Her mouth twisted. No, she reminded herself. That's not me. I'm not that woman.
She started to turn aside, toward the stand of trees that housed the little clearing where she'd first encountered Stag and Drik. She could change there. Her wolf form was more suited to travel, especially at nighteven if the thought of becoming the animal that had attacked Dhauna put a knot in her stomach.
"Good night, Keph," she said. "Safe journey."
"Feena?" The young man twisted in his saddle and asked, "Where are you going?"
"There's a path," she lied. "My journey lies that way."
"Wait. I'll come with you."
He pulled on the reins, turning his horse. Feena stiffened.
"What?" she asked. "Why?"
She couldn't quite make out his expression, but Keph's voice was tight. "I need…" He choked, hesitated, then seemed to change his mind. "Thank you for helping me," he said.
"You helped me at the Cutter's Dip," she said. "I owed you."
"I told you that you owed me nothing, but you helped me anyway." He urged his horse over toward her and asked, "Can I travel with you?"
"I don't need your protection, Keph."
The words came out more harshly than she'd intended. Keph was quiet for a moment.
"Sorry," he said finally. "I didn't mean to say you did. It's just… It's a dark night. I'd like the company. Please."
Feena glanced toward the trees. In her wolf form, she could move fast, trimming a day or more from her travels, but…
One night won't make a difference,'her knotted gut argued. Stay human for one more night.
"All right," she said, and her stomach relaxed. "We'd best stay on the road though."
"What about the path?"
"I'll pick up another one later."
They walked in silence until Keph shifted uncomfortably and said, "Feena, do you mind if I make a light?" "There's nothing to see."
"The dark is getting on my nerves." He turned and reached for his saddle bags. "I have a sunrod…"
Feena clicked her tongue. "Too bright," she said. "We wouldn't be able to see anything beyond it. Let me."
She picked up a fist-sized stone from the road. A prayer to Selune brought the glow of a full moon to it, bright enough to dispel the darkness around them, not so bright as to completely spoil their night vision.
"Better?" she asked, passing the stone up to him.
He hesitated before taking it.
"Thank you," he said.
He settled the stone into the crook of his arm, cradling it, then looked down at her. In the magical light, she finally got a good look at his face. He still seemed thunderstruck at her presence. She looked away uncomfortably.
Most of the land in that part of Sembia was farmers' fields and pastures. Low hedgerows separated fields from the road. Feena listened to the rustlings of small creatures in the hedges as their illuminated passing disturbed the nocturnal activities of mice, small birds, and badgers. A fox crouched in the shadows, eyes gleaming.
"You never asked me where I was going," Keph said with the abruptness of someone desperate to break a silence.
Feena glanced up at him and replied, "You didn't ask me where I was going either."
She looked back to the hedgerow. The fox was gone. Keph hadn't even noticed it.
"So," he ventured, "where are you going?"
"Arch Wood."
His face creased. "That's northwest of Selgaunt, isn't it? Right on the border with the Dalelands? It's a long way."
"My village is there." "Ah."
They walked a little farther.
"What's your village like?" he asked finally.
"Small," said Feena. "I suppose it's more of a hamlet, but no one there would ever admit to it. There's only a few houses clustered around a mill really, with a blacksmith on the other side of the mill run. My mother's cottagemy cottage," she corrected herself, "is out beyond the smith's."
"It sounds nice," Keph said. "Why are you going back?"
"I've had enough of Yhaunn," Feena said. She managed to keep the bitterness out of her voice. "Moonshadow Hall has lots of priestesses. Arch Wood needs me back." She looked up at Keph and asked, "What about you?"
He shrugged and said, "Ordulin, I guess. Then maybe Selgaunt or Saerloon."
"Wherever the road goes?" asked Feena. Keph nodded. "You did leave Yhaunn in a hurry, didn't you?" When he nodded again she asked, "Am I going to regret helping you?"
He fell silent, his eyes suddenly dark. Feena frowned. "Keph?"
"You might," he said.
He took a deep breath and drew something out of his pouch, then opened his hand to let it dangle from his fingers.
A disk of Shar.
Feena gasped and leaped away, eyes searching the night for signs of an ambush.
"Feena!" Keph shouted. "It's not what you think!"
He kicked his feet free of his stirrups and slithered out of the saddle, still clutching the glowing stone in one hand and Shar's symbol in the other. Feena whirled to face him.
"Stay back!" she growled at him, stepping away. He held his arms wide and said, "Please, listen to me. This isn't a trap." "What is it then?" "I need your help," he pleaded.
Feena stared at him in shock. There were tears running down his cheeks. His outstretched arms were trembling.
"I didn't know you were a Selunite, Feena. I swear I didn't. I wouldn't have helped you if I hadnot then, anyway. And you know I didn't expect to see you at the gate tonight. But now…" He choked. "Selune is Shar's enemy, isn't she? You have to help me, Feena. Please. I'm running away!"
She stared. A Sharran running away… Her stomach convulsed. Her cheststill aching from sobsheaved.
And she laughed. A short, bitter bark. Her mouth twisted.
"Well," she said. "I guess that makes two of us."
Selune was slowly sliding down against the night sky behind them. In the eastern distance, Yhaunn threw up almost as much light as the slivered moon, the combined glare of thousands of lanterns and torches a stain of brightness in the dark. Because the city was sunk down in its quarry, that stain was really all there was to see of it. It was strange, Feena thoughtYhaunn was only really there when you were right down in it.
She and Keph sat together on a hilltop not too far off the road, looking back the way they had come, the glowing stone set between them. Down along the hill's slope, the young man's horse chomped contentedly at summer dry grass. Its pale hide shone ghostlike on the fringes of the magical moonlight.
Feena took a pull at a bottle of surprisingly good wineKeph really had packed his bags in a rushand passed it back to him. He drank as well, then stared at the bottle without saying anything.
"There's no rush, Keph," she told him. "Take your fime. We still have half a bottle left."
Keph sighed. "There's not really much else to tell. After the dream, I knew there was only one thing I could do." He sat with one leg stretched out and the other bent, one arm draped around it. He took another gulp of wine, then rested his cheek on his arm. "I was wrong about so much, but Variance, Jarull, BolanSharnone of them were going to let me go easily. If I stayed, what would happen to Adrey? To the rest of my family?" He looked up. "So I ran."
"You can't outrun a goddess, Keph."
"But I can try to keep anyone else from getting hurt, can't I?"
"You can do that." Feena stretched out her arm, and Keph gave her the bottle. "Wouldn't Mifano and Velsinore love to see this? As if they didn't have enough to turn against me, I'm sitting and drinking wine with a Sharran."
Keph snorted and said, "Just this morning, I wouldn't have even thought about having wine with a Selunite. Let alone the werewolf who killed Cyrume."
Feena growled under her breath and bared her teeth.
"The Sharran at the well in the Stiltways?" she said. "I didn't kill him."
Keph looked at her, surprised.