not only seen, but also to have spoken with the King of Deviance himself, Greatkin Rimble. He appeared for the first time, she said, soon after her eighth birthday. Rimble had remained her childhood companion. Then, at age sixteen, he had inexplicably abandoned her to the «justice of Suxonli'—just after she had danced for him and just after she had made love to a dark-eyed man professing to be Trickster's emissary. Kelandris shivered again, watching the lavender landdraw mist with dislike. The bright yellow of the leaves along Jinnjirri's border hurt her eyes. She regarded the color with the same hatred she reserved for the black robes she habitually wore. Yellow and black were Trickster's colors; they were The Wasp's Own. Kelandris scowled at the trees. Autumn was Trickster's glory. And her curse. Kelandris glanced around herself furtively. Making sure she was completely alone, she raised her veil in an effort to see the mist more clearly. The late afternoon sun warmed her bronze-colored skin. The autumn wind caught several strands of her thick, black hair. The strands trailed over her broad shoulders, silky and glinting with blue highlights. Her hair was alive and full of motion. In contrast, Crazy Kel's pale, green eyes remained cool and devoid of passion. Only the acrimony of her perpetual sneer hinted at the furies this woman controlled. At thirty- three, Kelandris was a woman aged before her time. Her lips were thin, her sex frozen. Black bangs blew into her icy, green eyes. Intent on watching the sideways motion of the lavender mist in front of her, Kelandris made no move to push the bangs out of her face. She stood alone, isolated—like a cold, stone statue at the entrance to a forgotten underworld. Neither ugly nor beautiful, Crazy Kel remained unfinished, her features as uncommitted as her passion. The woman in black frowned. She was trying to remember why she had left the Yellow Springs. Her lips twisted into an approximation of a smile. The girl, she thought. The Tammirring spy from Suxonli. The child who had seen something in the woods during the attack of the wild dogs. What had the child said in the darkness? What were her exact words? He's gone. Kelandris savored the words in her mind, wondering anew at their meaning. Abruptly, Kel's mood changed to anger. The child had seen with her inner senses what Kelandris could not! This puzzled Kelandris and simultaneously outraged her. Kel had been the Revel Queen—chosen by the Coins of Coincidence (also known as the Luck of the Trickster) to dance for Greatkin Rimble on the eve of his hallows. She was the one they had been waiting for; Kel was the prophesied he. She was the woman who could turn inside inside-out for Trickster. So who was this young Tammirring kitten? This rival vixen who would take her place? Crazy Kel's expression hardened, and she felt for her knife. This was a nervous gesture. Since yesterday, it had also become automatic. The Jinnjirri mist swirled. Kelandris considered crossing the river a little farther down, but decided against it. Moving south would bring her closer to the Tammirring girl. If she got too close, Kel was sure the Suxonli spy would pick up on her psychic nearness. Kel had already been hit once with a dart; she wouldn't give the child a chance to do it again. «If it was a dart,» Crazy Kel added to herself. She scratched at the small, angry scab in the middle of her forehead. This, too, was a nervous gesture. And like reaching for her knife, Crazy Kel was completely unaware of doing it. Blood from the torn scab wet the tips of her fingers. Crazy Kel frowned, staring at the crimson color. She swallowed, feeling queer, all of her psychic senses on alert. Something was going to happen, she thought uneasily. Something strange. Kelandris flinched. The mist had left the bank and was swirling toward her legs. Jinnjirri draw was sneaky. Like the gender and hair color of its people, Jinnjirri landdraw was extremely mobile, able to change its location. Kelandris took a step backward and nearly lost her footing on the rocks. Making a hasty but ineffective gesture at the mist with her hands, she said, «Shoo. Go away.» The mist ignored her commands. Kelandris took another step backward and slipped into the cold river. The water reached to her knees. Kel ignored the shock of the cold and continued to back up. Her senses became confused, jammed up. Gasping, Kel wondered if she had inadvertently crossed from Piedmerri into the outermost border of shifting, unstable Jinnjirri. Panicking, Kel put her hands up to protect her face from the invading mist. As she did so, she caught sight of the blood on her fingertips again. Blood Day Ritual— Sound in her ears. A drone. Kelandris stumbled in the water and fled to the shore. The mist followed. Kel's robe, now soaked with river water, clung to her legs and made it difficult to move swiftly. Swearing, Crazy Kel scrambled up the bank, the sound of the drone increasing in her ears. She put her hands on her ears, biting her lower lip in a silent scream. The drone. The sting. The blood. That night. In Suxonli— The Jinnjirri mist engulfed the woman in black. Ah ya, RIMBLE! The Greatkin of Deviance. The Patron of Coincidence and the Impossible! Rescue when there's none! Disaster when the world least expects it! The Sting! The Wasp! Old Yellow Jacket—tonight he will be honored! Kelandris staggered and fell to her knees. She rocked back and forth, her eyes shut, her hands clamped across her ears. The mist caressed her bloody forehead. So sing it, ah ya, RIMBLE! Come, Trickster, come. Be yet again. But beware his back door ways, the thrall of his disrespect! Beware the color of his striped coat, the prick of his maddening sting! Change or be changed! Sing it, Yellow Jacket Yellow! The Wasp flies abroad tonight! The mist slid down Kel's left hand, mixing with the blood on her fingers. But where is Trickster's Common Ground? Where is this year's Revel Queen? Where is the she who dares to be he? Why does she not greet her village chosen consort? He searches for the Wasp Queen and finds no one. He swears. He cannot find Trickster's Wild Kelandris. In a nearby grove, the Wasp Queen smiles; she is making love with Trickster's Emissary. And her hands are bloody… Yafatah squealed with dismay as she felt blood drip down the inside of her thigh. How could her bloodcycle have come so soon? Would she never get the rhythm of it? Surely, bloodcycles weren't this unpredictable? Or their flow this heavy? Rolling her eyes under her orange blanket, Yafatah was so put out with this messy turn of events that she failed to feel the first brush of the Jinnjirri draw as its mist tickled her shoulder. Her abdomen cramped. Shivering instinctively, Yafatah mumbled, «Why does the blood have to come right now?» Crazy Kel stared at her hands, the lavender mist lacing them together with cruel stays from the past. Lavender turned to red in Kel's inner sight and dripped. Crazy Kel blinked in horror. Animal whimpers of fear rose in her throat. She rubbed her hands on her black—
—and yellow striped costume. Crazy Kel pulled her veil over her face hastily. «You do well to cover your face, missy,» said Elderwoman Hennin. «Flout village law, if you wish. Break the Blood Day Rule. Dance if the blood comes to you on the eve of Trickster's Hallows. And see what happens. It matters little to me, but just remember this, missy: deviance has its consequences. Step outside village law, and you also step outside its protection.» Elder-woman Hennin smiled here. «You can be sure of one thing about Trickster, missy. He'll offer you no protection of his own. That's not his way. He'll dance you and leave you.» «But Rimble's not like that,» protested the young girl in the black and yellow costume. «He's a Greatkin. He's my friend.» Elderwoman Hennin met her eyes. «Trickster likes his dupes young. Know why? So he can make fools out of you. There's nothing nice about Rimble, missy. There's nothing the least bit nice about The Wasp.» Yafatah pointed dazedly at the Jinnjirri mist. She felt her mother reach for her hand as a gesture of comfort. The touch of her mother's hand hurt her heightened sense of touch, and Yafatah pulled away, huddling alone under her orange blanket. Images of the previous night's dreams presented themselves to the young Tammirring girl for the second time that morning. Yellow and black. Old Jamilla in yellow and black rags, motioning Yafatah to her side. «Go to Speakinghast. Before it's too late.» «Too late for what, Jammy?» asked Yafatah, bewildered. «For me to matter.» Yafatah blinked. «I doon't understand, Jammy.» «Fool,» said the old Mayanabi woman softly. Then, she pulled back her raggedy cowl of yellow and black patches. She had pied eyes. Yafatah stared at the old woman's face. «You be not me friend, Jammy! You be not me friend at all! You be Greatkin Rimble come to prank me!» Yafatah's memory of this portion of her dream became so vivid that she began speaking the words out loud. Fasilla turned to her in alarm. «Doon't get caught in the shift, child. Remember yourself!» Fasilla's Tammirring-born daughter ignored her. Getting to her feet in the wagon, Yafatah wagged a finger at something Fasilla couldn't see and shouted, «I willna' do for you, Trickster! I willna' turn, and I willna' go to Speakinghast! Elderwoman Hennin be right. You be a wasp! And you do be pranking me with blood!» Fasilla stared at Yafatah, her face pale. «Hennin?» she whispered. Yafatah met her mother's eyes with fear. She blinked, feeling very disoriented. Where had all those thoughts come from? She knew no one named Elderwoman Hennin. Yafatah looked around herself frantically. She could sense someone else in the mist. Someone half-mad, someone choosing—
—not to dance for Greatkin Rimble. Sixteen-year-old Kelandris stared at the blood on her hands. «The blood has come on Trickster's Eve,» she whispered softly. «If I dance, I don't know what will happen. Something bad, say the Elders. But I am Rimble's chosen consort. And he is the Greatkin of Deviance. So, I must answer his call. I must be worthy of being his Revel Queen. I must not be afraid of the unexpected. Or the impossible. I must be Trickster's he,» she whispered, her green eyes frightened. «But I don't know what that is. I don't know what that means.» Kelandris swallowed. «Laws are made to help, not hinder. There must be a reason why the Elders say: No Revel Queen shall turn for Trickster on the night of her first blood.» Yafatah frowned. «But this isna' my first blood. It do be me third.» Yafatah looked at the Jinnjirri mist as it swirled around her thighs. «And Speakinghast be too far away. I canna go there alone. I should stay with me Ma—» Crazy Kel blinked. «Stay with my mother?» She laughed bitterly. «Stay with the one who would not speak a single word in my defense at the Ritual of Akindo?» Crazy Kel's expression changed from perplexity to contempt. «Coward,» she hissed at the voice in the mist. «You're not worthy
