"Why?" Adhémar demanded.
"Chivalric duty. Mother would have approved."
"I was going to travel with them too," Adhémar said with a grumble. "At least for a bit. I think, however, thatyoushould return home as the crow flies."
"I don't like crows."
"I don't care. Go home. Morgan will be fine. I'll look for your wielder for another fortnight, then I'm for home as well." Adhémar looked down at him archly. "I, at least, am staying on task."
"And if she is y?" He shut his mouth before he said any more, but it was likely too late.And if she is your task? Miach watched the idea as it hung there in the stillness of the chilly air, brittle and fragile, so fragile that a single sigh would have shattered it beyond repair.
And then Adhémar snorted. "Impossible."
"Quite right," Miach said promptly, quickly waving the words away and leaving no trace of their passing. "I don't think I can take any shape but my own for a bit." He shivered. "Too much raw meat, you know."
Adhémar shivered in distaste. "Stay, then, but not overlong. I'm going to find a bed and sleep off my headache. I have another lump, but I can't fathom where I earned it. "
He turned and walked off, gingerly touching the back of his head.
Miach looked at his companions. They were still snoring in a duet that he was certain would eventually givehima headache. He sighed and rose, collected all Morgan's weapons and piled them into a corner, then removed his stool from between his sleeping companions. He wrapped himself in the cloak Cathar had pressed upon him, sent a happy thought his brother's way, and sat down in a corner to try to find his own rest.
He found it difficult. Too many questions, too many possibilities, too much noise.
And too much beauty lying before him.
He supposed it would be a very long night.
Chapter Eight
Morgan woke. She shifted, and a thrill went through her, as if she'd had a great sickness and its vestiges were still coursing through her veins. It was not unlike what she'd felt after the sea journey from Bere. Magic? Not unless Adhémar had been pouring his foul brew down her and she suspected she would have remembered that.
Well, whatever it was, it would no doubt fade in time. The best thing for it would be to sit up and face the day. She managed to get herself upright with a minimum of effort, dragged her hand through her hair, then froze.
There was a man sitting on a stool in the corner of the chamber, watching her.
She reached for her sword, and found nothing. She could tell without moving that the rest of her daggers were missing as well. She glanced about her casually but with deadly purpose for the rest of her weapons. They were, as fate would have it, all propped up about the man who was sitting on the stool in the corner, watching her.
He looked briefly at her gear, then back at her. "Everything is here," he said calmly. "I kept watch."
"Good of you," she said. She could defend herself with her hands alone, but that was generally a messy business and she was resting on a quiet nice mattress in what looked to be a decent chamber. It would be a pity to ruin all that. But she would, if she had to. She suspected by the way the man did not move that he realized the same thing.
Then she remembered who he was.
He was the man from the night before, the one who had flown into the clearing as a hawk, spewed forth fire, then changed himself into himself.
Hadn't he?
She frowned, then rubbed the spot between her eyes that had begun to pound. Sea travel was harder on the body than she had feared. First it was magical herbs, now it was shapechanging men. What next? Swords that sprang to life with magelight?
Oh. But that had already happened.
Heaven help her.
Morgan immediately shunned that memory and swung her legs to the floor. She waited until the tingling subsided, then forced herself to attempt a bit of politeness.
"Thank you for guarding my gear…" She reached for his name, but found she did not know it.
"Miach," he supplied helpfully.
