“I was a fool,” he said contritely. “I permitted my lust to overwhelm my judgment. I should have listened to Tepshen, and now I pay the price.”

  “It is done,” Kedryn returned, “and you have survived; do not dwell on it.”

  Brannoc shook his head, fixing hollow eyes on the bank. “I am less sure,” he murmured. “I feel ...” He shook his head again and Kedryn saw that his knuckles shone white where he gripped the thwarts. “I feel . . . unclean.”

  “You were poisoned,” Tepshen said from the prow. ‘The venom affects your mind.”

  “It is more than that,” Brannoc responded. “I am afraid.”

  This last was said low, and Kedryn saw that his jaw trembled on the words, his even teeth clenched tight, as if he fought an awful dread.

  “Of what?” he asked. “We are free of the changelings’ clutches and you heal apace. We have food and water aplenty, and we ride the river to Taziel’s mountains.”

  “I do not know,” Brannoc answered, and lapsed into silence.

  He spoke little for the remainder of the day, sleeping or staring at the forest that rolled past along the banks, and when twilight descended and the changeling creatures reappeared and set up their miserable chorus he sat huddled, shivering although the night was warm. He struggled again when Kedryn applied the talisman, requiring Tepshen’s strength to hold him down as he fought the touch of the blue stone, screaming, then abruptly slumping into unconsciousness.

  ‘This troubles me,” Tepshen murmured over the supine form. “His wounds mend fast as any Healer might cure them, but he fights the process.”

  “By night,” Kedryn amended. “By day’s light he complained only of the burning.”

  The kyo nodded, his sallow features thoughtful. “He spoke of something inside him. He said he felt unclean.”

  “Surely he was delirious,” Kedryn replied. “The poison leeched his reason—you said it yourself.”

  “Aye.” Tepshen’s mouth curved briefly in approximation of a smile. “But now I wonder.”

  Kedryn studied Brannoc. The half-breed appeared to sleep sounder now, but still he twitched, moaning softly, as though held by some malign dream.

  “You believe there is truth in his doubt?”

  Tepshen shrugged. “Mayhap. I know little of succubi, but I think it as well we watch our comrade.”

  Kedryn stared at the easterner, not wanting to grant credence to his fears, but filled now with an ugly apprehension.

  “You think him tainted? Do you say the changeling cut him deeper than his flesh?”

  “I say only that we be wary,” Tepshen answered carefully. “If he heals as I hope he will, then my thanks to the Lady. If not ...”

  He left the sentence hanging unfinished on the night air. Kedryn set a hand to the talisman, seeing its radiance shine through his flesh, outlining the bones. If not, he finished in his mind, then Ashar has tainted one of us. Would the Lady allow that? He looked to the moonlit bank, the nightmare figures standing there stark emphasis of Tepshen’s fears. Can the Lady prevent it? he wondered. Here in this unearthly place is even her power great enough? He shook his head, seeking to rid himself of such ugly cobwebs of doubt, and stared at Brannoc.

  Moonlight played on the dark face, flattening its planes, throwing shadows across the fever-hollowed sockets of the closed eyes. Brannoc groaned, his lips drawing back from his teeth. For an instant, as they glinted in the silvery light they seemed as fangs, bared beneath snarling jowls, and Brannoc’s visage was animal. Kedryn leaned closer, thrusting out the jewel, and Brannoc whimpered, turning on his side, raven hair falling across his face with a small tinkling of shells. Kedryn shook his head, dismissing that momentary impression of therianthropism, and resumed his stance in the stern.

  He slept as the dory drifted on, waking when Tepshen prodded him to take his turn on watch. It was, he judged by the position of the moon, some time after midnight and they passed a section of forest too dense to permit the changelings entry, for the darkness was silent, only the gentle lapping of water against the dory’s shingles disturbing the quiet. Brannoc slept, no longer moaning, and it was a tranquil scene, the river an inky blue streaked with bands of silver where moonlight struck the ripples of its passage, the woodlands ebon, merging with the velvety indigo of the sky, the dory itself encompassed by the effulgence of the talisman, drifting peacefully within its own calm nimbus. The current carried them steadily onward, as though the river itself bent to their purpose, obviating the need for oars or rudder. He touched the hilt of the great glaive propped beside him, studying the grim death’s-head shape of the pommel, seeing the curling claws that held it in place. They appeared separate from the ornamentation, and he thought that Taziel would easily remove the round of metal and set those claws about the talisman.

  With that thought in mind he stared ahead, and saw a change in the sky. The indigo hue brightened there, blue shading into a feint pink as if some unimaginably huge fire burned far off on the horizon. He blinked, not sure he could believe the evidence of his eyes, and squinted again into the darkness. Then the river turned, swinging wide around a jut of forest, and the glow was gone, the timber receding from the bank so that his attention was once more caught by the presence of the watchers, waiting along the shore, hatred redolent in their horrid chorusing. He started as Brannoc stirred, shifting where he lay, as if summoned from the depths of honest slumber by the howling. He saw the half-breed turn, almost rising from the thwarts, then falling back, moaning again, his hair dropping clear of his face so that he seemed once more oddly lupine.

  Kedryn clutched the talisman and told himself it was no more than a trick of the light and his own weariness, and did his best to ignore the unearthly stridency. It was not easy, for the therianthropes lining the banks seemed more numerous, their caterwauling more insistent, and it seemed to disturb Brannoc more. Several times Kedryn moved to still the half-breed as he twisted on his makeshift bed, hands with hooked fingers lifting to flail at the sky, his lips drawn back from his teeth as if he fought for breath, or snarled, though only a strangled moaning emerged. Once, his eyes opened and Kedryn saw the hazel orbs yellowed, like a cat’s but they closed quickly and he could not be certain of the impression, deeming it a trick of the moonlight, for the alternative suspicion was too unpleasant to entertain. He was thankful when dawn transformed the horizon to a pearly opalescence that shaded to pink, then gold as the sun rose, night’s indigo paling to azure, and Tepshen woke.

  The kyo looked to Brannoc then raised his eyes to Kedryn, brows arched in unspoken question. Loath though he was to express such doubts, Kedryn told him what he had seen, and what he had thought he saw. Tepshen grunted and moved to strip the half-breed. Brannoc groaned as the bandages were unwound, opening sleepy eyes, but offered no protest as his comrades examined his wounds. They appeared to be well on the way to healing completely, the inflammation gone and the gashes covered with healthy scabs. There was no sign of pus, and when Kedryn passed the talisman over the cuts, Brannoc did no more than stiffen, clenching his teeth. He remained silent as the strips were bound once more about his chest and midriff and his tunic replaced. Then he asked for food.

  It seemed a healthy sign and Kedryn rummaged through the dwindling supplies, passing the half-breed a thick slice of roasted pork and a chunk of somewhat stale bread. Brannoc wolfed the meat and nibbled gingerly at the bread, finally handing it uneaten back to Kedryn. He smiled, a semblance of his old self returning, and said, “I feel better.”

  Tepshen said, “You no longer feel unclean?”

  Brannoc shook his head: “No.”

  Kedryn told him of the glow he had seen and Brannoc smiled again. “We approach Taziel’s fiery mountains then.”

  “And you heal apace,” nodded Kedryn. “Praise the Lady.”

  “Aye,” Brannoc murmured, and closed his eyes, leaning back.

  He was rapidly asleep and Kedryn grinned at Tepshen, indicating the slumbering form between them.

  “It seems our doubts were groundless: he appears to recover.”

  “Mayhap.” Tepshen stared somberly at the half-breed.

  Doubt lay heavy on his luteous features and Kedryn frowned. “You disagree?”

  Tepshen shrugged. “I do not know. The cuts heal, but I like not what you told me.”

  With the sun beaming down from a sky streaked with high cirrus Kedryn was prepared to believe the night had played tricks on his eyes. “Surely, were he tainted by some fell magic,” he argued, “he could not bear the touch of the talisman.”

  “It appears to bum him still,” Tepshen murmured.

  “With a cauterizing fire,” Kedryn responded. “It must surely leech any venom remaining.”

  "Let us hope so,” Tepshen said. “And watch him still.”

  The kyo’s suspicion soured the day somewhat: Kedryn recognized it as a doubt that was, given their circumstances, healthy, but nonetheless felt it was a kind of betrayal. He had shared much with the former wolf’s-head, both joy and sorrow, danger and hardship, and to think that Brannoc was befouled by changeling magic, a potential threat, seemed a renunciation of their comradeship. Yet he knew that Tepshen shared the bond, finding in the half-breed a kindred spirit, and that the kyo’s caution was bom solely of concern for him and their quest. Still, he fell silent at the words, settling in the stem as the easterner resumed his vantage point at the prow.

  The day passed much as before, save that fewer changelings appeared and Brannoc slept, waking only when roused to eat. The dory drifted onward, held to the center of the river by the current, the woodland unfolding tranquil along the banks, interspersed with meadows and occasional tributary streams. Dusk fell, the sun descending behind the timber to paint the horizon with crimson as the shadows lengthened across the water, the rising moon bringing a return of the therianthropes.

  Brannoc roused with the first screams, sitting upright on the thwarts, his head cocked. Kedryn had dozed, waking as the ululation split the peace of twilight, and now he felt his skin crawl, a hand fastening instinctively on the hilt of his dirk as Brannoc’s face turned toward him.

  The half-breed’s eyes were wide, huge in the moon’s silver light, glowing with an unnatural, fulvous excitement. He stared hard at Kedryn, his shoulders braced and stretched as though he strained against himself, and his lips curled slowly back to expose teeth that seemed elongated, become more canine than human. It seemed to Kedryn, in that time-stilled moment, that Brannoc’s dark hair was grown more coarse, his straight nose flattened and spread, like a snout. He reached beneath his shirt with his left hand, the right still set about the dirk’s hilt, and drew the talisman out. It was not yet full dark and the jewels effulgence was consequently pale, yet still it outlined the nightmare transformation in horrid detail.

  Brannoc moaned as the glow embraced him, his head arching back, tendons standing out along his neck. Behind him Tepshen slid dirk from sheath, his lean body tensed. Brannoc shook his head slowly, his shoulders trembling, and a voice that was hoarse with the effort of speaking groaned a painful warning.

  “She has me! Beware, friends! I . . . cannot ... I cannot fight it!”

  He rose as the sentence ended, his body hunched, arms thrust out as if he sought to embrace Kedryn. Or to rend him, for the fingers were hooked and the nails grown long, curved and sharp as talons, and his words choked off into a savage growling.

  Tepshen rose in the same instant, springing forward with dirk raised. Horrified, Kedryn could only stare as the kyo’s hand came down, once and then again, driving the pommel of the dirk hard against Brannoc’s neck, where it joined the shoulder. The changed half-breed yelped like a struck dog and slumped to his knees. The dory rocked wildly. Tepshen struck again, this time with the edge of his left hand, against the base of Brannoc’s neck. The motion of the boat threatened to pitch him overboard and he fell across the half-breed, bearing the body down beneath him. Kedryn shook off his paralysis, lurching forward, ready to strike Brannoc, but Tepshen rose, clutching at the starboard gunwale, his face grim.

  “Quickly,” he snapped. “We must bind him.”

  They found cord and belts, lashing the fallen man’s wrists firmly behind his back, securing his ankles.

  “I thought you had killed him,” Kedryn said when they were done.

  “No,” Tepshen grunted, heaving Brannoc onto his side. “I would not—unless I must.”

  They studied the unconscious man, horrified by what they saw.

  Whatever foul poison the succuba had planted in Brannoc’s veins had not—likely, Kedryn thought, thanks to the talisman—transformed him completely. He was not become a changeling for he retained his human form, though altered, as if he were become a were-beast, his natural shape distorted. His features were flattened, the jaw thrust forward over lengthened, fanglike teeth, his ears grown small and pointed, his dark hair coarse as a pelt. His shoulders were spread, stretched back, his arms thickened, the hands bristling ragged fur, the nails become claws. He seemed poised at some transitional point between man and animal, and Kedryn felt a great sorrow as he studied the supine form.

  “He tried to warn me,” he said, his voice harsh with grief.

  “Aye,” agreed Tepshen, “and for that alone he deserves to live.”

  “Perchance the talisman will effect a cure,” Kedryn offered.

  “Mayhap,” Tepshen allowed. “But the bonds remain.”

  Kedryn nodded and went down on his knees beside Brannoc. He removed the talisman from his neck and held it to the wolfish face. Brannoc twitched, groaning, but there was no change in his shifted shape.

  “Perchance in time,” Kedryn said sadly as he regained his seat.

  “Perchance,” said Tepshen; no less miserably.

  “By day’s light,” Kedryn said.

  Tepshen ducked his head in agreement. Or resignation, Kedryn could not decipher which.

  Brannoc awoke during the night and struggled against his bonds, snarling furiously, but the cords were strong and the knots tight, and he could not free himself. His actions set the dory to rocking again and when water splashed over the gunwales he howled and fell still, confirming Kedryn’s belief that running water was anathema to the changelings. As the darkness dulled into the misty gray abstraction preceding dawn he quietened, curling in a fetal ball. The hoary light brightened, the banks becoming visible again, and the sun climbed into the sky, roseate light spreading steadily upward, driving back the night, becoming gold, and with it Brannoc resumed his human form.

  He lay silent in the scuppers, then groaned, shaking his head as does a man waking from a bad dream.

  “I dreamt,” he began, then halted, gasping, his voice rising to a wail as he became aware of his bonds. “Oh, by the Lady! It was not a dream.”

  “No,” Kedryn said, not knowing what else there was to say.

  Brannoc ground his face against the boards of the dory, his body heaving as he wept. Kedryn moved closer, setting a hand to a shoulder. Brannoc twisted, turning his face up. “Why did you not slay me? It would be kinder to slay me.

  ‘Tepshen stunned you,” Kedryn said, “and we bound you tight. We would not kill you.”

  Brannoc shook his head, in mute denial now. “I am befouled,” he whispered. “I would not become as Taron’s creatures.”

  “You shall not!” Kedryn answered fiercely, but Brannoc ignored him craning round to fix his haunted eyes on Tepshen. “You are made of harder stuff, kyo. Will you not end this misery?”

  Tepshen shook his head. “Mayhap there is a cure. Ifnot. . .”

  “If not,” Brannoc said harshly, “I ask you in the name of friendship to destroy me. Do you grant me that boon?”

  Tepshen glanced at Kedryn and nodded. Brannoc sighed, a soul-deep sound, and let his head sink.

  “It seems that by day you are safe,” Kedryn murmured, his hand still firm on the half-breed’s shoulder. “By night you . . . change. I think that if we secure you ere the sun sets we shall be safe.”

  “Better to slay me now,” Brannoc muttered; dismally.

  “No, ” said Kedryn, “not whilst some chance of cure remains. ”

  He stooped to the fastenings about the half-breed’s wrists then, aware that Tepshen drew his dirk, ready to strike, and tugged the knots loose. Brannoc eased his arms from their cramped position and chaffed his wrists, not attempting to rise. Kedryn unloosened the bonds about his ankles and took a hand, lifting it to the talisman.

  ‘Touch Kyrie’s stone, my friend,” he suggested. “If you are become one of. . . those creatures ... I doubt you can bear that contact.”

  Brannoc licked his lips, allowing Kedryn to place his hand upon the jewel. He closed his eyes, as if anticipating awful hurt, but when his fingers closed around the talisman he sighed and whispered, “I feel ... a calm. As when Gerat worked her magics upon me.”

  “Likely those gave you protection, too,” Kedryn smiled. “Estrevan and the stone together ward you against the poison.”

  “There is a further test,” said Tepshen. “Look to the river and wash yourself.”

  Brannoc frowned, but some little glimmer of hope sparked in his dark eyes, and he hauled himself stiffly to the thwarts, leaning over the dory’s side to cup hands in the water and splash his face.

  “Last night the touch of water gave you pain,” Kedryn informed him. “We need not. . . ,” he bit off “fear you,” saying instead, “worry so long as the sun is high.”

  “And when night falls?” grunted Brannoc, his voice bitter again. “What then?”

  “Before sunset we bind you,” Tepshen answered.

  “Will you bind me each night?” asked Brannoc mournfully. “Will you fear me each night?”

  “Mayhap the curse will lift when we depart this realm,” Kedryn said. “Or the talisman cure you.”

  “Mayhap,” Brannoc responded, his voice low. “But if not— Tepshen, I hold you to your word.”

  “My oath on it,” the kyo promised, his face solemn.