Changespell Legacy by Doranna Durgin Page A

this man and who was thoroughly irritated with her own inability to understand the undercurrents of the conversation, not to mention with things human in general. She gave the man a warning glance; he wouldn't meet her eye, but he looked far from cowed. He looked like a man quite certain he could figure out a way to make himself look right.
    When they reached the end of the barn—not all that far—Jess kept her voice to a mutter that didn't mask her anger. "I want to kick him from here to—" But she stopped, took a deep breath, and found solace in Dayna's sympathetic expression. "Against the rules. Even human ones. So I won't."
    "That doesn't mean you can't feel like it," Dayna said. " I feel like making his nose hairs grow down to his chin."
    "Can you?" Jess said, somehow instantly comforted at this image.
    Dayna shrugged. "Sure. Lots of hair growth spells floating around. But . . . rules and all. I won't."
    Suliya's mood had gone from cool to grim. "Sorry if I overstepped," she said. "I just thought . . . he was so insufferably—"
    "Is it true?" Dayna asked her. "About sitting in on SpellForge meetings?"
    Uncomfortably, Suliya said, "Yes. But I don't want people to know it. And I don't want to answer questions about why I'm here . Besides, the important thing right now is that he's right . We can change his attitude, but we can't change the fact that we're stuck here without horses. Even if you—" She looked at Jess, hesitated, and said, "Even if you agreed to change to a horse, you can't carry two of us over that terrain. And we don't even know if there's another saddle here."
    "The palomino's . . ." Jess said, but with doubt in her voice. Her horse-self was an athletic creature, sturdy in size and build and well sprung in the ribs. The tall, rangy stallion had a leaner build and sharper withers and probably wore a saddle that would pinch her back even without a rider's weight in it.
    "The palomino," Dayna repeated. "We could take him. That would make two horses."
    "He belongs to Trent," Jess said.
    Suliya glanced over her shoulder at the erstwhile head courier for Second Siccawei. "Let Garvin deal with that."
    Jess shook her head, short and sharp. "He belongs to Trent. We will not take him without asking."
    Suliya said, "But—" and Dayna stopped her.
    "Jess makes the call on that one," she said. "I can talk to Trent. The question is, can you ride Lady without a saddle if they don't have one here?" Then she stopped, her expression going wry. "Or maybe I should try that, because I'm not sure I can handle that stud under saddle."
    "He will be easier, following me," Jess said, shivering as the cold bit through her sweater. She looked at the younger courier, trying to keep her misgivings from her face. "Only Carey and Jaime," she started, and then stopped, hunting for words that could express the depth of her misgivings without insulting Suliya.
    Suliya didn't give her the chance. "Don't worry," she said, but too glibly to be of any real comfort. "We won't have any trouble. And we both know the way."
    "I'm going to go find Trent," Dayna said. "I'll leave you two to settle things with our good friend Garvin."
    She peeled off her coat and gave it to Jess. "It won't really fit, but it'll help. I'll bring your coat and saddlebags when I come back out."
    Jess took the coat gratefully, although the stretch of it across her shoulders was a laughable thing. As Dayna dashed out the barn and back to the log-walled hold, Jess strode down the aisle, Suliya on her heels. She stopped before Garvin, finding sullen defiance stamped in every heavy feature of his face, his thick, greying brows dominating with their frown. He said, "Don't think you can make trouble for me—"
    "You have made your own trouble," Jess said, no longer interested in him, but only in getting on the road. In returning to Carey, the solid and dependable part of a world fracturing around her. "We need the gear for the palomino, and I need to see your extra bridles.