She stood up, slowly, very conscious of the fact that her hair was coming undone, that she was sweaty from the long walk and had not had a chance to bathe, that her nails had dirt under them, and that there was soot on the side of her nose from the fire. The stranger was more than immaculately well-groomed and impeccably, though strangely, attired-he was physically perfect.
He was as blond as she, with large, gray eyes, a chiseled face, and a slender but muscular build, like that of a dancer or runner. From his clothing and the jewels on the hilt of his sword and ornamenting his collar, he was wealthy as well. He watched her, measuringly, and she flushed. Her automatic reaction, which she stifled, was to punish him for insolence. Never in her life had a mere man looked at her that way. But this was no "mere" man, it was a free man, and therein lay the difference. Not a freedman; that was another distinction that had suddenly become critical. This was something she was going to have to keep in mind.
She pulled herself up to her full height, and looked him straight in the eye. "I am the leader of this expedition," she said proudly, matching him glance for glance. "Thank you for agreeing to help us."
He replied in some unknown tongue; Ware translated for both of them. "Thesius says to tell you that he was pleased to be able to aid his old friend in whatever way possible."
I can well imagine, she thought, unable to suppress a twinge of jealousy. Obviously, they had already shared love, since Ware was Ware , and not Wara. It occurred to her also that this Thesius could pass for her very own brother; they shared the same hair-color, the same body-type, and given Ware's exacting standards, he was probably well-spoken and well-educated. He might even be of some kind of noble birth.
Had Ware chosen her because she looked like Thesius? she wondered. Was he amused by the fact that they could be siblings? Was it really Thesius he had wanted all along, and was she only the means to get this man?
"We don't have a great deal, as I am sure Ware has told you," she said, trying to cover her uncomfortable thoughts as well as she could. "The mage-storm destroyed most of our supplies, but you are welcome to share our poor meal."
Ware translated, and again the man spoke. "He is simply saying what I was going to tell you," Ware said. "That he has brought mounts and supplies for us, and that he thanks you for your ready hospitality. He also-ah-says that he brought some gifts especially for you, clothing and things, and that if you would like to make use of them..." Ware's voice trailed off, somewhat embarrassed. "He's trying to be kind, Xylina. He is not intending to insult you, but you do look as if-"
"As if I've been walking across the hills for several days without a bath or a change of clothing; thank you, Ware, I was quite aware of that," she replied sharply, then took a deep breath and softened her tone, although she could not bring herself to apologize. "Tell him that I appreciate his generosity and that I would be very glad to get out of these things and into something clean."
The man smiled when Ware translated, and Ware dropped his eyes, though from embarrassment or amusement, Xylina could not say. "Thesius says that your things are on the last horse in his string, and that someone of my age and experience should have found a more graceful way of telling you of his gifts."
"You can tell him that I agree!" she snapped, considerably irritated now as well as embarrassed-but she also went straight to the indicated horse and availed herself of the clean clothing she found in its pack. It was not, as she had feared, a completely impractical dress-some kind of fancy, long-skirted robe unsuitable for travel or fighting. It was, in fact, a slightly feminized version of the trousers and shirt that Thesius himself wore, right down to the jeweled collar-studs.
Now they really would look like brother and sister, she thought, with dismay. But she took the clothing anyway, and leaving Horn in charge of the meal, went off to conjure herself soap and water to make herself presentable.
When she returned, the others had already started the meal without her. To her continued chagrin, Thesius fit comfortably in with the rest of the men, despite a lack of common language. When she rejoined them, taking her place as unobtrusively as possible, she could not help but notice an exchange of glances between Ware and Thesius, glances that said more than words. And although she put on a cheerful face, her resentment-and yes, jealousy-smoldered just below the surface.
That resentment and jealousy did not abate as they drew nearer their goal, aided considerably by the horses that Thesius had brought with him. Whenever she looked at Thesius, instead of remembering what she and Ware had shared the night before, she kept recalling that Wara had risen immediately from her bed and gone to him. She kept wondering how much Ware cared for her, and how much he cared because she looked like Thesius. She knew that he had to do it, because Wara could not afford to show her face by day, but her emotion refused to be reconciled. Whenever he left her bed, she tortured herself with doubts; whenever he came back she felt guilty about doubting him. She tried to drown both emotions in passion, and did not succeed. One night, after persuading him to return when he had made the change back to male, she sent him shuttling back and forth for half the night-and it did not help that Thesius seemed perfectly capable of keeping up with her in this undeclared contest.
Faro had it all figured out, of course, and one of the few things helping her to keep a civil "public" face on all of this was his tacit protection of all three of them from discovery.
When she asked him how he had known, he simply shrugged; she could only assume that Ware must have told him about the changing-and that in itself was a cause for resentment, since Ware seemed to be trusting everyone with this "secret nature" of his, and yet he had not trusted her until she forced the revelation out of him.
Things could not have gone on in this way much longer-but the fates had some other surprise in store for them: one that made such trivialities superfluous.
The woodlands gave way to a flat country, hot and humid, covered with scrub plants and bordered on one side by a salt sea of some kind with a flat, soft sand beach. There was not a great deal of shade, and all the vegetation was bent in a perpetual slant away from the coast. Xylina did not like the look of this country; aside from the fact that it was the most boring place she'd yet seen, it was too open, and there were no good places for defense. There weren't even hills to vary the countryside, they were plagued by swarms of biting insects which made the horses miserable, and the sticky heat made all of them irritable.
The insects were particularly hard on the horses, and nothing seemed to keep them off. Xylina tried to conjure repulsive oil, but it repulsed the horses more than the flies. As a result, they were paying more attention to their restive mounts and the fetid heat than to keeping quiet and to "blending" with their surroundings-and that was when an entirely new enemy struck.
A huge metallic-black creature, droning like some kind of giant insect, swooped down out of the sun straight at their column. As the thing plunged down to within a wagons length of Xylina, she saw that it had a rider that was guiding its motions. It actually did them no harm-
But it spooked the horses, who began to rear and shy, their eyes rolling wildly.
The men and Pattée were unused to riding, and lost all control of the beasts. The monster rose into the sky again, turned, and came back for a second pass. That was when the horses panicked completely, and bolted, bucking and kicking.