest of his life as a short, square, blond Islander groom with no prospects than ever be Fey again.
 
He had had enough.
 
Perhaps if he had stayed on Nye, was able to pick a body he liked, as some of the older Doppelgängers did, and remain in it for decades, he would have been content.
 
But here, if Rugar knew he was alive, he would be changing bodies every few months, always ahead of the Islanders, always dodging their holy water poison.

As a groom, he had none of those concerns.
 
He rarely saw the religious, and he could choose whether or not to go to the Sacraments.
 
He had found his own way to live the life of a Doppelgänger in peacetime.
 
Denying his Fey heritage wasn't as hard as he thought.

"Ejil."
 
Tapio emerged from the stable.
 
His short hair had a piece of hay in it, and a black streak marred his light skin.
 
He was younger than most of the grooms by a considerable ways, but he had been Miruts', the King's, and the Prince's favorite.
 
He was also the best man for the job.
 
"Twill be soon before they come.
 
We need ta change."

"Twould be nice if the others was here.
 
Tis the Fey I dinna wanna see."

Tapio nodded.
 
"Ye think any of us do?
 
If I let ye go, I let all go.
 
And I canna.
 
Besides, if we can serve the Princess, we can serve her da."

"The Queen," Tel said, correcting him.
 
The thought of Jewel being Fey among these people had always intrigued him.
 
When she came to the stables, he watched her from a distance.
 
She always seemed so sure of herself, even though things weren't going exactly as she had planned.

"Right."
 
Tapio shook his head. "We get one of them as Queen now."

Tel almost grinned.
 
Tapio would be surprised that his best friend and best grooms was "one of them."
  
"Still, someone has ta be with the stallions."

"The stallions are alone each night.
 
A day will na hurt em."

They had had this same argument earlier.
 
No matter how many times Tel tried, Tapio always had an answer for him.
 
"All right," Tel said.
 
"You change.
 
By then the others will be here, and I'll go."

"Be back on time," Tapio said.
 
"I need me best man with strange horses."
 
Then he walked toward the servants quarters.
 
Orders had come from the House that all grooms were to wear their best clothes, and to polish their leather boots.
 
Tel and Tapio had polished their boots the night before, trading stories and rubbing to get each scratch and nick off the material.