Elvenbane (19 page)

Foster Mother taught her just like Keman—but when she talked about the Kin, she never
had
said that Shana was one of the Kin. She didn’t talk that way to Keman…

Only to me…

So it wasn’t just a malicious story. And Foster Mother knew it. That was why she taught Shana a little differently from Keman.

I’m not one of the Kin. I never will be. I’m an ugly old two-legger. Somebody’s lunch, if he wasn’t too hungry…

Tears welled up in her eyes as she clenched her hands into fists, fingernails cutting into her palms. They spilled down her cheeks, burning their way through the mingled sweat and dust, as the last rays of the sun faded and the light disappeared from Shana’s little pocket, leaving only the blue glow of dusk.

Her chest tightened and ached, her throat closed, and more silent tears followed the first. She felt cheated, somehow, or betrayed.

Why didn’t they tell me? Why didn’t they
tell
me? If Myre knew what I was, then Keman knew, he had to
—
why did he let me think I was Kin? Why didn’t Foster Mother tell me? She found me! She knew from the beginning what the truth was
!

She cried silently, sobs shaking her thin frame, and hugged her arms to her chest in a vain attempt to keep the ache from overwhelming her. Arms that would never wear scales, or sprout long, fierce talons. She would never fly in the Thunder Dance, never be a shaman like Foster Mother.

Never.

Why didn’t they tell me?

The question produced a curious change; hurt became anger, and while the tears continued, they grew hotter and less frequent.

They didn’t tell her because they didn’t care. They were just like all the rest! They didn’t care because she was just an animal and she didn’t matter.

The sense of pressure she had been creating while she tried, in vain, to work the shape-shift built up inside her again. She hugged herself and rocked back and forth in impotent rage.
It’s all their fault. It’s all their fault! They don’t care and it’s all
their fault!
I’ll show them
—I

She felt something snap inside her, and pounded her fists on the ground and howled with rage—

Suddenly every rock within touching distance flew into the air and hurled itself against the walls of the crevice; some hard enough to split themselves in two or more pieces.

She was so angry that for a moment this didn’t even startle her, she just stretched out her hand to grab a bigger rock close by and throw it after the others—throw it at a target she’d spotted high up on the wall. But it rose into the air and struck the projection shaped like a rough dragon’s head, and Shana watched as it and her target vanished in a shower of tiny bits of sand and rock.

The ground squirrel that called the crevice his home came shooting out of his burrow, tail high and stiff, bounding with rage, to chitter angrily at her.

His temper called up answering temper in her.

Shana didn’t even think. A rock simply rose up from beside her right hand, and hurtled across the crevice.

Her aim when throwing rocks by hand was no better than any other child’s. Her aim with
this
weapon of the mind was deadly and accurate.

The rock shot across the crevice so fast that it whistled; hit the little rodent in the head and killed it instantly.

The body tumbled from the top of the burrow and lay on the grass, like a little lump of squirrel-shaped mud in the blue twilight.

Unbidden, Foster Mother’s voice filled her mind. “
Study the ground squirrel so that you may become one with him
. …”

A terrible quiet filled the crevice. Shana came back to herself, thrown out of her temper with the shock of what she had just done. She had often spoken blithely of “making a kill” with Keman, but the fact was that she had never actually killed or even harmed another living creature.

Until this moment.

Never had she wanted so much to undo something she had done. Never had it been so impossible to undo it.

There was no point in going to look at the squirrel; she knew by the way it was lying that she had broken its neck and back. But she crept to it on hands and knees, anyway, and picked up the tiny body, cradling it in her hand. The body was still warm, the fur soft, all the little limbs limp.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered hoarsely, the tears starting again. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—honest, I didn’t. I’m really, really sorry—”

But the squirrel cooled swiftly on her palm, stiffening. It didn’t spring magically to life again.

“I was supposed to learn about you.” She sobbed, crying in earnest now. “I was supposed to learn about you, and I killed you! I—”

She put the little body in the depression that had held her cache of gems and piled rocks over him. She wanted to use her newfound power to do it—it seemed fittest—but the power seemed to have vanished along with her anger. So she built the tiny cairn by hand, crying with all her heart as she did so.

When she finally managed to stop crying, it was completely dark, and she had to make her way down the hillside by moonlight. It was slow, deliberate work; carefully placing each hand and foot, and testing the ground before she trusted her full weight to it.

It gave her plenty of time to think.

She felt for a toehold and looked up at the moon and stars, trying to judge how far she had come. I
didn’t mean to kill him
. But she had, and she did it with her power.
That must be why I lost it. Because I killed with it
.

She didn’t know whether to burst into further tears, or—oddly—feel relief. The power had been intoxicating while she used it, but now, in retrospect, it frightened her.

She slid carefully onto a narrow ledge, her body pressed tightly against the rough rock. If she still had it, she’d have something no one else did. But that wouldn’t make her Kin. The others would probably just figure she was a
dangerous
animal now.

But if I had it, I could keep Rovy and Myre from hurting me.

But she killed with it. What if she killed
them!
She didn’t want to kill them, she just wanted them to leave her alone!

Finally she reached relatively level ground, and could walk normally. She trudged towards home, head down, not so lost in thought that she forgot to watch her step. Each pace down the hill meant the same thoughts, running around and around her head in a litany that soon became part of the climb. When she reached the bottom of the hill and stood on flat ground, she found herself swaying with exhaustion and sick to her stomach. She was sweating and chilled at the same time, and her legs felt as if they weren’t going to hold her up. She had to lean up against a tall pillar of rock for a moment to settle herself.

The rock was still warm from the summer sun, and she pressed herself against its smooth surface gratefully. Suddenly she was so tired that she couldn’t even think, and if it hadn’t been so dangerous, she would have slid down to the ground at the foot of the stone pillar and gone to sleep right there.

But loupers were out at night, and hill-cats, and both were killers in packs. And there were snakes or scorpions which might be attracted to her warmth, and sting or bite her when she moved.

No, she was going to have to get home, somehow.

When she thought she could go on, she raised her head, only to have a wave of disorientation wash over her and leave her weak-kneed and shaking. She clung to the rock and wished with all her heart that she could undo this entire day.

Another dizzy-spell hit her, now all thoughts of guilt and power were gone. All she wanted was to get back to her bed and safety.

She pushed away from the rock and stumbled, half-blinded, over the rough ground in the moonlight, tripping and falling more than once, and inflicting further punishment on her poor, skinned knee. It was the longest journey she’d ever made in her life, and she cried silent tears of joy when she rounded the foot of a hill and reached the area of the pens where Keman still kept his pets. It no longer mattered to her that she was one of them. All that mattered was that it was home, and meant a place to lie down.

She had to stop and lean against the rock surrounding the otter pond, as yet another wave of sickness and dizziness came over her. When leaning did no good, she sat down on the rim of the pond, and bent over the water, scooping up a handful and splashing it over her face.

Then she lost her bearings and her balance—and she was
in
the pond.

The cold water shocked her into awareness; she rose to the surface, spluttering, but clear-headed again, though still weak. She clung to the rock of the side for a while, as the otter came out of his den and nosed her curiously, swimming around her and nudging her. It took a long moment for her to drag herself up out of the water, and she lay on her side, panting, as the otter gave her up as a hopeless bore and went back to bed.

Her impromptu bath did one thing for her, at any rate. She was clean, at least, if battered and bruised by the afternoon’s misadventures.

The dry air pulled the moisture off her; by the time she staggered to the entrance to the lair, everything was dry again except her hair. She was very glad that
her
bed was nearest the entrance; she wasn’t sure if she could have told Foster Mother anything sensible about her absence after dark.

Even so, it was a long trek across the stone floor of the linked caverns. More than long enough that she was half-asleep and shaking in every limb by the time she made the safe haven of her little cavelet. She literally fell into her bed of Alara’s stolen fabrics, already asleep, deaf and blind to everything around her.

Shana stared at the magically smoothed rock of her cavelet ceiling, and blinked befuddled eyes. When she first woke, she had been puzzled about why she ached so, and why her knees and elbows were so battered. Then she had remembered—and could not believe the memories.

It must have been a dream
, she thought finally. No one could have thrown stones around just by thinking about it. Even Foster Mother couldn’t do that; all she could do was move the stone, mold it with her hands. She couldn’t make it fly through the air.

The more Shana thought about yesterday, and all the things she
thought
she’d done, the less likely it all seemed. All except the part with Myre and Rovy—her bruised and battered body gave ample testament that
this
much, at least, was very real.

When she couldn’t shift, she was so tired—she must have cried herself to sleep and dreamt it all.

She had no idea how long she’d slept, but she didn’t feel entirely rested—and her head ached, a dull, constant throb, that made her feel a little sick. Not from the temples, the way it did when she’d overworked, but from deep inside, somewhere behind her eyes.

I’d better get up
, she decided.
Before someone comes looking for me
.

She pulled herself out of her tangled nest of fabric, and stripped off her tunic. After the beating she’d given it yesterday, this one would need some repair-work to make it fit to wear again.

She pulled out another, she had half a dozen, all told, most of them made by her own two hands. Alara had shown her how, but had been adamant that she learn to make her own clothing.

And now she knew why. Because she’d have to have clothing to wear, she thought glumly, as she ran her fingers through the tangled mess of her hair, trying to put it in some kind of order. Finally she gave it up as a bad job, and went to find Keman.

He’s bound to be up by now, and his punishment is over. Maybe we configure out something I can do
. She was no longer angry with her foster brother and his mother—they couldn’t help it. If they’d told her the truth, she wouldn’t have believed it anyway. She looked in Keman’s little sleeping-place—only five times the size of her own—but he wasn’t there. She was torn between going out the front, and seeing if Keman was in the rear with his pets.

Alara found her first.

The shaman intercepted her halfway between her little sleeping-cave and the rear outside entrance. She startled Shana halfway out of her wits. When she chose, Alara could move with complete silence, and her appearance on the trail before Shana, noiseless and sudden, made the girl jump back a step, stifling a scream.

“Myre told me you were out last night after dark.”

Alara said without preamble, in that steady, expressionless voice that told Shana she was in very deep trouble.

If I lie, she’ll know
, Shana thought with resignation, putting her hands behind her back and staring up through the gloom of the softly lit cave at her foster mother’s head. Alara looked down at her; a long way down. The adult dragons were large enough to carry Shana on their backs, if they chose, without using much, if any, magic to help them fly. That meant they were very tall indeed, and Alara knew how to use every bit of her height to her advantage.

“Yes, Foster Mother,” Shana said sadly. “I didn’t mean to be, but I was so unhappy after Keman’s fight yesterday that I went and hid. I—It got dark before I—I—could go home.”

Alara blinked; twin ellipses of her moon-pale eyes. “Are you what Keman and Rovy fought over?” she asked evenly. “I didn’t see you there, but Keman wouldn’t tell me where you were, and I thought that you might have been the cause of the quarrel.”

“Yes, Foster Mother,” Shana replied. She lifted her own chin defiantly. “Myre was mean to me, and Rovy shoved his snout into it. Rovy tried to hurt me, he almost choked me. There are bruises on my neck if you don’t believe me—”

She started to pull her tunic away from her neck. Alara stopped her, but without uttering a word in reply. Shana waited for her to say something and, when nothing was forthcoming, decided she might as well say everything.

“Maybe I’m not Kin,” she said, her voice trembling with anger, “but I’m not an animal, either! I’m not a pet Rovy can hurt whenever he wants to!
Keman
wanted to protect me; he tried to, he tried his best. That was why he shocked Rovy, it was the only way he could get Rovy to put me down.”