Sianim 02 - Wolfsbane

can be part of the same gift. Did my father have a scent?”
    “What do you mean?” she asked, shocked at the inane . . . Wait, not such an inane question after all. “Allyn’s toadflax, I never thought of that. I don’t remember ...” A mouse’s sense of smell was not as good as a wolf’s, but it was better than a human’s.
    “Father had a scent that he always wore: cloves and—”
    “—cinnamon,” she broke in. “I remember. I would have noticed that. I don’t think he had any scent at all.”
    “Dreamwalker then,” said Wolf. She couldn’t tell what he thought about it. “Though it’s a rare talent, my father was not the only dreamspeaker among the wizards. Whatever you saw was not a real person but a similitude. Any dreamwalker who knew my father well could produce it.”
    “So it isn’t your father,” she said with a rush of relief.
    “I didn’t say that.” Wolf sighed and tightened his hold. “Dreamwalking is one of the two or three things that wizards are supposed to be able to do for a while after they die.”
    “There are a lot of dead wizards around?” Aralorn asked.
    Wolf shrugged. “I’ve never seen any. There are stories, but no one really believes them.” He hesitated. “It’s just that if any wizard would come back from the dead, it would be my father.”
    “So this is either your father or another wizard who knows a lot about your father.”
    “If Kisrah were a little better at self-deception,” said Wolf, loosening his hold, “it could even have been him. I never heard that dreamwalking was one of his abilities, but most of the great mages have several.”
    “Kisrah thought your father was a good man,” she returned.
    “My father’s magic was powerful enough to reach Sianim,” he said. “Certainly he’d have put stronger spells on any wizard close enough to smell black magic. On his own, Kisrah is pretty observant: He’d know if he was causing my father’s appearances in his dreams.”
    “I was hoping for the Dreamer.” Aralorn stepped away and began undressing.
    “You just think the Dreamer would make a better story,” he said.
    She frowned at him. “What’s the use of going to all this work if you can’t brag about it when you’re through? If it is your father, we have to be quiet about it.” She took a step nearer to him, then said suspiciously, “If I didn’t know you better, I would say that you’re cheerful. You are never cheerful around the subject of your father.”
    “My father isn’t a cheery topic,” he said. “But whether we are dealing with him, some other wizard, or a creature out of one of your stories is something that can wait. I think I have a solution to our more immediate problem. I’ve been doing some thinking while you were gone, and I’ve remembered a few things. If we can get Kisrah and Gerem’s cooperation, I think I can break the spell on your father.”
    She stilled. “Are you sure?”
    “My dear Lady, nothing’s certain in this life, but it should work.”
    “What about the possibility of Geoffrey’s attacking you?”
    “ If Kisrah and Gerem are willing to cooperate, it shouldn’t be a problem.”
    He sounded very certain, but so had Geoffrey.
    “Kisrah’s not very happy with what’s been done to my father, or his own part in it,” she said. “But convincing him that Geoffrey is . . . was . . . is— Plague it! —that Geoffrey was-and-is not a good man won’t be easy.”
    “Hmm,” Wolf said. “I think I might have an idea or two on that score.”
    He was, she noticed, dividing their problem into two: save her father and deal with his. That he believed her father’s ensorcellment was solvable was beyond good. She could feel herself relax into belief in his ability. That he was ignoring his father was less good. She worried that it was less confidence in his own skills than it was indifference to danger to his life. It was time to let him know what she had done.
    “Wolf,” she said, “I—”
    “I know,” he said with a wicked smile glinting in his eyes. “We’ve done enough work for now.” The smile left his eyes, and his hands traced her face.
    “I’ve never had a family before,” he said in wonder. “Not really. It feels so strange to belong to you and have you belong to me.”
    She looked up at him and opened her lips, but she couldn’t do it. Couldn’t tell him that she’d married him to force him to take care of himself, not when it obviously meant so much more to him