Elvenbane

Am I asleep and dreaming?

:You're not dreaming, child,: Rennis said directly into her mind, just as Foster Mother used to. :This is quite real. You aren't the first wizardling we've bought at auction, and you won't be the last. The only difference is that very few of the others cost as much as you did!:

She blinked, now completely stunned. 'But...'

'We only just managed to save you, you know,' he continued, ignoring her bewilderment. 'There was a real emissary from Lord Dyran coming to buy you. We intercepted him at the inn; I wore his face and carried his gold...and he woke up just in time to hurry to the auction and discover you were gone. That was probably when he also learned that his pocket was much lighter. He'll have a lot of explaining to do to his Lord.'

They wanted something, she thought suspiciously. Nobody would do this without wanting something. But she had learned enough in the slave pens to keep her mouth shut on that observation. Whatever it was that they wanted, she'd learn it soon enough. As long as it wasn't the secret of dragon-skin...

'What were all those rumors about'dragon-skin'?' his companion asked Rennis. 'It was all over the city. Something that was going to make a fortune for the Lord whose bondlings found the dragons. If I hadn't been staying in character, I'd have laughed my kejannies off. I've never heard so much bunk in my life!'

Rennis shrugged. 'Ask the girl, Zed,' he said shortly, turning to work on his own horse's harness. 'I heard less than you did, and I didn't bother to read Tarn before I put him out.'

Zed spend a moment with his packs before finally turning reluctantly to Shana. 'So,' he said in a condescending tone, 'what was all this about dragon-skin?'

She decided to lie and see if she could get away with it. If these people were reading her mind all the time, they'd know if she was lying. But if they weren't...or if she was stronger than they were...they would have no idea. It would be a good test, since she would then know exactly how private her thoughts were.

'I found these little lizards in the desert,' she said boldly. 'They had really beautiful colors, mostly because they were poisonous enough to drop a full-grown one-horn.'

'They could drop an alicorn!' Zed was clearly impressed. 'I thought nothing could poison those things but their own spite! That's one nasty lizard, girl!'

Shana nodded solemnly, encouraged at his response.

Evidently Zed, at least, was unable or unwilling to test her thoughts. 'It's funny, in the desert, things that are really deadly seem to be really pretty.'

Rennis looked up from his work and smiled. 'That is because nature has evolved them so that their colors advertise their danger to other creatures.'

Shana nodded; that was exactly what Foster Mother had said, though not in the same words. 'Most poisonous creatures are brightly colored, because they do not need to protect themselves with camouflage. And sometimes, their pretty colors attract the foolish and unwary to become their dinner.'

She continued her tale-spinning. 'Anyway, since they were really poisonous, they were pretty easy to kill as long as you did it from a distance; they couldn't move very fast, and they liked to spend a lot of time sunning. I started killing them because I didn't want any of them being where I was sleeping; I was pretty good at getting them with rocks. But it seemed a waste to just kill them...I couldn't eat them, they were poisonous to eat, too, so I started skinning them and I made a tunic out of the skins. The men that found me called it'dragon-skin,' I don't know why. And they wouldn't believe me when I told them where it came from.'

Zed snorted in disgust, and shook his head so that his forelock flopped into his eyes. 'Elves! There's always got to be a secret; someone's always got to be hiding something. They couldn't even tell their own mothers a straight story, and they don't believe anyone else would, either.'

For some reason, her story seemed to make Zed a little friendlier, at any rate, he stopped scowling at her and started explaining things, while he unpacked what seemed to be three sets of bedding.

'We're going to spend the night camped out here in the woods,' he said, pulling a metal bowl, and some things Shana didn't recognize, out of the bags he'd had tied behind him during the ride. He looked up at Shana, and raised an eyebrow at her doubtfully. 'You aren't going to have any problem with that, are you? This is pretty rough camping. I mean, there's no showers, no real beds, and not a lot to eat...'

It was her turn to look sardonic. 'I spent most of my life in hills drier than this,' she pointed out. 'With less cover and less to pile up between me and the rocks. I've slept with runner-birds and two-horns, on sand. I've caught my own food. I survived a sandstorm.'

The younger man blinked, his jaw dropping. 'Oh,' Zed said weakly, somewhat taken aback. 'You really are a wild child, aren't you?'

She shrugged. 'If you know so little about me, why did you rescue me?' she asked, voicing the question that had been eating her alive since the moment Rennis had told her how much gold and effort they had expended on her part.

'Because of the power, child,' Rennis said from the other side of the clearing where he was unpacking his goods, entering the conversation again. He stood up, and walked toward her. 'Magic is...noisy, so to speak. It makes something like a mental'sound'; the more magic, the more sound, unless you are very, very good...good enough to mask that sound. The more power, the more sound. Your collar inhibited your magic, yes...but to do so, it required power, and so created a sound. In your case, a very loud sound, which told those of us that could hear it that your own power was very great indeed. That was why we came to save you...your potential power is enormous, and well worth the risk. Now, would you care for something to eat?'

The abrupt change of subject took her by surprise, and she only nodded. Rennis went back to his bags and began rummaging through them. As Shana watched him, rubbing her feet, a question occurred to her. One that she did not ask.

Why would they need someone with a lot of power...and need her badly enough to risk getting caught themselves?

Rennis returned, and gave her a piece of fruit and some hard bread and a bit of dried meat. She thanked him, and since her legs still ached, stayed where she was while he and Zed set about making a campsite.

What did they want her for, she wondered.

But the answer was not forthcoming.

Chapter 14

THUNDERCLOUDS PILED BLACKLY Overhead, and the rumble of distant thunder was a constant undercurrent to the argument. 'No!' Keman shouted, his tail lashing. 'I don't believe you, Mother! Shana is my sister, she's more my sister than that lazy lump of spite everyone else calls my sister! She is in danger, and you took me away before I could help her! And I'm going back there, and nothing you can say is going to stop me!'

'Keman...' His mother glanced over her shoulder uneasily; they were arguing in the middle of the Lair valley, and his shouting was beginning to attract a crowd.

'I told you, I'm going back, and you can't stop me!' he repeated, uncomfortably aware that his voice was cracking from the strain, which wasn't doing much for the confident, adult image he was trying to project.

'Maybe she cannot,' a voice rumbled warningly behind him, 'but we can. The