“It turned out to have lodged in a vixen with six cubs, which had some strange consequences.”
“It is ascended, surely.”
“Well, yes, but in an odd mode. It seems to be, I’m not sure how to put it, taking care of the vixen. And her children.”
Hamo sat back, nonplussed, but then after a moment sighed. “That would be Magal, I suspect. It sounds like her. Svedra was a woman more in the style of your Ruchia. Very… forceful.”
Pen wondered what less flattering term Hamo had swallowed. Des snickered at him, or possibly at them both.
“I have some ideas of what might be done with her,” Pen put forward. “The vixen, that is. Uh, and the demon.” Or he would, when he’d had a chance to sleep and recover. Hamo could take this burden of care from him with a word, Pen knew. Half of him was almost weary enough to let him, but… “Yesterday, you said you were thinking on it?”
Hamo scrubbed his hands through his hair, grimacing. “There are only two choices. First, have the Saint of Easthome remove the damaged demon to the god.”
Of course the Bastard’s Order at the royal capital would have its own saint at hand. Although not, probably, at call, from what Pen had experienced of saints. Such directly god-touched men and women did not owe their primary allegiances to the Temple, after all. Des flinched.
“Or second,” Hamo went on, “sacrifice the fox and transfer whatever is left of the demon to a new Temple sorcerer. Salvaging… something.”
“Do you really think it would be that much different than when an elemental is transferred for the first time from an animal to a sorcerer?”
“I am quite sure it would be different. What I don’t know is how dangerous it might be to the recipient to take in such a crippled partner.”
Pen almost rose to the defense of the vixen by arguing that Hamo wouldn’t be talking of sacrifice if the demon had gone into some random person. But of course, if it had gone into a person, they’d be able to speak for themselves, human and demon both. Gods, he was too tired to think straight. “There’s a third choice. Leave the vixen with the shamans for a while, let them tame her.”
Hamo sat back, startled. “What would be the point of that? They cannot use her demon-spirit for the basis of a Great Beast; the two magics are incompatible. And the longer we wait, the worse the demon’s condition may grow. The more of Mags and Svedra to be lost.”
“Or what was lost, was lost at the first. Like pouring water into a cup until it overflows, which then remains as full as it can hold. The point is to study a rare situation, at least for a little. The point is, there is time to think about it. The vixen is probably not going anywhere till the cubs are weaned, some weeks at least.” Unless the ascendant demon was directly threatened with annihilation. When it surely would try to save itself, and then they’d have a real problem. Well… another real problem.
Hamo hesitated. “Did you sense it to be so?”
“I’ve only observed the vixen briefly. It would take more time than that to perceive ongoing changes.” He carefully did not say deterioration. Not that he had to.
“Fine if she’s stabilized. Not if she hasn’t.”
Pen shrugged in provisional concession. “You should certainly come out to the Fellowship’s menagerie and examine her carefully, before making any irrevocable decisions.”
Lips twisting in bemusement, Hamo said, “Penric—are you trying to preserve the life of a fox?”
“Magal’s demon seems to be doing so,” Pen defended this. Weakly, he feared.
Hamo rubbed his eyes. “Feh. I can’t… Let us take this up again out there, then. Tomorrow.”
“Good idea, sir.” At least the man was not dismissing Penric’s words outright. Time for a tactful withdrawal, before he fell off this chair onto that lovely, inviting floor.
Hamo stood up to see him out, another hopeful sign. At the door, he lowered his head and murmured, “I would never have compromised my demon, you know. …I’d have used my bare hands. Or a knife.”
Pen couldn’t very well feign being appalled when he’d run through similar thought-chains himself. “Not needed now.” He mustered a sympathetic smile and signed himself, tapping his lips twice with his thumb in farewell.
It was midnight by the time Pen made his weary way back to the Temple guest house. He was trying to mentally compose a note to slip under the princess-archdivine’s door, excusing himself from appearing due to the lateness of the hour, when he discovered a paper pinned to his own. It was in her secretary’s fine hand, and charged him to call on her before he retired regardless of the time.
He threaded the halls to her chambers and tapped tentatively, waited, and knocked again. He was just turning away when the door swung open, and the secretary beckoned him inside the sitting room. “Ah, Learned Penric, at last. Wait here.”
He stood dumbly in his day dirt, feeling every bruise and muscle-pull. At length, Llewyn emerged from an inner door, wrapped in a brocade night robe and with her hair in a gray braid down her back. Not an ensemble he’d seen before.
She looked him over. “My, my, my.”
Three mys tonight, goodness. He usually rated only two. He wondered what he’d have to do to win four.
“My apologies, Archdivine, for waking you at this hour. It’s been a long day.”
“At my age, I’m never asleep at this hour.” She made a dismissive gesture, charitably fending his apology. Her secretary settled her in a cushioned chair, and her wave directed Pen to another.
Fine blue-and-white silk stripes. He stared at it in dismay, considered his reek, and then settled himself cross-legged on the floor at her feet, instead. Her gray brows rose ironically as she looked down at him.
“So, how was your day in the country this time?”
He was grateful for the practice he’d had recounting it already. He didn’t have to think as much. She pressed her fingers to her lips a few times, but did not interrupt him apart from a few shrewd, uncomfortably clarifying questions.
“I thought… I thought I might receive some spiritual guidance from Learned Hamo, as we both share the burden and gift of a demon, but it turned out to be more the other way around,” sighed Pen. “Though I don’t think he’s going to bolt off in the night to try to commit murder on Learned Magal’s behalf.”
“Was that a risk?”
“Mm… not now.”
Her lips twitched. “Then your counsel must have been good enough.”
He turned his hands out, smiling ruefully. He really wanted to lie across her silk-slippered feet like a tired dog. “But who will counsel me?”
“Your own Temple superior, of course. That’s her job.”
“Ah.” His head tipped over, and he found himself resting it upon her knee. Her beringed hand petted his hair. Dog indeed.
“Anyone who wishes to question my court sorcerer on his actions today must go through me,” she stated. And good luck to them stood implied, he thought. Heartening, but…
“So much for the realm, and the law. But what about my god? And my demon. My soul stands more naked in that court. Violence, it appears, grows easier with practice. Or so Halber demonstrates. I’ve seen it in the ruined mercenary soldiers come back to the cantons, too, sometimes. The pitfall of their trade. I don’t want it to become the pitfall of mine. And… and I see how it could. So very, very easily. Hamo was almost ready to slip tonight, and he’s had decades more experience than me.”
“And thus you seek my counsel?”