Wizard of the Grove (42 page)

Crystal heard a deeper meaning beneath his words and knew she could probably force it out. But did she want to? Was it something that could survive being dragged out and totally revealed between them?

Not yet,
murmured a voice.

Idiot,
snapped another.

“You must do something about the wer,” said Lord Death, not totally unaware of the turmoil he'd caused and pulling away from it for his own sake.

“What?” The sudden change of subject caught Crystal off balance.

“You cannot leave them as they are when you can heal them.”

“The changes?”

“Yes. You can right a very great wrong.” Young women and infants, faces feral and in great pain, flickered across his features.

She shook her head, hiding behind a curtain of silver hair until he wore his own face again.

“I am Death, Crystal, and often I seem cruel, but these have been robbed of even a chance at life. I am not as cruel as that. Too many come to me too young.”

She thought of the power it would take to heal so many, how her shields would weaken. She thought of the goddesses breaking free. She opened her mouth to say she couldn't, looked at Lord Death and knew he expected her to say she would. Although he had seen the excesses of the ancient wizards, he had never, she realized suddenly, expected her to follow their path.
Free my people
were among the first words he'd ever said to her. She would not have
Heal the wer
be the last.

“I will heal them,” she said and felt that his smile of approval well rewarded her for the risk.

*   *   *

When Crystal returned to the campsite, Raulin and Jago sat nervously watching the giant who, as far as Crystal could see, hadn't moved.

“I have to speak to the wer,” she said.

“Are you crazy?” asked Raulin, standing and striding over to her. He took hold of both her shoulders and gave her a little shake. “You barely escaped from them with your life. Go near them and they'll zap you with that rod again.”

“They won't dare, not while Sokoji is with us.”

“In case you hadn't noticed, Sokoji is not with us.”

“I am only thinking, mortal, I am not dead.”

Crystal suppressed a smile as Raulin paled. She gently patted his cheek and whispered. “Don't worry, they're used to it.” Sliding out from under his hands, she crossed the camp until she stood at the giant's knee. “I need to speak with the pack. Will you come with me?”

Sokoji nodded. “I will.”

Crystal raised her voice slightly, turning her head so she faced the trees beyond the giant. “Then I will speak with the pack, the entire pack, when the sun has moved a handspan in the sky. They will speak with me because they remember what I did for Beth. The Elder will see that we both, the pack and I, are no threat to each other.”

A shadow separated itself from the shadows of the forest and moved off toward the mountain.

“I knew it,” Raulin muttered, still a little rattled by the giant's sudden return to awareness. “I knew we were being watched.”

One handspan of the sun later, Crystal stepped out of the trees and faced the wer, the giant on her right and the brothers on her left.

“You can't leave us behind, Crystal,” Jago had said quietly. And he was correct. She couldn't.

The wolves had grouped in the center of the slope, the cats in their regular flanking position to each side. Of the sixty-two wer assembled, all but two walked on four legs. A young woman stood at the back of the pack, warmly dressed in leather and fur, holding a squirming bundle
in her arms. It had to be Beth. A great black wolf wove about her legs, every now and then whining and sticking his nose in the bundle.

“You will not, of course, be using that,” Sokoji called out.

Crystal followed her gaze and saw the amethyst rod between the forepaws of a wolf she thought she recognized as Eli.

“We will not use it if we are not attacked,” Beth replied, settling the baby more securely in her arms, “but we must be able to defend ourselves, Elder.”

Sokoji looked unconvinced. “I would prefer it with one less likely to use it.”

Beth shrugged. “Eli is hunt-leader.”

“It doesn't matter, Sokoji.” Although she spoke to the giant, Crystal's voice carried up the mountain. “I'll give him no reason to think his people under attack.”

“And if he uses it anyway, I'll rip his tail out and strangle him with it,” Raulin muttered, not at all comfortable standing so exposed before the wer.

Crystal ignored him and continued. “I have only one thing to say. If you wish it, I will remove from the women the flaw of the ancient wizards and heal them all as I healed Beth, a gift they will pass on to their daughters.”

The silence on the mountain was so complete the sun could almost be heard moving across the sky. For different reasons, Raulin and Jago were as shocked as the wer. Only Sokoji seemed unaffected.

Then one of the cats changed and a tawny-haired woman with eyes as green as Crystal's asked suspiciously, “Why only the women, wizard?”

“That is
my
flaw. I am sorry, but I have nothing in me to touch the men.”

“No!” An old man crouched on the mountainside. “Each generation we grow more stable, some of the younger ones are able to walk with mortals and keep them unaware of what they are. We don't take anything from wizards!”

“Some? Two! Two! only!”

“Each generation we grow fewer!”

Bodies shifted out of wolf and cat all over the pack, ignoring the cold in the need for a voice.

“What good is it, if she cannot change the men?”

“It's women who die!” screamed a girl, barely in her teens. The male wolf beside her bared his teeth and growled. She slipped into wolfshape, rolled on her back and exposed her throat, but before he could close his teeth on the soft fur Jason threw himself between them and cuffed the male away.

“She's right,” Jason snarled, taking on his manshape but looking no less furious, “it is the women who die. This is their choice. Not ours.”

“But what of us,” whined the male, shifting only long enough to form the words and not rising off his belly.

“It is too soon to tell, but I think,” Jason looked back at Beth and his features softened as he met her smile, “when the women have control, it will help us remain calm.”

“And what do you want for this great gift, wizard?” Eli stood, the rod dangling from his fingers.

Crystal's face hardened.

“I want you to ask me. Come to the camp when you've reached a decision.”

Then she turned on her heel and headed back into the trees.

The brothers held their peace until they reached the camp but only just.

“Crystal, you are out of your mind! They almost killed you and you want to help them?” Raulin stomped about, one hand twisting at his mustache, the other waving in the air. “Put yourself at risk for
them?”

“They
are women and children, Raulin.” She explained about the random changes and what that meant to childbirth. Her shoulders squared. “I can't allow such suffering to continue when I could banish it.”

“And if the goddesses break free while your power is elsewhere?” Jago asked quietly.

“Sholah, I know, is with me in this.”

We cannot leave them as they are,
agreed the goddess, although only Crystal could hear her.

“And the rest'll shatter you into nothing!” added Raulin, still driven to stomp around the clearing by the force of his emotions.

“I'll take that chance.”

“No.” Lord Death's quiet tone carried a finality just bordering on the melodramatic.

“Listen, Crystal,” Raulin began. Sokoji laid a massive hand on his shoulder.

“Gently, mortal, let the Mother's son have his say. He seems to agree with you.”

“What? Is he here?” Raulin glared up at the giant. “And you can see him too? Oh, great.” He threw himself down on the sleigh beside his brother. “Well, maybe he can talk her out of sacrificing herself.”

“Maybe he can,” Jago murmured, watching Crystal, watching Lord Death.

“I didn't realize what I asked of you,” Lord Death told her, his eyes locked on her face.

“I'm ashamed you had to ask.” Crystal flushed. “For all my talk, I am more like the ancient wizards than I suspected.”

“You needn't do this to prove yourself to me.”

She smiled. “I'm not. I'm proving myself to me.”

He nodded slowly and she saw he understood. Something blazed for a moment in his eyes, something that caused her heart to pound and then both it and Lord Death were gone.

Raulin got to his feet and Jago, knowing his brother was neither as brash nor as insensitive as he pretended, wondered what he would say, even having heard only Crystal's side of that conversation.

But, concern the single emotion in his voice, Raulin only said, “Can't it wait? Just until you get the goddesses under control?”

“And if I never do? Should I let more innocents die because I'm afraid to take a risk?” She cupped her hands, letting them fill with sunlight, then wove a garland out of glowing golden strands. With a disdainful toss of her head, she let it dissolve. “Do I spend the rest of my life using only enough power to do pretty tricks? I am the only one who can help them. They need me.”

“We need you, Crystal.”

“No,” she corrected gently, “you want me and as wondrous as that is, it isn't the same thing. If I turn my back on the wer, I am no better than the wizards who created them, denying the responsibility of my power.”

He lifted her hand to his lips. “Then I will stand with you and do what I can to help.”

Jago rose and took her other hand between both of his. “I also,” he told her.

Crystal's lower lip trembled and she blinked rapidly.

“Idiot,” Raulin said tenderly, and drew her into his arms.

The centaurs wrought better than they will ever believe,
Sokoji thought.
And I hope I am there when this wizard-child comes to believe it herself.

Later that day, while Crystal and the giant were deep in discussion, Jago went to his brother and demanded an explanation.

Raulin looked up from the harness he mended—Crystal's method of releasing the buckles had turned them into slag—and raised both brows. “An explanation of what?” he asked.

“Don't give me that, brother, you've never been good at hiding what you feel. Why no response to Crystal's conversation with Lord Death?”

“I gave her the only response I had.”

Jago snorted.

Raulin sighed. “Look, Jago, you're a complicated man, I'm not. I'm her lover and her friend, but I've never fooled myself that I'm her love. In a lot of ways, you're closer to her than I am.” He shrugged and reached for his dagger. The metal wouldn't pry free, he'd have to cut the leather. “As for this morning, well, I don't see as it changes anything. I'll share her bed for as long as she'll have me and when it's over, I'll thank the Mother-creator that I knew her.”

“I thought you loved her . . .”

“Of course I do. So do you. And she loves us both.” He grinned and winked. “Although in different ways. But there's too much to her for just you and me. We couldn't hold her and we shouldn't try to. Close your mouth now, and pass me the repair kit.”

Jago did as he was bid and then picked up the other harness. “I guess I underestimated you,” he said, turning the straps over in his hands.

“I guess you did,” Raulin agreed. “You forgot, I've got hidden depths.” He looked smug. “It's why I always get the girls.”

“They feel sorry for you,” corrected Jago, ducking a wild backhand, and more relieved than he could say that when Crystal finally found her own heart she wouldn't be breaking Raulin's.

That evening, just before the sky grew dark enough for stars, the wer came with their answer. Only Beth, Jason, and their daughter actually entered the camp, but it didn't take wizard-sight to spot the rest out under the trees.

Her head high, Beth ignored everyone but Crystal. She walked across the clearing as if she owned it. The baby rode in a sling across her chest and she kept one arm curled protectively around it. The other arm hung by her side, hand resting on Jason's head. She stopped in front of the wizard and gray eyes looked fearlessly into green.

Raulin stepped up to stand behind Crystal's right shoulder, facing the great black wolf.

Jason growled.

Raulin growled back.

From that moment on, they ignored each other.

“Have you come to a decision?” Crystal asked, trying desperately not to laugh.

“We have.” Beth's mouth twitched as well. She took a deep breath to steady herself, during which time Crystal also gained control. “Will you heal us, wizard?” she asked simply.

Crystal nodded. “I will.”

“There are three other packs . . .”

“Them too.”

“They can be here in a quartermoon.”

“Then in a quartermoon, no female wer will be at the mercy of the changes again. I will heal all of you then.”

The sling wriggled and a tiny fist fell free to flail in the air, turning to a tiny paw as it waved.

“Get down, Jason,” Beth admonished as his nose got in her way. She tucked the arm in safely, and looked back to Crystal. “Thank you,” she said.
For my life and my daughter's, not what you may, or may not, do in a quartermoon.
Then she turned and they walked away from the camp.

*   *   *

During the week of waiting, Crystal spent a lot of time with Sokoji. The giant's presence calmed the goddesses, lessening the constant struggle to keep them confined. They discussed the healing and once Crystal went into the trees and told the startled sentry she needed to talk with a woman who knew how wer children learned to change.