She remembered this.
All of it.
The harsh change, the shock that came with it, not easing from one form into another, but being jerked out of one and crammed into the other. The dull ease with which she could simply continue to lie on the rough ground, rocks jabbing her skin and a damp drizzle leaking down from a featureless grey sky to bead upon her deep dun coat. The droplets collected, marking the time Lady spent stretched out on her side as they gathered, outgrew themselves, and rolled down her well-sprung barrel, leaving damp trails behind. Water beaded on her long black lashes, framing dull eyes. Water beaded on her whiskers and dribbled into her exposed nostril, inspiring not so much as a twitch.
Not at first.
Hampered by the rough transition, Lady floundered in the leftover Jess-thoughts, the ones full of concepts and meanings too complex for her abilities. She needed an anchor, a single simple thought to start with. Something to build on.
Blood.
Wrongness.
Her legs flailed in a brief spurt of energy, hooves scraping against the rocky ground, churning up clots of lime mud and grey, wintering moss; she heaved herself up to rest on her chest, front legs stretched awkwardly before her. Beside her, a palomino, his gold coat deepened by blotches where water soaked through at hip and shoulder and the slabby curve of rib, lay motionless aside from shallow, eratic breathing.
Blood.
Wrongness.
Message for Anfeald.
She braced her front legs against the top-slick ground, digging down to a firmer base, and shoved herself to her feet to stand braced, head down, long mane and forelock obscuring her eyes and a coating of mud along one side turning her into a half-and-half horse—half dun with all the primitive markings a dun could carry, and half coated by light clay with gravelly little rocks sticking to her skin, smirching the boney features of her face above eye and cheek and jaw.
Lady again. A rough, hard slap from one form to another, but Lady again. Home.
Blood.
Carey, coughing so hard, looking at his own frothy bright blood with befuddled surprise. Back in what Lady vaguely thought of as the other world, knowing only that she couldn't reach it . . . knowing she'd chosen to leave and now feeling the pull of her fear for him.
She lifted her head slightly, snorting harshly to clear her nose of water and mud—and as much as the memory-sight of Carey's blood worried her, the sight of the palomino relieved her. Ramble. Himself again. She took a step closer, running her whiskers along his hip, taking in the strong wet and musky scent of him. His ear flicked; he knew she was there. But his open eyes were as dull as hers had been, and he offered her no other response.
She nickered at him, barely making a sound. Question and request. Get up. Get moving. Find yourself.
The ear subsided; the eye closed.
She nuzzled his hip again—and when he didn't respond, she bit him.
His head jerked up; she bit him again. Hard enough to hurt, not hard enough to wound. He surged to his feet, a two-toned horse just as she, and stood with his head lowered to shake like a dog—orange-streaked mane flopping, small stones flying, freeing himself from the confines of what until so recently he'd been. And then he snorted—great big sneezy snorts, as wet as the drizzle around them, a whole series of them.
When he lifted his head, his eyes had brightened. He knew he'd come back to what he wanted to be, and unlike Lady, he'd hardly been human long enough even to consider taking on the form again. He was simply Ramble, a palomino stallion who had once been human and who for some time—a short while or maybe the rest of his life—might, if he chose, have a certain insight on human behavior.
Although it looked as though he might choose not. For he lowered his head again, bogging it, leaping into a back-arching buck and then another, squealing and grunting and charging a small circle with the pure physical expression of aggressive joy at shedding that human form. His second circle around he tried to entice Jess into the game, but she tucked her tail and haunches and tipped her head to warn him off with flattened ears; he veered away.
After a moment he approached her more courteously, waiting for permission to come all the way to her, to arch his neck over hers and most demurely nibble along the base of her mane. Flirting, but not strongly. Connecting.
Claiming.
It felt strange. Strange because Lady, sorting equine memory, could not remember a time since first becoming Jess that she'd had a simple, quiet social moment with a herd member. Strange because the Jess-voice in her head made mild protest, trying to draw her attention to Carey and to Jaime at Anfeald. But thinking of Carey made Lady think of blood and wrongness, and having Ramble's ministrations comforted her. And thinking of Jaime and Anfeald . . .
The hay bale beside them made a welcome distraction, and for a long while, that was as far as she got; she and Ramble fed together—she neatly, he by tearing away great chunks of hay and trying to work it into his mouth before he lost any of it to the mild wind. Lady ate until her stomach filled, twitching her withers against the irritating movement of a wet, unfamiliar braid and its burden, the round black thing Mark had attached to her. The courier pouch, as unfamiliar as it was.
The courier pouch. The one she had to take to Jaime. She wasn't ready to leave the hay yet, not for good, but she lifted her head to consider the trail to Anfeald.
The ground beneath them was sloped; that around them, rolling. The clay and limestone soil supported tough, scrubby bushes with stout thorns, faded brown to her eyes and with plenty of room to navigate between clumps. The bushes themselves reeked of goat and goat droppings; the damp, cool air told her about the copious hares that frequented the area, and brought her the fading scent of pursan—a predator cat not quite big enough to threaten a horse, but all the same not a creature Lady wanted to encounter. She eyed the trees on the opposite hill—stunted, bare-branched trees, just the thing for a medium-sized eater of things. She hoped, with the part of her that had learned to think more complexly since she'd added her human side to her makeup, to avoid that hill on the way to Anfeald. Beyond it, and who knows how many hills beyond that, mountains stabbed up at the sky like giant snow-capped teeth. She hoped, too, to avoid crossing such rough territory.
But she didn't know if they could.
Because she had no idea where they were, or how to reach Anfeald.
"I don't know," Dayna said, glaring at Carey, unable to dampen her annoyance even at his pale face and tormented expression, his features suddenly tight and a smear of blood on his shirt that led her glance to his hand. "You cut yourself," she said. "You'd better do something about it."
A cough rumbled in his chest. "I will," he told her.
"I don't know," Jaime said, glaring at Hon Chandrai. "I haven't authorized the use of any major magic, and Natt and Cesna are busy enough just keeping this hold secured and healthy. If you want to figure out who burst in on the eastern province, you're going to have to do it yourself."
Chandrai glared back at her. "We will," she told Jaime. "And you'd better hope we don't find you involved."
"I don't know," Arlen said, staring with thoughtful but puzzled resignation at the hardened bloom of distortion by the edge of the narrow trail. Crowded by trees, darkened by shadow and early spring cloud-gloom, the spot had almost escaped his notice. "I think we're going to have to get involved. And sooner than I'd planned, at that."
Grunt bit the tender twiggy end off a tree branch and snorted wetly, not a comment Arlen found useful one way or the other.
Throughout Camolen, the meltdowns bloomed. Random blooms, some no larger than an apple, some big enough to flow across the horizon, engulfing all that stood in the way. Some met with old blooms, solidifying together in handshakes of startling vigor. Some made their own way. One small community became entirely circled, and immediately began rationing food while those within only hoped they lived long enough to starve to death.
Camolen knew.
Not the cause, not what to do about it, not how to stop it or in which direction they might run to escape it. But what had killed its wizards, what had left it without services, what had separated families and brought the daily life of its people to a terrifying standstill . . .
Camolen knew.