Days of Blood and Fire - Katharine Kerr [182]
Side by side they darted toward the forest, but just as they reached the trees, Dallandra heard the wolf warrior howl. Shrieking, leaping up, their guards raced after, throwing spears, throwing rocks, cursing and screaming in rage. As the missiles tumbled by it seemed to Dallandra that they flew through falling mountains. Ahead she could see the pair of oaks and between them an unnatural veil of mist hanging like caught moss. With a chirp to the sparrow, she darted straight into it and through.
They were flying across a grassy plain, where tiny streams wound their way between hummocks of yellow flowers. Here and there at deep pools hazels and rowan grew in tangled clumps. Ahead on the horizon she could see a distant roil of smoke, such as marked the battle plain where Evandar and his brother often met. From behind them she heard howls, the baying of a wolf, the sharp yip-yip of foxes. When she risked a glance back, she saw the pack running after them, on all fours and in animal form, the wolf racing ahead, the bears lumbering after, the humanlike thing laboring along in the rear. She felt an exhalation of fear from the sparrow and knew that he’d seen them, too.
With every stroke she flew, the amethyst figurine slapped against her breast. She could feel it pulling her down, slowing her down, aching her already sore body or surrogate of one. Although she considered growing in midair, all her dweomer knowledge warned against any such foolhardy working, no matter where she might be in the vast scheme of interlocking worlds. She forced herself to think only of flying and live each moment as a single wing stroke. Although no natural wolf or fox could have outrun a bird’s flight, behind the two birds the pack was gaining. With a shriek the sparrow pulled ahead in a frantic flapping of stubby wings.
Seeing him, Dallandra recovered herself. She’d been thinking like a hunted bird, but with the pageboy free, she could use her dweomer. She deliberately slowed, letting him escape ahead, then wheeled round, letting herself drop low to draw the pack after her and heading for one of the hazel thickets. In bird form she darted among the snarl of shoots and trunks, found a spot of clear ground, and landed, hop ping among the twisted roots. She could hear the pack howling and grunting round and smell the bears as they began tearing at the thicket with clawed paws, pulling the withes out, rending the branches. A moment’s thought, and she stood in elven form.
The pack yapped and snarled, falling back a few feet. To them she must have suddenly appeared from nowhere, standing among the knotted shafts and foliage. Dallandra threw up one hand and summoned etheric fire. Blue flames blazed round and shot from her fingers and struck the bears full in the face. Screaming, they raised up on their haunches, seemed to shimmer, and reformed into mostly human creatures, stark naked, batting at their snouts and eyes with human hands, clawing at sparks, and yelping as the flames bit deep into their illusions of flesh. When the wolf warrior leapt for her, she flung a cloak of fire and caught him in midtransformation. Fur scorched but so did skin; a human head screamed on a wolf’s body. With both hands she threw blue flames like darts, scattering them across the pack, until the foxes and the wolf creatures turned and fled, howling across the plains. The ursine warriors fought toward her through one last shower of flame, then broke and lumbered after their fellows, dragging the humanish thing with them.
Panting for breath Dallandra pushed free of the thicket and watched them run toward the wisp of dweomer mist, hanging in the far distance. Their tiny figures plunged through; it blew away. She stood alone on the grassy plain, wondering where Evandar might be. Perhaps the page had flown to find