Karleah grunted her thanks, bit a huge bite from her food with her strong white teeth, and said, “Give me a minute to—heh, heh—‘wolf’ my food, and then I’ll check out the passages. Maybe I can scent something.” Karleah smiled, her canines gleaming in the bright light of the midday sun that shone overhead. An eagle, attracted perhaps by the travelers, circled above. Its piercing cry echoed off the mountainsides.
“Can I go with you, Karleah?” Dayin asked. He began to eat his food quickly, too. “Maybe I can scent something you might miss,” he said through a mouthful of bread.
The wizardess shook her head. “No, son. You’d only slow me down and be a cause for worry,” Karleah said. She pointed a thin finger up at the circling eagle. “She’d have you in her talons before I’d even hear her dive to the ground. Out here I can’t protect you like I could in my woods. There everyone knows not to touch my young rabbit.” The old woman took another bite. She chewed her mouthful and said at the same time, “Why you chose to be a cottontail is beyond me.”
“Karleah shapechanges into a wolf and you into a rabbit?” Johauna asked. She sliced another strip of venison and handed it to Karleah. At Braddoc’s nod, the squire sliced him a strip as well.
“Why a rabbit?” Braddoc asked. “And why can you change into only one animal? That doesn’t seem very useful.” He gestured at the bird flying above. “If you could turn into an eagle, I’ll bet you could spot the guards carrying the abaton. Then we’d know for sure which way to go—and could even cut them off, if possible.” The dwarf chewed his food slowly.
Dayin shrugged, his shoulders lost beneath the thick fur vest that Flinn had given him. “I like rabbits, and I wanted to be one,” the boy said. “They’re lots smarter than people give them credit for. Besides, they’re small and can wiggle into places most other creatures couldn’t. They’re fast, too.” Dayin smiled widely at the old wizardess. “I’ve given Karleah quite a run in the woods.”
The crone snorted, then turned to Braddoc. “To answer your question, dwarf, there are mages who can learn to shapechange into more than one creature, but they take on merely the animal form and not the animal spirit. When I am the wolf, I am that animal. I wanted Dayin to experience that same sensation, and he does.” She nodded her head toward the boy. “Gather up the animals, will you? It wouldn’t do to have them panic and desert us in these mountains.” Dayin agreed and left the others to their meal.
“But as a rabbit?” Braddoc asked again. Dayin frowned at the dwarf, ending the conversation.
Karleah reached for Jo. The younger woman held out her hand, thinking the older one needed support. The wizardess’s dry, bony fingers touched Jo’s palm, and then Karleah withdrew her hand. Jo looked down at her palm.
“This … this is a crystal from a real abelaat?” Jo asked. She held up the eight-sided crystal. It was fully twice as large as Jo’s other crystals. The sunlight flickering through it shed prisms of color into the young woman’s eyes, and she was dazzled by its beauty. She heard Brisbois gasp and move closer to her.
Karleah nodded. She said, “Yes, that’s what Keeper Grainger gave me. Her people have been the keepers not only of the history of the abelaats but also of their crystals. This is the last true abelaat crystal—a crystal made from Aeltic’s own spittle.” Brushing her hands and sniffing the wind, Karleah said. “Its time for me to change.”
Braddoc and Jo stared at Karleah as the old woman began her transformation. Her lanky gray hair shortened and then spread over her body while her face lengthened and ears grew. Karleah pulled off the last of her clothing as the rest of the shapechange occurred.
“How long will you be gone?” Jo asked the wolf-woman.
“Not long,” Karleah said in painful half-growl. “Take … care of… the crystal,” she continued. “It is my … only protection … from the abaton.” Her black eyes turned golden, and her pink tongue lengthened and fell out of her not-quite-changed jaw. The woman flexed her fingers as the digits shortened and claws grew. Karleah’s arms and legs grew leaner, the muscles rippling beneath her black fur. Finally, her torso changed shape and a tail grew. The old she-wolf yelped once and leaped away from Johauna and Braddoc.
Jo enviously watched Karleah’s sure pace carry her into the mountain passes. She said to Braddoc, “I wish I could shapechange. I think it would be wonderful to transform into a wolf like Karleah and roam the land, at one with it in a way humans never are.”
Braddoc shrugged noncommittally. “She’ll be back soon. I want to check the pack on the mule. I think it needs rearranging.” The dwarf stood.
“I’ll come with you,” Jo said. “I packed Fernlover a little quickly myself.” Dayin accompanied them to the animals. Brisbois, who had said nothing since discovering the original sign of the passing guards, moved solicitously out of the way. With a confused glance at the man, Jo began checking the bundles on her mule. Silent moments passed, then Jo said, “What are you looking at?”
Brisbois smiled slightly and shrugged. “What would you do if Verdilith attacked you right now, in these mountains?” he asked.
Braddoc stared up at Brisbois. Jo once again stood in silence for a moment. “What kind of question is that?”
“A legitimate one, I should think,” the man replied. “You’re so vulnerable out here, on an open mountain range, with no way to fight, nowhere to run.”
“You’re as vulnerable as we,” Braddoc interjected. Brisbois shrugged, “More so, I bet you think. After all, I don’t carry Wyrmblight, scourge of the Great Green, do I?” The man moved with reptilian grace toward Jo, his hand reaching out to the blade harnessed to her back.
Jo backed away, watching the yellowish steam rise from Brisbois’s nose. “What’s gotten into you?”
Brisbois withdrew to a nonthreatening distance and said, “You have a lot of faith in that sword. Too much faith, if you ask me.”
“I didn’t ask you,” Jo shot, checking the straps on Fernlover.
“You think that sword will save you,” Brisbois pressed, a gleaming grin on his mouth, “but it didn’t save Flinn.”
Jo whirled, wrenching Wyrmblight from its harness and leveling it before Brisbois’s heart. “You mention Flinn one more time, and I’ll cut your heart out with this.”
“Jo,” Braddoc said, with a warning glare.
Brisbois smiled and waved the dwarf off with a bandaged hand, “She doesn’t mean it. That sword is everything to her. She holds on to it and thinks she’s holding on to Flinn. But Flinn failed her, and so will the sword.”
Jo lunged forward, a snarl of rage on her lips. The tip of Wyrmblight sliced through the dishonored knight’s tabard, punctured his breastplate, and slammed the chain mail into his sternum. With a slight gasp, Brisbois slipped and fell to the ground.
Jo stepped up, setting the blade back on the gash and towering over him. Braddoc clutched her arm, trying to pull her back, but Jo gritted her teeth and began to lean onto the blade.
“Mercy,” Brisbois cried out with mock fear. “I beg you mercy on this battlefield, squire of the mighty Flinn. Will you kill me, though I beg mercy of you?”
A confused frown crossed Jo’s face and she colored. Her pressure on the sword relented as Braddoc pulled her away from the knight. As Brisbois painfully rose to his feet, the dwarf led Jo back to the mules and locked the gaze of his good eye with hers.
“You lost that one, Jo. Don’t let him manipulate you like that,” the dwarf said evenly. “Everybody already knows he’s an idiot. Don’t let him make an idiot out of you”
Something half-human and half-wolf suddenly streaked toward them. Karleah had returned from her search. Braddoc turned his head away politely as the wolf-thing transformed back into a naked old woman. The wizardess pulled on her clothing. She said with some asperity, “I’m sure a woman’s body is nothing new to you, Braddoc. Seen one, you’ve seen them all.”