The Shapechangers (13 page)

Alix shivered. “But…Lindir came back.”

Torrin’s hands clenched against his knees. “She came back eight years after Shaine began the purge. Hale was dead and she herself was ill. The Mujhar accepted her only because he needed an heir, and when Lindir died after bearing a girl he would not accept it. He said the purge would continue. The Lady Lorsilla and myself pleaded with him not to have the child left to die in the forests. He said I could take the girl, if I left his service and swore never to allow her in Mujhara. I agreed.”

Alix stared at him. “You did all that for a halfling girl-child…”

He swallowed heavily. “Had Shaine cast you out, I could not have served him again. Taking you was the best thing I have ever done.”

“Then they are not demons?”

Torrin shook his head slowly. “The Cheysuli have never been demons. They have arts we do not, and most of us fear them for it, but they do not use them for ill.”

“Why did you allow me to believe they were?”

“I never called them demons, Alix. But neither could I tell you differently, or your own innocence in defending them would draw suspicion. Had Shaine ever heard of you, he might have called you to him. He might have rescinded his decision to let me keep you as my own.”

“And Hale?” she asked softly.

Torrin’s head bowed. “Hale served his lord with a loyalty no other man could hope for. It was Lindir who twisted that loyalty. Hale was a good man. You have no need to fear the memory of your father.”

Alix went to him and knelt before him, placing soft hands over his hardened ones. She put her forehead down on his knee.

“
You
will ever be my father!” she said brokenly.

Torrin placed one hand on her bowed head. “You are my daughter, Alix. If your blood begins to show you another way, I understand it. There is magic in a Cheysuli soul.” He sighed and smoothed her hair. “But you will be my daughter as long as I live.”

“I will never leave you!”

He cradled her head, lifting it so she could see his face. “Alix, I think you must. I served with the Cheysuli years before your birth; I know their strength and dedication and their magnificent honor. They did not ask for this
qu’mahlin.
But they realize it is a part of their
tahlmorra.
”

“
You
speak of that!”

He smiled sadly. “I have reared a Cheysuli girl-child in my house, and in my heart. How could I not?”

A chilling sensation rippled through her body. “Then you knew…one day…”

“I have ever known.” He leaned forward and kissed her brow softly. “A Cheysuli can never deny his
tahlmorra.
To do so angers the gods.”

“I did not want this,” she said dully.

Torrin removed his hands and sat back from her as if to illustrate the sacrifice he made. “Go with the prince, Alix. I
would keep you, if I could, but it is not the will of the gods.” He smiled, but the pain remained in his eyes. “The path to your
tahlmorra
lies another way.”

“I will stay,” she whispered.

Carillon rose quietly and moved to her. “Come, cousin. It is time you met your grandsire.”

“You have brought me home, Carillon. It is enough.”

He bent and grasped her arms, pulling her upright. Alix jerked around and glared at him. “You would have me think you no better than Finn—ordering me this way and that!”

He grinned at her. “Then perhaps he has the right of it. What else can a man do when a woman defies him, save force her?”

She took a step away from him. “I will see the Mujhar another time.”

“If you do not come now, you will never do it.” Carillon glanced at Torrin and saw the confirmation in his eyes. The prince smiled faintly and took her arm once again.

“You will come here another time,” Torrin said.

Alix, testing Carillon’s grip tentatively, gave it up. She looked down on the slump-shouldered man who had been a king’s arms-master before taking a halfling girl-child to his heart.

“I have loved you well,” she whispered.

Torrin rose, looking at her as if he hurt. Then he cradled her head in his gnarled hands and kissed her forehead.

Carillon led her from the croft.

The prince took her out of the forests and the valleys into Mujhara, and through its cobbled streets. Alix sat behind him silently, clinging to his waist as if his closeness would give her confidence. The gleaming city with its winding, narrow streets took away her powers of speech. Alix was acutely aware of her torn and stained garments and bare feet.

“I do not belong here,” she muttered.

“You belong wherever you wish to be,” Carillon said. He gestured. “Homana-Mujhar.”

She looked past his arm and saw the stone walls rising before her. The fortress-palace stood on a gentle rise within the city itself, hidden behind time-worn walls of rose-colored, undressed stone. Before them towered massive bronze-and-timber gates, attended by eight men liveried in the Mujhar’s colors. Alix saw red tunics over light chain mail, emblazoned with a rampant black lion. It was the proud coat-of-arms she had seen etched into Carillon’s ruby seal ring; and stamped into the heavy gold of the sword hilt.

The guardsmen swung open the huge gates, acknowledging
Carillon with brief salutes. As their incurious eyes fell on her she let go of Carillon’s waist, blushing in shame.

“Carillon…take me back to the croft! I should not be here!”

“Be silent, Alix. This place is your legacy.”

“And Shaine sent me
from
it!”

He did not answer her. She was forced to sit quietly on his warhorse and ride inexorably toward the huge palace. Alix closed her eyes as they entered the bailey and wished herself elsewhere.

Duncan was right…Homana-Mujhar is not for me.

Carillon stopped the horse before a flight of marble steps that led up to the palace of Homanan kings. A groom raced over to catch the reins and bowed reverently; Carillon jumped down and lifted Alix from the horse before she could protest. She kept her head lowered as he took her up the smooth, dark-veined steps into the rose-colored palace, until she saw the first servant stare at her with undisguised contempt. Carillon did not see it, but Alix was instantly aware how her arrival would be regarded. Everyone would think her some lice-ridden woman of the streets if she behaved as one, so she resolutely lifted her head. She summoned her pride and confidence and went with Carillon as if she belonged with him.

She saw magnificent tapestries picked out in rainbow colors; candleracks holding fresh candles glowing with flame; thick rugs and clean rushes; ornaments and heavily embroidered arrases at doorways. Liveried servants bowed respectfully to Carillon and included her in their homage. Inwardly she smiled at the change in attitude a little arrogance brought.

But when Carillon escorted her up a winding stairway of red stone to a doorway of hammered bronze, Alix halted abruptly. “Where do you take me?”

“These are the chambers of the Lady Lorsilla.”

“Shaine’s
wife
?”

“She will see to it you are bathed and dressed as befits a princess, before you meet the Mujhar.” He smiled at her. “Alix, I promise you will be safe.”

She swallowed and glared at him. “I do not wish to be safe. I wish to go back to the croft.”

Carillon ignored her and rapped on the bronze door. Alix closed her eyes and consigned herself to the netherworld. The defiance she had held in abundance when first learning of her heritage fled, leaving her cold and lonely within the massive palace.

“Carillon!” cried a woman’s voice as the door swung open. “You are returned so soon?”

Alix opened her eyes. She saw a chambermaid at the door, curtsying to Carillon, and beyond her a tiny blonde woman in a silken blue robe banded with white fur.

“I have brought back what I said I would,” Carillon said gravely. “Regardless what my uncle wishes.”

The woman sighed and smiled wryly. “You are more like Shaine than you know, at times. Well, let me see her.”

Carillon led Alix forward. She heard the door shut behind them and swallowed against the sudden fear in her throat.

The woman sat on a cushioned bench of dark stone. She settled the rich robe more comfortably around her shoulders. “Alix, you are well come.”

“No,” Alix said. “I am not. Shaine cast me out before; I have no doubt he would do so again.”

Lorsilla, queen of Homana, smiled warmly. “He must see you, first. And I think he will hold his tongue, if only from sheer amazement.”

“Or hatred.”

“He cannot hate what he does not know,” Lorsilla said gently. “Alix, he is your grandsire. His anger was never at you, but at himself for losing Lindir. Had he treated her more gently when she refused Ellic, she might have remained here.”

Alix gestured helplessly, indicating her tatters and blood-streaked face. “I am not the sort a king would acknowledge.”

Carillon laughed. “You will be, when
she
has done with you. As for me, I will leave you to the lady. When I come for you, you will be ready to face even the harshest of men.”

Instinctively she whirled and caught his hand. “Carillon!”

He detached himself gently. “I must go, Alix. It is not my place to see you bathed and dressed.” His grin was amused. “Though I would not mind it so much, myself.”

Lorsilla lifted a delicate brow. “Carillon, conduct yourself with more decorum.”

He laughed at her and bowed, then took his leave.

Alix stood before the queen of Homana and shivered once, involuntarily. Her feet ached and her face burned with shame.

Lorsilla rose and moved forward. She touched a soft hand across the healing welt on Alix’s face and brushed away the dried remains of the guardsman’s blood. Her voice was very gentle.

“You have no need to fear me, Alix. I am your granddame.”

Alix’s voice shook. “But I am a
halfling
…”

The tiny woman smiled sadly. “I will have no children of my own, and no grandchildren. Let me at least have Lindir’s daughter, for a time.”

She bowed her head and nodded, hiding the welling of grief in her heart. She heard the woman order a bath drawn and clothing to be prepared. Then Lorsilla laughed softly.

“You have been raised a croft-girl, Alix. Now you will know what it is to claim the heritage Shaine denied you. I will make you a princess, my girl.”

She swallowed painfully. “But I am Cheysuli.”

Lorsilla’s delicate face grew stern. “It does not matter. You are Shaine’s granddaughter, and that is enough for me.”

But what of him?
she wondered apprehensively.
What of the Mujhar himself?

Alix went before her grandsire in silks and velvets, girdled with gold and garnets. The rich brown fabrics whispered against her legs and fine slippers hugged her bruised feet. Her head felt heavy with the weight of her hair, laced with pearls and tiny garnets. Her ears ached dully with fresh piercing, but the gems glittering in them assuaged her pain.

The croft-girl was gone as she stood before the Mujhar of Homana, and she wondered if that girl would ever return to her.

Carillon, standing next to her in the huge audience hall, radiated pride and confidence. But Shaine dominated the hall with inborn power and strength of will.

“My lord,” Carillon said quietly, “this is Alix. Lindir’s daughter.”

The Mujhar stood on a low marble dais that spread the entire width of the hall. Behind him, raised on grasping lion’s claws, stood a carved throne banded with bronze and silver; cushioned in silks and velvets. Etched deeply within the throne was scrollwork of gold paint, and the wood gleamed with polishing. The scent of beeswax and power hung in the air. Shaine himself wore black and gold, and the harsh pride of an arrogant man.

His gray eyes narrowed at Carillon’s announcement. Alix stared at him, concentrating on the fact he was her grandsire and not Homana’s king. It did not help.

A wide circlet of emeralds and diamonds set in gold banded his brow, smoothing his silvering dark hair. He was bearded, but
it did not hide the determination of his jaw or the tight line of his lips.

There is no forgiveness in this man
…Alix realized.

Accordingly, she lifted her head proudly and firmed her own mouth. Carillon stepped away from her, renouncing his right to speak for her, but it did not disturb her. She was beyond fear or reticence and let the instincts she had only sensed rule her actions. Her defiance flashed across the Great Hall to strike Shaine like a blow.

“I see nothing of Lindir in you,” the Mujhar said quietly. “I see only a shapechanger’s stamp.”

“What does it tell you, my lord?”

He stared at her, face taut and remote. “It tells me you have no place here. It speaks to me of treachery and sorcery, and a Cheysuli curse.”

“But you admit it is true I might be Lindir’s child.”

A flicker shadowed the gray eyes a moment. Alix could sense Shaine’s consideration of rejecting her outright, but she knew his pride too well for that. He would not quail before acknowledging his wish to rid himself of a halfling child, even at birth.

“Carillon says you are that child,” he said finally. “Also that Torrin had the raising of you. So you may call yourself Lindir’s child if you wish—it does you no good. I will not acknowledge you.”

“I did not come expecting acknowledgment.”

His dark brows rose. “You did not? I find that difficult to believe.”

Alix kept her hands away from the golden girdle with effort, fighting down her nervousness. “I came because I wished to see the man who could cast out a child and curse an entire race. I came to see the man who began the
qu’mahlin.
”

“Use no shapechanger words to me, girl. I will not have it in this place.”

“Once you welcomed them.”

His gray eyes burned with inward rage. “I was deceived. Their sorcery is strong. But I will take retribution for it.”

Alix lifted her head in a reflection of his arrogance. “Is what Lindir did worth the destruction of an entire race, my lord? Do you seek to be no better than Bellam of Solinde, who wants only to humble this land?”