"What's happened?" she asked.
"She let Chandri heal her wounds, but when Velsinore tried to give her the belladonna you prescribed, she refused it. Velsinore tried casting healing magic on her as well, but Mother Dhauna resisted that, too." Julith swallowed. "Then she prayed to Selune herself, asking her to send her brightest light."
Selune's brightest light…
"The light of a full moon?" Feena asked, and Julith nodded. Feena sucked in her breath. "Moonmaiden's grace, she's forced herself to transform into a werewolf!"
CHAPTER 12
Keph watched color spring back into Feena's face. Her jaw shifted in determination. She dropped the gray bundle to the ground and began to loosen the drawstring of her skirt. He stared, then turned away.
It felt very much like he was on the periphery of events. Whatever was happening at Moonshadow Hall didn't involve him. Feena had helped him just by talking to himbut what was he to her? Just a misguided enemy of her faith she'd only met once before. Her real devotion lay with her old friends and her own mistakes.
Something inside him raged at being ignored, just as Strasus and Dagnalla had ignored him, but he fought it down, swallowing the arrogance that had brought him so much trouble.
"Wouldn't she have changed at the next full moon anyway?" he asked over his shoulder.
"The next full moon. A tenday and a half from now. We…" Feena's voice caught. "Moonshadow Hall would have been ready."
"She caught us off guard," said Julith. "The clergy present managed to keep her back, but just barely. She needs your help, Feena. You're the one who knows the most about Iycanthrope. Mother Dhauna was locked in a chamber in the infirmary when I left. She's like a w'ld animal."
"She is a wild animal," Feena said. "That's the chamber I used to be locked in when I changed as a girl. Julith, what are you doing?"
Keph glanced around out of reflex.
Feena was naked. Before her, Julith was also undressingand swiftly donning Feena's discarded clothes. Keph gulped and looked away again. He heard Feena growl at him.
"Keph, don't be an idiot." "Sorry," he muttered.
He swallowed and turned back around. Under the moonlight, Feena's skin shone like ivory. Her arms and legs were long, lean, and muscular. The moonlight had leeched the color from her hair, turning flaming red into lustrous copper. If Selune herself had stepped down onto that field, she couldn't have chosen a more beautiful, vigorous form. He bit back a gasp and forced his eyes away before he could stare too long.
Julith pulled Feena's blouse down over her head. The other woman's country clothes hung ridiculously loose on her frame.
Julith shook her head in response to Feena's stare and said, "I'm not mad." She reached into her satchel again and produced a slim case of worked silver. "Jewelry and baubles aren't the only treasures in Moonshadow Hall's chests."
She touched the case and it sprang open. Inside, two square vials of crystal wound with silver filigree nestled side by side. The liquid inside them caught the moonlight and reflected it back in a blue-white glow.
"Temple records refer to this as Iraelathe's Escape,"
Julith said, "presented to a High Moonmistress over three hundred years ago by a worshipful devotee. When the vials are replaced in the case and the case placed in moonlight, the potions regenerate themselves with the turning of the moon."
"What do they do?" asked Feena.
"Tonight, they'll help us outwit Mifano and Velsinore." She held out her free hand. "I need three strands of your hair. Wrap them around my finger."
Feena reached up and plucked at her scalp, then twisted fine red hairs around one of Julith's fingers like a delicate ring, carefully knotting the ends so they wouldn't come free,
"Now," said Julith, "you take the potion on the right. I take the potion on the left. We drink them at the same time."
Keph watched the two priestesses slide the vials free of the case and open them carefully. Feena's nose wrinkled.
"It smells like sugared almonds."
Julith just smiled and counted to three. She and Feena lifted the vials and drank their contents at the same moment.
A slight shimmer passed over both of them. When it faded, Julith wore Feena's face and long red hair spilled down her back. The country clothes no longer hung loose on her. Keph couldn't tell if it was just an illusion or a true transformation, but if he hadn't seen it happen, he certainly wouldn't have known the woman tucking the vial back into the silver case wasn't Feena.
Feena, however, was still herself.
She frowned and said, "Nothing happened to me."
"Nothing you can see," answered Julith. She might have looked like Feena, but the younger priestess's voice was still her own. "But until the potions wear off, only the most powerful divination magic can locate you. When Velsinore and Mifano try to find you, their magic will find me instead." She smiled as she took Feena's vial from her and replaced it in the case, then put the case back in her satchel. "Iraelathe's Escapeto sight and magic, one person takes the place of another."
"What if they've already found Feena?" Keph asked. "You said they were already on their way."
"At best the trail will lead them to this field. I'll ride from herethe trail they follow will be mine and I'll lead them a merry chase." Julith gave Feena a brief hug and said, "Selune watch over you, sister."
"Selune watch over you."
Feena stepped back. Julith pressed a hand to her tired horse's heaving side and murmured a prayer. Light flickered around her hand and the horse shivered, standing tall with renewed energy. Julith swung up into her saddle.
And what, asked a small voice inside Keph, are you going to do? He swallowed, and urged his horse forward.
"I'm going with you, Julith."
Both Julith and Feena looked at him sharply.
"You don't have to do that, Keph," Feena said. "Velsinore and Mifano aren't looking for you."
"They might be," Keph said firmly. "We've been traveling together since Yhaunn. If their magic shows that, won't it look odd if we separate now?"
Julith frowned and said, "He's right."
Feena grimaced.
"All right then." She stepped up to Keph's horse and put her hand on his leg. "We'll meet again, Keph. May Selune favor you until we do."
The blessing pulled at him. He clenched his teeth against tears and gave Feena only a brisk nod of farewell. The priestess moved away.
"Keep hold of your horses," she warnedthen shook herself.
Her transformation was at once both terrifying and awe-inspiring, beautiful woman flowing smoothly into powerful wolf. Keph's horse shied. back at the sudden appearance of the predator. He couldn't blame the animal. Even though he had been expecting it, the wolfs appearance struck a primal fear in him as well.
"Easy," he whispered to the horse, "easy." He might as well have been whispering to himself.
Feena gave one sharp yip, caught the strap around Julith's gray bundle in her mouth, then turned and surged off through the grain, across the field and back toward Yhaunn.
Julith looked to Keph and said, "This is your last chance. If you want to go your own way, I won't tell Feena."
Keph shook his head. "I've run away once tonight. I think that's enough."
Wolf legs devoured ground. Muscles bunched and stretched, driving her across the countryside parallel to the Ordulin road. Feena ran as she had seldom run before, not out of joy or fear, but out of pure desperation.
Hedgerows flashed past. All of the small creatures that she had heard from the road, she smelled as she passed in the fields. Where they had rustled with the passing of humans, however, they froze with the lightning-swift passing of the wolf. Feena put them out of her mind, put all thoughts out of her mind, and simply ran.