Balkis stared. That, just from a name? “I … I have a memory of such a journey, when I was very young—but I’ve been raised in Allustria since before I could walk.”
“Allustrian enough, I warrant.” Idris frowned and came closer, reaching out to touch Balkis’ hair. Balkis steeled herself against the stranger’s nearness.
“Don’t be silly, I won’t hurt you,” Idris said impatiently. “You’ve the aura of magic about you, child. How did you come by it?”
Balkis stared. “I didn’t know …”
“Did you not?” Idris frowned at the puzzle, then shrugged it off. “Enough. You haven’t walked deep into the woods and braved the dangers of wolf and bear for idle chat. What is your errand?”
“I … I seek a potion to keep me from going into heat.”
“Into heat?” Idris stared. “Odd choice of words for it. Well, there’s nothing we can do about that, child—we feel the warmth and the tickling every month whether we will or no. The only cure for it would play havoc with your innards, and might keep you from ever having a baby. You wouldn’t want that, now, would you?”
“Oh, no! And that kind of heat I can withstand easily enough …”
“That kind?” Idris frowned. “What other kind is there?”
“The … the kind a cat feels,” Balkis stammered.
Idris’ gaze sharpened. “How would you know what a cat feels?” When she saw Balkis hesitate, she cajoled, “Come now, child, I can’t help you if I don’t know what troubles you. If you feel you can’t trust me, why, begone with you! But if you truly want my help, then truth you must tell, and all of it!”
“You’ll think me mad,” Balkis warned. “I’ll have to show you.”
“Show, then.” Idris seemed mightily puzzled.
Balkis took a deep breath, hoped Idris could take it in stride, and changed into a cat.
CHAPTER 3
Idris stared, then took a deep breath and said, “Yes. No wonder there was an aura of magic about you. I can see why you’d want a potion to keep you from going into heat.”
“Can you help me?” Balkis asked, forgetting her cat-shape for the moment.
Idris frowned. “What was that? I almost understood it.”
Balkis stared up at her, amazed. It had never occurred to her to try to speak as a cat-she’d never been near anyone who wouldn’t have called her a monster. She tried again, slowly and carefully, to shape her mewing into words. “Xhan … eeeeyooo … help … mew?”
Idris nodded. “Yes, you can talk even in that form. Your ‘kuh’ and ‘hih’ sounds come out more like coughs than anything else, but if I strain, I can understand you. You’ll have to practice that, my lass.”
Balkis felt a thrill of accomplishment and pranced with delight.
“And as to my helping you,” Idris said, “there’s still no potion-but for a cat’s heat, there is a spell. Hold still, now, and let me sing.” She knelt by the little cat, hands almost touching, and began a tune in a language Balkis had never heard. Somehow she understood it, though, and wondered if it were akin to the songs of the wind in the leaves. Idris was calling upon the spirits of wood, water, wind, and earth to shelter Balkis and keep her body from its sexual urges for all but one week out of the year. Perspiration sprang out on her brow as she chanted, but at last she sat back on her heels, done. “There, now. You’ll have to keep from changing into a cat during the week before and after the shortest day of the year, but even if you should forget and do so, there aren’t all that many male cats about then. Just pick yourself a house where you’re the only one.”
“I shall,” Balkis mewed. “Oh, thankyouthankyouthankyou!”
Idris nodded. “It is my pleasure. But you can return the favor by telling me how you came to be able to change forms. Somehow I doubt you were born a shape-shifter. Come, change back to a lass and tell me.”
Balkis willed it, and felt her body grow and swell until she stood before Idris again as a girl. “Thank you, good woman!”
“Show your thanks,” Idris suggested. “Tell me how you learned this trick.”
Balkis turned regretful. “I can’t say—I don’t remember. I’ve always been able to, that’s all I know.”
“But you say you have a dim memory of coming from a far place?”
“Yes, before I found Greta and Ludwig.” Tears filled Balkis’ eyes. “God rest their souls.”
“Lost them this last year, did you?” Idris gave her a smile of sympathy. “A difficult time, I know. Tell me what you can remember, then—all that you can.”
Balkis started to speak, but Idris turned away. “No, not standing here! For myself, I’m rather weary. Let’s sit, and sip some brew.”
The “brew” was powdered herbs in hot water. As they sat and sipped, Balkis told Idris the tale of her life. The older woman touched her hand with gentle sympathy when she spoke of losing her foster parents, then again when she explained why she had left her home.
“It comes to all of us sooner or later,” Idris told her, “unless we’re lucky enough to fall in love with a man who truly falls in love with us—but I’ve seen many a woman waste her life because she settled for a man she didn’t truly love, in order to have a house and home and children.” She shook her head sadly. “I don’t know who to pity more, her or her brood.”
“I’ve seen some, as you say.” Balkis’ tears dried in the contemplation of those less fortunate than herself. “Most of them seem able to convince themselves they’re happy enough.”
“And so do their men,” Idris said grimly, “which only proves how well people can lie to themselves. No, you’ve made the right choice, lass, hard though it may be. Now see if you can remember in the other direction.”
“Other direction?” Balkis frowned. “You mean back into infancy?”
“I mean that indeed.” Idris took the chain from about her neck and held up the pendant—a polished crystal almost an inch across. She held it by the chain and let it swing, watching it thoughtfully, and Balkis followed her gaze, staring at the bauble. It glittered in the sunlight that came through the window, flashing reflections here and there. She felt the urge to bat at it with her paw, then remembered with a shock that she was in human form and told herself sternly to behave.
“Let your mind rest,” Idris intoned. “Sit at your ease, let your limbs go loose. Let your thoughts roam, let them go back and back. Remember, but do not let the memories disturb your tranquility. Be at peace, but bring to mind the time that you first slipped your shape into that of a cat.”
Perhaps it was the brew, or perhaps the slow, soft sound of Idris’ voice, perhaps even the feeling of being safe and secure again—but no matter what it was, a delicious languor spread over Balkis’ limbs and penetrated her whole body. Her eyelids grew heavy, but she couldn’t bear to let them close and lose sight of that lovely whirling crystal and the flashes of light that coruscated off its surface. It seemed to swell, the room darkening about it, until it filled her sight completely. Then, in the maze of its flashing, she saw a face, a green face with hair like river weeds, and a green hand reaching down to touch her.
She stiffened. “I remember!”
But the face was gone, and the glittering crystal was only a bauble, tiny in a shadowed room suddenly huge.
Idris’ voice stayed slow and calm. “What do you remember?”
“A—A green face, and a green hand.” Balkis sank back in the chair again. “Huge, they were, filling the whole world.”
“River spirits,” Idris said thoughtfully, “and yourself a baby. Come, let yourself slip back into languor, let your thoughts roam free again, and drift back … drifting free … drifting back … drifting … drifting …”
The room darkened, the bauble shone, and heaviness stole over her limbs again. This time, though, Balkis couldn’t keep her eyes open; they drooped shut, darkness came, the chair seemed to rise and fall beneath her, rise and fall with the flow ofa current, and there were stars in the darkness, stars behind the green head and the green hand, a wooden rectangle about them, and she began to tellidris what she saw, but somewhere in the telling, she fell asleep.