Winds of Change Read online

  She had always dreaded the coming of winter, for during the winter months her father often became bored. It was difficult for his creatures to move through the snow; even more difficult for them to slip into the Hawkbrothers’ lands unseen. And of course, Falconsbane would not venture outside unless it was an absolute emergency, so his own activities were greatly curtailed. Humans tended to keep to their dwellings in winter, and the intelligent creatures to band together, so the opportunities for acquiring victims were also reduced. He dared not be too spendthrift with the lives of his servants, for there were only so many of them, and fewer opportunities to get more. They were trapped within the walls, too, and if he pushed them too far, they might become desperate enough to revolt. Even he knew that. So Falconsbane ‘s entertainments had to be of his own devising.

  When he grew bored, he often designed changes he wished to make in his own appearance, and worked them out on her, an activity that, often as not, ranged from mildly to horribly painful. And when that palled, there were other amusements in which she became his plaything, the old games she now hated, but had then both loathed and desired.

  No, until now, winter had not been her favorite season. Spring and fall had been best - spring, because her father was out of the stronghold as often as possible, eager to escape the too-familiar walls, and fall, because he was seizing his last opportunities to get away before winter fell.

  But this year, the coming of winter had not induced the fear that it had in the past.

  Odd. I wonder why?

  Then she realized that all the signs of winter that she had learned to fear were things Falconsbane had created; the increasing number of mage-lights to compensate for the shortening days, the rising temperature in the stronghold, and the shuttering of the windows against the gray sky.

  Any mage might do those things - there were other signs in Falconsbane’s stronghold that marked the season of fear.

  Forced-growth of strange plants brought in to flower in odd corners, creating tiny, often dangerous, mage-lit gardens. Many of those plants were poisonous, some had envenomed thorns, or deadly perfumes. It was one of her father’s pleasures to see who would be foolish enough to be entrapped by them.

  More slaves in the quarters reserved for those Falconsbane intended to use up, slaves usually young and attractive, but not terribly bright. Her father tended to save the intelligent, warping their minds to suit his purposes, keeping them for two or even three years before pique or a fit of temper brought their twisted lives to a close.

  Strained expressions on the faces of those who hoped to survive the winter and feared they might not. Sometimes, usually in the darkest hours of the winter, her father’s temper exceeded even his formidable control - though most of the victims were those former “favorite” slaves. . . .

  There had been none of that this year. The shortening of the days had not signaled anything to her, and she had simply reacted to the long nights by sleeping more. There had been no blazing of lights in every corner to wake old memories, merely the flickering of her own friendly fire. There was no tropic heat to awaken painful unease, only the need to move everything closer to the firepit, and to build up a good supply of wood.

  This place that she lived in could be called squalid, compared to the lush extravagancies of an Adept’s lair, but it was hers. She had made it so with pride, the first place she could truly call her own, unfettered by her father’s will. The wood and rope and furs were placed by her desires alone, with the advice and help of Need, who had become a trusted friend. Taken as a sum of goods, it was insignificant; taken in its context, it was delightful.

  The view from her window surprised her with unexpected beauty; the ugliest tangles of brush and tumbled rock had been softened by the thick blanket of snow.

  It was astonishing; it took her breath away. She simply admired it for many long moments before turning her thoughts back to the reality that it represented.

  It could also be deadly to one who had no real experience in dealing with it.

  For a moment, a feeling of helplessness threatened to overwhelm her with panic again.

  She quelled it. No point in getting upset - I have Need. She can always help me solve any problems that come up. If we have to, she can deal with them with magic.

  She turned her mind to her sword - And met only blankness.

  She never quite remembered the first few hours; hours when she had huddled in her furs, alternately weeping and howling. It was a good thing nothing dangerous had come upon her then; she would have been easy prey.

  When she exhausted herself completely, she fell asleep, doing so despite her fears, despite her despair, she had drained herself that badly.

  When she woke again, in the mid-afternoon, the sheer, unthinking panic was gone, although the fear remained. Somehow she managed; that day, and the next, and the next.

  She found game, building a blind beside the pond where the ducks and geese came to feed, and covering it with snow. She caught a goose that very night, and not content with that, hung it in her improvised larder to freeze and scoured the forest for rabbits. She didn’t catch any of those, but she discovered a way to fish in the ice-covered ponds, using a bit of metal found in the tower, scuffed until shiny, as bait.

  She hauled wood up to her shelter, and kept it reasonably warm and dry; made plans for a blind up in one of the trees above a deer-trail, so that she could lie in ambush for one.

  Somehow she kept panic from overwhelming her at the thought that the sword was no longer protecting her from detection.

  For if something had happened to Need, she would have to protect herself. She had no choice, not if she wanted to live. Sooner or later, something would come seeking her.

  She spent hours crouched beside the fire, bringing up everything Need had ever told her about shielding, about her own magic. Then she spent more hours constructing layer after layer of shields, tapping into the sluggish power of the sleeping forest and into her own energies. But to tap into her own power, she needed a great deal of rest and food - which brought her right back to the problem of provisions. She decided that she must start hunting deer; that there was no choice, that it was the only way to buy her the necessary days of rest and recovery when she built up her shielding. The rest of the time - the hours of darkness before sleep finally came - she spent bent over the sword, begging, pleading with it to come back to life. Prodding and prying at it, to try and discover what had gone wrong. Something must have; there was no reason for the blade to simply fall silent like that, not without warning.

  And all with no result. The blade was a sword now; no more, no less. A weapon that she could not even use properly, for without Need’s skill guiding her, she was as clumsy as a child in wielding it.

  Finally, after trying so hard on the evening of the third day that she worked herself into a reaction-headache, she gave up, falling into an exhausted sleep, a sleep so deep that not even her despair penetrated it. A dreamless sleep, : so far as she knew.

  When she woke again, quite late on the morning of the fourth day, the clouds had vanished overnight, and sun blazed down through the windows of her tower with cold, clear beams. When she looked out of her window, she had to pull back with her eyes watering. It was too bright out there; too bright to see. The sun reflected from every surface, and although there were shadows under the trees, they were not dark enough to give her eyes any rest.

  Now she knew what her father’s men had meant when they spoke of “snow blindness.”

  There was no way she was going to be able to see out there without getting a headache, unless she found some way to shade her eyes.

  Shading her eyes probably wouldn’t do that much good; there would still be all the light reflecting up from the snow.

  Wait, though, she could change her eyes. After all of Need’s lessons, she had a little control over her body; she might be able to make her eyes a little less sensitive, temporarily . . . perhaps darken them to let less light through. . . .
r />   :It’s about time you started looking inside yourself for answers,: came the raspy, familiar mind-voice.

  She whirled, turning away from the light, peering through shadows that were near-black in contrast with the intense sunlight. “You’re back!” she cried, staring at the vague shape of the sword leaning against the firepit where she had left it the night before.

  :I never left,: Need said smugly. : I just decided to let you see you could manage completely on your own for a while.:

  Anger flared; she took a deep breath and fought it down. Anger served no purpose unless it was channeled. Anger only weakened her and could be used as a weapon against her. She reminded herself that Need never did anything without a good reason.

  Anger faded enough so that she was in control, not the emotion. She tried not to think of the fear, the first hours of desperation - of all the endless hours when she had been certain that she would not live through this season. That would only make her angry again.

  “Why?” she asked bluntly. “Why did you do that to me? I didn’t do anything to warrant being punished, did I?”

  The sword didn’t answer directly. :Look around you. What do you see? The game stocked away, the firewood, all the defenses you constructed.:

  She didn’t have to look, she knew what was there. “Get to the point,” she snapped. “Why did you leave me alone like that? Why did you leave me defenseless?”

  :Did I do any of that, any of the things you‘ve accomplished in the last few days? Did I hunt the game, catch the fish, rig that hidden ladder to the top?: There was a certain quality in Need’s words that overrode Nyara’s anger completely.

  “No,” Nyara admitted slowly. She had done quite a bit, now that she thought about it. Without any help at all.

  :Did I rig all these shields ?: the sword persisted. :Did I figure out the way to make them cascade, so that the only one under power is the first one unless something contacts it?:

  “No,” Nyara replied, this time with a bit of pride. “I did that.” Given that her magic was pathetically weak compared to Need’s, or even the least of the mages that her father controlled, she really hadn’t done too badly.

  :If I really was destroyed tomorrow, would you be able to get away, to hide, to keep yourself alive?: The sword waited patiently for an answer, and the answer Nyara had for her was a very different one than the one she would have had a few days ago.

  “I think so,” she said, nodding to herself. “Yes, I think so. Was that the point?”

  :It was. Four days ago if I had asked that question, you would have said you couldn‘t do without me. Now you know that you can.: Need’s mind-voice conveyed a hint of pride. Nyara smiled a little, despite the remains of her anger.

  Need chuckled at her smile. :lt wouldn‘t be easy for you to do without me, and any number of creatures could take you in a heartbeat, but I would give you even odds of being able to hide and stay hidden if you chose that route over fighting. You were coming to depend on me too much, and I am not invincible, dear. I can be hurt, or even destroyed. Your father could have done it, if he‘d known how. Any of the Tayledras Adepts could. You needed to know you could survive if I was not here.:

  Nyara considered that for a moment and let her anger cool. Another of Need’s ongoing lessons - anger used to make her incoherent; now, once it was under control, it made her think with a little more focus. That could be a problem, too; being too focused meant that you could miss something, but it was better than being paralyzed and unable to think at all.

  “What about what you’ve been doing to fix what Father did to me?” she asked. “I can’t do that. And it isn’t finished - ”

  :It may never be finished,: Need told her frankly. :It could take a Healing Adept - which I am not - years to change all the things that were done to you. But you are doing some of that for yourself. If you didn‘t recognize the problems and want the changes, if you weren‘t consciously helping me, there wouldn’t be any changes. I can’t work against resistance, my dear.:

  “Oh.” Nyara couldn’t think of anything else to say.

  :There’s something else I want you to consider.:

  A breath of chill breeze came in the window. Nyara shivered and moved away from it, returning to the warmth of her furs. She wrapped up in them, cuddling down into their warmth, and let her eyes readjust to the darkness of her tower room. “What?” she asked, expecting something more along the same theme - perhaps something about using her own magic more effectively.

  :What do you want?: asked the voice in her mind.

  The question took her completely by surprise. “Wh-what do you mean by that?” she stammered.

  :It’s a question no one has ever asked you before - and one that you were never in a position to decide, anyway,: Need said patiently. :But you are out here in the wilderness. No one knows where you are yet. You are in a position to decide exactly what is going to happen to your life because there’s no one here to affect you, to do things you don’t expect and haven’t planned for. So what do you want? Assume all the power in the world - because, my dear, you have many powerful people who consider you a friend worthy of helping, and they might just do that if you came to them and asked it of them.: The sword’s voice warmed. :You are quite worthy of being helped, child, though I don’t want you to come to depend on it.:

  What did she want? To be left alone was the first thing that sprang to her mind -

  To be left alone . . . there were no complications out here. Nothing to get in the way of simply living. No emotional pain - that is, when Need wasn’t deserting her! This was the first time in her life that she had been in a position of control over her own actions and reactions. There was something very attractive about that.

  But - no. It was lonely out here. She was often too busy to think about the isolation, but in the dark of the night, sometimes, she felt lonely enough that she had to fight back tears. At first, she had been too busy to think about it, and then Need had been enough company, but now she wished there was someone else to talk to, now and again. Someone who wasn’t a teacher, who was just a friend.

  Or ... maybe a little more than a friend? The frequent urges of her body had not gone away, they had simply become less compulsory, and more under her own control.

  But if she didn’t want to be left alone, that meant rejoining some portion of the outside world. North meant other Birdkin Clans, and she had been warned they were far less tolerant of Changechildren. South was Dhorisha. There were only two real directions for her, east to the real “outside” world, or west, back to the k’Sheyna Vale.

  There were problems with both directions. Should she leave the area entirely, and try to find someplace in the east where she could go?

  But then what could she do? She would have to find some way to support herself. She had to eat - there was little or no hunting in lands that were farmed. She would have to have clothing, and a place to live, and in civilized lands, one couldn’t wear rough-tanned furs or live in a cave. Even assuming there were caves about to live in.

  “I could go to the lands where the Outsiders came from. When I am there, I can track and hunt,” she said aloud. “I could hire out as a hunter or a guide ... or maybe as some kind of protector.”

  Need indicated tentative agreement. :True, but what are the drawbacks of running off like that, into places you know nothing about and where you have no friends? Remember, out there, no one has ever seen anything quite like you. They might not treat you well, they might greet you with fear or hatred, and you would be one against many if it came to hostility.:

  There was another option - one in which her alien appearance might be of some use. “I could . . . hire out as a bed-partner.” There. She didn’t like the idea, but it was a viable one. It was one thing she was well-trained in. Skif had certainly been pleased.

  Again, Need indicated tentative agreement, but with reservations. :You could do that, and you would probably do very well. But is that what you want? I thought that was the poin
t of this discussion.:

  She sighed. “No, it isn’t what I want. It would be a choice, but not a good one. I suppose - if I had to, it would be better than starving. But I don’t have to go east, do I?” If she didn’t go east - Then she went west. Back to k’Sheyna. Back to where the Outland strangers were. . . .

  No point in avoiding it. The one person in the whole world that she thought of with longing was that stranger. The young man called Skif - who was with k’Sheyna. And the only Hawkbrothers in the world who might look upon her with a certain amount of kindness were the k’Sheyna. She had helped them, after all-fought against her father’s controls. She was the reason they had known that one of their own was Falconsbane’s slave. In a sense, they did owe her a debt. . . .

  In more than a sense, so did Skif. She had saved his life at the risk of her own.

  And they had shared so much in such a relatively short period of time, enough that the intensity of her feelings had frightened her. That was more than half the reason why she had run away from him. She did not want him near her while her father’s directives still ruled her so closely.

  Not while she wanted him so very badly. . . .

  :I rather thought so,: Need said, following her thoughts, with a feeling of wry humor. :I rather thought that your Skif would be in the equation somewhere.:

  “Is there anything wrong with that?” she asked defensively, a little apprehensive that Need would not approve. After all, when she had been a woman, she had been celibate. And now that she was a sword, did she still understand feelings?

  :No, child, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. I think your emotions are quite healthy. I think it’s just as well that you feel this way, especially since he’s out here looking for you.:

  She held quite still, rigid with surprise. What?

  Nyara had never experienced such mixed emotions in her life, all of them painfully intense. Elation and fear. Joy and dismay. She hugged her furs to herself and trembled.