The Borderkind by Christopher Golden Page A

mouthful of razors and offered him a little wave of greeting. A creature as frightening and imposing as this would make one hell of an ally in a fight. Oliver nodded to the beast and silently wished that it could come along with him to rescue Collette.
    Beside Chorti, seated close enough to indicate that they were together, sat a coldly imperious woman with hair so white it looked almost silver. She wore a white dress, cotton and lace, and other than her hair she seemed entirely too proper and ordinary to be one of the Borderkind. Frost introduced her as Cheval Bayard, and Oliver took it from the accent in her quiet hello that she was of French origin.
    Cheval leaned over to whisper something to Chorti and the beast-man grunted in amusement, a soft, chuffing laughter coming from his chest. She stroked the thick fur at the back of his head. Apparently, she was not nearly as cold as he had imagined. He liked her better for her easy way with the beast-man.
    Oliver studied them a moment out of the corner of his eye. The way Cheval had whispered to Chorti gave the pair the air of lovers, but as she stroked him, it was almost as though he were her pet. Yet, when he saw the way they looked at one another—the knowing humor there—neither of those theories seemed correct, and he was left wondering about the relationship between the strange pair.
    The last of the gathering was a seven-foot, broad-shouldered man with a gray-streaked, rust-colored beard. When the man looked up from beneath a wide-brimmed hat with stone-gray eyes, Oliver knew he’d met him before.
    “And this is—” Frost began when he came to the man, the last introduction.
    “Wayland Smith,” Oliver interrupted. “I remember you from Amelia’s.”
    “Yes,” Smith replied. “That was…regrettable.”
    The man was a weaponsmaster and forger, as well as a magician. And as far as Oliver was concerned, he could not be trusted. Smith toyed briefly with the fox-head of his cane, then rested it against the table.
    After the introductions, that odd convocation began to eat. The beef had been marinated in some exotic spice, and Oliver thought it was among the most delicious things he had ever tasted. The boiled potatoes likewise surprised him. They had clearly been boiled as part of some other recipe, simmering with herbs and spices, and the flavor was rich, the potatoes creamy.
    Several minutes passed in relative silence as the travelers began to sate their hunger. Low conversation went on amongst the local Borderkind. Frost was deep in thought and whispered several times to Blue Jay. Kitsune watched them, and Oliver thought she was irked to be left out of whatever scheme they were hatching.
    His attention returned every few moments to Cheval Bayard and Chorti. The pair were such an unlikely duo—this beautiful, distant woman and her hirsute companion with his metal fangs and claws—that Oliver found himself unable to stop puzzling over them.
    “Do you find her beautiful?” Kitsune whispered to him as the others continued their meal.
    Oliver frowned and glanced at her, startled by the intensity of her eyes as she searched his own for the answer to that question.
    “I suppose she is,” he admitted, “but I was just curious. They make a strange pair.”
    Kitsune’s expression softened. “Sometimes the most opposite people make the closest friends. That’s true on both sides of the Veil.”
    Oliver nodded, unconvinced.
    She leaned in and lowered her voice further. “Cheval and her husband were traveling in Yucatazca. They were set upon in the jungle by bandits. Chorti came to their aid. He saved Cheval’s life but was too late to stop her husband from being murdered. The two of them fought the bandits together. None of the bandits survived. Cheval and Chorti have been inseparable since. Neither ever goes anywhere without the other.”
    Oliver glanced around the room as Kitsune told this story, not wishing to be caught staring at the beast-man and the