Changer's Daughter by Jane Lindskold Read Free Book Online Page A

lights of the ranch house and the memory of how warm a fire can be and how her father’s strong fingers feel when they rub her neck and shoulders lure her back to domesticated ground. Unlike a wild coyote, human houses hold no special terror for her, especially one where her father is dwelling. Shahrazad spent much of her young life within the walls of Arthur Pendragon’s hacienda. Houses can mean food and the pleasant drone of human conversation to lull her to sleep.
    Her pace increases as she draws closer, picking up her feet in something like a trot, her head held high, her bushy tail in a line straight behind her. Hearing conversation from the outbuildings, she turns that way as the one voice that means home draws her in.

    In a large horse barn, Frank MacDonald, assisted by the Changer and the Wanderer, is doling out grain and hay to the eager residents, mostly horses with a small intermingling of unicorns. This is Shahrazad’s first close encounter with one of the creatures she had mentally tabled as “odd” horses, and she halts as a unicorn turns to face her.
    As in most artistic depictions, the mare’s coat is a pale, bluish white. She is small, hardly larger than a pony, with a build delicate enough to make the daintiest Arabian look chunky. Her slim legs end in feathered hocks over cloven hooves. Although the unicorn’s mane is a fall of snowy silk, her tail is like a lion’s (or a donkey’s), tufted only on the end. China blue eyes beneath a spiraling nacreous horn study the young coyote with unblinking interest, and the unicorn’s beard waggles as she chews a stray bit of hay.
    Frank, apparently, hears more than chewing, for he says aloud: “Yes, that’s right, Pearl, this is the Changer’s daughter, Shahrazad. Shahrazad, this is Pearl, the senior unicorn of our community here.”
    Shahrazad backs off a step, her bushy tail low, not at all certain that she likes this horse with a sword on its brow. She knows what swords are: Eddie and Arthur have several and she had watched them fence before her father had taken her back into the mountains. It does not seems fair that an herbivore should be so well equipped to defend itself. Her experience with deer has been limited (and jackalopes still do not count in her assessment), so perhaps her shock is greater than it might otherwise have been.
    “Pearl,” Frank says, returning to tearing flakes off the hay bales, “was born in France—or what is France today—about the time that the Romans were expanding that direction. It’s a wonder she survived, but... Well, that’s a story for another day.”
    Shahrazad sidles to where she can press herself against her father’s legs, very carefully avoiding Pearl and her sword.
    “I don’t think”—the Changer chuckles—“that you’ve convinced Shahrazad that the unicorn is friendly.”
    “Good,” Frank says. “She may just survive her visit here.”
    A muffled stamping on the sawdust-covered floor of an open box stall draws his attention.
    “I’m sorry,” Frank says, glancing over. “I have been remiss in my introductions. Shahrazad, the husky fellow glowering at me from the stall at the end of the row is Sun. He’s Pearl’s current favorite, originally from the Harz Mountains. Along with a dragon who was killed in the fourteenth century, he made life hell for the residents of the area. They called him the Golden Warrior, and kings offered enormous fortunes and lofty titles to the one who would capture him. Needless to say, no one ever managed the trick.”
    “Husky” seems an understatement when used to describe the unicorn who steps forth to acknowledge this introduction. Easily seventeen hands at the shoulder, deep-chested and muscular, the unicorn stallion seems wrought from molten gold. His coat is a glowing palomino, but where a palomino might have white points or a pale mane, Sun’s mane and tail are the same brilliant gold. Even the horn that spirals from his forehead is metallic gold,