Slowly, she nodded. “Barring that it violates any request of Ridane, yes.”
“I know you, Aralorn,” Wolf said in a low growl. “You do not fight in the regular forces because you don’t like the ties that bind such folk to each other. You work alone, and prefer it. You have many people who like you and some people you like, but no one who is truly a friend. You protect yourself with a shield of friendliness and humor.”
“I have friends,” she said, taken aback by his assessment; it had come from nowhere—and she thought he was wrong. She wasn’t the loner; he was.
“No,” Wolf said. “Whom did you tell when you came here?”
“I left a note for the Mouse.”
“Work,” he said. “You believed your father had died, and you told no one. What did the note to Ren say? That you’d been called home on family business? Did you tell him the Lyon was dead or leave it for his other spies?”
He was right. How odd, she thought, to see yourself through someone else’s view and discover a stranger.
“You fight to have no bonds to anyone,” he continued, an odd hesitation in his rough voice. “You don’t even come to visit your family because you fear the pain of those ties. But you would tie yourself to me anyway. Because you love me.”
She felt stripped naked and bewildered. “Yes,” she said, when he seemed to be waiting for some response.
“If you wish to marry me,” he said, “I am most honored.”
Tilda cleared her throat awkwardly. “Uhm. I’m not actually certain that I can marry someone to a wolf.”
Aralorn gathered her tattered defenses together and managed a grin. “I agree. Wolf?”
Wolf could no more have resisted putting on a show for the priestess than a child could resist a sweet.
Black mist swirled up to engulf him until he was merely a darker shadow in the blackness. Gradually, the mist rose to the height of a man before falling away to reveal Wolf’s human shape, complete with his usual silver mask.
Aralorn turned to Tilda, who had recovered from her initial surprise, and indicated Wolf. “May I introduce you to Cain, son of Geoffrey ae’Magi. But I call him Wolf, for obvious reasons.”
“Cain the Black,” whispered Tilda, horrified. She drew a sign in the air that glowed silver and green.
Wolf shook his head in disgust. “You can hardly think, whatever tales you have heard, that I would attack a priestess in her own temple. Not the brightest of moves.”
“Don’t mind him,” offered Aralorn. “He always responds to other people’s fear this way—not that the fear is always unwarranted, mind you, but, generally speaking, he’s harmless enough.”
“You want me to wed you to Cain the Black?” asked Tilda, sounding like she’d had one too many shocks.
“Look,” said Aralorn, stifling her impatience. “I’m not asking you to marry him. Do this for me . . . ask the goddess what She thinks of Wolf . . . Cain. Then decide what you would do.”
Tilda spared Wolf another wary glance. “I’ll do that. Wait a moment.”
She sat on the middle stair and bowed her head—without removing the sign she’d drawn. It hung in the air, powered by human magic rather than anything of the goddess’s. Tilda was mageborn. Aralorn wondered if she should add the priestess’s name to the list of mages Kisrah had requested.
“You’ve taken quite a risk,” murmured Wolf in a voice that went no farther than Aralorn’s ears. “What if the goddess decides I am so tainted by my early deeds that I should die to pay for them?”
Aralorn shook her head, not bothering to lower her voice. “I know my stories. The goddess has always had a weakness for rogues and reprobates—just like me.”
“You’re right,” agreed Tilda quietly, visibly calmer. Her sign faded quickly, without a motion on Tilda’s part. “She likes you—very much. If you would like to stand before me, the goddess of death will bind you tighter than the threads of life.”
“Take off the mask, please,” Aralorn asked him.
He slanted a glance at the priestess and flicked his fingers toward his face. The mask disappeared and left his face bare of scars. Aralorn touched his cheek.
The priestess stood on the middle step, and Wolf took Aralorn’s hand formally on his forearm. They faced Tilda together: Aralorn in her riding leathers, doubtless, she thought, smelling of horses; Wolf in his customary sartorial splendor, not a hair out of place.
“Who stands before me?” asked Tilda formally.
“Wolf of Sianim, who once was Cain ae’Magison.”
“Aralorn of Sianim, once of Lambshold.”
“To what purpose would you come?”
“To wed.” They answered together.
“For all things to come, either good or evil? Desiring no other mate?”
“Yes,” said Wolf.
“Yes,” agreed Aralorn.
Tilda took out a small copper knife and pricked her thumb so that a drop of blood formed. She pressed it to the hollow of Aralorn’s throat, then to Wolf’s.
“Life to life entwined as the goddess wills, so be it. Kiss now, and by this shall the deed be sealed.”
Wolf bent and touched his lips to Aralorn’s.
“Done!” The priestess’s word rang with a power that had nothing to do with magic.
“It shall be recorded,” said Tilda, “that Wolf of Sianim married Aralorn of Sianim on this date before Tilda, priestess of Ridane.”
“Thank you.” Wolf bowed his head.
From her perch on the stairs, Tilda leaned forward and kissed the top of his head. “We wish you nothing but the best.”
Wolf drew back, startled at the gesture. He started to say something, but shook his head instead. Without a word or an excess bit of magic, he shifted to his lupine form.
Aralorn looked at the priestess with full approval. “Now, do you still want me to shift for you?”
Tilda shook her head with a sigh. “It’s not necessary. I had no idea that he was anything other than a wolf.”
Aralorn laughed. “Neither did my uncle the shapeshifter—and we can usually tell our kind. Hold a moment.” She knew her change wasn’t as graceful or impressive as Wolf’s, but it was swift. She chose the icelynx because she’d been working on it and because someday she might have to spend some time at the temple: She didn’t want Tilda to be looking too hard at strange mice.
She arched her back to rid herself of the final tingles of the change. The shadows held fewer secrets in this form, but there were fewer colors as well. Staring at the priestess’s face, Aralorn could see a hint of satisfaction in Tilda’s eyes.
No, Aralorn thought, this should be a fair exchange of favors. She lay down on the floor and began tentatively to hide herself within the icelynx’s instincts. She was better with the mouse—and it was less dangerous that way, but she trusted that Wolf would stop her if she lost control of her creation. When she had done what she could to disguise herself, she waited for ten heartbeats, then allowed herself to reemerge.
Hiding so deeply always left her with a headache to remind her why she seldom went to such extremes. She stood up, shook herself briskly, then shifted back to human form.
“Well,” asked Aralorn, rubbing her arms briskly, “could you tell I was not the real thing?”
Tilda took a deep breath and loosened her shoulders with a rolling motion. “When you first changed, yes, but for a moment while you lay still, no.”
“I think then you should be all right. Most of the shapeshifters don’t care to get that deep into their creations,” said Aralorn. “There’s always the chance that the shaper might get lost in his shape.”
“Thank you,” said Tilda. “I found that to be most . . . enlightening.”
Me, too, thought Aralorn, who had learned that a cleric mage was going to be harder to get her mouse shape past than human mages were—but not impossible.