Rieve scrambled to his feet, kicked again at the dog, andmissed. He spun toward the door and came eye to razor sharp beak with a dark-eyed falcon.
"No!" he shouted, flinging up an arm to protect his eyes. The falcon's talons raked along the back of his hand. "No!"
As though in response to his protest, the falcon darted away, lifting high to take perch on the mantel. Rieve drew a shuddering breath and stumbled again to the door. A heavy, tawny paw hit him hard in the chest and dropped him where he stood. The panther's fangs shone like daggers in the fire's glow.
Standing at the panther's shoulder, one hand on the mountain cat's broad golden head, another extended in a parody of greeting, stood a light-eyed, pale young mage. His cold smile awoke a fear in Rieve that even the panther's gleaming fangs had not.
Rieve moaned. He wondered if he would have time to prepare for death.
Animals were turning into people all around him, and the squirrel didn't know where to look first. The falcon, that beautiful bird, became a tall, dark-haired young man. There was still something of the falcon's brooding about him. The squirrel thought that it must always have been this way. The fox, limping from having been kicked half-way across the cottage, was no fox at all but a red-haired half-elf who leaned against the wall, holding ribs that must truly hurt from the look in his long eyes.
The dog… ah, the dog! The squirrel almost knew that he would be a dwarf, brown-bearded and grumbling about a sore stomach even before he was changed.
There remained only the panther, crouched over Rieve, his heavy paw still planted firmly in the middle of the mage's chest. The slight young man scratched the big cat's ears idly, smiling as though he had only dropped in for a cup of something warm to take the chill out of the night.
"Four more changes we need, friend Rieve," the young man murmured. "I will effect one after you effect three."
Rieve panted something, and the squirrel thought it must be hard getting enough air to speak with the panther leaning so heavily on him.
"Do I take that for agreement?"
"Do I — do I have a choice?" Rieve asked sourly.
"Well, yes. We always have choices. Yours, however, are limited."
Rieve swallowed hard, recognized the limits, and nodded. The squirrel flashed his tail and scurried around in his cage.
Cat! Pytr! Watch! Watch! They're going to do more changes! Pytr? Pytr, where are you?
Pytr was gone. Or the cat was gone, anyway, replaced by a stocky, golden-haired man who wore around one wrist a slim bracelet of braided leather.
And the wren, who had clung so fearfully to the edge of the table near the squirrel's cage during the whole splendid attack only moments ago, was gone as well. Instead, a small, pretty girl, her hair the color of the wren's brown feathers, rested her hand on the cage.
"One more," she said, "And this, perhaps, the most important."
The panther, of course, the squirrel thought. He looks fierce enough to eat the mage for dinner and still come away hungry. They'll change the panther next.
But to the squirrel's surprise, the panther remained a panther, rumbling and growling deep inside his broad chest. The girl leaned over his own cage and undid the latch. She gathered him carefully into her hands and lifted him out.
No more cage I As though he hadn't breathed in days, the squirrel drew in a lungful of air and leaped from the girl's hands. He could smell the sweet night air. He could taste it, and it tasted like freedom.
The girl cried out, the dark-haired young man shouted something, and the half-elf leaped to kick the door shut. But squirrels can make themselves very small. Sucking in all the air that he could, the squirrel dashed between the closing door and the jamb and plunged into the night. He'd had enough of men and beasts and cages. He wanted trees, cozy nests, and sweet caches of chestnuts. And he was going to have those now, no matter what they shouted inside…
"Come back here, you stone-headed kender!"
Halfway up the closest tree the squirrel stopped, frozenby the dwarf's cry. Not crazy, he'd told Pytr, but stone headed. Stone-headed… something. Stone-headed kender! Kender?
Something strange happened to the cold night air. It shivered, the way it does under summer's heat, and then it sighed, the sound of a small drifting breeze. The squirrel tried to breathe but found that he couldn't quite draw in the air he needed. Suddenly he lost his grip and tumbled to the ground.
Kender!
"And where, in the names of all the gods, did you think you were going?"
"I — " Tas got his legs under him and climbed to his feet. Some of the squirrel feeling was in him yet. He had to swallow hard to ignore the imperative to run from the dwarf. "I — don't know. I don't even really know how I got here, wherever here is. I was following the wren, I think, and… well, then I was here, falling out of this tree. But I think I remember some dreams… strange ones, about squirrels and cats and — »
Flint snorted and pulled the kender to his feet. For all his scowling, though, his hands were gentle. "Come on, now, back inside. You can be sure Caramon is getting hungry by now. And Raistlin has some work to do yet."
"But Caramon is always hungry," Tas said, dusting himself off. "What's so important about that — oh, the panther?"
Flint nodded. Tas, remembering Pytr's intense and always sharp cat-hunger, grinned slyly. He was not unhappy that Rieve must be learning even now what it meant to be the object of that hunger. "It's just a thought, Flint, but perhaps they could just feed Caramon whatever's lying around the cottage?"
In the end, though Tas had not been alone in his wistful wish, they did not feed Rieve to the panther. Some oath or promise was extracted from him, though what passed between him and Raistlin none ever learned, for Raistlin banished all but the big panther from the cottage. If Caramon heard or understood, he was uncharacteristically silent about it. And a week later, when those who had been cat and squirrel, wren and falcon, fox, dog, and panther were gathered in Solace, it was yet a matter for speculation.
Wren watched Raistlin, who sat in the shadows of Flint's hearth. "Were truth told, I'm not sure that I want to know."
"I wouldn't mind knowing," Pytr muttered. He stroked her hair and sighed. "I'd like to know with what coin Rieve's debt has been paid."
The young woman shook her head and smiled. Small and cheerful, her brown eyes bright now when she looked at Pytr, she was, Flint thought then, very like the wren for which she'd been named and which she had, for a time, been.
Tanis, who at that moment had the same thought, glanced once at the dwarf and, when he received a slight nod, crossed to the hearth and took up one of Flint's small carvings.
"For you," he said, taking a seat next to Wren.
"But — what is it? Surely you've given us enough?"
"One more thing, but you must close your eyes now."
Curious, Sturm and Caramon leaned closer and Tas ducked under Pytr's arm to get a closer look. They saw nothing, however, for Tanis had the object hidden in closed hands. In the hearth's shadow, Raistlin stirred but did not rise to join his companions.
Wren closed her eyes, and Tanis placed the small object in her hands. "Now, this is something Flint has taught me: let your hands know what it is you hold before your eyes tell you. Our eyes, as we have lately learned, can too easily deceive us."
Wren let her fingers discover the wings first, then the carefully rounded back, the beak, and finally the deftly carved tail feathers. "A bird!" she cried. "A wren?"
A little breeze sighed, then wandered away.
Yet when she opened her eyes and saw the small carving, Wren wore a small, puzzled frown. "But… it FELT like a wren. I don't understand."
Neither did Tanis. Nor did Flint. It was Tas, finally, who spoke.