With an effort not to make an effort, Tal finally relaxed enough to hear her words without thinking about them. It was a state of mind he reached only while fencing, when for brief moments he could obey Master Ferrick's instructions without knowing he'd heard them. Soon Feena's words dissolved into the images he had practiced forming.
He felt himself floating in warm water, the tide gently tugging him first away from and toward a shore he could sense but not see. Each wave that pulled him farther from land was stronger than the one that pushed him back, and each time he felt slightly farther from his surroundings, even his own body.
Gradually he floated out to sea, the distant shush of the surf growing fainter as he went. The waves grew stronger, raising him high before dropping him back below the surface. He tried to remain calm as he rose back to the surface, but he felt smothered and restrained. A sharp pain twisted his back. He gasped for air but felt no relief.
Opening his eyes, he saw only a dim yellow light on the other side of the bars. A human voice spoke to him from beyond the lamp, but he could not understand its words. Standing, he felt the clothing fall away from his transformed body, rough straw and hard iron bars beneath his paws. A hundred strange smells competed for his attention. They were all familiar, but he could not think of their names. One in particular called to him, a musky odor similar to the smell of his own body but far more alluring.
"Tal," said the voice.
It was a sound he should recognize, he thought briefly, but he was more interested in the scent. He moved toward it and found the bars. He was too big to press between them, so he turned to find another path. He turned and turned again, finding nothing but the narrow spaces.
The other animal kept speaking, low and urgent. He felt the sounds should mean something, but they were unimportant. It was the borders that vexed him. He could not stay trapped. He would not stay trapped.
He called out for help, and a voice answered. It told him to stay, to remain calm, but it was not trapped as he was, and it would not help him.
He forced his head between the bars and pushed. They would not yield. He leaped up upon them, shouting to frighten them away. They did not run. Instead, the blood roared in his ears, and a red cloud filled his eyes. Rather than blind him, it gave him the hunter's sight-he could sense every movement in the room, despite the bright spot of light.
The other animal was out there, and it was keeping him confined. He wanted to get at it, to tear and bite at it, to kill it for holding him here.
Again and again he threw himself against the barrier, raging and howling in the darkness.
"Halt!"
Tal remained utterly still as Master Ferrick strolled among the four ranks of students. At just over five and a half feet, he was shorter than his reputation led most to believe, though his hawkish nose and imperial gaze gave him an air of authority. More than sixty years had left their trails across his tanned face, but his compact body was that of a man half as old. He moved with a quiet grace, never hurrying.
When he first joined the school eight years earlier, Tal found these slow, deliberate inspections excruciating. His twelve-year-old arms could not hold even a foil steady for so long, and he dreaded attracting Ferrick's attention. Fortunately, he had earned Ferrick's correction only rarely in recent months. The man's keen eyes spied every imperfection, and he noted them in terse syllables as he passed each offender.
"Overextended," he told one student. "Grip," he said to another.
Silence as he passed was all the approval he was likely to give. Tal accepted his gratefully, keeping his eyes on his imaginary opponent as Ferrick passed. The instructor completed his inspection and stood beside Radu Malveen. Even in his peripheral vision, Tal detected Ferrick's faint nod. The instructor's foremost student was the only one worthy of acknowledgement. Despite frequent absences, Radu retained the mantle of first student. He had never lost a challenge.
It was no longer a secret that Tal wanted to change that standing.
Ferrick snapped out another string of commands.
"Return. Cross left. Advance. Retreat. Half advance! Cut four! Parry eight! Recover!"
The words never formed completely in Tal's brain. Instead, his body moved before he could think, but always in the right direction. Action without thought was one of the best things about fencing drills, and he had become much better at it since Feena's arrival. Learning to ride the moon was a difficult and often disturbing process, for each morning after he remembered more and more what it was like to have been a wolf. The rage he felt at confinement was frightening, but he knew it meant he was gradually asserting his own will over the wolfs mind.
Sword drills had become Tal's greatest pleasure. He was beginning to spend as much time at Ferrick's studio in the Warehouse District as he did at the Wide Realms, though it was in the playhouse that he choreographed endless fight scenes in anticipation that Quickly would put them in one of her plays. His creations were equal parts fighting and fancy, and his fellow students would surely sneer to see them.
While he did not share the scrupulous ideals of his fellows, Tal tried to ensure that the stage fencing was as plausible as possible. Sometimes he went too far, and Quickly chided him for making it so realistic that it was boring to watch. What was exciting to do, he realized, was not always exciting to show.
The students who had seen his performances at the Wide Realms used to scoff at Tal's showy technique, but fewer were scoffing lately. Since the month of Ches Tal had challenged his way out of the middle ranks and into fourth place among Ferrick's students. His three-month rise won him both admirers and rivals, and he reveled in the praise and scorn alike. In truth, he had never much liked most of his peers. Like his brother, Tamlin, most young nobles were more concerned with fashion and gossip than skill at arms.
One of the few exceptions was Radu Malveen. He rarely spoke to the other students, a reticence usually attributed to his family's questionable past. Tal thought of him as self-sufficient rather than haughty, though he sympathized with the family history.
The Malveens were still on the recovery after their involvement with pirates cost them the head of the household, Velanna Malveen, as well as her eldest son. A similar catastrophe would have obliterated House Uskevren but for Thamalon's tireless efforts to restore both the wealth and the reputation of his family. Even so, all of the Uskevren had been subjected to subtle reminders from their peers that theirs was a lineage on which the shadow of villainy still fell. How much worse would it have been for Radu, had he dared to engage his peers socially. Far better to remain apart from them, thought Tal, who had his own reasons for avoiding his peers.
Tal imagined that he and Radu were similar in other ways. Radu's younger brother was a notorious wastrel, not entirely unlike Tamlin except for his reputation as an eccentric artist. His bizarre paintings were notorious for their unsettling abstractions, which naturally put them in high demand among the art-conscious nobles of Selgaunt. Laskar, the eldest of the Malveen brothers, had a reputation for integrity and fair dealing that rivaled that of Tal's father. Tal imagined that he must be equally insufferable to Radu.
"Armor and masks," commanded Master Ferrick. As his students complied, he clasped his bronzed hands behind his back and gazed out the window toward the bay.
Tal grabbed a pair of towels and tossed one to Radu, who caught it neatly and without acknowledgement.
"Did you have a good journey?" said Tal.
Radu raised an eyebrow.
"You were away on business, I heard," said Tal, hoping to strike up a conversation. "I hope it went well."