A large fox ... a vixen . . . snarled and leapt at the shaman, who staggered back, then recovered in time to kick it strongly. It yelped in pain, and its yelp echoed across the camp. Yet once again it charged Strong Tongue, and this time it was not alone. Two other, larger, foxes joined it in harrying the shaman. The vixen broke its hold on her booted ankle long enough to bark sharply.
Silver Snow did not need to see Willow in her human guise to know that the fox’s barks had to mean, “Run, Elder Sister.” Grabbing up her skirts, she fled from Strong Tongue’s tent, whether toward her own or to the great tent did not matter.
Abruptly she blundered into the solid bulk of someone walking rapidly, and she screamed.
* “You, lady! I left you sleeping,” Vughturoi accused. “And yet, here you wander ...”
Bright light shocked her and she stiffened in his grip as the light neared her. Vughturoi squinted to make out its bearer, but as the torch dipped with each step, Silver Snow sighed with relief. It was Willow, limping across the trail of bloody footprints that Silver Snow had left, scattering something with her free hand. Her limp was so painful, so pronounced, that Strong Tongue’s kick must surely have left her with broken ribs.
“Blood has power,” Willow muttered to herself. “I must prevent Strong Tongue from using that power against my sister.”
“Get away from her, witch!” snarled Vughturoi. His face twisted in the sudden, inexplicable fury that made the Hsiung-nu feared wherever they rode. He thrust Silver Snow behind him and drew his knife on her maid.
21
Appalled by Vughturoi’s rage and the gravity of the charge, Willow recoiled. Her lame leg gave out, and she staggered. Heedless of the pain of her gashed foot, Silver Snow flung herself from behind her husband to catch Willow before she felclass="underline" mistress and maid clung together, a tiny island of Ch’in in a sea of grass, eyes wide with shock, pain, and fear.
Vughturoi leaned forward and seized the torch from Willow before it fell from her weakened grasp; there had been no rain for many days, and all of the Hsiung-nu feared fire on the grassland. The flame cast a demon’s mask of light and shadow on his harsh features, making him appear doubly fearsome.
What was the punishment for sorcery? One thing the Hsiung-nu had in common with those of Ch’in: a hatred of magic used for their despite. And another: both people had developed highly inventive and painful methods of punishment.
Eyes wild, Willow stared at Silver Snow. Then, even as the maid leaned upon her, she shook her head slightly, as if enjoining silence upon her.
What manner of woman are you, Silver Snow? she demanded of herself. For all these years, Willow has guarded you, tended you, loved you; and will you abandon her because your new lord calls her a witch?
Had she boasted to herself just that noon that she had found happiness? What good was it if it came at the price of betraying an old and dear companion’s trust?
“You accuse the wrong woman, husband” Silver Snow’s voice was as sharp as the arrow on which she had stepped. “Bring charges of sorcery against Strong Tongue, if you dare. She is the one who bespelled me when I was weak and ill.”
“I drugged you,” Willow said faintly.
“You gave me herbs to make me sleep—and not for the first time,” Silver Snow waved that objection aside. Fury as hot as her husband’s flooded her, burning away the cold of her earlier ensorcellment. Even the pain in her foot seemed to have receded. “You are blind, my husband, blind to nourish vipers in your camp yet threaten my oldest friend!”
“Do you deny that she has powers denied to ordinary men or women?”
She had only to say “yes” and be safe, a gentle, cherished creature too innocent to sense the presence of magic in her own household. Yet, she had been asked to repudiate Willow before, and had never done so—and she remembered her father, surrendering to this man’s father to preserve the lives of his soldiers.
Her father’s surrender had been right and proper; hers would be the blackest treason.
“Nothing Willow does is a secret to me,” she snapped. “Who aided me with that foolish girl at the riverbank? And who do you think helped us— us, husband—fight the white tiger? I tell you, if you send her away, if you punish her, you must also punish me, the mother of your only heir.”
Because Vughturoi had claimed to despise the silent, passive obedience of Han ladies, Silver Snow had shown spirit before. Still, what was that but a form of obedience, of doing his will? For the first time, she sought to oppose him to uphold . . . not my will, but what is right, she thought firmly. This , not cringing and manipulative trickery, was the obedience and service that wife owed husband, or subject owed ruler: to uphold what was right even in the face of anger in order to protect the best interests of the one who must be served.
“Test me,” cried Willow. “Test me to the death. I shall die vowing that I have done nothing, ever, in all my years of service to harm my elder sister!” Her voice was thick with tears and anger, and she spoke directly to the shan-yu as might a shaman or a prisoner who had nothing to lose.
Vughturoi watched his angry lady as she eased Willow to the ground, as grateful for its support as her maid. She hated herself for the way the hot, ready tears ran down her face, though these were tears of rage, not of weakness.
“Lady,” he spoke softly, but in that moment, his voice was that of the shan-yu, not the indulgent lord, “your word is your bond and an honor to our tents, but I must have proof before I move against a shaman and a prince.”
“Then take this!” Silver Snow demanded, and thrust the whistling arrow at Vughturoi. “Look at this arrow and tell me that my Willow keeps such for her bow—or that she uses a bow at all!”
“She need not,” Vughturoi said. “Not when she is mistress of herbs, spells, yes, and shape-change too.”
He gestured both women to rise. Unsteadily, they obeyed. “Hold this,” he ordered Willow, and thrust the torch back at her.
Silver Snow gasped, warmth flowing back into her hands and feet, despite a loss of blood that was turning her giddy.
“One of those vile whistling arrows that Tadiqan has trained his men to obey, like beasts to a command,” Vughturoi muttered. “Lady, where got you this?”
“I stepped on it,” Silver Snow told him. “Outside Strong Tongue’s tent as she stood watching. The pain broke the demon’s hold that she had on me, and I could flee.”
The night sky and the tents were tilting slightly. She put out a hand and found it enfolded in a familiar grip.
“Then that is the only time that such an arrow has done me service.” Again, Silver Snow felt herself falling.
“You cannot even stand!” Vughturoi’s voice trailed away into words that Silver Snow was certain must be curses.
“You,” he ordered Willow. “Take my little queen back to her tent and tend her well. Check that wound for poison!” Already he was turning to go back to the great tent, his stride long and decisive for a man who had spent most of his life in the saddle. “Yes, and there is this, too. Know that I accused you wrongly and that I will make it up to you.”
Silver Snow looked up into Willow’s face, which mirrored her own amazement. With just those few words, Vughturoi had accused, tried, and acquitted the maid, and now he thought to make amends. She bit her lip against laughter and saw Willow shake her head. Not for the first time, however, the maid was quicker than she herself.