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one end, capped by gold; pointed at the other. A dog*s tooth, or a wolfs.
A wolfs.
"Such an insignificant thing. ..." I said aloud.
Be rid of it, lir at once
1 stared at the tooth. "Lillith," I said aloud. "Lillith, Alaric Gisella " And
I knew what they had done.
What they had made me do.
My hand spasmed. Fingers shut over the tooth. Tightly, so tightly; the tooth
bit into my flesh. "Oh gods Deirdre
. . . they have made me slay them all!"
Lir, be rid of the charm!
I thrust an arm against the ground and pushed, rising
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hurled Lillith's gift as far as I
could into the forest depths.
They have made me slay them all. Deirdre, Liam, Shea
even lerne and the unborn child
Oh gods.
I began to run again.
Lir! Serri came running behind me; running, running, even as I went running.
Lir wait
Dead. All of them dead.
All the proud eagles of Erinn, proud, fierce Erinn, with its aerie upon the
white chalk cliffs overlooking the
Dragon's Tail-
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Deirdre.
Oh gods Deirdre
I stopped running. I stood in the sun-gilded clearing and felt the warmth upon
my face as I turned it toward
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the sun. Gods, I said, how is it that in the moment you give me the greatest
gift of all, you take away another?
You give me the knowledge of what I can do . . . and the knowledge of what I
have done.
Serri, beside me, lifted his head and licked my hand.
Lir, be not so bitter. What is done is done; look not to lay blame upon your
platter when it was another who had the fashioning of that platter.
The fashioning of that platter. . . . "Gisella?" I asked aloud. "No. It was
Alaric who put the torch into my hand; Lillith who stood by him even as he did
it."
I recalled it so well, that night upon the dome of the dragon's skull. And all
the light in my eyes as I set torch to beacon-fire.
Gods. All dead.
Gisella: who had spun a web within my mind and bound me to her will.
At her own instigation? Perhaps not. Perhaps she as much as I was a puppet
caught in the tangle of strings pulled by Lillith and Alaric. I thought she
lacked the wits and concentration to make or carry out such plans.
And yet it had been Gisella who had ensorcelled a lirless man.
A man who was lirless no longer.
"Serri," I said aloud, "there are things that I must learn, and I must learn
them well. Things such as taking fir-shape. Things such as healing." I paused.
"And the gift of compelling a person to do as I wish him to do."
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Lir
"And then we will go to Clankeep. And then to
Homana-Muj har.''
Lir
I looked down at the wolf, my lir, and knew myself complete even while I felt
the emptiness of grief; the hollowness of despair. "Serri," I begged, "teach
me what
I must know."
Serri seemed to sigh. It begins, he said, with the shapechange. . . .
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Nine
Gods but I cannot begin to say what it is to trade human form for animal.
There are no words to describe the melding of heart and mind and spirit, the
perfect bonding of man and animal. I knew only that I could not comprehend how
I had lived before, so empty, so insub-
stantial, so unwhole; so vague a shadow of what a man can be when he is a
Cheysuli warrior.
It is a trade, the ability to put off one form and wear another. A transience
unlimited by beginning and end, simply a time of being, when I was a wolf I
was a wolf, not a man, not Niall; not even the Prince of Homana.
Not even a Cheysuli. Just a wolf, and bound by such freedom as an unblessed
man cannot possibly compre-
hend. Not even a Cheysuli. Because even a warrior, in human form, lacks the
perfection of the animal he be-
comes when he trades one shape for the other. Even a
Cheysuli is less than he can be.
I began to understand. And I began to see why my race is so arrogant, so
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insular, so certain of their place within the tapestry of the gods. Our colors
are brighter.
We are the warp and weft of Homana, and all the pat-
terns besides. Pick us from that pattern and the shape of the dream collapses.
The shape of life collapses-
As Homana herself would collapse.
Gods, but what responsibility. And I began to under-
stand what my father faced, trying to merge Homana and the Cheysuli. Trying to
blend recalcitrant yarns into a harmonious tapestry.
I learned to think as a wolf, feel as a wolf, act as a wolf. I learned how
vulnerable is a man's naked flesh;
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how much stronger are hide and fur. I learned sounds I
had never heard, scents I had never smelled, flavors I
had never tasted. 1 learned what it meant to be alive, alive, as no man can
ever be until he claims a fir.
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I learned that to be lirless and trapped forever in the shape of a man is a
torture of the kind no Cheysuli should ever experience.
I thought of myself as I had been: lirless, unblessed, a shadow of a man,
lacking a soul altogether.
And I thought of Rowan. And began to respect him as
I had never fully respected him, knowing only I had resented him as I had
resented myself, because we nei-
ther of us claimed a lir.
0 gods, I thank you for this lir.
Serri taught me the shapechange and the responsibili-
ties inherent in the ability. There was, he said, a matter of balance, a
matter of retaining the comprehension of self.
Without it, a man in Ar-shape who grows too angry can also grow too careless,
and he can tip the delicate bal-
ance. Tipping it, he loses himself, and slides over the edge into the madness
of permanent ffr-shape.
Because a man, he said, a a man; locked in A'r-shape forever, he loses the
thing that makes him human and becomes a beast instead.
I wondered aloud: would it be so bad to be an animal forever?
And Serri had answered that a man, born a man, was intended to be a man; the
gods, seeing how unbalanced the scale had become, and why, would take their
retribution.
And I bad said: Our gods are not retributive; that is a thing of Asar-Suti,
the Seker, the god of the netherworld.
And he had answered: It is a thing of all gods, high and low, when their
children go astray.
Aye, a trade. The putting off of human form and the replacement with animal
flesh and blood and bone. But where does the man-shape go when the man desires
the guise of an animal? Into the earth. We vouchsafe our
Human forms to the power of the earth, whose magic gives us the ability to
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