The Hobs Bargain Page 9

Chapter 9

 

  NINE

  The hob was waiting for me when I woke up the next evening. This time he was holding a mug of something steaming that smelled sweet and milky.

  "Here," he said. "It's a little chilly tonight. There's a storm blowing in. I thought you might like something warm to start the night with. "

  I wiggled around until I could take it from him, then sipped it cautiously. Some kind of tea with honey, but the blend was nothing I'd ever tasted before.

  "Thanks," I said. He intimidated me a lot less than he had the night before, but I decided not to ask him why he was here tonight.

  "I've come to teach you," he said. "Don't worry, I've cleared it with Koret. Tomorrow he'll need you, but tonight's mine. "

  I rolled my eyes at his mock leer, and he laughed. I didn't ask him what he was going to teach me. I should have - then I could have refused while I had a chance.

  "But I don't want to talk to ghosts. "

  The manor garden was unkempt, but still recognizable as deliberate planting. I was all too aware of the burial ground on the other side of the garden's stone wall.

  "If you don't learn how to use your abilities, you'll be used by them," he said. Hurrah, that sounded like fun. "Aren, you've got to learn to protect yourself. You can summon spirits, but by the same token you can be summoned by them. "

  "Why you?" I asked nastily. It wasn't his fault, and I knew it, but he was there. "You aren't a speaker. " Whatever that was.

  "Because there's no one else," he explained, though I could see him fight a smile. He seemed to get some sadistic enjoyment out of my whining. "On this side of the river, I can deal with ghosts if I have to. But I'm hoping you'll be able to save yourself. "

  "How reassuring," I said witheringly.

  This time he did grin. "Come on, lass. Likely you won't be summoning anyone you know. It won't hurt to talk a bit with the dead. If you can convince them to go on, as you did the ones who came to you last night, you'll be doing them a favor. "

  "Great," I said, shivering, though I wasn't cold.

  Last night was a lot more frightening in memory than it seemed at the time. I was in no hurry to visit with more ghosts.

  I thought of a possible way out of it. "Hold up a minute. Didn't you stop me from summoning the ghost of that poor skeleton?"

  "There is a difference between summoning a soul back to its dead remains, and calling a ghost which is merely spirit. "

  "What's the difference between soul and spirit?" I asked.

  "People like you and I are made of body, soul, and spirit. The body is the physical and is tied very tightly to time. Humans are very rooted in the body - it's why there aren't more mages among you. Soul is what determines who you are - stubborn, impatient. . . the qualities that make you different from Kith or Koret. It is where emotions live. Hobs are tied most tightly to the soul. Spirit" - he hesitated - "spirit ties your body and soul together. It's where magic abides and it can take on aspects of both your soul and your body. That's why Touched Banar's ghost looked like his mortal body. It's why it was frightened as his soul was before it went on. "

  "So the soul and the spirit are immortal and the body is mortal. " I said.

  "Without the soul and body, the spirit usually dissipates after a while. If it doesn't you get ghosts. "

  "So I'm supposed to call a wandering spirit for a chat. " Hello, I'm Aren and you're dead. Didn't sound like fun to me.

  He nodded. "A ghost is a human or animal who has died, but has chosen not to go on to the spirit realms. Calling someone who has already gone on is an act of evil. "

  "And it creates wraiths," I speculated.

  "One way to get them," he agreed. "Sit down. "

  I leaned my back against the garden wall and sank to my rump. The solid stone against my back was cold and damp. I crossed my legs.

  He crouched in front of me, gripping his staff. "Now think about the dead. Just ghosts. Wisps of memory and being left here where they no longer belong. "

  "They must feel frightened," I said, thinking about it despite myself. Banar had been frightened.

  "Frightened," it agreed, settling at my feet.

  "Who are you?" I asked. The hob hadn't told me what to say to the ghosts when they came. I didn't really want to interrogate it.

  "Mercenary," it said, the whispery voice a little stronger.

  "Fighting the war. Our side was losing and the man who hired us dead. No money in it anymore. Captain said, 'Got to turn raider, boys. Lots of lords dead, estates left undefended. Find one of them. " As it spoke, the wisps seemed to gather together and solidify.

  One of the raiders. I didn't think it was one I'd killed.

  "It's time to rest now," I told him. I didn't want to know what he'd do if he figured out I was one of the villagers.

  "Rest?"

  "You've done your duty, soldier," said the hob. "Sleep. "

  The ghosted started when the hob spoke, as if it hadn't noticed him there. Unlike the earth spirit, it didn't seem to troubled by the hob.

  "Time to sleep," he agreed, though he didn't do anything but rest at my feet.

  I whispered, "Sleep. " I didn't know why I whispered, but it worked. The ghost faded away.

  "That one was brighter than Banar was," I said softly when it was gone.

  "The new ones glow almost as if they were still tied to a soul," said the hob, though he was looking uneasily around the garden. "The old ones can be shadows so dark even I can't see them unless they choose. "

  "Mistake, mistake, the mountain's slave made a mistake," crowed a voice from the wall over my head.

  I knew that tone, though I didn't recognize the boy who bounced down on the ground in front of me. "Hob made a mistake. Hob made a mistake. " The singsong was unmistakable. The earth spirit's servant wore the shape of a boy younger than Caulem. This one I didn't know.

  "Quiet, shaper," said the hob, his attention still elsewhere. "Your place is on the other side of the river. "

  The shaper turned to me with a bright smile, "Hob forgets a lot. Forgets my master is here, too. Forgets some ghosts are not so weak. Forgets old places have their dangers. "

  "The shaper's right," said the hob, his voice lifeless with failure. "Being around humans makes me arrogant. I came here because I knew there were recent dead wandering - bound to be, after a battle. Should have thought there might be older spirits here. "

  Defeat was something I almost couldn't associate with the hob. Not even being left alone with only a mountain for company had given him such melancholy. Nor could I see any reason for it. I looked around suspiciously.

  "There's a graveyard just over the wall," I offered, because what he'd said made me wonder if he knew. "Caefawn?"

  The hob bowed his head and didn't answer.

  "Show yourself," I commanded the air at large.

  "Here I am," chortled the shaper.

  "Be quiet or leave," I said sourly. "I have enough to work out. If you interfere. I swear it'll be the worse for you. "

  He subsided, except for a couple of smirks. I didn't know what he thought I could do to him, but I was glad he was threatened enough to desist.

  "Show yourself, ghost. " I said again. "Caefawn, don't you bring me out here, then leave me alone to deal with this thing. "

  It was there. Larger than the garden we were in, its substance covered the ground with a deep shadow.

  "Caefawn," I said again. "Time enough for despair when there's nothing left to do. "

  "Hobs are emotional," observed the shaper. "Ghosts affect them more than they do you mortals. "

  The shadows continued to deepen in the garden, frightening the moon's light away. I reflected, not for the first time in the hob's company, that cat's sight would be extremely useful. Darkness crept over Caefawn, who was bent around his staff as if it comforted him.

  The shadows stopped at my feet.

&nbs
p; "Who are you?" it asked in a voice like fiddle music in the dawn. I thought that was supposed to be my question. "Why did you summon me?"

  "I am Aren of Fallbrook," I answered it, as I had the earth spirit the day before. "I am here to be taught. "

  Something touched me inside my head. It was the strangest feeling I'd ever had, as if something soft and ethereal drifted through my skin and bone. After an instant the touch turned to ice.

  "Warm it," advised the shaper as he gripped both my hands and stared into my eyes. For once his face was serious. "Think of hot, rich food; the fire on a cold night; my master's eyes. Think of touch and life and light. " Then, without loosing my eyes from his hold, he said in a different voice, "Hob, now would be a good time to help. "

  Would you like to join me?

  I shuddered with the icy jolt that shot from my head to my spine. I thought of fires and soup, hot green-brown eyes that flared to red in an elemental's face.

  I am so alone here.

  Me, too, I thought before I caught myself. I'm so alone.

  The shaper slapped my face. "Warmth and living, Aren. "

  Warmth. The touch of Daryn's hands on my flesh. Warmth slipped from his remembered touch to my cold skin. I concentrated on the one night we'd had, the passion and fire. When I ran out of memory, I built new ones. Dreaming about the dead didn't seem like the right thing to do under the circumstances, so for the new ones I substituted coal-gray skin for sun-browned, the nip of fangs gently wielded, a tail wrapped around my ankle. Thoughts curiosity had brought to me after the bargain was struck. I asked the question, What would it be like to be wed to the hob? The answers came whether I willed them or not.

  The cold withdrew slowly, more slowly when desires replaced solid memory. So I tried another tack. I built the image of the gradual magic of rye and wheat pushing up through the earth, exchanging safe darkness for sunlight and warmth. Flowers opening for the first time to the dance of butterfly wings.

  It was gone, and I was breathing as heavily as a drowning victim just rescued. I expect the analogy occurred to me because my clothes were wet with sweat. It started to rain. Lucky me.

  "Good girl," said the shaper. "Did well enough for a mortal - better than the hob. "

  Behind the shaper crouched the ghost. I felt no fear of it now, for it was mine. It could do no more harm unless I set it free.

  "But Caefawn's no speaker," I said with sudden knowledge of what that might mean. "The despair. . . that's a ghost's weapon, isn't it? It doesn't affect me. "

  Caefawn, his face drawn and remote, looked up from his staff. "That and fear. As a speaker you are immune to those and many other weapons of the spirit. The mountain could defend me from terror or gloom, not both. Not so far from her slopes. "

  Rather than tiring me out, holding the ghost under my control seemed to be giving me energy, as if I'd been drinking fizzies all night and was jittery with it.

  All beings had spirits, not just ghosts. I thought that if I wanted to, I might be able to take the shaper as well, though not the hob. Not yet. It was as if I could see the will that each possessed, and measure my power against them.

  See, said the ghost speaking secretly to me. See what we could do?

  "Should be more cautious," advised the shaper. "Could have killed her seeing if she could protect herself from ghosts. My master would have been unhappy. He sent me to watch you. "

  The ghost looked up at me with its eyeless face, as if we shared a secret. The double vision I'd had with the skeleton came back, and I could see the ghost as it had been in mortal form - a woman with hair of bright brass and laughter sweet as the south wind. A woman who had been afraid to be alone, to die.

  Yes, her voice whispered in my mind, I could give you power. Magic you could use to make the villagers like you again. Make them do as they ought, appease the earth guardian. You could save them from themselves.

  I knelt until I was level with its face.

  "Go rest," I said slowly because it was difficult to speak. "Sleep now. " It wasn't a suggestion, as I'd made to the raider, for this ghost I controlled absolutely. "Be at peace. "

  The ghost faded, as the other had. As it did, I felt that odd surge of power and awareness drift away.

  I looked up into Caefawn's eyes.

  "I didn't bring her here to see if she was strong enough to protect herself from the ghosts," he said.

  "What, then?" demanded the shaper petulantly.

  "He wanted to know if I'd give in to temptation," I said suddenly, not realizing it until the words were out of my mouth. " 'Death magic, blood magic slips easy down the throat'. " I quoted an old lay softly. " 'Power calls with temptation's demand. "

  "I could have stopped you," Caefawn said. "Now, while you're just learning. " Could have killed me, I thought.

  "You didn't have to," I replied, getting to my feet like an old woman.

  Stiff and sore, as though I'd been fighting rather than sitting in a garden, I tottered forward and kissed the hob's cheek. The surface was smoother than the skin my imagination had endowed him with. It was a relief to know I wouldn't have survived to do the things the ghost had offered to me.

  The shaper hooted and blew raspberries, but the hob smiled as sweetly as if he read my thoughts.

  When I took my patrol the next night, the hob came with me. Though "with" might be the wrong word. He'd run ahead and jump out from behind trees, laughing when I jumped and swore at him.

  "No need to swear so quietly," he advised merrily. "The raiders are mostly in camp today. There's a small party by Wedding Pass, but they'll not cross our path. "

  I stopped short. "If there's no danger, why are we patrolling?"

  He looked at me seriously for a moment. "Wouldn't do to get dependent on me. The bargain's for the survival of the village, remember. They need to be ready. Even when the raiders are taken care of, there are hillgrims, trolls, and a dozen other such nasties. I understand that in the past you've been protected here. " He gestured widely to indicate the valley. "Not having to worry about much but the occasional bandit or wolf. It will never be that way again. " He strolled through the field, passing an arm over my shoulder and letting his tail settle around my hips. "There was a reason the mages felt they had to bind the magic. Most of the wizards of the time felt the same way you do about bloodmages, blood magic. But they agreed to it all the same. "

  "Why not leave the lands to the wildlings?" I said. "There were other places to go. "

  He shook his head. "The wild was growing, pushing mankind back. I don't know how it was other places. " He gave me a wry smile, acknowledging his tie to the mountain. "But here mankind was dying. "

  I walked with him, thinking about what he'd said. But I was also thinking about the arm slung so casually across my shoulders. Being courted by a hob wasn't as different as it could have been. But it was different enough, for me. I grinned to myself as I bent to unhook his tail.

  So I didn't tell Koret the hob knew where the raiders were most of the time. When I patrolled, Caefawn joined me as often as not. Sometimes the earth spirit's shaper came, too, never in the same shape twice but never again in the body of anyone I knew. When I wasn't patrolling, the hob continued my lessons. Sometimes I wasn't certain whether he was teaching me, teasing me, or courting me - often as not, it was all three.

  "Come on, then, the raiders aren't going anywhere today," he said, pulling me proprietorially in the direction opposite from the one I should be going.

  "And how do you know that?" I asked, though I fell in beside him willingly enough.

  He grinned and twitched his tail with mischief. "A few of my acquaintances are having fun tonight. They'll do no harm - except to the raiders' pride, and you'll have more time to learn. "

  "Did you talk to your 'acquaintances' about the thefts in the village?"

  "None of them admit to it, though that's no surety. If you could talk the people into leaving something
out for the little folk, it might go better for them. "

  "Better for whom, the little folk, or the villagers?" I asked. "The widow Shona left a handful of cookies out last night, and this morning something had unwoven the better part of the blanket she was working and tracked blue dye all over the walls and ceiling. "

  The hob chuckled. "I'll look at it. Happen I'll recognize the footprints. "

  We crossed Fell Bridge. There was no guard there. The hob had advised against it, saying the raiders were unlikely to harm the crops before harvest, or to take any of Albrin's livestock out of the valley. What went missing could be retaken closer to a time it would be of use. Put up a few herdsmen with the animals to guard against predators and give them orders to run at the first sight of the raiders. Koret had agreed. The raiders seemed to have the same philosophy, for no one had seen them on the manor side of the river since the last attack.

  "Where are we going?" I asked, climbing over a stone wall that divided one pasture from another.

  "To the bogs," he said. "I'm hoping to find a few noeglins or maybe a will-o'-wisps. You'd like the will-o'-wisps: when they sing, the flowers bloom even at night. "

  We found a large rock to sit on by the edge of the Fell bogs. The air was damp and chilly despite its being summer. The bog smelled of rotting vegetation and sweet bogflower.

  "It'd be easier to do this inside the marsh," Caefawn informed me. "But then we'd get wet and smell like a bog for days. We'll try for noeglins first. They're about as strong as ghosts, and guaranteed to fight you with anything in their power. They'll be good experience for you. "

  We sat for a while. His tail snuck around my waist. I pried it off and set it politely between us with a pat. I hadn't realized just how strong his tail was. If he hadn't let me, I'd never have gotten it off.

  "Is the rock uncomfortable?"

  I quit twitching my hips. "Quite. So how do I call a hooglin?"

  "Noeglin," he corrected. "Hmm, this might be a problem. I'll try to describe it, and we'll see what happens. Think of a creature formed from the stench of the swamp. They aren't too intelligent, nor yet too - " He broke off abruptly and pointed.

  In the dark, only its movement allowed me to see the creature scuffling about the edges of the swamp. It had a dark, furry pelt and looked almost bearlike, but was much smaller. It might have been the size of a herd dog.

  "Pikka," said the hob when it was gone. "They're a true animal, but I'd be careful just the same. They've a nasty temper - I'd rather face a bear than a pikka. Most times a bear will leave you alone. "

  "They use magic?" I asked. Otherwise, why would they come back after the bonds were lifted? I'd certainly never heard of a pikka before.

  The hob nodded. "For stealth, mostly. A pikka can slip into a herd of sheep and eat a lamb lying beside its mother without disturbing any of the sheep. "

  "Caefawn," I asked, "where are they all coming from - the fairies and such? Spirits are immortal, and I know how you survived - but what about the pikka and earthens?"

  "The guardian spirits like the earth spirit, mostly, I suspect. " His tail slipped off the rock, almost as if it were accidental. I gave it a suspicious look. His eyes crinkled, but he kept his mouth seriously straight as he continued. "I suppose a few of them were here anyway, just hiding. The only time you'll ever find a dwarf is when he wants you to. The earthens are a manifestation of the earth spirit - not really creatures in their own right. Most of the things the village has been seeing lately are under the earth spirit's guardianship. Except, of course, the winkies that tangled the nets and made Cantier so angry. They belong to the river guardian. "

  "The mountain had only you?"

  "Of my kind," he replied.

  There was something in his voice. Pain, I thought, or at least sorrow, so I changed the subject. "Hooglins are formed from the stink of the swamp. . . "

  The hob settled more comfortably on the rock. "Noeglins are mischievous. One of their favorite tricks is to creep up behind some poor unsuspecting traveler and scare the bejeebers out of him. "

  "Like a hob-of-the-bog?" I suggested.

  He cleared his throat, so straight-faced I worried he was offended until he spoke. "Well, hobs don't generally eat their victims. . . unless they're hillgrims. Hillgrims taste really good raw, but they're best when cooked for a day in a pot with onions and butter. " His tail now rested on the rock again, this time on my right (the hob sat on my left).

  "How can they eat if they don't have a body?" I looked at his tail suspiciously, but it lay virtuously still.

  "Very few creatures are pure spirit," he said seriously. "Ghosts are, and poltergeists. But all things are tied more strongly to either body, soul, or spirit. The ones you can call are tied strongest to the spirit. Sometimes, like the noeglins or the earth guardian, they can put off and on the physical body as easily as I shed my cloak. "

  "So you call them spirits, even though they have a body?"

  "And a soul, most of them. " He nodded. "There are three types of living creatures: mortals like humans and dwarves, soulfuls like hobs and cats, and spirits like the guardians and noeglins. "

  "Cats?" I said.

  A flurry of sticks flew at us out of a growth of bog-weed. They hurt when they hit - and most of them hit. Caefawn snarled, startling me, for he sounded like a wolf and I'd been thinking of him as though he were human, despite his talk of eating hillgrims. Overlaying the smell of the bog was a acrid smell. After a moment I couldn't smell anything else.

  "Right," the hob said after the deluge was finished. "There's a noeglin. You need to keep him from hurting you and get him out into the open. "

  "Come here, you nasty noeglin," I coaxed. A speaker's voice seemed to have some power with the earth spirit and the ghosts. Maybe it would work with a noeglin.

  "Here I be," said a soft, sibilant, hate-filled hiss. Then, like the ghost, it attacked my mind.

  It was easier to fight than the ghost had been, though the noeglin didn't attack in precisely the same way. I tried to block his advance into my head. It seemed to work best when I envisioned something solid.

  So I held a mental door before the noeglin, a stout barn door that stopped it where it was. Before it could try something else, I put doors all around it, trapping it there, though I could see it hanging over the swamp like a misty clump of rotting weeds.

  I don't know what part of it I held trapped, no more than I could have said what part of the ghost I'd caught. These were creatures of spirit, not body - so I thought I'd ask the self-appointed expert.

  "How can I hold it in my mind and yet it is still there?" I asked, pointing at the noeglin.

  "Bloodmages take a bit of an enemy's hair or skin and attach it to a vole or mouse by magic," said the hob soberly. "When they kill the mouse, they can kill their enemy, too. Sympathetic magic. You can hold a small bit of it in your mind and affect the whole of it. "

  The noeglin wriggled suddenly, spouting a series of sounds that boomed and hurt my ears. "Me go," it said.

  "It wants you to let it go," translated the hob unnecessarily.

  I opened one of the doors, releasing the noeglin from my control. The spirit sank tiredly into the dark mud of the swamp, taking the noxious odor with it.

  "How is it that it - and you - speak the same language I do?" I asked, when the noeglin was gone.

  " 'Tis a gift of the hobs to speak whatever tongue they hear, a gift the guardian spirits share when they will," he said. "As for the other - another human wouldn't have understood the noeglin. But you are a speaker, and what good would your gift be if you couldn't understand the spirits you call? Now about the will-o'-wisps - "

  Speaking to the spirits, once I knew I could do it, was easier than the visions. Calling them was simply a matter of knowing what they were. Caefawn had started with ghosts because they were relatively powerless, and I already knew what they were. He seemed to think it was his duty to stuff my head full o
f every kind of spirit I was likely to meet. He made me memorize the names and characteristics of any number of them. Most of the creatures, he said, he'd never seen.

  Spirits had no body in their natural state - which is what made them spirits, I suppose. Ghosts, ghasts, noeglins, and poltergeists were lesser spirits who were often hostile. He hadn't found any ghasts here, but I met most of the rest of the very weak and horrid. Poltergeists, he said, were both powerless and mindless - not worth the effort of approaching them.

  The weaker benevolent spirits like dryads and naiads he'd shown me as well. The dryad had been soft-spoken and solid-seeming; he reminded me of the ancient oak he called home. The naiad had been shy, leaving as quickly as she'd responded. Caefawn hadn't seen her, though he'd been sitting beside me the whole time.

  Some of the spirits we'd looked for, like the will-o'-wisps, we couldn't find. I could tell it made Caefawn sad, though he didn't say anything.

  One or two of the creatures had attacked me. Sometimes their attacks were physical, like the noeglin throwing sticks. More often they were mental. As I learned to defend myself, the hob would find a new, stronger, more contentious thing to call.

  Caefawn said that most of the stronger spirits, like the earth guardian, would know when I was about and come on their own if they chose. I could summon the lesser spirits whether they willed it or not. Some of them I could dominate if I chose - but it made me increasingly uncomfortable to do so. It felt wrong, even evil, to do more than defend myself. Gram always said that if something felt wrong, it probably was.

  "So what's it tonight?" I asked cheerfully. I was starting to feel brave in the night. Facing off with noeglins and ghosts had made me less afraid of the darkness. Silly me.

  Still, it was easier than facing the villagers. Someone had decided it was best to tell the village about the necessity of appeasing the earth spirit. Predictably, it was seen as my fault. As of yesterday, none of the patrollers except for Ice would talk to me.

  "There's a fetch abroad here," Caefawn said. "They weren't very common Before, and you might not get another chance to meet one. "

  There were stories about fetches. I decided missing my only chance to meet one might be a good idea. "Isn't it dangerous to meet a fetch?"

  "Yes," he said, stopping beside one of Soul's Creek's little waterfalls. "But so are ghosts and noeglins. "

  We were half a league or so above my old croft. I leaned against a tree, panting a little. The hob was hard to keep up with, even when he was obviously slowing down for me.

  "Are we here?" I asked hopefully.

  "As close as we need to be," he answered. He waited, gathering his thoughts. "I wouldn't willingly take you to meet the fetch. They have too much power over humans, and I'm not certain how much your talents will help you against it. And it's too far from the mountain for me to help much. "

  I'd learned a lot about the hob. Away from the mountain his magic - which mainly concerned things of the hunt, like hiding or tracking - faded, though his great strength and speed seemed to stay with him.

  I frowned at him. "You're scaring me. "

  He nodded solemnly. "Good. You'll be more wary that way. I don't think it would be a good idea to try to control it - I'm not certain you're good enough. However, you don't want to let it wander around the valley for long - it'll start to take victims. "

  I shook my head. "So what am I supposed to do with it?"

  "You'll have to decide that yourself. " Caefawn sat down on the ground, wrapping his tail around one of his ankles for a change.

  We waited in silence for a while, a peaceful silence. I could hear Soul's Creek running behind me. A nightjar cried out.

  "Tell me about names," I said.

  "Names?" he asked.

  "My gram always sa,id the wildlings guarded their names, and I know Caefawn isn't your name. You enjoyed it too much when you gave it to me. "

  He snickered. "I'll tell you what it means sometime. Right. Names, then. Names have power. "

  "What power? Should I worry that everyone and their dog knows my name?"

  He shook his head. "You don't have a name, not really. Birth names are weak things, tied to the body, not the soul. There aren't many in your village who have real names. The priest does, and he knows enough to keep his real name secret. Real names are given in a ceremony with earth, air, fire, water, and magic. If someone knows your real name, it gives them power over you - an advantage. Focusing a spell on someone with their real name makes it harder to fight or unspell. If you knew the real name of the earth spirit, you could call Kim and he would have to come. "

  "If real names are so dangerous, why would anyone want one?" I asked.

  He laughed. "Real names add power to your magic as well. When you know enough about your magic to know what you are choosing, you can decide if you want a real name and I will help gift you with one. "

  "Hmm. " I considered what he said, shifting against my tree because my shoulder was going numb. "What did you say I should do with the fetch if she comes?"

  "Anything you want to," replied a low feminine voice in sultry tones.

  I turned, but it was too dark under the trees to see anything more than a shadow. The voice sounded familiar. Knowing what little I did about fetches, I would have bet that its voice sounded just like mine - though I don't think I'd ever sounded quite so sultry. There was an old saying, "If you ever meet your fetch, if you don't die today, you'll die the next. "

  I felt outward with the sight. At some point in our excursions, I'd discovered that the sight and this spirit-speaking were very close. It was the sight that allowed me to see the spirits when even the hob couldn't. Calling and seeing were just two sides of the same thing, like talking and listening. Not that I was good at controlling either one, but I was getting there.

  A woman dressed in boy's clothing walked out from the shadows of the trees where I'd been watching. Her face was strong, though not pretty. Her dark hair was drawn untidily back into a thick braid. I'd thought it might be like looking into a mirror, but it wasn't. I'd thought it might be like looking at Caulem animated by the shaper, but it wasn't like that either. She was a stranger; if I hadn't known she was a fetch, I wouldn't have noticed she looked like me.

  "What do you see?" I asked Caefawn.

  He shrugged with his ever-present grin, though his eyes were wary. "Nothing, but I heard it speak. "

  "Leave this valley," I said, turning back to the woman.

  "He brings you here to me," she purred. I never purr, at least not in public. I began to feel a little indignant, but she continued. "So kind of him. He never told you what happens to a human who meets their fetch, did he?"

  A few days ago, I would have believed her. Believed the mere sight of her would kill me. But I trusted Caefawn. He wouldn't have brought me here if death was the only thing to win.

  "I've heard the stories," I agreed mildly. "But you cannot harm me, a speaker. " The look on her face told me that what I said was true, and that she wasn't happy I said it. Me, I was happy. I'd hoped that, as with the ghosts, my magic would serve to protect me.

  "Not if I don't believe you can hurt me," I continued, watching her face closely to see if I was right. I was.

  "We don't believe in you anymore," I said cheerfully. This one was as easy as the noeglins had been. "If someone meets you and talks with you, when he is home, he'll dismiss it as his imagination. It's been too long since your kind has been here. You'll have to find other prey. "

  She laughed. Not good. She approached me, gripped my hand with hers. I could see the pale scar the hillgrim had left me winding down her forearm. The hair on the back of my neck lifted, and I met her eyes. She smiled and looked at her arm as I'd just done, drawing my gaze with hers. The skin on her arms began to dry. It cracked and pulled back, curling away from the flesh. I stared at it, unable to break her spell.

  The skin broke along the lines of the hillgrim's scar,
and for a moment, just an instant, I thought the arm I stared at was mine. I cried out with the sharp pain of it and with revulsion at the ugly wound. The pain made it more real, so when I shifted my gaze away from her arm to mine, I wasn't surprised to see that my scar had split, too. Yellow pus oozed out like a tear and dropped to the ground. The distinctive odor of rotting flesh filled the air. I felt the hob's hands on my shoulders, but I couldn't pull away.

  "Break it," he said hoarsely. Good, he was scared, too, how comforting. "Break her hold. "

  Very helpful, I thought, but he was right. I thought of how I had broken the ghost's hold in the garden and tried thinking of Daryn again. The fetch giggled and ran her tongue into the same ear Daryn had. Her saliva burned, and I couldn't hear out of the ear.

  Passion didn't work. I'd try something else, then. Caefawn had enveloped me in his arms from behind. I could feel his heart beat against my back like a drum, like hoof-beats.

  A vision came, and I grabbed it with both hands, unsure whether it would help me or her.

  Duck's hooves drummed against the ground shaded with golden light from the sunset's fading glow. I sat him without saddle, reins resting loosely on his neck.

  I remembered the day clearly, several weeks after we'd come back from Auberg. Memories shifted to accommodate the vision, subtly strengthening both sight and memory.

  I laughed as the wind caught my hair and spilled it out of its loose braid. Free, I was free. Free of hiding what I was. Free of being less than I could be. I gloried in my strength, my freedom. The price had been too high, but it was paid. Now there was no one to hold me in subtle chains of wifehood, womanhood. No one to belittle my warnings because I was a woman, and women are given to such fits and starts. No need to hide what I was behind the image of what I should be.

  I let out a war cry and shook my hair in the wind. Letting the cool fingers of air wash my other self behind me. The weak woman who cowered in her cellar was gone forever. The woman I was now had grown beyond her.

  I stretched out my arms until they felt like wings as Duck ran down the mountain.

  I came to myself slowly. I looked at the fetch and said, softly. "Go away. "

  Her eyes faded from brown to sea-green; her face shifted subtly, leaving behind cheeks more rounded, lips softer, jaw narrower than they had been. She snarled at me, and her face looked less than human. Then she was gone.

  "About time," growled Caefawn.

  I sank to my rump on the cold grass, which was damp from the spray of the small waterfall. My arm hurt as if it had been savagely ripped open, but there was nothing wrong with it. The hillgrim's scar was as it had been, and my wrist was unbruised. I covered my face with my hands and took deep, slow breaths until I felt like myself again.

  The hob watched Aren put herself together again, one layer at a time. First she put aside the fear, then the rush of danger. She did it so thoroughly he could barely smell the remnant emotions on her. She had such control. He wondered if she'd learned it, or if she'd always been that way.

  "Why is it that strong feelings broke her hold on me, just as it broke the ghost's hold in the garden?" Her voice was soft and calm.

  "How do you control the spirits?" He asked not because he couldn't have told her the answer, but because she'd learn it better if she found it herself.

  It was hard for her to articulate what she'd done. A limitation of the language, he thought. He wondered if the bloodmages had their own language for what they did.

  "I take a little bit of their spirit inside of me," she said. "If I separate it from the rest of the creature, they cannot attack me. I learned that from the noeglins. "

  He nodded. "It's like knowing their real names. You have a part of them, and they cannot struggle against you effectively. "

  "So why can I break their hold by thinking about" - she hesitated. He could see in the darkness as easily as the light, so he watched the blush highlight her cheeks.

  "By thinking about strong emotions? It worked with the ghost, and now with the fetch. "

  "Not just any emotions," he said, speculating about what strong emotions she'd been using. He could make a good guess, and it delighted him. "Only things that make your spirit want to stay with your body. " Experimentally, he ran his tail in a swift caress over her heated cheek. She was still nervous about his hands - perhaps it was his claws. But his tail she found amusing and peculiarly safe, and he used it to his advantage.

  She appeared to be lost in thought, and pretended not to notice when his tail slid over her shoulder and wrapped around her wrist. It was the slight dimpling of her cheek that gave her pretense away.

  Controlled she was, but there was also humor in her, if not mischief. He could almost remember having a mate with mischief - but he would make do with humor. She was so much better than being Alone. He tightened his tail a bit, though not enough to betray his desperation. He could make do with Aren.