Okay, this chapter is not quite the way I want it, but…… close enough. Maybe I’ll rewrite it later. See, I’d have to rewrite it if I were to edit it, because otherwise I’d end up not changing anything. I don’t seem to be able to easily lift certain phrases and put them in new settings…

News: Sick is… getting better? I can sing again, but my nose is still a “Bag of Holding filled with goo” and the sinuses to my ears are blocked, which gives my head the feeling of being stuffed with cotton. Which is interesting, because I thought that was just a writerly turn of phrase. But it is a real feeling. I have a mocha beside me, though, and I had some tea earlier, so I’m good, more or less. My brain is less fuzzy. Now I just wish I could breathe.

EDIT: My left ear just cleared. Huzzah! : D Still snorking, though.

Man, the clouds are going past fast overhead.

I’m in a Starbucks in Toronto because I’m here to see K.’s play last night (which was excellent and a lot of fun and I’d never seen A Wonderful Life before and even the child actors were really good! and also K. looks really good in period makeup/hair). There were basically two parallel plays going on simultaneously; one between the people in the story (George and company) and one between the… characters who were acting the play. It’s wheels within wheels… actors playing actors. Good thing no one in the George story was an actor. XD And one thing that was super great because they sang jingles for the modern-day sponsors who sponsored the show IRL! Loved it. And they had people doing Foley work, too.

So the other thing I am here for is a production of Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet. Whee!

And while I’m here, someone asked when Chapter 9 was going up. Well, now I can say Right Now, because I didn’t actually have to edit it as thoroughly as I thought I did. Chapter 10 is going to get rewritten, though. Anyway. Here you go.

(Chapter 8)

Chapter 9

Illinia walked through the dark woods. Normally, she would have walked slowly, looking around. But now she walked quickly, with determination – even though she had no idea where she was going.
Eventually, she might find a road, or she might not. In any case, she was sure she would find something before she ran out of food.
Exploring with the others had been fun; it had taught her things she never could have imagined, especially about herself, and they had done many good things for people, which always made her happy. But it had been too much of a distraction from her real task, and she had wasted so much time…
And now she missed them terribly. Why was life so complicated?
She walked for a week, covering many miles to the north. She met no one, and the forest did not end. The wind began to blow chill, but between the oversized black velvet cloak and her newly-finished gryphon-feather cloak, she was warm through the day and the night.
And yet… she sometimes felt like she was being watched. Her hawk was restless, sometimes taking off for no apparent reason, divebombing seemingly random trees. But she couldn’t see anything that Illinia couldn’t see, even from the air.
Two days out of Thaxted, she knew she was being followed for certain. There was someone, trying to be stealthy, on her trail. But she let them follow her; if they wanted to talk to her, they would talk to her. If they wanted to attack her, they would have already.
Five nights after that, she was meditating, lying curled among the roots of a great oak tree, recalling the times she had sung old love songs with her sister, imagining what their future husbands might be like. Even elven girls indulged in that. She wondered if her sister had yet found someone.
There was a rustling nearby, and she half-opened her eyes. There was someone creeping out from the bushes nearby; there was a shadowyness about them that she couldn’t identify. Illinia lay still, knowing it was difficult to see her, and her hawk was perched above her, motionless in sleep.
But the person seemed to know exactly where she was; they came straight to her, and even as she sat up to grasp her little knife, they pounced on her, pinning her to the ground, sitting on her. He was heavy.
“Well, little girl, now we meet again!” purred the voice, and she felt a blade at her throat. A hand in her long black hair kept her head in place. “And this time the advantage is mine!”
She looked up, uncomprehending. She could see him clearly in the dark, but the face was not reminding her of anyone. “I-I’m sorry… please don’t hurt me, but I don’t know you. Wh-who are you? Why are you following me?”
The figure gritted its teeth. “You don’t know me? After you twisted me around your cursed little delicate elven fingers?”
She blinked. “Er… That doesn’t help… Could you be H-Hansen?” He had been the one to tell her of her husband in this land. But she wouldn’t have thought he would be able to follow her across it.
“No! Oh.” The man’s face blurred, and when it became clear again, it was a classically handsome, pale face, with light hair and sharp, determined features.
“Oh! Michael!” she cried. “That boy!”
“Yes, ‘that boy’,” he growled, pressing the knife deeper into her skin. “It was your mistake to let me go. I’ll show you that shapeshifters are not to be trusted.”
“I don’t understand,” she said honestly. “Why would you follow me?”
He laughed bitterly. “Because you need a lesson in the ways of the world. And I need redemption.”
“R-redemption?”
“I was set free by an enemy. What could be worse?”
“Your death would have been worse to me.”
He stared at her. “You don’t mean that. You just have that ridiculous… You don’t even have that. I don’t know what you have.”
“I do mean it. I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I said I would try to get you freed, and when I found out that it was either your freedom or death…”
“It wasn’t my death that would be worse to you. It would be my death on your clear little conscience.” He spat off to the side. “Pathetic.”
“I don’t know why you’re complaining,” she said, suddenly bold and wry. “Or why you’re attacking me.”
He hesitated. “Your saving my life does not bind me to you.”
“No. Without your help, it would have been much more difficult to defeat the monster. Kellan was almost eaten!”
“So why aren’t you with them? Too weak and pathetic to deal with their anger? Did they disown you? Serves you right.”
“Yes,” she whispered, tears coming into her eyes. “Yes, I ran away.”
He seemed tense, and the knife slowly withdrew from her throat. “You’re no better than me, then.” His tone was mixed with a thousand subtleties, and she couldn’t catch them all.
“I don’t know,” she said in a very low voice.
He snorted, got off her, and flumped down beside her. “So… why?”
“Why?”
“Why do all that for me? I have my honour, and I understand that, but you’ve gone beyond honour. It’s almost random.”
“I… I just couldn’t let anyone else die,” she said. “You don’t seem bad to me.”
“After I held a knife to your throat. You do know that shapeshifters are universally hated, right?”
“That’s what they all told me, but… how can you choose but to be bitter if everyone hates you? I want to show you it’s possible not to hate you…”
He was silent for a long moment. “Even if I hate you and all your kind?”
“What is my kind?”
“Elves. People who call themselves good. Smug bastards.”
She shook her head a little. “I don’t know the elves here. I-I want to be good… I try my best… although sometimes I just don’t know what it is. What the right thing is. But my friends aren’t smug! Well, maybe Kellan is.”
“They’re all smug,” he grumbled.
She waited, watching anxiously. He didn’t move.
“W-what will you do?” she asked eventually.
He shot her a look that was not lost on her even in the dark. “What do you want me to do?”
She stared. “What?”
“I can tell what you’re thinking. You’re hoping I’ll reform my ways to fit into your world, and the rest of the world will start being nice to me, and everyone can live happily ever after with sunshine and rainbows.” He made a sharp, dismissive gesture with his hand. “Is that not so?”
“Well… s-sort of… I just want you to not hate me.”
“Yes, because the world revolves around you.”
“N-no…”
“Give it up, little girl. You can’t argue with me.”
“What are you going to do?” she asked again.
He sighed and was quiet again. “I want to teach you that the world is not what you think it is. No one takes care of you. Trust doesn’t exist, only bargains. That thing you call love… is only lust and convenience; transient affection at best. Light burns. Heroes are arrogant. Humility is an act. Laws and rules are the only things which keep societies running.” He turned to her. “Except… in you, I begin to doubt my own words. You sound like you believe every word you say.”
“I-I… yes? I…”
He chuckled darkly. “And now you can’t form words. Do you have a sense of irony?”
“I have a very little one…”
“Do you! That’s news to me.”
“Will you come with me?” she blurted out impetuously.
“What!?”
“Come with me, on my journey.”
“What is your journey?”
“I’m looking for someone…” He waited patiently, until she could gather up her courage to tell him. It was so important to her! He would sneer at her, and he wouldn’t have seen him, anyway. “I-I’m looking for my husband… You haven’t seen him, have you? He is tall, with golden hair… he is an archer…”
He said nothing for a long time. “No. I haven’t seen him.” He paused, and turned to her with a mirthless smile. “Do you believe me?”
“Why should I not believe you?”
“Because I just told you I can’t be trusted?”
“But hardly anyone’s seen my husband… And you have no reason to lie to me.”
“I don’t?”
“Not really…”
“You’ll change your mind sooner or later.”
She thought about that for a moment. If he was trying to break her, and she was trying to prove something to him… she sensed that they were both going to be stubborn. This would be a difficult journey if he came with her. But wouldn’t it be worth it?
“Right, well, if I’m not killing you tonight, I’m going to sleep,” he said, and lay down a little way away from her. “Do you trust me?”
“Yes,” she answered patiently.
He chuckled darkly again and lay motionless.
“Are you cold?” she asked after a moment, but he didn’t answer.
The next morning, her hawk woke with a furious screech, dropping onto the hapless shapeshifter and clawing at him.
“No! Forestfeather!” Illinia cried, jumping up at the first sound. “Come to me. Come, there’s a dear. Leave the poor man alone.”
He glared at her, feeling the long scratches on his face. “See?”
“What?”
“Even your hawk knows I’m an enemy.”
“That’s because last time we met, you were an enemy. Oh dear, I’m so sorry! Hold still.”
He jerked away from her. “Why should I hold still? Get away from me, crazy woman.”
“Oh, all right,” Illinia said. “I think I can heal from a distance… Wait a moment…” She closed her eyes, reaching out into the forest around her, and gathered a little bit of its vast energy, its livingness. She gently touched the being in front of her with it; he was dark in her mind, a hard cold rock on a green plush carpet, but his body still accepted the healing. When she opened her eyes, his face was still covered in blood, but his wounds were gone.
“What- why did you do that?” he demanded with a snarl. “You just want me further in your debt?”
“What? No! I didn’t-“
“Mind your own business.” He stomped away towards the sound of water.
She hurried after him; her hawk flew up into the sky, going to hunt. “It was my fault, so I should fix it!”
“No, it’s your bloody hawk’s fault.” He turned abruptly and waggled a finger in her face. “Even I can see that. Although, I’m sure you set the whole thing up.”
“N-no! I don’t know what you mean…”
“It doesn’t matter.” He bent to the stream and washed his face, coughing as the cold water hit his face. When he was done, he stood up and wiped his face on his sleeve.
He was still wearing the guard uniform, red tunic and brown leather, although the helmet was missing. But he shivered in the late-fall air.
She offered him the gryphon feather cloak. He stared at it in distaste. “What kind of gaudy thing is that?”
She laughed a little. “It will at least help keep you warm.”
“Firstly, stop offering me things. Secondly, it’s incredibly girly.”
“But you’re shivering! There’s no one around but me.”
“What about that black one? That one would even fit me better.”
“Ah… yes, I could give you that one. It’s actually not as warm, though.”
“Lies…”
“I tell you no lies. And it was a gift, from my guide, many months ago…” She took it off and held it out to him.
The black velvet shimmered in the sun as he seized it from her roughly. For the barest instant, he paused, and she could see his mind churning. A frightening look passed over his face, but the next moment, it was gone, and she wondered if she had imagined it as he calmly wrapped the cloak around himself.
“You shouldn’t tell me such things,” he said, walking away. “They’re only tools that give me an advantage over you.”
“Where are you going?”
“Where were you going?”
He had a good point. “Somewhere. Perhaps somewhere with people.”
“There’s nowhere with people in this direction for many miles still. And then there are mountains between them and us. Don’t you know even that?”
She shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t know where to start looking. Perhaps he is looking for me. That would make things harder. But I can’t sit still.”
“Why not?” and his voice was suddenly silky, seductive, soothing. He turned to her, advanced on her; she backed away until she was trapped by the stream. “He doesn’t even care for you. Why else would he run from you? Why else would he hide in this world? Oh, yes, I’ve picked up that you’re not from here, faster than your moronic human friends. Why would you bother to look for him?”
She couldn’t look him in the eye; he was taller than her, and standing only inches away. “Because I do truly love him, and he truly loves me. I know it.”
Without a word, the shapeshifter turned and walked away again.

They walked all day, going steadily north, talking very little. Her hawk returned after a while, and spent its time eyeing him suspiciously from her shoulder. She herself tried not to watch him, or to stare at him. That wouldn’t help trust for either of them. But if she tried her hardest to show him she could trust him, then perhaps he would trust her. It felt silly now to admit it, but the plan he had sarcastically outlined sounded like a very good plan to her.
They didn’t speak much, however, until they had eaten and settled down for rest. He was sitting cross-legged on the other side of the fire; his eyes were dark and gleamed eerily, watching her as she sat quietly with her arms folded around her knees.
“You really shouldn’t trust me, you know,” he said matter-of-factly, at last.
“I have no choice but to trust you,” she answered. “I don’t trust you enough, because I want to live long enough to see my husband and although I know you don’t think so, I do have a sense of self-preservation. And yet I trust you, because if I distrust you, it will destroy the ground I’m standing on.”
“Funny; you should trust me only to not kill you, at this point,” he said.
“Why?” she interrupted.
He flushed a very little. “Because if I kill you, then I won’t be able to prove my point for very long.”
She smiled. “It would be a short lesson indeed.”
He grunted. “You don’t seem too concerned.”
“You just said you weren’t going to kill me.”
“You can’t believe me, though.” The inhuman, sardonic smile was back.
She met his gaze this time, trying to tell him that she could.
To prove a point, she lay down and rolled over so her back was to him and the fire. She heard him grunt again and smiled to herself.
The next day was again very quiet. The sky was grey, and it smelled like snow.
He broke their silence partway through the day. “Are you certain you want to climb mountains in winter?”
She looked back at him. “Why not?”
He rolled his eyes. “You’re not really a traveller, are you?”
“Well, no. But my husband has climbed many mountain passes in winter.”
“I get the feeling you don’t know what you’re talking about.” A quick joyless smile. “Perhaps he was lying to make you praise him.”
She thought about that for a minute. “No, I’m pretty sure there’s no other way for him to be where he was.”
“Well, I don’t want to climb mountains in winter.”
She stopped and waited for him. “Where would you go?”
“There’s a place close to the mountains…”
“We can go there, if you like.” He looked like he was waiting for something. “What is it?”
He cocked his head. “You don’t even care where it is?”
“I do,” she said, and gave him a little smile. “And what it is. That’s all right. You don’t have to tell me.”
He looked at her, unimpressed. He began walking and she followed him.

They began going uphill pretty steadily; the trees were getting thinner and shorter and lighter. It was the fifth day since they met, and they had been slowed somewhat by Illinia needing to hunt for food.
They finally reached the mountains. She was much more comfortable with him, and she thought he was more comfortable with her. They still had awkward nightly discussions about trust, but she no longer felt tempted to stare at him and wonder what he was thinking. And so when they climbed, she even felt all right to reach out and help him with her hand. Her hawk tensed when she did so; it still did not trust him at all, and she couldn’t change that.
Yet there were times when he had that look on his face that she couldn’t read. Either it was a dark, almost angry look, and sometimes it was a tight, mysterious smile. Either way, it reminded that he was not human, or like any other person she had ever met.
They came to a high path among many ravines, a bare, dry, brown place with tough old bushes clinging to the rocks. Michael was in front, Illinia behind, when she stepped on a loose stone. With a cry of alarm, she slithered down the loose scree of the cliff to her left, landing in a large pile of dust about ten metres below where she had been.
Coughing, she looked around. The ravine twisted both ways, so she could not see if there was an easier way out – and the place where she had landed did not appear to be climbable.
Michael appeared at the top of the cliff. “Having trouble?”
“A bit,” she said, and her smile was interrupted by another cough. “Help me out, please?”
“No,” he said, and turned his back.
“Michael!”
He reappeared briefly. “I have no reason to help you. In fact, I have every reason to leave you.”
She sighed. “Haven’t we argued this enough?”
“I never lost.”
“But…”
“If you would like to beg, I wouldn’t mind seeing that.”
Her shoulders slumped. He just wanted an exhibition at this point, a further chance to rub in her face that he was not one of the heroes. He was just trying to push her buttons.
But if that was what he wanted, to see if she would do even that, she would give it to him.
It was a good thing her emotions were mostly genuine, because acting was definitely one of the worst of her abilities.
“Michael…” she began, letting her voice shake a little, “I… I don’t want to stay down here. I don’t know where this path goes, and there could be monsters…”
“Oh, there are probably lots,” he said cheerfully, enjoying the show.
“Can’t you please help me to climb out? I know you have some rope, and it wouldn’t be much effort… I’ll repay you somehow…”
“I’m listening…”
“I… I’ll always help you if you get in this kind of situation, you know that.”
“Ah, but I’m not in this situation. And aren’t you an elf? Aren’t you too good to fall in a silly little hole?”
He was mocking her, but she refused to be baited.
“Michael,” she breathed, letting a tear well up, “please…”
“Nope!” and he turned away. For one final second, his head appeared where she could see. “This is just your first betrayal, by the way,” he called, and was gone. “Hope you have lots more!”
Well, it had been worth a try. Her hawk screamed, and she heard him yell, and scrabbling footsteps. She tried to call back her hawk, but it was too far away.
She sat down and felt around her for the magic of nature. It was not too plentiful, but there was some.
She waited a few minutes, gathering her courage, and pulled on it.
Roots burst from the cliff-side, brown and gnarled. But they were thick, and they were long enough. She took hold of them and began to climb up the side of the cliff.
She got to the top and sat down to rest. She really was rather tired. Her diet was unbalanced, and while she didn’t feel too much additional stress from travelling with someone who constantly told her he would betray her (and who had apparently just done so), she was getting tired in mind and body.
“I just want to find him again,” she murmured to herself. “It’s been so long.” The years might pass swiftly for an elf, but for an elf deprived… they turned into eternities longer even than for humans. Her hawk returned and settled on her shoulder, nuzzling her head sympathetically.
After a while, she got up and continued north. She wondered what kind of place Michael had been leading her to, and what kind of people lived there, and if that was the ‘second betrayal’ he had said. Or if he was just leading her into the middle of nowhere. But he didn’t seem the suicidal type.
She had nowhere else to try at the moment, really, so she set one foot in front of the other, over and over and over and over.
It was dusk, and the sun was painting rainbows in the clouds, when she heard something move.
“Michael?” she called softly. “I made it out…” And then she gasped, because whoever it was, it wasn’t her shapeshifter.
She was surrounded by tall people in dark robes. She gave a little cry and transformed herself into an old tree stump, trying to hide somehow.
“Say… Gilkar… This tree stump wasn’t here the other day, was it?”
“And it’s in our way, too. Let’s chop it down and burn it.”
“Unless it changes back and says what it’s doing here in our lands.”
“Can we chop it up and burn it after that?”
“That might come later. If we don’t like the answer.”
Illinia, shaking, dropped the disguise. “I-I’m sorry! I didn’t know these were your lands! I am travelling in search of someone, and I was travelling with another, but he left me behind. I- you frightened me, and so I changed…”
“You’ll be a sight more frightened when you know who we are… Who are you looking for? Who were you travelling with?”
“I was travelling with Michael… I-I’m searching for my h-husband. Have you seen him? He is tall, with golden hair…”
“A sun-elf,” one of the figures spat in disgust, and Illinia shivered.
“We haven’t caught a Michael around here,” one of the others said, and reached out with a slender black-gloved hand and gripped her arm tightly. “Are you making him up?”
“No! He’s… well, he’s a shapeshifter, and so he might not look the same…”
“An elf travelling with a shapeshifter? Ridiculous…”
“Wait, Lord Kilness arrived earlier. Could she have been with him?”
“That doesn’t make sense. She obviously wasn’t his prisoner, and no elf would willingly travel with a shapeshifter.”
“Well, I would,” she said rebelliously. “I don’t want to be bound by the prejudices of everyone else.”
They laughed, rather unkindly. “How old are you, little girl? Ten? Run back to your mommy and your tolerant imaginary friends.”
“Although, perhaps she only wasn’t his prisoner yet. Oh, everything is making sense. Lord Kilness cleverly took advantage of her naivety and enticed her here to us so that we could deal with her!”
“Yes, that,” said another voice, from further back, “and also she is a psychological experiment of mine. So I’ll thank you for not interfering except on my say-so.”
“Michael!” she gasped, for it was his voice. But it was not the person she knew who stood there, flanked by female guards.
“Come, bring her inside,” he said, and strode away to a gate that opened wide for him. The torchlight flickering inside did not invite her.
Once inside, iron gates closed behind her noiselessly.

Chapter 10