Unicorn Point

“Let him go?” Tania smiled ruefully. “Because it were the only way I could continue to be with Bane, an the search went on. I am descended to that level, I would be with him on any pretext, though I know he will ne’er love me.”

Neysa gazed at her unbelievingly. Why should this woman make such a demeaning confession?

Tania held out her hand. “Touch me with thy horn, and verify.”

Neysa bowed her forehead, touching the horn-button to the hand. The touch was true; the woman was speaking truth.  “Now believe this too,” Tania continued, drawing back and waggling her finger as if making a savage point. “There be a geis o’ silence on Flach, imposed by Purple. Translucent liked it not, but came so close to losing the lad that Purple gained leverage and imposed this. Flach dare not commune with Nepe in the other frame, lest his dam and her alien mother be killed. In this way our side gains power and thy side does not.”

“The geis!” Neysa exclaimed.

“Now have I told thee. Now have I truly betrayed my side.  An thou wishest to see me die, thou has but to tell o’ this, mare.”

“But why? Why dost thou do this thing?”

“When I came to love Bane, I came also to assume some o’ his values, strange though they be. Now I be friend to Fleta. I would not see her die, or Agape in Proton. Or kept prisoner till my side wins, and then needed not more, and die anyway.”

“But an that happened, thou wouldst have clear access to Bane!”

“Aye. But now I would take him not that way. This be the measure o’ my fall.”

“But—“

“Enough, mare; the spell dissipates. Now it be in thy hands. Fleta knows not.”

Indeed, the little bubble was fading out; their privacy of vituperation was gone. Tania turned away as if smoldering;

Neysa stood amazed.

Fleta and Flach were looking at her, as if trying to judge the outcome of the encounter. What was she to do?  She had to get away from here! Now she knew what was wrong with the boy—and knew why he had pushed her into the encounter with Tania. He had known Tania would tell what he could not, for he was watched as she was not. The watching Adepts would not have been concerned about the quarrel between Neysa and Tania; that was peripheral.  She must not give away its true nature.  She had to hide what had happened. But how? She knew her life would not last long, if the Adepts realized what she had learned. She would have an accident on the way back, or she would die, seemingly of age. The Adepts were not bound by scruples—not the Purple Adept.

Then she realized what she had to do. But she had to hide it from whoever observed, by making a diversion. She had to provide some other seeming effect of her encounter with Tania.

She walked toward Fleta. “An the wicked Adept woman be friend to thee, can I be less?” She opened her arms.

“0 my dam!” Fleta cried, and flung herself forward. They met in a solid embrace, Fleta’s tears flowing. “0 my Dam!  Thou hast forgiven me at last!”

“There be naught to forgive,” Neysa said, and realized it was true as her own tears flowed. By this unexpected device she had been brought to do what she should have done eight years before, and accepted her foal’s decision. The barriers between species were breaking down, with Fleta’s union with Mach, and Bane’s with the alien female, and Suchevane’s with Trool the Troll. Neysa knew she should have been the first, not the last, to accept this new reality.  Then, not daring to dally here, she bid farewell to Flach, resumed her natural form, and set off for the realm of the land. Tania still faced defiantly away. Neysa ignored her, as was proper in the circumstance.

Would she make it safely back? At this stage she didn’t know. The Adepts would not dispatch her without reason, because it would be a pointless act of provocation at a time when they wanted things quiet. But if they suspected . . .

Then, just as she was about to pass through the bubble wall, she realized that she shouldn’t risk it. She had to act now, to ensure that the situation changed. Going back and telling Stile would take too long and was too risky. There was a much faster and more certain way—one that Flach should have thought of himself, had he not been cowed by the pressure of the situation.

She changed back to woman form. “I forgot the charm!” she exclaimed. Indeed she had; she would need it to pass through the water without drowning.

“I have it!” Flach cried, running up to her.  She accepted the charm, and embraced him. “I be old and forgetful,” she murmured. Then, directly in his ear, she whispered: “Tell Bane as he exchanges. Then wait.” She kissed his ear and drew back, changing back to mare form.  Flach stood, apparently stunned by the simplicity of this solution. He could not commune with Nepe directly, because the Adepts were alert to that, but they would hardly expect him to commune with the man he had so recently seen in person. Bane would tell Mach, and then the two most concerned would know the threat against those they loved. They would know what to do.