"Great news," said Enric, "I've got the tickets! I'll see you in Richmond this Saturday evening."
         "Terrific."
         "Well, I think so, anyway; you don't sound so sure."
        I clenched my hands around the phone cord. "I want to be, Enric. I swear I do."
         "And I believe you, Kyriel. That's why everything will be all right in the end."
        I rolled my eyes. "You always say that, Enric."
         "And I'm always right."
        That brought a - slightly bitter - laugh from me. "You most certainly are not!"
         "Okay, then," he amended, "I'm usually right."

         "I suppose you think there'll be a chain around the tree this time, don't you?"
        Enric shrugged. "It could happen. The day's not over yet."
         "That's what you said yesterday and the day before - and this morning, and again at noon." I kicked a stone out of the road. If the Dwarves wanted us back, they'd have signaled already, not waited until dark just to come out and tie a chain around a tree."
        Enric looked up at the sky, which still showed a trace of color in the west. The east was already black as pitch. "There's still plenty of light out. Besides, they could have lanterns. Who knows? Maybe they're preparing a feast for us and they couldn't get away before now."
        I made an exasperated noise. "Come on, Enric, you can't really believe that."
        We'd come to the last bend in the road; the tree was just around the corner.
         He took my hand. "No," he said, "I don't, really. I just like to hope for as long as I can."
        We rounded the bend. The tree loomed above us, a triad of black and twisted boles, bright only where the lightning had struck it. Far above our heads, a jagged scar rent one trunk down to its pale core. The other trunks leaned outwards from it, as though afraid the destruction was contagious. Despite its color, however, the tree looked basically healthy.
        I'd done it again: focused on the upper branches and the lightning scar to avoid the bare base of the tree. Reluctantly I dragged my eyes downward. There was no chain.
         "That's it, then," I sighed. "We're not welcome here."
         "I suppose not," Enric agreed.
        For some reason, we both kept walking toward the tree. Perhaps even I harbored some faint hope that we'd been mistaken.
        Suddenly, from behind the leftmost trunk a lantern flared. My night vision adjusted and soon I could make out a small figure standing next to the tree. She didn't move or speak, only waited for us to approach.
         "Hello, Meli," said Enric. "I don't suppose you've come to invite us back to Mornegald."
        The Dwarf's face was a mask of misery. "No, I've come to apologize. I never should have told King Aglor about you two."
        The look in her eyes forced me to assume the worst. "You're not in trouble, are you? He hasn't banished you?"
        Quickly she shook her head. "No," she sighed. "It's worse than that. He said I was to be commended for telling him the truth."
         God, I thought, please don't let that mean he's coming after us.
        Meli twined her fingers through the braids of her beard. "He said I was to be commended just as you were to be commended, and then he gave me this-" Reaching into her pack she pulled out a mithril shirt, nearly identical to the pair he'd given Enric and me. "I can't bear to put it on, but I can't bear to throw it away, either."
        Silence hung between us as we considered the bribe.
         "So," said Enric, "what are you going to do?"
         "I don't know. Go home, I guess." Paradoxically, she sat down and leaned into the tree. "They're my people; I can't leave them. I don't want to leave them. But I can't just cut you off the way he wants me to, not after all you've done for me. You didn't even tell anyone what the men did; you let them think it was only robbery...and murder." Her hands began to shake, and she twisted them even tighter into her beard. "It was hard enough losing Urd, without having to tell the King about the other."
        We sat down beside her. "You didn't have to tell him-" I began, but she shook her head fiercely.
         "No, I did! It was my last chance to make him see what I owed you, what we owed you. I thought he wouldn't cut you off if he just knew the whole story." She spat on the ground, then continued in a dead-on impersonation of the King's voice. "'Meli, I understand your point of view, and I'm sure these people are every bit as harmless as you say. Truly, I wish there were some other way to deal with them. But I am a politician, and I must bow to the will of my people.'" Her shoulders shook.
        For a moment I thought she was crying, but I should have known better. It was laughter of the bitterest sort. "What a load of shit! He is afraid of you. He's so afraid that, if you hadn't left before I told him the truth, he'd never have said a word to you himself. But this way, all he had to do was not do anything. Ignore you, and the problem takes care of itself!" Meli shook her head. "And the worst part is, I gave him the opportunity to do it. I never should have told him the truth."
         "Don't think that," said Enric, squeezing her hand. "We never wanted you to betray your people for us."
         "But what about betraying you for my people? This is how I've thanked you for saving my life."
         "No," I soothed, "how you thanked us was defending us before your King, at the cost of great personal pain; and coming out here alone to apologize even though you knew what we were. That's the greatest honor you could have given us."
         "Besides," added Enric, "it's a nice change, really, being insulted and ignored. Usually we're insulted and attacked."
        That brought a smile to the Dwarf's face.
        It was an incredible honor, I reflected. Meli knew full well what could happen if she'd judged us wrongly. We might have torn her limb from limb. Yet here she sat, alone in the dark with a pair of monsters - holding hands with a werewolf, no less! I thought back to our confrontation in the Pillar Hall, when I'd expected an axe in my face any moment. How could she have changed so much in such a short time? "Meli," I asked, "when did you know it was safe to trust us?"
        She seemed surprised by the question. "I don't know; it didn't happen all at once." She blinked. "But I suppose it must have started back in the cart, that first night. I woke up hurting all over, with two strangers in my face and Urd dead behind me-" For the first time that night, she met my eyes- "And you cried with me." She reached out and took my hand, the first time she'd touched me of her own accord.
         "I'm sorry I didn't appreciate it at the time. But when we were arguing, when you said you'd leave in peace, I saw the same expression on your face and remembered. And when you really did leave in peace, I knew." She sighed. "It was a long process, maybe too long. But that was where it started: you cried with me."
        Her color had improved, I suddenly realized. I thought about telling her, but was interrupted by a flurry of barks in the distance.
        Enric's eyes met mine. "Kyriel, do you hear that?"
        I nodded. The Dwarves kept no dogs, and humans never hunted near Mornegald. "I don't like it."
        Pulling away her hands, Meli glanced nervously between us. "What is it?" she asked. "What do you hear?"
         Let Enric take care of the explanation, I thought. Those barks weren't nearly far enough away. I leaped into the air.
        
        It was a short flight, straight down the mountain to the source of the noise. I'd wrapped myself in shadow as a precaution, but soon realized that I needn't have bothered. The mob carried no torches and only a handful of lanterns, shuttered to within an inch of darkness. They could barely see the road in front of them, much less the air above. I swooped low over the crowd, counting heads.
        There were fifty-three humans and twenty dogs, and they'd just passed the first switchback leading to Mornegald. Urssela herself strode at their head, a longbow across her back and a look of deadly determination on her face. About fifteen others bore similar arms, while the rest carried hatchets or swords. At the rear, a pair of men pulled a cart laden with Molotov cocktails. The dogs were all leashed and muzzled - although one, at least, had escaped long enough to warn us of its presence. And a good thing it had: not even Enric and I would have noticed them otherwise, not until they were practically on top of us.
        I darted back to the tree and made a quick report.
         "This is all our fault," I told Meli. "We left the bodies by the road when we rescued you that night. Urssela must think the Dwarves are to blame."
         "I'm sure she's delighted," Meli answered sourly. "I've heard all about that woman. She preaches peace, but she'd have attacked us long before if only we'd given her an excuse."
         I knew it! Smugness flared within me. And now, at last, I'd have the chance to make her pay for her hatred.
        Enric shook his head. "It doesn't make sense," he said. "Fifty humans against all of Mornegald? They don't stand a chance."
         "No, not against Mornegald." Meli twisted her beard. "Kyriel, where, exactly, did you see the mob? Were they on the switchbacks or a side trail?"
         I pulled myself back to the moment and thought hard. The road to Mornegald climbed the mountain in a series of switchbacks, many of which branched into smaller side trails. In my concentration on numbers - and on Urssela - I'd never stopped to consider the actual route of the mob. But I could see it in my head now, clearly enough. "They turned south at the first switchback."
        Meli nodded. "That's the way to the Lace Halls, on the eastern face of the mountain. We keep a few guards stationed there, but even if they raised an alarm, it would take over an hour for reinforcements to arrive."
         "How many guards?" I asked. "Few enough for fifty humans to take them?"
        Meli grimaced. "Few enough for twenty." She shook her head in disbelief. "They're just a few small caves, independent from the main halls; we never thought they'd be attacked, except by vandals."
         "How many guards?" I demanded.
        The Dwarf looked miserable. "Twelve, but only four on duty at any given time. They'll be slaughtered."
         "No, they won't," said Enric firmly. "What's the quickest, straightest way down the mountain?"
         "There are a few walking tracks that go down between the switchbacks. They're made by kids, mostly."
         "That'll do," said the werewolf. He turned to me. "I'll cut off the attackers, you warn the guards, eh?"
         "Right," I nodded. "And I'll meet you back at the mob." We kissed; then he changed and tore off down the road, nose to the ground, searching for the nearest Dwarf track.
         "What about me?" Meli yelled, as I took to the air behind him.
         "Stay where you are," I called. "You'll be safe here!"
        
        The Lace Hall would have been easy to spot from the ground; from the air, they were impossible to miss. Dwarf-sized braziers burned on either side of massive iron doors. Four Dwarves stood guard around the entrance: one on either side, and a pair on the battlement above. I remembered the calls that had signaled our arrival at the Dwarf hold, and was glad to see that the Lace Hall guard carried horns. There must be a chain of watchers all along the mountain, I thought; the warning would reach Mornegald in minutes. On the other hand, if not for that blessed dog, Urssela could have short-circuited the alarm system with a few well-placed arrows. Then she'd have found the gate key on a body and forced her way inside. Fifty humans against eight Dwarves: it would have been a massacre. And with no warning to Mornegald, the bodies might have lain there for days before anyone found them.
        I touched down in the dark behind the ponies' pen and raced toward the gate, making as much noise as I could. The last thing I wanted was to surprise a guard into firing at me. At the sound of my feet, the Dwarves sprang to attention and drew their bows, aiming them down the path in my direction.
        "It's Kyriel," I called, raising my hands and stepping slowly into the light. "Remember me? My partner and I rescued Meli from the robbers."
        The bows drooped only slightly. "I remember you," said one wary Dwarf who wore the insignia of a captain. "I heard you'd left."
         And did you hear why? But this was no time for bitterness. "We were leaving," I told him, "but we came back to warn you: there's a mob of about fifty angry Junders on their way toward the Lace Halls, and they've already passed the switchback. You need to call for reinforcements and get to safety."
         "Why would they attack us here?"
         "Revenge," I snapped, infuriated by his apparent lack of concern. I didn't have time for this. "They don't know about me and Enric; they think Dwarves killed those men outside Orit. Now listen, they're less than thirty minutes away; you have to call for reinforcements immediately. In the meantime, Enric and I will try to hold them off, but I can't guarantee anything. Make the call, then lock yourselves inside the Halls."
        I could practically see the wheels turning in the captain's mind: was this some kind of trap? If I have to convince one more mule-headed Dwarf - or human, for that matter - to trust me....
        Suddenly, from far out in the darkness, a howl went up: Enric calling the dogs. The captain shuddered visibly.
         "They're coming," I told him again. "They've got dogs and long bows and materials for explosives, and I need to get back out there to try to stop them. Now, will you please just do as I say?"
        It certainly wasn't my words that convinced him. Maybe it was the look on my face, or the fresh spate of howls from Enric's direction. Maybe it was simple grace. At any rate, the captain commanded his guards to lower their weapons and get inside.
        The horn sounded as I disappeared into darkness.
        
        I found the mob in a narrow dell, bounded on one side by a steep wooded hill and on the other by a hundred-foot drop. Some of the villagers had climbed into the woods in search of their errant dogs. The canines had revolted en masse at Enric's call, but now he had to free his troops before they were recaptured. I watched him from above, cutting away the dogs' muzzles as they clustered around him. Those already free spread out in a sort of shield, but they made an easy target and the villagers were closing fast. Only the steep terrain had kept the rebels free this long.
        Hurriedly, I cast a blanket of shadow over the woods. Not even Enric could see in this sort of dark, but I trusted him and the dogs to navigate by smell. Besides, they had the added advantage of four-legged balance. The humans, meanwhile, lost their bearings and tumbled quickly down the hill.
        Hearing the screams, the mob, which had already halted because of the dogs' revolt, drew their weapons. I threw a bowl of darkness over them all, closing them in with their own frightened faces and fearful cries. What kind of witchcraft was this? Was it some kind of Dwarf trick? But sorcery was supposed to be a human art! Urssela's steady voice carried over the crowd: "Keep your heads, people, keep your heads!" Lanterns flared in the darkness.
        I could see her through my self-made shadow, hand raised, radiating command. It wouldn't take her long to figure out that my walls were as solid as smoke. I had to act while she was still confused. The problem was, there'd been no time for Enric and me to form a plan. I knew my partner would want to avoid violence as far as possible; and so would I, under normal circumstances. But Urssela infuriated me more than any inhuman monster I'd ever encountered. I didn't know how long I could - or should - restrain myself with her. Stay calm, Kyriel, I told myself, and stay human. If we were to have any chance of turning this mob around without bloodshed, Enric and I had to keep our human shapes. Let the Junders believe we were sorcerers; that way they'd fear us more than they hated us. It made for better crowd control.
        I drew a deep breath, then dropped to the ground and stepped through the shadowy walls. "Urssela," I called, "what have you gotten yourself into this time?"
        Urssela spun to face me, all flashing eyes and wary defiance. She recognized my face instantly. "I should have known you were a witch when I saw you in the tavern," she said. "You aligned yourself with the devils even then." She raised her bow, and those around her instantly followed suit. "If we kill you," she said steadily, "this false darkness should disappear."
        It wasn't hard to control my fear, not when my fury was so much stronger. "Probably," I agreed. "But I won't be easy to kill. And what will you do about the dogs?" I gestured toward the hill and my bowl expanded, revealing Enric and his troops descending on the mob. The archers shifted aim toward the new threat.
         "Don't shoot!" warned Enric. "They won't attack you unless you attack first." But he'd drawn his own sword, and he forced the men pulling the cart to drop the handles and retreat toward the rest of the mob. Then he stationed his troops in the space between.
        Urssela let her bow droop slightly, assessing the situation. Don't give her time to think, Kyriel. I folded my arms across my chest and spoke again. "Tell me something, Urssela. When we were back in the tavern, you said it was your policy to leave all judgment to the One. Yet here you are now, with your swords and bows and explosives, ready to take matters into your own hands. What changed? Did you finally realize God wasn't on your side after all?" As I spoke, Enric began tossing unlit Molotov cocktails over the cliff.
        Breaking glass punctuated Urssela's response. "Judgment does belong to the One," she answered, resolutely ignoring the commotion, "and the One has spoken through me." She raised her voice to be sure the mob could hear. "The rockheads killed six good men last week and left their bodies to rot. That's how little they think of us. They're not afraid at all; they think they can do whatever they want and then run back to their filthy holes where we can't get to them. They need to be taught a lesson. We can get to them, and we will." Her bow came up again, pointing directly at my heart. "And no pair of two-bit witches will hold back our justice."
        Darkness oozed from my pores. "Dwarves didn't kill those people," I sneered. "Enric and I did. We found your 'six good men' robbing a pair of innocent peddlers, and we stepped in to save them."
        Urssela's bow held firm, although some around her wavered. "Dwarf peddlers?" she asked coolly.
         "Would it matter? Do you really think it's a crime to attack innocent humans, but it's all right to attack innocent Dwarves - is that what the One told you? And I guess they burned Chresta at the stake for telling people to hate each other!"
        A clatter from above stopped Urssela's reply. We looked up together and saw a minor avalanche of pebbles, closely followed by a falling Dwarf. I groaned inwardly; it was Meli.
        She fetched up against a rock about forty feet over my head, with a crack that made my own bones ache in sympathy. Her face paled even before the pack of longbows swung in her direction.
         "There's no such thing as an innocent Dwarf," snarled Urssela, and let her arrow fly.
        Meli wore the usual Dwarf helmet and armor, but Urssela had aimed well. I leapt for the arrow and intercepted it only a yard or two from Meli's head. I'd intended to catch it by the shaft, but instead it caught me: straight through the palm of my right hand. I screamed loud enough to make the crowd beneath me cower. Then again, they might have done that anyway, considering the way I'd intercepted that arrow. And still I hung in the air, wringing my injured hand. I longed to pull out the arrow and heal it, but I didn't dare take my attention off the crowd.
         "It's not so easy, is it?" I taunted them, "shooting an unarmed woman?" My hand throbbed in time with my pulse, making it difficult for me to concentrate, but I gritted my teeth and hung on. "Give it up, all of you! I won't let you hurt an innocent Dwarf!"
        Seemingly unperturbed, Urssela fit another shaft to her string. "The witch may be able to stop one arrow," she called, "but let's see her try to stop sixteen." She raised her bow. "Everyone: on my mark!"
        Nine archers complied. As for the rest, they looked uncertainly at their bows, the ground, anywhere but Urssela's scalding eyes. She tossed off the rebellion with a shake of her head. "Cowards!" she spat, and swung back toward Meli. "The rest of you: fire now!"
        Urssela was right: I couldn't stop that many arrows at once...not with one hand, at least. But in their hesitation I'd reached a decision. I wouldn't stay human another moment.
        Black flames exploded around me and my body and wings expanded into an airborne shield - just in time to catch a score of arrows. The pain in my hand was nothing compared to this. I roared until the rocks shook, then crumpled in on myself and dropped like a crippled bird. But as I dropped, I shifted back to human form, setting the arrows free. I landed in a crouch, thin shafts clattering around me, and the Fury re-ignited. "Want to try again?" I growled.
        Urssela reluctantly lowered her bow.
         "I thought not," I sneered. "In that case-" I flung myself across the clearing and seized her by the throat. She didn't speak - couldn't, with her throat inside my fist. I lifted her off the ground and brought her face to mine. Snakes writhed and hissed around my head, straining to tear into the enemy, but for the moment I held them back.
        The attack on Urssela was too much for the mob. Previously they'd been paralyzed by fear; now they were galvanized by it. In their panic they'd turned against Enric and his dogs, desperate to find a way back down the pass. The werewolf was forced to shift shape just to defend himself. "Stay where you are!" he shouted, swinging wildly with sword and claws. The dogs clustered tightly behind him out of reach. "You won't be harmed if you just stay put!" He fastened his claws around an incoming club and yanked it out of its owner's hands. Tossing it down the mountain, he repeated again, "Stay put - and don't hurt the dogs!"
        The pure Enric-ness of that last command brought me back to earth...for a moment, anyway. He needed help. I opened my mouth wide and screamed as loudly as I could - a move guaranteed to turn every head in my direction. All who met my eyes were instantly paralyzed, about half the crowd. The rest, trapped between dogs, darkness, and frozen comrades, might as well have been paralyzed, too. They were now completely at our mercy.
        The thought made my head spin with something like glee. I lifted my hand to call for the iron dagger and turned back to Urssela. It would be a pleasure to pierce that hardened chest, that blackened heart. But my face fell as I saw what I held in my hand. The bigot's head lolled limply in my grasp. Her face was purple, her eyes and tongue bulging, fluid leaking from every orifice. I'd killed her already, and I hadn't even meant to.
        Stunned, I dropped the body. This wasn't how a Fury did it, I thought. There was no deliberation here, no justice - just rage out of control. I was no better than this lynch mob.
        Nevertheless, my rage remained. I might not have given Urssela the death she deserved, but there was no question in my mind that she deserved death. As for the lynch mob, maybe I was out of control, but dammit, they'd pushed me to this point! All that talk about rockheads and moles, all their jokes about women with beards, all their smug fucking superiority. Their rage fueled my rage; so it stood to reason that if I could just wipe them off the face of the earth, I might have a little peace. Yes, Urssela had cheated me out of a clean kill - but there were plenty more where she came from. The dagger burned in my hand. I reached for the nearest victim, a frozen archer, and grabbed him by the shirt front.
         "Kyriel, no!"
        Reverting to human form, Enric shoved his way to the front of the crowd. "You can't do it this way," he shouted in English. "They're helpless!"
        Only Enric would think of attempting a private conversation in the middle of a battle. How very fucking reasonable of him. I answered him, quite intentionally, in dreamtongue.
         "Helpless?" I sneered. "Like Meli and Urd were helpless back at the crossroads?"
        Enric reached my side and grabbed the archer's paralyzed shoulder. "You know what I mean," he said, still in English. He tried to pull the man away, but I held on tight. The snakes whirled on Enric, giving me a moment's horror, but I reigned them in and held onto my anger.
         "No, Enric, I don't. If you mean they can't move, then just look at Meli. She couldn't move either, when they shot at her just now!"
         "But not all of them did shoot at Meli; you saw that for yourself."
         "Nine shot," I snapped. "The rest chickened out, but you know as well as I do that they came up here prepared to commit murder. And for that, they all deserve to die."
         "No, you know as well as I do that they came up here to avenge a murder. And once they found out the truth, many of them were ready to turn around and go home."
         "Many?" My laugh sounded close to a shriek. "Oh, that's just terrific, Enric. 'Many would have turned around and gone home' - to keep on hating the Dwarves and teaching their kids to do the same. And many would have stayed - to knowingly commit murder. Either way it's the same. These people are full of hate, Enric! Don't you feel it?"
        Enric's face wore an expression I'd never seen on him before - was it compassion or sorrow? "Yes," he said. "I feel it - and I smell it. In all of us." He paused, long enough for me to consider the implications of that statement. "If hatred alone is enough to condemn a person, then we all deserve to die. But if it's not enough, then how are you going enact justice on a group like this? You can't know for sure how many of them would really kill an innocent Dwarf, or what it would take to make them do it. Are you really going to judge them by the same standard you used on Urssela?" His voice dropped. "You told me a story once, about a sorcerer who imprisoned you and tried to make you slaughter a child. You killed the sorcerer but you let one of his guards live even though she'd taunted you, even though she wanted to watch you kill the child. You had mercy on her; are these people really any worse?" He cocked his head. "Where's your sense of mercy now, Kyriel?"
        Enric was right; I knew he was right - but the anger still blazed as high as ever. It's the Fury, I told myself. See, Enric? I can't give up. The Fury won't let me.
        At that moment a new voice rang out above my head: "What are you waiting for, Kyriel?" shouted Meli. One of her legs was bent at a frightening angle, and her face beneath the beard was pale. "Kill them!"
        If anyone had a right to call for vengeance, it was this Dwarf, almost murdered twice now by these bigots and their kin. I rounded on the frozen archer. I was almost certain he'd been one of the nine who shot at me, at us. To hell with mercy. My hand clenched around the iron dagger - then fell to my side.
         What? No, that's not what I meant to do! I have not changed my mind! I want justice, dammit! The Fury wants justice! But I didn't lift my hand, not yet.
        Meli assumed the worst. "Kyriel, no!" she screamed. "You know what they did to me! You know they deserve it!" She scrabbled for the axe at her belt, although what she could have done with it, trapped forty feet above the crowd with a broken leg, was beyond me. It didn't make much of a throwing weapon.
        Near the front of the mob, someone laughed. "Give it up, rockhead. The Fury knows who her real friends are."
        It wasn't every day someone called me by my right name. I dropped the archer and whirled on speaker, a young man of about twenty with black hair and blacker eyes. Urssela's eyes. "God's avenging angel," he said. His voice was smug, but I noticed how carefully he avoided my gaze. "You know, my mother always said the Furies were her role models." He glanced down at the corpse and sighed dramatically. "In a way, she might even be pleased to have died at your hands."
        I refused to believe that anyone as vile as Urssela could have a Fury as her role model. The thought alone made me angrier than ever. "And will you be pleased," I snarled, "if I kill you too?"
        The boy shrugged. "If you were going to kill me," he said, "you would have done it already. But after all, we are on the same side." He looked back up at Meli and sneered. "We both work to keep evil in its place, don't we? We both feel righteous anger, don't we? We both work to right wrongs, take vengeance-"
         "You shut up, you little prick, or I'll split you from end to end!" My own emotion brought me up short. If the boy's suggestion were truly as blasphemous as it seemed, then why had I reacted so defensively? I sounded more like a frightened kid than an avenging angel. Tumblers clicked and whirred inside my head. Looking to Enric, I saw that his face was a mask of pain. What do you smell on me now, Enric? Whatever it is, I'll bet it isn't Fury. The snakes whirled furiously around my head, twining, overlapping, even snapping at one another. And what if there were just as many snakes inside my head? One for anger and one for fury, one for love and one for hate, one for mercy and one for justice.... Sometimes they twined so tightly I couldn't tell them apart, but they were separate.
        The young man's face looked almost angelic. He'll be their new leader, I thought, watching him step boldly from the crowd. He's got her confidence, her charisma, her warped sense of justice. And if he hasn't committed any crimes worthy of death, he's certainly capable of them.
         "That's right," he purred, gliding toward me. "You pretend not to understand, but what you feel for me now is exactly what we feel for the Dwarves. Righteous anger."
        Just for a moment my inner snakes flew apart. "Not anger," I said. "Hatred." The flames around me died.
         "Call it what you like," the boy drawled, "but you must admit, it's a gift we have in common. The only difference between you and me is that you deny what we embrace."
         "No," I answered. "The difference between you and me is that I know the difference between a gift and a curse." The snakes lashed out, farther and faster than they ever had before, piercing his face in a dozen places. The boy screamed and fell writhing to the ground.
        I stopped Meli's cheer with a wave of my hand. "Don't get too excited," I warned. "I haven't killed him." I turned back to the crowd and repeated the words, more loudly. "I haven't killed him, just marked him for life." This was what I'd done to the sorcerer's guard, but for the life of me I couldn't think of a time I'd used the snakes since then. And why not? What had become of my sense of mercy?
        I bent over the thrashing boy but directed my words toward the mob. "You may have heard stories of Furies who didn't kill their prey, but pursued them for as long as they lived. Now you'll have the opportunity to watch it happen. From now on, every dream this boy dreams will be of me. Every time he preaches hatred, he'll feel my dagger in his heart. Every time he even thinks of harming a Dwarf, he'll feel my judgment burning in his veins."
        Spittle flew from between the boy's clenched jaws, but he couldn't speak.
         "The pain will ease when you've calmed down a bit," I told him, "but don't fool yourself: there's no magic spell anywhere that will draw this venom out of your system. All you can do is learn what triggers the pain, and avoid those things. Then you'll have peace." I paused. "Of course, I can't force you to change. But I can make sure you won't poison anyone else with your hatred. Every time you try it you'll end up face down in the dirt, just as you are now."
        I stood up and faced the crowd again. "Is there anyone else here," I demanded, "who still thinks the Fury is on their side?" No one moved a muscle. "I didn't think so."
        I looked down at the bodies by my feet, one still, the other writhing helplessly. "You'll be tempted to make these two martyrs," I told the mob. "You'll be tempted to blame the Dwarves for what happened here. Don't. I killed Urssela, just as I killed those men outside Orit. I punished this boy here, and I will continue to kill or punish anyone else who comes against an innocent Dwarf - or an innocent human, for that matter. If you want to hate someone, hate the Fury; but leave the Dwarves alone."
        An almost inaudible grumble swept the crowd, proof that I couldn't force them to change any more than I could force the boy. Again the snakes writhed, but what could I do? Even if I injected every man and woman here with venom, I couldn't guarantee a single change of heart. More likely, I'd just embitter them further. And, of course, as Enric said, some people here didn't even deserve that punishment. I looked at them again and for the first time saw the individual faces: men and women, old and young, different hair colors, different skin tones, different reasons for coming here. What gave me the right to judge them all the same?
        I sighed and flung out my hand, dispersing the bowl of darkness. Behind the crowd a clear path stretched all the way back to Orit. "Go," I told them, "and take these two with you." Then I resumed my human form, freeing the crowd from its paralysis.
        A trio of men scuttled forward, grabbing the bodies and dragging them backward into the crowd. Oddly enough, everyone else seemed focused on a point behind my back. I turned, curious, and found the Lace Hall captain standing behind me on the path. Oh, hell. I started toward him, then remembered Meli trapped on her rock. I might have finished with the Oritans, but Enric was just getting started. I could hear him warning the humans not to punish their dogs for the animals' betrayal. He hadn't thought of Meli yet; it was up to me to help her. Turning my back on the Lace Hall captain, I flew to Meli's side.
        The Dwarf glowered at me with a mixture of anger, frustration, and humiliation. "I'm sorry, Kyriel," she muttered. "I should have stayed behind, but I wanted to see you kill the humans."
        "And I'm sorry I couldn't give you what you wanted. Are you mad at me?"
         "A bit." She dropped her eyes, but when I held out my arms she climbed into them readily enough.
         "That's all right, then," I smiled. "If it keeps you from hating the humans, you can be as mad at me as you want. Now, hold on tight; I'm going to fly you to the ground."
        As long as my feet were planted on earth, I could carry Meli as easily as I could a child; but that would change the moment I left the ground. My own weight dropped away during flight, but hers would not; in fact, it would drag my lighter body down like a boulder. Still, forty feet wasn't too far to fly with a boulder in my arms. Besides, it was safer than trying to carry her down the slope. We lifted off and I engineered a sort of controlled fall to the path below. Meli grunted hard at the landing. "Sorry," I muttered.
        By this time Enric had finished with the crowd. Rushing to our side, he laid out his makeshift splint materials and set to work. I left Meli with him and turned back to the Lace Hall captain. When I first noticed him, he'd been standing in the road, a little outside the barrier of my bowl; and apparently he hadn't moved while I tended to Meli. Only now, as he saw me looking at him, did he start forward again. In one hand he held a lantern, unshuttered now that the mob had left; in the other he held the reins of a small pony. So that's how he reached us so quickly.
        I searched his face for clues to his intent, but this captain was as impassive as any Dwarf I'd yet met. Instinctively my eyes flicked to the axe at his belt and the bow on his back. He couldn't reach them without letting go of the lantern or reigns, and for the moment he seemed inclined to leave them where they were. I took that as a hopeful sign.
        Under ordinary circumstances my first thought on being "outed" as a supernatural would run something like, how much did he hear, and what does he plan to do about it? But considering my current frame of mind and the fact that the captain hadn't drawn his weapons, I chose instead to snap, "I told you to lock yourselves in."
        He only shrugged. "The others are locked in, but someone had to make sure it wasn't a trap."
         "And are you satisfied now?" The questions I hadn't asked tinged my sarcasm with worry.
         "Absolutely."
        Enric finished the splint and looked up, nostrils flaring almost imperceptibly. "You're not afraid of us," he said, surprised.
        Again the Dwarf shrugged. "Neither is Meli, and she knows you better than I do. I trust her judgment. Besides, I heard enough to know you're on our side."
        The military mind never ceased to amaze me. It could be so wonderfully pragmatic - and so incredibly shortsighted. "We're not on anyone's side," I corrected him. "If you attack the humans unjustly, we'll be just as quick to defend them as we were to defend you tonight."
        The captain thought about that for a moment, then nodded. "Fair enough," he grunted. "At any rate, you told the humans you'd continue to protect us, and for that I'm grateful. You and I both know this isn't the end of our troubles with them."
        Of course I knew it, but my pledge to protect the Dwarves was built on a bluff. As much as I hated to abandon our friends, Enric and I were still honor bound to stay away from Mornegald. I looked down at Meli and she rolled her eyes.
         "King Aglor doesn't want Kyriel and Enric's help," she told the captain, "not since I told him what they were."
        He started to respond, then stopped and frowned - the first clear sign of emotion I'd seen on his face. "That's ridiculous," he snorted. "He must see the strategic advantages of having a Fury and a-"
         "-werewolf," supplied Enric.
         "Werewolf-" The captain blinked and forged ahead bravely - "to defend our gates."
         "Oh, he understands all about defense," Meli sniffed, "his own better than anyone's."
        Their eyes locked and the captain was first to look away. "I see," he sighed and shook his head. "Well, in that case, we'll just have to persuade him that his best defense lies in having these two with us."
         "Can you do that?" I wanted to believe him, but the prospect sounded too good to be true.
        The captain tugged thoughtfully at his beard. "We'll see."

architectural friezes courtesy of Randy D. Ralph at the Icon Bazaar

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