Sianim 02 - Wolfsbane

and looked at the privacy screen as if it were a detailed work of art rather than the mundane piece of furniture it was. One of his hands was still on Aralorn’s shoulder, but he seemed to have forgotten about it.
    “It’s all right,” said Aralorn finally, sitting up and pulling her legs until she could link her arms around them. “You don’t—”
    “It is not all right ,” he bit out hoarsely, tightening his grip on her shoulder with bruising force. He twisted back to face her, and his kneeling posture became the crouch of a cornered beast. “I . . . Plague it! ”
    Aralorn scarcely had time to realize that her cooling bathwater had become scalding hot before Wolf pulled her out dripping like a fish onto the cold stone floor. She took the time to snatch the bath sheet and wrap it around her twice before joining Wolf near the tub, watching as the water erupted into clouds of billowing steam. After a moment, she opened the window shutters to disperse the fog in the room.
    “I could have burned you,” he said, looking away from the empty tub, his voice too quiet.
    “So you could have.” Aralorn pursed her lips, and wondered how to handle this new twist in their relationship.
    She knew him well enough to know that heating the water hadn’t been a bizarre practical joke: He had a sense of humor, but it didn’t lend itself to endangering people. It meant that his magic was acting without his knowledge—sternly, she repressed the tingle of fear that trickled over her. Unlike Aralorn, his magic, human or green, was much better than the average hedgewitch’s: But her fear would hurt him more surely than a knife in his throat.
    “I should have told you before,” he said without looking at her. “I thought it was just my imagination when things first started happening around me. They were little things. A vase falling off a table or a candle lighting itself.” He stopped speaking and drew in his breath.
    When he spoke again, his ruined voice crackled with the effort of his suppressed emotion. “I wish I had never discovered I could work green magic as well as the human variety. It was bad enough before, when I was some sort of freak who couldn’t control the power of the magic I could summon. At least then it only came when I called. Ever since I started using green magic, I’ve been losing control. It tugs me around as if I were a dog, and it held my leash. It would be better for you if I left and never came back.”
    As he spoke the last words, he made a swift gesture, and the steam clouds disappeared from the room. Aralorn stepped in front of him, so he had to look at her.
    Smiling sweetly, she reached up to touch his face with both hands. “You leave, and I’ll follow you to Deathsgate and back,” she said pleasantly. “Don’t think I can’t.”
    His hands covered hers rather fiercely.
    “Gods,” he said, closing his eyes. Aralorn couldn’t tell if it was a curse or a prayer.
    “Green magic has a personality of its own,” she said softly. “One of the elders who taught me likened it to a willful child. It responds better to coaxing than force.”
    Yellow eyes slitted open. “Do you not have to call your magic? Just as any human mage would do?”
    “Yes,” agreed Aralorn, though reluctantly. She hated it when he shot down her attempts to make him feel better.
    Wolf grunted. “A human mage is limited by the amount of pure, unformed magic he can summon and the time he can hold it to his spell. The magic you call is already a part of the pattern of the world, so you have to respect that limit. I tell you that this magic ”—he spat the word out—“comes when it wills. If you are not frightened by that, you should be. Remember that my magic is not limited except by my will. This does not heed my will at all. I cannot control it, I cannot stop it.”
    Aralorn thought about that for a moment before a cat-in-the-milk-barn smile crossed her face. “I do so hate being bored. You always manage to have the most interesting problems.”
    She caught him off guard and surprised a rusty laugh out of him.
    “Come,” she said briskly, “help me dry off, and we’ll eat. My mother’s people live near here—maybe they can help. We’ll stop there before we go back to Sianim.”

THREE

    Aralorn walked to the great hall, with Wolf ghosting beside her, once more in lupine form. When she’d told him he didn’t have to accompany her, he had merely given her a look and waited for her to open