Rachel Aaron - Spirit's Oath

Her room was on the mansion’s third floor. The garden below was dark and deserted. Everyone was in the ballroom on the opposite side of the house. Still, the drop would have been enough to discourage most people, but Miranda wasn’t most people. She drew Alliana’s moss-green ring from her little finger and leaned out the window, dropping the ring when the wind died down. It fell silently, disappearing into the dark, but Miranda didn’t need to see the ring to feel her moss spirit cleanly, and she knew Alliana had landed just below her window. The moment the moss spirit hit the ground, Miranda fed a bit of power down their connection. The effect was immediate. All at once, a great springy bed of moss blossomed, pushing out the grass as it grew into a huge mound so vibrant Miranda could see the green clearly even in the dark. When the moss had finished growing, Miranda reached into her bodice and drew out Eril’s pearl pendant.

“Eril,” she said firmly. “Time to work.”

She wasn’t actually sure she’d gotten through to him until she felt his breath by her ear. “Must I?”

“Yes,” Miranda said firmly, climbing onto the window ledge. “Ready?”

Eril’s answer was a blast of wind that nearly blew her over. Smiling, Miranda nudged forward and slid out the window, plummeting into the night. Eril’s wind caught her as she passed the second story, slowing her fall and dropping her gently onto the bed of springy moss. Miranda took a moment to catch her balance, and then she leaned down, snatching Alliana’s ring out of the moss’s green folds. The beautiful moss vanished immediately, shrinking back into the ring as Miranda slid it onto her finger.

“Good work,” she said, setting off across the grounds. “Thank you.”

“My pleasure, mistress,” Alliana said.

Eril just gave her hair one last puff before sliding into his pendant. Miranda rolled her eyes. Maybe the real reason most Spiritualists didn’t keep winds wasn’t because they were hard to catch; maybe it was because they were a pain to work with. But Eril was a problem for another day, and she shoved his pendant back into her dress as she slipped into the dark garden, weaving her way between the tall plants toward the zoo house at the other side.

The building was dark and shuttered for the night. She undid the lock as before, walking straight past the sleeping animals until she was standing again before the ghosthound’s cage. The animal didn’t even bother to feign sleep this time. He was awake and waiting when she came around the corner, his orange eyes wide and glowing in the ambient light from the torches far across the lawn.

“Changed your mind?” he growled.

“Yes and no,” Miranda said, stepping up until she was right in front of the bars, well within claw range. “I’m getting out of here tonight, and I’m taking you with me. I can’t let you kill Hapter, but I can offer you something else.”

The dog snorted. “You think because you’re a wizard you have anything I want?”

“I’m not just a wizard,” Miranda said. “I’m a Spiritualist, and what I can offer you is my solemn promise on my oaths and my name that if you leave here with me tonight, I will not rest until I have returned you to your home. It was wrong of Hapter to bring you here, wrong of him to lock you up. I can’t let you kill him for those wrongs, but I can help undo them. I will take you home, all the way across the sea to the land of ice, but you have to swear to me that you will not make any move for Hapter.”

The ghosthound’s orange eyes widened, and then his long toothed mouth opened in a laugh that made her hair stand on end. “Take me home?” he said, the words so broken by his growling laughter that Miranda almost couldn’t understand them. “You stupid little girl. What makes you think I want to go home?”

“How is that stupid?” Miranda snapped. “Isn’t that why you want to kill Hapter? Because he brought you here and keeps you against your will?”

“Among other reasons,” the dog said.

“So why won’t you let me make it right?” Miranda said. “I can put things back as they were, return you to your life before Hapter came.”

“There is no more home for me,” the ghosthound growled. “You understand nothing, human. I do not want to kill the man who captured me because he brought me here. I must kill him because that is the last act left of my life.” He tilted his head, and his orange eyes grew bitter. “I have no more home to go to. My capture was a disgrace. If I were to take your offer and go back, my pack would hunt me down and kill me. Death is the only cure for such dishonor. I understand this, which is why I must kill the man you call Hapter. If I must die, I will at least die with a cleared name and my honor restored. My pack mates are proud, worthy hunters, and they deserve no less.”

“Wait,” Miranda said. “That’s why you want to kill Hapter? To appease some kind of screwed-up honor system for your pack a thousand miles away across the sea? Powers, mutt, they won’t even know.”

“I will know,” the ghosthound snarled. “And that is what matters.”

“What matters is your life!” Miranda shouted. “You are healthy, strong, alive. You are worth so much more than the dishonor of being captured by some hunter who got lucky. Hapter’s a slime, his life isn’t worth a hair of your coat, and I will not let you die avenging yourself on the likes of him.”

“I don’t see how it’s any of your business what I do with my life,” the hound said, lashing his tail.

Miranda lifted her chin. “If you’re so willing to throw it away, then I don’t see how you can complain about me picking it up.”

The ghosthound snorted. “And what would you do with it? Bind me to you with the rest of your pets?”

“My spirits are not pets,” Miranda said. “They are my partners, my strength. They are what I have pledged my life to.” She stepped forward, plunging her hand through the bars. “Come with me. If you won’t go home, we’ll find something else.”

The dog glanced at her hand, growling deep in his throat. On her finger, she felt Durn pull at their connection, but Miranda didn’t dare take her eyes off the ghosthound’s to see what the stone spirit was upset about. “Don’t die here,” she whispered. “Don’t let him break you. Come with me; run with me.”

The ghosthound met her eyes one last time. “It is you who should run, little Spiritualist,” he said, his voice low. “Listen to your rock.”

Miranda frowned and shifted her attention to Durn’s connection. As she did, the warning blared through her right before the hand closed on her shoulder, jerking her away from the cage.

“What do you think you are doing?”

The roar was Hapter’s voice, and the hand was his as well. Caught off-guard, Miranda tumbled back when he pulled her. The ghosthound’s claws snatched out a second later, going through the air where she had been to claw at Hapter. If she hadn’t been there, the blow would have landed, but the ghosthound apparently wasn’t willing to kill her to get to his enemy, because the dog shifted his strike at the last second to keep from hitting her and missed Hapter as a result. Hapter dragged them both back with a string of curses and threw Miranda against the wall, putting them both well out of the dog’s reach.

“Are you insane?” he shouted, panting beside her. “What part of ‘dangerous animal’ do you not understand?”

“He’s not an animal!” Miranda shouted back. “He’s as smart as we are. How dare you keep him in a cage like that?”

Martin stared at her in disbelief. “I see,” he said at last. “It’s not enough for you to throw away all propriety, you have to try and steal my ghosthound while you’re at it.”