Mercedes Lackey - Elvenblood

A tall, powerfully built man with closely cropped, tightly curling gray-white hair stepped into the shaft of light from the smoke hole in the tent roof above, and stood before Lorryn, arms crossed over his chest. He leveled a challenging gaze at Lorryn, who froze.

"So tell me what it is that you are, tamer of one-horns," he demanded. 'Tell me why it is that you and four of my captives share a semblance, while this you call your sister looks all too clearly like the other twain I hold in chains."

He knows what we are! He can see through the illusions! Lorryn thought in panic. Oh, Ancestors, now what do I do?

Well, there was no real choice. Tell the truth? It seems the only way out.

"It's a very long story," he began, tentatively.

For the first time, the man who must be the Chief Priest cracked a slow, cautious smile.

"There is always the time for a long story," he responded.

So Lorryn began at the beginning; the priest interrupted him often to ask very pointed questions, and by the time he reached the end of his narrative, the light from the smoke hole had crawled halfway up the wall of the tent, and he was hoarse.

"I can't think of anything else to tell you," he concluded. "Two of the people you have are elves, what you call green-eyed demons; the other four are obviously halfbloods like me. It seems to me that the wizards would be very interested in opening up trade with you, just as they claim. They probably need all the allies they can get against the elves."

"Interesting." The man stroked his chin and stared quite through Lorryn. "I am inclined to believe you. I must think on all of this you have told me; clearly things have greatly changed since my people fled into the South." His eyes focused again, and he gave Lorryn a look that made the halfblood quiver inside; in all of his life he had never met someone with so powerful a personality. "Hold to your illusion; I think perhaps I am the only one to have seen through it, since I was consciously disposing myself to doubt it as soon as word of your coming reached my ears. The rest will see you both for Corn People. You will be on sufferance until I say otherwise."

Oh, just what I wanted to hear, Lorryn thought, suppressing a shiver.

"The War Chief will find you of no interest," the Chief Priest continued. "The Corn People were never of any use in warfare, and it is logical that he will dismiss you to my care. Be glad; if he penetrated your illusion, you would fare much worse than with me. And I think your illusion would not last beyond his desire to taste the strangeness of your sister."

The Priest's arched eyebrows left no doubt in Lorryn's mind about what that had meant. He fought down mingled fear and anger at the very idea; the Priest chuckled at his expression.

"Have no fear that she shall be subject to my whims, boy; my taste is for my life partner and wife, which is just as well. Had she not chosen me, she would have become a Man-Hearted Woman, I think, and gone running with the warriors—and she does not brook that I should look elsewhere than her." He chuckled again, as if the idea amused him. "Stay you in the dwelling to which I shall send you while I ponder upon the problem you have presented, and speak with the spirits of our fathers and with the First Smith."

Since they really didn't have any other choice, Lorryn nodded his agreement. The Priest went to the door of the tent and called out a soft summons; another, younger Priest came at his call, and ushered them out into the fading sunset, taking them to a small tent-wagon in the midst of many such. All of the people here were attired like the Priest, with the same iron torque with the flame-filigree pendant

The tent itself was plain enough, just a few cushions and some colorful blankets, with a cold brazier set under the smoke hole. As soon as they were alone, Lorryn quickly explained to Rena everything that had happened. He halfway expected her to react badly to the news that they had been unmasked, but she heard him out without making a single comment until the end.

"It could be worse," she pointed out. "If he's a Priest, he could have gotten quite a bit of prestige out of revealing us for what we are. He didn't; I don't think he will. I think there's some kind of power-playing going on between him and the War Chief. I think he might be holding us in reserve, to be used against this man."

Lorryn blinked in surprise; where had she come up with that! Not that it wasn't logical; in fact, it made altogether too much sense. But how had she seen it so quickly?

She might not be able to read thoughts, but she could certainly read his expressions like one of her romances. "Mother and I were subject to every shift in politics that Lord Tylar made," she commented ironically. "We learned to read the state of things very quickly and from very small hints. We had to; we had no choice. We had to be certain that if we said something complimentary about last week's ally, he was still an ally and not an enemy."

"Ah," he replied, at a loss for an answer.

Then he was saved from having to give one by the arrival of a woman with a basket of food: a soft white cheese and strips of dried meat the consistency of leather, together with fresh water. Rena frowned as she surveyed their limited meal.

"I could get very tired of that, very quickly," she said, gingerly picking up a meat strip and nibbling on it. "I think perhaps I'd better work a bit of magic on a handful of grass or two every day."

"I wouldn't argue with that," Lorryn agreed—although to his mind, the meat and cheese made a wonderful change from handfuls of grass. He'd begun to feel rather like a goat these past few days. He yawned hugely, only now becoming aware of how tired he was. "Meanwhile, maybe we ought to rest while we've been given the chance?"

Rena echoed his yawn as if she couldn't help herself. "I—1 would have thought I'd never be able to sleep under a circumstance like this one—but—"

"But we might as well; the circumstance isn't going to change, whether we sleep or not." He took up a meat strip and began to work his way through it, valiantly. "The same goes for making the most of these meals—"

Rena took the strip away from him, before he'd even managed to worry a bit off. Before he could object, she'd handed it back. "Try that now," she suggested.

He did—and to his surprise, it was tender. It still tasted like unflavored dried meat, but now one could eat it without getting sore jaws.

"I didn't know you could do that with anything other than plants," he said in surprise.

She shrugged. "Neither did I until just a moment ago."

He felt his eyebrows rising. With every day that passed, she offered yet another surprise. Now she was trying her magic on something that was no longer alive—and making it work. What would she be able to do in a month?

Enough, perhaps, for them to win free of these people?

It could be. After all that they had been through so far, he was not willing to put any limitations on her potential abilities anymore.

He managed to muster up the energy to work the spell of tongues on Rena after a short nap, before anyone looked in on them. That was just as well, for immediately after they broke their fast, another young Priest arrived to bring them to the Chief Priest for another round of intense questioning. This time he concentrated as much of his attention on Rena as he did on Lorryn, pretty much dividing his questions equally between the two of them.

Not that this proved to make things any easier, at least for Lorryn. He was constantly worrying that Rena would say something wrong—not that he would know what was wrong or right! But the Priest—who finally introduced himself, belatedly, as "Diric"—was far more intent on learning what she knew about the wizards than about anything else.