“And I am?” he asked.
“How old are you?” asked Aralorn. “Kisrah is only a few years above forty. How many more centuries have you spent learning? Don’t tell me that you have nothing more to offer us than a human mage.”
“Persistent,” he said chidingly. “I told you his affliction was none of my doing, child. Making an agreement with the Lyon is one thing; going to the keep is an entirely different matter. I will not endanger my people further.”
Aralorn met his gaze. “Come. Because I ask it of you. Because my mother would have done so if she had lived.”
His eyelids fell to cover the expression in his eyes as he thought. She wasn’t certain her appeal would be enough, especially because she had no idea if her mother cared enough for the Lyon to come to his aid.
It might just be possible that he would want to come. No one could resist the Lyon’s charm when it was directed at them, not even, she hoped, Halven. If he liked her father enough . . .
Wolf watched Aralorn’s uncle with sympathy—Aralorn could talk a cat into giving up its mouse. He could only understand her half of the conversation, but he could tell quite a bit from Halven’s gestures and Aralorn’s speech.
Wolf wondered, for a moment, why Aralorn had told him once that her uncle was indifferent to her. The poor man hadn’t even taken his eyes off her long enough to notice that her pet was a wolf. The shapeshifters had few children—Halven, Wolf knew, had none at all.
“Leave the humans to their own trials, my dear,” said a lark as it landed on Halven’s shoulder. Her voice was light and high-pitched, making it difficult to understand her.
He shrugged irritably, sending the small bird to perch on top of a gatepost. “Does this concern you, Kessenih? Tend to your own business.”
Aralorn could have cheered. Nothing was as likely to persuade her uncle to go to the hold as his wife’s opposition.
“Very well, Aralorn,” he said, “I’ll accompany you to see your father. Is that silly goose still the only bird you do?” He stopped abruptly and frowned. “That dog”—he paused, frowning at Wolf—“wolf of yours is going to slow us down.”
Halven had looked at Wolf but hadn’t been able to detect his nature. Shapeshifters always knew their own—but Halven hadn’t seen Wolf for what he was any more than Aralorn had at first.
“Why don’t you meet me there?” she suggested. “I’ll walk back with Wolf. Maybe the stones will aid our travel.”
Halven frowned. “All right. I will ask the stones to speed you to Lambshold. Sometimes that helps.” In a flutter of hawk feathers, he was gone.
FIVE
“So, you’ve grown up, halfling,” observed the lark, having fluttered to one of the gateposts after Halven made his abrupt switch.
Aralorn bowed shallowly to the yellow-and-black-banded bird. Not certain how much Rethian her aunt understood, she switched back to the shapeshifters’ tongue Kessenih had used. “As you see, Aunt.”
“No good will come of this.” The lark’s beady eyes focused malevolently on Aralorn. “If it is known he is gone to the castle again, he will be cast out. They came close to doing it when he helped the Lyon with his cattle breeding. He was told not to contact the humans again without the approval of the quorum.”
Aralorn looked at the snowy ground for a moment. She didn’t know how far to trust Kessenih. Her aunt hated her husband almost as much as she despised Aralorn herself.
“It is his decision to make,” Aralorn said at last, a little fiercely. “I have no choice but to ask him to make it.”
“Selfish child,” her aunt decreed.
“Perhaps so,” agreed Aralorn, “but the fact remains that the shapeshifters benefit as much from my father’s continued existence as I do, if not more. It is in your best interest to keep Halven’s activities a secret, as you will share his fate if he is exiled.”
“Then you’d best be gone from here before someone notices,” snapped Kessenih as she exploded into flight.
Wolf waited until she was gone before speaking. “She said something that upset you?”
Aralorn nodded, switching back to Rethian. “My uncle is risking a lot to help us.”
“He’s going to help? I couldn’t tell.”
“He’s meeting us at the castle.” She shrugged, feeling discouraged as well as guilty for asking Halven to risk so much.
“He says he didn’t have anything to do with Father’s current problem. There appears to be opposition to the aid Halven gave Father in breeding the ryefox. Judging from my aunt Kessenih’s attitude, I think that there could be enough opposition to having humans know of their presence that they might be willing to kill to stop the association with humans.” Aralorn gave him her best smile. “It would be simpler if the shapeshifters didn’t have a hand in this. If the people here are convinced that my father’s affliction came at the hands of the shapeshifters, it would mean war.”
“We’ll have to see to it that doesn’t happen.” He paused. “If necessary, we could provide them with a villain.”
She glanced at him, and said sharply, “Oh, no, you don’t. You’ve been maligned quite enough as it is. Let the late ae’Magi’s evil son disappear from view after his father’s death.”
She started hiking back toward the waterfall. “My uncle might be able to do something about the creature that is guarding the Lyon. He’s a lot older than he looks—and powerful. If nothing else, he should be able to tell us what the shadow-thing is.”
As they exited the waterfall, Wolf glanced over his shoulder, then froze, pricking his ears. Aralorn followed his gaze and saw that the smooth surface of snow behind them was unmarred by any sign of their passage.
“It’s always that way,” murmured Aralorn. “There are never any trails—not even of casual wildlife. I don’t know why the stones extend the effort since no one can come here without first going through the maze. They are very old, though, and have their own ideas of what’s important.”
She headed for the place they’d entered the grotto, where the undergrowth was thinner. Ascending the gorge was worse than climbing down had been—at least while they’d been going downhill, when she slipped it was in the right direction. It didn’t help that Wolf seemed to have no trouble at all and spent most of his time waiting for her to struggle through the underbrush.
They emerged finally into a level meadow, where frozen strands of grass poked gracefully through the snow at the bases of fifteen gray monoliths set in a circle, each one the height of a man. It looked nothing at all like the place that had been at the start of their descent earlier that day.
“The maze stones as they are from this side of the maze,” said Aralorn. “Do you want to take a closer look?”
Without replying, Wolf stepped into the circle.
“The story is that each of the stones was once a shapeshifter. They gave their lives to protect the remnants of their people,” she said.
High above them, a red-tailed hawk called out.
Aralorn looked up. “That’s my uncle. We’d best be on our way.”
“You know where we are?” asked Wolf, leaving the circle after a last thoughtful look.
She shook her head. “After we pass through the center of the maze stones, there is a barrier to cross outside the circle—here it is, do you feel it?”
The wolf shivered briefly as he started through it. Quickly, Aralorn grabbed a handful of fur and followed.
“Sorry,” she said, releasing his pelt. “If you cross separately, we’ll end up in two different places.”
“Ah?” Wolf turned to look behind him. There was no clearing, no monolithic stones, only dense forest. “A translocation spell? It didn’t feel like it.”