Page 192 of The Daughters of Avalon
“Aye,” he said, staring hard. “So she is.” And, somehow, though guilt should have tainted his admission, he said it without the least bit of compunction, as though it should be perfectly acceptable to covet two women at once—sisters, nonetheless.
Men were insouciant creatures. That fact sobered her. “Allmy sisters are beautiful,” Seren added, finding some small comfort in annoyance. “Each in her own way.”
“I have only met Rosalynde,” he said conversationally. “But I know Giles made the acquaintance of your elder sister.”
“Elspeth?”
He nodded. “When he took Rosalynde to Aldergh.”
“But you did not go with them?”
He shook his head.
Seren flicked her gaze away. “I was surprised to learn she did not remain at Aldergh.”
There was a wistful smile in his voice when he said, “True love, I suppose. It makes us do the oddest things. But, I must confess, she would have been safer at Aldergh. But you know your sister; she insisted upon returning with Giles.”
For Wilhelm, Seren presumed. “For love?”
“For love,” he said, smiling a devastating smile.
Seren turned away again, peering into the firelight, swallowing as she glimpsed Arwyn’s face.
Sadly, she was beginning to fear she might never again look into a fire and not remember the Whitshed aflame. It was still so painful to think about.
She swallowed convulsively, taking comfort in the golden-red color of the flame.
“Seren… there is something I should confess…”
Blinking away tears, Seren lifted her gaze to Wilhelm’s, loving that her name came so intimately to his lips. “What is it?”
The look in his eyes was so full of …somethingshe couldn’t name. Was he finally going to declare his affection for Rosalynde? Did he mean to speak the unspeakable—confess her this… this bond they were forming? But, then, even as she considered that possibility the red in his aura shrank back, giving way to shades of brown and black.
“I feel I must tell you…everything.”
“What do you mean,everything?”
He shrugged. “About what transpired with Rosalynde.”
Seren swallowed yet again, preparing herself for the worst. And yet what he disclosed wasn’t at all what she’d feared; it was so much worse…
He told her about the battle in the woodlot en route to Neasham—how Mordecai descended from the skies like a demon, shifting shapes, so he was one instant a bird of prey, the next a serpent and, somehow, the next, both.
A shadow beast?
“It was Rose and Giles who defeated it. She spoke words to bind it so my brother could take its head.” He lifted a second leg, wrapping both arms about his knees, turning his face so she couldn’t see the shame in his eyes. “And me… well, I sat on my arse like a knot on a log, too stupid to do aught but gape. My brother swooped in on his mare—like a delivering angel—smote the beast with his Palatine blade.”
Seren sat dumbfounded, uncertain what to say.
Shapeshiftingwas not a thingdewineswere inclined to, much less a common man such as Mordecai. “Art certain heshapeshifted?”
“Quite. Until your sister spoke those words, he was no more solidly formed than…” He waved a hand in the air. “Mist,” he said. “The man was a changeling in the manner of smoke, ebbing and flowing like the wind.”
“A shadow beast,” she whispered aloud.
There were references to such things in her grandmother’sgrimoire, though only in the manner of stories—no incantations. Cerridwen herself was ashapeshifter, but there was a difference between these two types ofmagik. Theshapeshifterwas never insubstantial, not at all like smoke. But only a very, very powerfuldewinecould ever perform shadowmagik.No proof of it existed in written form so far as she knew. Her grandmamau had said all knowledge of these darker arts—if ever they’d existed—passed away with the fall of Avalon. But then again… she blinked, realizing what more he’d said. “Palatine?”
Wilhelm gave her a meaningful nod. “So it seems… my brother is a Paladin.”
