I thought about the book, my mind running through everything it had said.
“We should claim the forest,” Rose said. “Or part of it.”
I could see the Briar Girl visibly tensing. The familiar bristled.
No rush. We’d been promised safety. I allowed myself a smile. “We could take something smack dab in the middle of it. Once it’s taken, it’s taken, right? You can’t have something for your demesnes if someone else has already claimed that ground.”
“It’s the most convenient location. Close to the house. Secluded…
Briar Girl’s familiar growled.
“If you keep talking like that, there won’t ever be another negotiation between us,” the Briar Girl said.
The words had a power to them. It was damn close to being an oath. It was a statement.
I shut my mouth, stood straight, and waited.
It was good to let the idea hang there, terrifying to her, a way to interrupt her plans. We could take a part of her territory from her forever.
The wait extended. I could see the Briar Girl shifting her weight. Periodically glancing at her familiar. No doubt communicating by some means.
“Agree to rescind the threat,” she said, “and I won’t tell Laird.”
“Excellent,” I said. “Deal. It’s good to do these things in threes, isn’t it? Makes it more powerful?”
“Close enough. So I’ve got to teach you to change your form.”
“Yes,” I said.
“Get the still-warm blood of an animal, as much as possible. Strip yourself of all clothes. Douse yourself, slowly, to allow yourself to feel the power instead of having your wits dashed from you. Put power into the parts of it you want to keep. Gorge the spirit, and draw the spirit into you. Fail to exert enough will and focus, and the power inherent in the blood will bleed over into other parts of you, you might physically change, you might experience other side effects, or your mind might slip away until it fades. If you don’t exert enough power, you’ll get far less effect for what you have spent. With practice, you learn how much to put in, and where your attention needs to go.”
That was… somewhat more perfunctory than I’d expected.
“Where do I draw the power from?” I asked.
“There are hundreds of possibilities.”
“How do I apply it to the shapechanging rite?” I asked.
“Depends on where you draw the power from,” she said.
“Can you give me an example?” I asked.
“Yes,” she answered, “But I’ll demand other things before I do.”
Meaning she considered her end of the bargain met. She’d told me what to do. Given me instructions.
“That’s unsporting,” Rose said.
“No,” I said. “Nevermind that. Look, Briar Girl…”
I pulled off my glove. I held up my hand, showing her the locket.
I could feel the attention the locket got. As the eyes of a number of Others and the Briar Girl fell on it, the hair extended, winding around the chain and pulling it tighter.
It’s fragile, I reminded myself.
“Can you at least tell me if I power it with glamour?” I asked.
She frowned a little. “Glamour isn’t the province of humans. It must be freely given. It is too fragile to handle otherwise. Too personal to each Faerie.”
“That so?” I asked. “Huh.”
“Who gave it to you? The only unbound Faerie here are the exiles.”
“Answer my question first. Can I use it?”
She frowned. “Give me the power, and I’ll give you another power source.”
“I’m partial enough to this that I can’t see myself giving it away,” I said. “Answer my questions, I’ll answer yours. Otherwise, I think I’ll be leaving to go plan against Laird.”
“Yes, you can use it to power the shaping, but you shouldn’t.”
“Why not?” I asked, momentarily concerned.
“If you want to change your form, using the glamour itself is enough. More flexible. More fragile, but I don’t see you fighting each and every member of Laird’s family, and if you’re in a position to have a glamour broken, you’re also in a position to have your shape stolen from you, leaving you in your ordinary form, helpless and naked. I would use glamour by itself, in your shoes.”
“I don’t have much of the glamour,” I said. “It grows, but not fast.”
It’s growing now, though.
“Use all you can. Layer it on thick. Render it into a form you can handle, dilute it, powder or paint yourself with it, mold yourself, and avoid letting that mold break. It’ll wear over time, as it’s challenged. Every doubt is a crack, and you can repair the cracks with power. Good illusionists can wear the same glamour for years, if they attach it to some power source. Some never change their clothes, only changing the glamour.”
I made a mental note of that.
“Who gave it to you?”
“It was fairly taken, after a duel.”
“What would it take for you to give the original piece to me?”
“I want to ask a question, before I answer that. What are the limitations?”
“There are few. My teacher told me many Faerie take refuge in audacity. Keep the rules of the change simple, without too many twists and turns, and you can paint any sort of picture. Your power and the glamour’s power is only truly expended if the glamour breaks. Cracks, frays, fades, peels, or breaks entirely. You’re deceiving reality, and reality can only make you pay for the sheer difference in forms when it finds out.”
“Okay,” I said. “That sounds far more workable. Can someone look at the connections, break it that way?”
“Not if you’re careful to mold those as well.”
“Okay. Opposite question, then. What if I deceive reality too well?”
“You don’t. You leave a tell. A key, if you will. Something deliberately wrong, often something that calls back to you, specifically. Anyone who notices it will see through the glamour, but you can notice it to do the same.”
“Like?”
“Eyes the wrong color, or you’re flipped left to right, like an image in a mirror, or you keep an old scar.”
I nodded. “To answer your question, it would take a hell of a lot for me to hand this over, but ask me later, and we could maybe negotiate. I have ideas on what I want to do with it, right now. That is, assuming we can negotiate in the future?”
“Don’t threaten me, and it’s possible,” the Briar Girl said.
“Excellent,” I said. But no promises. “On the subject of questions and answers… can I ask who or what your teacher was?”
There was a reaction to that. Surprise. Annoyance.
“No,” she said.
“Okay,” I said. “Do you have another question you’d like to ask?”
“None that I’d be willing to exchange an answer for. We’re done,” she said. She waved her hand, and the remaining Others began leaving. She paused. “I hope you fail. But I hope you don’t fail so badly you die.”
“Thank you,” I said. “I’m going to aim for one of those two.”
She frowned a little, but she walked off. I turned to trudge through the deep snow to get back to the house, pulling my glove back on.