Thrice Bound Page 23

  Most amulets were invoked immediately by the client's touch and the spell worked until it was exhausted, usually for several days growing steadily weaker. Those with a triggered spell were invoked by a word or an action, released a strong spell, and were immediately empty. Hekate explained and Aietes stared at her for a moment in silence. There was no threat in his expression.

  "I thought I knew magic," he said, "but what you do is remarkable. Quite remarkable. Amulets are common enough, of course, but to trigger a spell hidden in a thing . . . that is new to me."

  Hekate shook her head. "Just different, my lord, not remarkable. It is a healer's trick, and would not be necessary to you. If a person is very ill and needs a spell that will bring sleep or ease pain, either the healer must go to that person or have the person brought to her even if his condition is well known and the spell could be delivered in an amulet. But if the healer herself did not deliver the amulet, which would make the thing useless because the healer could deliver the spell itself, the greatest good of the amulet, which is when it is first invoked, would be lost on a messenger who doesn't need the spell. Thus the need for a triggered spell. Then the amulet could be delivered inactive and the patient could trigger the spell with a single word."

  "Teach me," Aietes said.

  Hekate sighed. What a king could do with such a device to hold spells made her uneasy. "This isn't as simple as the other spells."

  The king smiled. "Somehow I didn't think it was, but we don't have to finish the work today. You can come again as often as needed."

  "My business, my lord," Hekate murmured.

  "Come after dusk." He smiled again. "I will provide an evening meal, and we can talk about magic."

  So they did. Six days out of ten a guard came for Hekate and took her to the palace and brought her home again. The winter passed and the skies were often clear, the wind mild. Hekate moved back to her mat in the marketplace three days out of every ten for she had noticed that the poorer clients did not come to the apartment on Sorcerers Road. Aietes asked about the move and she told him the truth.

  "I would charge them the same, but perhaps they were afraid my price would rise, or they were overawed by the house. Why should they do without? And I like the market. I gossip with the other stall-holders. They have very interesting things to say."

  The king looked at her for a time without speaking, but a ten-day later she noticed that he no longer bothered to shield himself against her. From time to time, Hekate would be washed by an impulse to drop her own, but caution prevailed. Then one night when the moon was full, Hekate was flooded with a violent temptation to dismiss her own wards. Why should she not? Aietes trusted her, why should she not trust him? He had other protections, but—

  Then Kabeiros, who was lying on the floor apart from her rather than sitting pressed against her thigh, said, *Your magic will still be invisible, but your mind and soul will be naked to Aietes' gaze. Do you want that?*

  CHAPTER 16

  The mental voice was thick and dull, like a man just roused from sleep—roused unwillingly because the instinct to protect her both for the dog and for the man was stronger than torpor, came before life itself. Suddenly Hekate's throat closed with fear—not because she had almost given herself into Aietes' hands to do with what he pleased, but because she had not heard Kabeiros' voice for so long—for ten-days? moons?

  With a terrible pang of remorse, Hekate realized that she had spoken very little to Kabeiros over the whole winter. Between her business every day and the king's summons nearly every evening, she was too tired to do much more than tumble into bed and fall asleep when she reached her apartment. Although she enjoyed her evenings with Aietes, she needed to be wary and the hours spent with him were always a strain. Still, he was a fascinating man, although not as strong a sorcerer as she had first believed.

  She discovered very soon that his magic had not produced the wonders of Colchis, although he was a master of illusions and of binding spells of which he had taught her many. Bit by bit after he had ceased to shield himself against her, Hekate learned what Aietes could and couldn't do.

  Not that she had tried to probe him; he would have known that at once, she was sure, and never trusted her again. Hekate could not decide whether he was deliberately giving her the information as a sign of his trust or whether he didn't realize just how much she was learning about him, because what she now knew came through the wonderful tales he told, mostly about his great-great-grandfather, who had been a foster-brother to the god Hephaestos.

  In an infantile attempt to stop a quarrel between his mother, Hera, and his father, Zeus, Hephaestos had been picked up by the leg and flung away so violently he had been crippled. His terrified nurse had fled with him to Hermes, who had "leapt" with them to the farthest place he knew, Colchis. There the king had taken the nurse and her three-year-old charge into his protection.

  When he had grown into his powers, Hephaestos had built the palace of Colchis and given other artifacts to Aietes' ancestor out of love and gratitude, although those emotions were not so common among the gods. Among those artifacts were the dragon's teeth—Hekate had been startled by receiving an image of a fang longer than her hand—which if planted under certain conditions, grew into the stone-eyed servitors, who were Aietes' guards.

  None of that was of any importance now. Hekate put a hand to her head and choked on her remorse. Her pride and vanity, her insatiable curiosity, were a curse. Like a babe with a new bauble, she had cast aside the solid worth of a familiar friend for the gaudy tinsel of novelty. Because she was no longer hungry for conversation with a trusted equal as she had been when they were traveling or when they had first come to Colchis, she might lose Kabeiros.

  Aietes was speaking, but Hekate had both hands pressed to her temples. *Kabeiros,* her mind whispered, *Kabeiros, forgive me.* But there was no response.

  She looked down at Kabeiros and it was only the dog lying there on the floor. The image of the man she used to see was gone. Had it ever returned after Medea had attacked him? Had she failed him so long ago as that? Hekate stared wide-eyed but unseeing at Aietes.

  "What's wrong?" he was asking anxiously. "Hekate, what's wrong?"

  "Forgive me, my lord," she muttered. "Suddenly my head hurts unbearably. Will you permit me to go home?"

  Aietes looked startled, but he said immediately, "Of course, my dear. Shall I summon a litter for you?"

  Hekate tried to swallow her grief and misery. There was now rage in Aietes' eyes and ice behind the gentle voice in which he spoke to her. But she could not be concerned with Aietes any more. Kabeiros was more important.

  "Thank you, no," she whispered, dropping her hands from her head and closing her eyes for a moment. "I think the walk in the cool air will do me good."

  As she spoke, a guard opened the door. She rose and then had to bid Kabeiros to come, which further frightened her. How long had she needed to give him orders as if he were, indeed, a dog? When the man had been present with the dog, he had always listened to her conversations and been on his feet and ready to leave as soon as she moved. She put her hand on his head, whispering silently, *Kabeiros, Kabeiros, forgive me.* But there was no response.

  Once out of the palace, she hurried down Sorcerers Road as fast as she could. Not a hundred paces from the gate, the sense of being watched struck her with almost physical force. Hekate shivered and walked faster, one hand locked on the loose skin at Kabeiros' neck. The watcher, who had glanced at her only infrequently over the past moon, had returned with greater than usual intensity. Perhaps Aietes had been made suspicious by her sudden retreat; perhaps the pace she was setting was too fast for someone who had claimed an aching head. Hekate didn't care although her mind instinctively provided the excuse that she had been hurrying home to her herbs and simples to obtain relief.

  In her apartment, aware of the scryer's even more pressing attention, she shook some powder into a cup, added water, and drank it down. Then she sank onto the carpet where Kab
eiros lay and laid her head upon his shoulder.

  *Kabeiros,* she cried as strongly as she could make her mind voice sound, *come back to me. Come back. Where are you?*

  *What is left of me is here.*

  *Oh, forgive me. Forgive me.* Hekate embraced the dog and began to sob aloud.

  The dog barely stirred.

  *Please, Kabeiros. Please. I've been so tired at night. I didn't realize how I was neglecting you. Why didn't you scold me? Why didn't you remind me that I'd promised to talk to you all the time so that you wouldn't forget you were a man?*

  *It didn't seem important.* The mental voice was still dull, although somewhat clearer. *While you needed me, while you had to hide your magic in the caravans and even here at first, I was a man for you. But now you have found another man, more interesting than foolish Kabeiros, likely more powerful too. What will you do with me when you marry Aietes?*

  Hekate was so shocked that her sobs checked. After a moment of stunned silence, she echoed, *Marry Aietes? Sweet, merciful Mother, where did you ever get such an idea?* She sat up straight. *I will never marry Aietes!*

  *Won't you?* The dog finally looked at her. *He intends to marry you. It has been in his mind, more and more strongly, since he dropped his shields.*

  *Why didn't you warn me?*

  *Warn you? How could you not know? I assumed you were pleased. If I could read the intention in him, how come you couldn't?*

  Hekate stared into Kabieros' white eyes and slowly shook her head. *I have no idea. Perhaps he could have buried the idea so deep that I didn't notice . . . but then, how would you have read him so clearly? I don't know how . . . wait . . . let me think. Sometimes I would feel confused when Aietes and I were talking, as if his words were blurred. Several times I was tempted, although not so strongly as tonight, to open my wards to better understand.* Her lips thinned. *Do you think he's been playing with me all this time in the hope that I would drop my shields so he could discover the secret of my `invisible' magic?*

  *Possibly, but then why should he bury his thoughts about marriage from you?* The dog also sat up and his "voice" was clearer, quicker. *Surely showing you that intention should have been an inducement to openness.*

  *Not if he guessed how I would feel about marriage to him!*

  *How do you feel about it?*

  Hekate shuddered and leaned forward to clutch Kabeiros to her. *The only man I will ever marry—if that man should be willing to take me—is you, Kabeiros. I have surety enough, over the years we have been together, that we are alike in mind and spirit, that there is nothing with which I would not trust you, mind, body, or soul. There is no other man—most certainly not Aietes—about whom I could say that.* There was a long pause, and then Hekate said, wonderingly, *I love you, Kabeiros. I . . . I didn't know it until now, but I love you.*

  Suddenly the man was beside her, squatting in and around the dog, one immaterial arm around her shoulders, one hand stroking her cheek and hair. The dog panted gently and turned his head to lick her cheek.

  *But I am not a man.* The anguish in the mental voice drew tears from Hekate's eyes.

  *You will be! You will be! I will never give up, never! I have been bewitched, flattered that a powerful mage-king should talk with me, should tell me his secrets and tales of the gods. Forgive me. It won't happen again. I am come to my senses.*

  *My forgiveness is easily won, but will that of Aietes be?* Dog and man shook his head, but the mental tone was all human, ascerbic. *I hope it's not too late. How does one tell a king that his attentions, which have been encouraged for some three moons, have become unwelcome?*

  The dry mental tone, completely undoglike, delighted Hekate, who released him and straightened up. *I don't know,* she admitted. *We'll have to think of something.*

  *We!* Kabeiros exclaimed. *You got us into this . . . * The mental voice began to drift.

  *Kabeiros!* Hekate bellowed.

  The dog jumped. *What? Why are you shouting into my head?*

  *I thought you were drifting away from me.*

  *Oh, no. I just had a thought. It's very strange you didn't sense Aietes' intention of marrying you, and what you said about sometimes finding him hard to understand made me wonder if his desire to have you for his wife might have been hidden by an outside force.*

  *Outside?*

  The dog lolled out his tongue in silent laughter. *Do you think Medea would be very happy to have a mother-by-law?*

  Hekate's eyes opened wide and a slow smile curved her lips. "She would have a litter of kittens!" Hekate was so enchanted with the idea that she spoke aloud, then recalled the scryer and added silently, *Yes, Medea. Now that you've called her to my mind, I wonder how I could have forgotten her all this while. Do you think my shields were not so impenetrable as I believed and Aietes spelled me to forget his daughter? If you're right and he wanted to marry me . . . well, what woman would want a daughter-by-marriage like Medea?*

  *I think your shields are sound. I think it was the way Aietes spoke to you, took you into his confidence—or seemed to—that made it seem he had only himself to please. It was a kind of suggestive idea that takes unobtrusive root.*

  *Do you think they could have been working together, Aietes winning my confidence and Medea waiting to seize my mind when I dropped my shields?*

  The dog was silent, his mind withdrawn into thought, the skin above his eyes wrinkling in his concentration. Then he heaved a great sigh.

  *I am also at fault. Because I was alone, I allowed myself to sink into the dog who felt less. I've been lax in my duty to protect you—*

  "No!" Hekate cried aloud, and put her arms around him.

  *Yes. I haven't been paying attention to the smell of power around us. It's very faint and I have to strain to pick it up . . . and I was in no mood for straining. That doesn't matter now.*

  Hekate hugged the dog to her. *We're together again.*

  The dog reared back a little, and Hekate released him. *Still, I can't believe they worked together,* he said. *I don't think Aietes would trust Medea to get into your mind. And why should he? If you dropped your shields, he would seize your mind himself. Besides, if they were working together, Medea wouldn't have blocked Aietes' thoughts about marriage . . . unless those were no part of the plan?*

  *That's possible, but I still think you're right. I can't imagine Medea taking at all kindly even to the pretense that her father might marry again, particularly to a very strong sorcerer.*

  *So we are agreed that if Medea interfered, Aietes was unaware of it. Now how can we use her to convince Aietes he doesn't want you to wife?*

  Hekate grinned. *By telling her the absolute truth: that I only realized today that Aietes thought of me as more than a friend and that, although I respect and admire the king, I have no desire at all to be queen. We need to think about this some more, but I might also tell her I wish to leave Colchis because I have despaired of untangling the draining spell from your shifting power or of finding anyone in Colchis who can help me do it. Oh, wait . . . another idea occurs to me. Why don't I ask her to tell me how she intended to do that as a bribe to leave Colchis forever?*

  *Never mind about asking how she intended to get the draining spell out of my power node. I know that. What she planned was to burn away the shifting power—*

  Hekate uttered a wordless cry and clutched the dog to her once more. *But that would kill you!*

  The dog leaned away from her to loll out his tongue in laughter again. *Did you think that would trouble Medea overmuch?*

  *Serpent bitch!*

  *Now, now. Let's not malign my species or that of the serpent, which is a clean beast, even if venemous.*

  Then the dog's mind went blank. Hekate tightened her grip on him. *Never mind her, Kabeiros. I will spread my shield so that it covers you also.*

  *No,* Kabeiros said, *you can't afford to thin the wards so much. I'm not afraid of her. I was just suddenly reminded of how she shifted to the serpent form. Why did she do that, Hekate? Why
did she expose herself to us?*

  *Because she wanted to see you shift so that she could learn how it works? I have no idea what I do to shift, do you?*

  *No, and what you say is possible, even probable. I agree that she wanted to see me change, but still there was no need for her to change form. She could have just told us she knew I was a shape-shifter and ordered me to change. No. She needed to be in the serpent form.* He paused then went on slowly, *Yes . . . yes. It is because she has powers in that form that she does not have in the human body.* His mental tone quickened. *Think, Hekate. As a dog I can smell magic. I cannot sense it as a man, except for being able to see the flow of earth-blood.*

  *You have it!* Hekate hugged him, then released him and bit her lip. *But can she cast spells in serpent form? You told me you couldn't do spell-casting as a dog.*

  Kabeiros ducked his head in the equivalent of a shrug. *I don't know. I think not, but you can cast spells in any of your shapes—*

  *Those I use are all human. I couldn't cast spells when I once took the body of a cat. That was one reason I never tried to perfect any animal form.*

  *You mean I could shift to a form other than the dog?*

  Hekate nibbled on her lower lip. *I don't know. So little is known about shape-shifting. No one—as far as I know—has ever dared to study it because it is so hated.* Her silver eyes glowed with interest. *Now that is something you and I must do—you can study me and I you—when we have found a safe haven. Think what we could accomplish if we could win control of shifting—*

  The dog had looked away and Hekate caught her breath, knowing his pain. She hugged him tight again. *You will be freed. I am bound to it and bound again. We will leave Colchis and seek our answer in Olympus.*