Patricia Briggs: Masques

She hesitated for a minute before she continued. “I know how he is. How he can twist things until black seems white. His power is frightening, but it is not as dangerous as his ability to manipulate thoughts with words. I was only there for a short time; you were raised by him. It doesn’t seem to me that exposure would make you immune to everyone; the opposite, I think. Perhaps having someone with you might make it easier.”

Wolf was still. He didn’t want to do this alone, but he wanted even less to have her hurt—or worse. Aralorn abruptly jumped to the ground.

“I couldn’t have lived with myself if something happened to you and I was not with you.” She shrugged and twitched her whiskers. “Besides, why should you have all the fun? He will see only a mouse, if he looks.”

He wanted to send her away, not just for her safety, but because he didn’t want her to know what he’d been before, even though he’d done his best to tell her himself. The feelings that she brought out in him were so painful and confusing. It was easier when he had felt nothing, no pain—no guilt. No desire.

His father had taught him how to be that way. When Wolf had understood that he was becoming the monster his father wanted, it had driven him to escape. It was easier when he had cared for nothing, easier when he’d been his father’s pet mage. Much easier.

The desire that he felt to return to what he had left behind terrified him. No one who hadn’t been raised there would understand the addiction of his father’s corruption. Aralorn was right. He needed her to keep him from returning to his old ways, becoming his father’s tool once more. The knowledge that she was watching might be enough to strengthen him.

“Stay,” was all that he said.

Once he’d made his decision, he ignored her. Kneeling, he emptied the contents of the backpack, a motley collection of jars, which he organized in an overtly random fashion. He stripped himself of his clothes and began a ritual of purification, using the water from a nearby stream.

Aralorn watched for a while, but when he started to meditate, she went for a scurry—mice seldom walk. Once out of sight, where she wouldn’t pull his concentration back to her, she shifted into her own form.

She stopped when she had a good view of the castle. It was funny how she always pictured it as black on the outside, the way it had appeared both times she left it. In the sunlight it sparkled a pearly gray, almost white. She could almost visualize the noble knight riding out to face the evil dragon. She hoped in this story the dragon (accompanied by his faithful mouse) would defeat the knight.

She clenched her fingers in the bark of the tree she stood next to and turned her cheek against the rough texture, closing her eyes against the very real possibility that this story would turn out like all the rest—the knight living happily ever after and the dragon slain.

When the shadows lengthened into dusk, Aralorn—once again the mouse—snuck back to where Wolf sat with closed eyes, the last light resting on his clean-shaven unblemished face with loving affection. The sight of his scarless face momentarily distracted her from his nudity.

Aralorn fought the chill that crept over her, knowing that if he looked just then, his all-too-discerning eyes would see her anxiety. It was unsettling to be in love with someone who looked like the face in her nightmares.

Ah well, as her stepmother would have said, at least he was handsome. And his face wasn’t the only beautiful thing about him.

She leapt blithely onto his leg and ascended quickly to his bare shoulder, feeling a slight malicious pleasure when he jerked in surprise. When he turned to glare at her, she kissed him on the nose, then began to clean her forepaws with industry. With a sound that might have been a laugh, he ran a finger lightly up her back, rubbing her fur the wrong way. She bit him—but not too hard.

He smoothed her hair and set her down on the ground so that he could regain his clothing. She noticed that it wasn’t the same outfit he’d taken off. It wasn’t like anything that she’d ever seen him wear. The main color was still black, but it was finely embroidered with silver thread. The shirt was gathered and puffed, hanging down well over his thighs, which was just as well, because the pants were indecently tight, from mouse height anyway. She could see the faint flickering of magic in the fabric and assumed that the clothes he wore were the magician equivalent of armor.

When he was dressed, he put her back on his shoulder and strode out of the clearing like a man who was at last within reach of attaining a much-coveted goal. He talked to her while he walked.

“I thought of confronting him in the castle itself, but it has been the center of so much magic that I really don’t know how this spell would affect it. I suspect that at least some of the construction of the older parts of the building was done purely by magic. Without magic, it could collapse on top of us. I don’t know about you, but I thought it might be interesting to survive long enough to find out just what the ae’Magi’s loyal followers will do to his murderers. That is, if we manage to make it that far.”

“I’d forgotten that aspect of it,” answered Aralorn in the squeaky-soft voice that was the best her mouse form could manage. “Will his spells still be in effect when he dies?”

“Probably not, but people will still remember how they felt. We will remain the villains of this story.” Wolf leapt easily over a small brook.

“Oh good!” she exclaimed, holding on tightly with her forepaws. “I’ve always wanted to be a villain.”

“I am happy to please my lady mouse.”

“Uh, Wolf?” she asked.

“Umm?”

“If we’re not going to the castle, where are we going?”

“Well,” he said, sliding down a steep section of his self-determined path, “when I lived in the castle, he had a habit of going out to meditate every night. He didn’t like to do it in the castle because he said that there were too many conflicting auras—too many people steeped in magic had lived and died there in the past thousand years or so. There is a spot just south of the moat that he used to like to use. If he doesn’t do it tonight, he probably will tomorrow.”

Aralorn sat quietly, thinking of all the things she’d never asked him, might never get a chance to ask. “Wolf?”

“Yes?”

“Has your voice always been the way it is?”

“No.” She thought that was all of the answer that she was going to get until he added, “When I woke up after melting the better part of the tower”—he pointed to one of the graceful spires that arched into the evening sky—“I found that I’d screamed so loud that I damaged my voice. It is very useful when I want to intimidate someone.”

“Wolf,” said Aralorn, setting a paw on his ear since they were on relatively smooth ground, “not to belabor the obvious, but your voice isn’t what intimidates people. It could be the possibility that you might immolate anyone who bothers you.”

“Do you think that might be it?” he inquired with mock interest. “I had wondered. It has been a while since I immolated anyone, after all.”

She laughed and looked at the castle as it rose black against the lighter color of the sky. She had the funny feeling that it was watching them. She knew that it wasn’t so, but she was grateful that she was a mouse all the same, and even more grateful that she was a mouse on Wolf’s shoulders. She leaned lightly against his neck.

She knew that they were near the place Wolf had spoken of from the tension in the muscles she balanced on. A stray wind brought the smell of the moat to cut through the smell of green things growing. It almost disguised another scent that touched her nose.