The Silvered Read Free

mage-craft may be too diffuse to be viable…” The opinion of her kinder professors; the less kind accused her of being lazy, stubborn, and superficial. Occasionally all at once. “…but no one ever said I was stupid. We’re only seventeen miles from the border and refugees have been arriving for weeks.” Bercarit’s hotels were full of people from both Duchies with money enough to pack up and escape the advancing Imperial army, and the streets were filling with people who’d left without anything more than a desire to survive. “Mother says the refugees are proof positive the border will hold.” Mirian thought they proved only that Pyrahn had fallen. “But it’s not just the refugees,” she continued through gritted teeth. “The Hunt Pack is on the border and the Pack leadership has come to Bercarit in case defending the border requires their personal touch. Mother and Father couldn’t possibly miss this chance to present me at the opera like a dressed side of beef!”
    With four and a half years and a dead brother between them, Lorela had carried the weight of their parents’ expectations until her marriage to a young man she’d met at school had taken her out of the social advancement game. It would never occur to her to say
Mother and Father just want what’s best for you
. Their father wanted the Pack’s business at his bank. Their mother wanted to be invited to all the best parties. The only way that would happen was if their remaining daughter married into the Pack.
    “They think because my mage-craft was strong enough to get me into the university, it’s strong enough to attract a member of the Pack.”
    “Have you told them you won’t be going back?”
    Mirian frowned, and bent to grope among the folds of a sprigged muslin day dress.
    “Miri?”
    What she thought might be the pearl earrings turned out to be the two polished bone buttons that closed the top of the bodice.
    “Miri!”
    “No!” She straightened so abruptly that Lorela’s image flickered. Drawing in a deep breath, Mirian forced herself to concentrate. Forced herself to calm enough to anchor her end of the link. “No,” she repeated quietly, “I haven’t told them. It seemed a little pointless what with Emperor Leopald suddenly deciding this year would be all about conquest. Besides, you know how Mother thinks. I was tested, I was accepted, I was schooled. I can, therefore, attract a member of the Pack.”
    “Well, you won’t,” Lorela said bluntly. “Not with only first levels. So, it’s the opera and parental disappointment tonight. What about tomorrow?”
    Mirian kicked the portmanteau shut. Tomorrow she’d try again to get her parents to leave the city, to head to Trouge, higher up in the mountains where the land itself would give the Imperial army pause. Of course, as long as the Pack leadership remained in Bercarit, the odds were high her parents wouldn’t be moved and she’d be expected to smile and dance and pretend that disaster wasn’t on the doorstep. “Tomorrow,” she sighed, “never comes.”

    “Tomorrow, I’ll take Jaspyr and Sirlin down to the border and have a sniff around.” Shifting the brass candlestick that held a curling corner in place, Ryder Hagen stared down at the map spread out over the sitting room table.
    Danika sighed, set down the book she’d been trying to read, and stood, shaking out her skirt. Ryder had spent the afternoon studying the map, pacing, studying the map, arguing with his cousins, studying the map, changing, and pacing some more. Although her husband weighed the same in both fur and skin, an agitated wolf took up considerably more space and the room, even emptied of half of its owner’s overly fussy furniture, was not large.
    “The Hunt Pack will have closed with the Imperials this afternoon,” he continued. “There should be news by morning. Tomorrow…”
    “Tonight,” Danika interrupted, wrapping both hands around Ryder’s arm and tugging him around to