The House Of Gaian

world.”
    Aiden just looked at him for a long moment. “I suspect Selena is also someone capable of deep feelings for people, whether she’s known them for a long time or not.”
    Adolfo walked back into the clearing, followed by eager Inquisitors and wary guards. Hearing footsteps, the witch made muffled, distressed noises, but he ignored her, his attention on the cage.
    Alarm danced up his spine when he saw the broken cage bars—until he remembered the wood had snapped when he released the power, ft wouldn’t do to have these creatures loose among his own men.
    It wouldn’t do at all.
    Then he heard wood cracking, saw the blankets shift as limbs pushed through broken pieces of the cage.
    “Quickly,” he snapped. “Put the meat in the cage. Push it through that broken section.”

    The guards moved forward cautiously, jumping back when the creatures screamed, having caught the scent of meat and blood.
    “Quickly!”
    The first guard approached, the body of a dead falcon tied to one end of a long tree branch. He thrust the branch through the bars.
    The cage rocked with the impact of the creatures lunging for the offered prey. Something snapped the branch. Sounds of fighting. Of bones snapping.
    “More!” Adolfo ordered. Two other birds that the longbow-men had brought down were thrust into the cage. Then a rabbit, recently snared and still barely alive, was shoved into the cage. Then a chunk of meat from the hind leg of a deer that had been fleeing from one group of men and had run into the middle of another pack of guards hunting to supply meat for the cookpots.
    Five meals, all smeared with a paste he’d made to put the creatures to sleep for a few hours. Long enough for the guards to get them close to the Old Place—and Baron Liam’s estate.
    When the sounds inside the cage diminished to snarls and crunching bones, Adolfo took one of the branches, caught the edge of one blanket, flipped it aside, then did the same with the other blanket. He stepped back to admire what his power had wrought. One of the creatures was still transforming, and its leg revealed clearly what it had been.
    He turned and looked at the faces of the Inquisitors and guards. Shock. Revulsion. Fear.
    Smiling gently, he walked over to the witch. He fumbled with the blindfold before managing to pull it off.
    Leaning down, he whispered, “Look what your magic created.”
    She just stared at him as he moved to one side, as frightened as the rabbit that had been caught in the snare.
    “Look,” he said again, turning her head to focus her attention on the cage.
    She stared and stared. Then she screamed, the piercing, terrified sounds muffled by the bridle.
    Suddenly the screaming stopped.
    Leaning over her again, Adolfo studied the blank eyes, pressed a hand to her chest. Her heart still beat.
    She still breathed. But her wits had fled, and he wasn’t sure they would return. Not a strong witch in any way. No matter. She could be used for one more spell before she became too worn out to be useful.
    One by one, the creatures inside the cage fell into a drugged sleep.
    “Swiftly, now,” Adolfo said. “There’s enough time to ride to the Old Place before they rouse from this sleep, but not much more time than that.”
    The guards hesitated.
    “Move!”
    One guard pulled a knife from his boot sheath and sliced at one of the blankets until it could be ripped in half. Gingerly opening the cage, he took one of the creatures, wrapped it in half the blanket, and hurried out of the clearing to the spot where other guards held the horses.

    Three guards, following the example of the first, ripped the other blanket and bundled creatures into the pieces. The last creature in the cage was the one not fully transformed. The guard hesitated. There was nothing left to wrap the creature in. His hands shook as he finally grabbed the creature and ran for his horse.
    Adolfo waited until the guards rode off. Then he turned to his Inquisitors and gestured toward the witch.
    “Take it back to a tent. Give it water. Feed it if it still has enough wits left to eat. Take care of it. I need it physically strong and healthy for another day or two. After that...” He shrugged. “The men will have another use for it.”
    Aiden was already dozing off in the saddle as Minstrel crossed the bridge that would take them back to Liam’s house. If he’d been riding another horse, he might have stayed at the Old Place after finishing his watch at Nuala’s