“Worked, did it?” asked my mother. “I told him to go close to the tent for just a brief time, then withdraw. Close, to get you loose—assuming it was Talent which held you, which it seems to have been—and then far enough away to let you use your own Talent to escape. Clever, wasn’t it. Not my idea, actually. Jinian sent him.”
“Where is she?” I begged.
“Just up the hill, boy. Don’t fume so. She’s quite all right, but she’s surrounded by Immutables, so your clothes won’t last.” She put Bryan down to burrow in her pack. “I have a sort of robe kind of thing here. You might like to have it before you go haring off. . . .”
I had it in a moment and tarried only long enough for her to hug me. Only that long. She let go of me reluctantly; there was a tear in her eye. I knew she wanted to hold me for a time, knew she had longed for my escape as a thirsty man for water, that she had ached and agonized over me—I knew that, but I was telling myself there was plenty of time later, and I was halfway up the hill before she could say anything more.
I found Jinian behind a rock on a knoll kind of place. Surrounded, as Mavin had said, by Immutables. Mertyn was there as well, and some men I recognized from Schooltown. I saw none of them until later. Jinian was all I saw. She caught sight of me then, and a kind of light came over her face. I forget what happened next; there were some things said as I recall—and I do, really recall. When we had done hanging on to each other for all our lives were worth, I settled down a little. Mertyn was shaking his head at me. Mavin was standing there smiling that outrageous smile of hers, her face quite clear of the longing that had been in it down the hill—almost as though she had set that need aside for the time. I remember feeling grateful to her and resolving to do something exceptionally nice for her soon. One of Mertyn’s serving men was waiting patiently with some trousers over his arm. Jinian’s and my greeting had evidently taken some time.
“How did you get out of the Bright Demesne?” I demanded of Mavin, hugging Jinian to me. “Huldra left half her army there, and all the shadows.”
Mavin shook her head, making a face. “The shadows were not following Huldra. No. There were Oracles there. At least I suppose they were Oracles, for they looked as Jinian described.”
Jinian gaped. “What did you do?”
Mavin laughed uncomfortably and described the technique she had developed to control Bryan. “A kind of basket,” she said, making a face. “Baskets were used for discipline back in the place I grew up. The only way to control a Shifter, really, though I never appreciated that fact until your son came along, Peter. At any rate, when Bryan misbehaves, I make a basket of myself, scoop him up, squeeze him into his own shape, and then hold him till he settles down.” She jiggled the baby, he crowing at her. Evidently he bore no ill will for having been basketed.
“And that’s what you did to the . . . Oracles?”
“Basketed and squeezed, yes. Only this time rather smaller than their natural shape. I’m afraid they were quite squashed. I buried everything under the tent to cause mystery and confusion among the troops. Evidently it worked.” She told us a few more details of what had happened at the Bright Demesne, concluding, “The shadows fell into disarray, and Himaggery managed the rest.” She spoke with a kind of weary pride, and I knew that despite everything, she continued to love Himaggery. Those two! I had never understood them.
“I wish it had been the real Oracle,” whispered Jinian. “Though I’m afraid they were only followers.”
“Well, there are two fewer followers now,” Mavin said, hugging her. I was struck, not for the first time, by how well these two seemed to get along.
Evidently there had been enough time for Huldra to regroup, for we heard trumpet and drum sounds from her lines, and everyone behind the stone became suddenly very busy.
The oldest member of the seven, Murzemire, materialized at my elbow and suggested in a kindly voice that I go with Jinian up to the caverns. “We’ve put everything in place already, everything a seven can do, Peter. Jinian’ll not be needed here for a while, at least. Your mother, too. I’m sure she’s tired from the journey”-not seeing or perhaps purposely not noticing Mavin’s outraged face at this presumption—”and there are more comfortable quarters up there.”
We were rather a cynosure at the moment, and I could understand her wanting us out of the way. Mertyn was shouting commands. Great pillars of flame had erupted from Huldra’s lines, fire elementals, as Murzy said in a horrified voice. “I really didn’t think she’d dare.”
“It’s all right,” said the one with braids, Cat. “We’ve prepared for it with water elementals of our own. Do get out of the way, Jinian.”
So we went up the hill, hand in hand, through the Immutable lines, on to the caverns.
13
JINIAN’S STORY: WITCH AND BASILISK
After all my longing and agony, Peter’s escape was almost anticlimactic. He simply showed up, wearing some kind of lounging robe, having escaped when the Immutable came near the tent, then hidden when the Immutable left again. Mavin, it seemed, had suggested that refinement of my original plan, and she told us about it in a chuckling voice as she followed us up to the Ice Caverns.
“Immutables,” she mused while Bryan burbled and chortled at her. “Now that’s the answer for you, grandson. You may try to gorble all you like, but with Immutables around, it won’t work. I think a
