The Shape-Changer's Wife Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Epilogue

  Ace Books by Sharon Shinn

  “Shinn shines as a powerful storyteller with a depth of feeling that touches the soul.”

  —Romantic Times

  THE SHAPE-CHANGER’S WIFE

  Selected by Locus as Best First Fantasy Novel of the Year

  Nominee for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer

  “The spellbinding Ms. Shinn writes with elegant imagination and a steely grace, bringing a remarkable freshness that will command a wide audience.”

  —Romantic Times

  “A delightful world to escape into.”

  —Locus

  ALSO BY SHARON SHINN . . .

  JENNA STARBORN

  “Jane Eyre fans will enjoy tracking the character and plot parallels. Shinn fans will enjoy the way the author perfectly captures the tone and color of Brontë while maintaining Jenna’s unique voice. Best of all, Jenna’s narrative makes us feel joy in her love, sorrow in her despair, numb in her shock.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Romantic and graceful . . . Shinn’s SF take on a great romantic tale succeeds wildly well.”

  —Booklist

  SUMMERS AT CASTLE AUBURN

  “A charmer for the romantically inclined.”

  —Booklist

  “Intensely emotional . . . An exquisitely rendered coming-of-age tale.”

  —Romantic Times

  continued . . .

  HEART OF GOLD

  “A telling story of a racially divided society, and a pretty good love story, too . . . another top-notch outing.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “Smoothly written. Shinn has a talent for creating vivid, sympathetic characters. Nuanced and intelligent. A thoroughly entertaining reading experience.”

  —SF Site

  “The love story of this book is balanced by deft examination of prejudice, intolerance, and inequality. This book is difficult to put down and will appeal to fantasy readers as well as fans of an intriguing love story.”

  —VOYA

  WRAPT IN CRYSTAL

  “Taut, realistic police work, an involving love story, and a fetching backdrop ... well up to Shinn’s previous high standards.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “Shinn deftly combines mystery, high-tech SF, and romance with a layering of fantasy in a fresh and innovative tale full of surprising turns of plot.”

  —Library Journal

  “Offers a convincing view of human impulses toward both worldly and unworldly passions with a touch of the otherworldly to bring it into the realm of science fiction.”

  —Locus

  “It doesn’t get much better than Wrapt in Crystal—interesting characters, an intriguing mystery, a believable love story and a satisfying ending.”

  —Starlog

  PRAISE FOR SHARON SHINN AND

  THE SAMARIA TRILOGY . . .

  ARCHANGEL

  “Shinn is a good storyteller . . . Archangel takes advantage of the familiar—goodness, the Bible, Paradise Lost—through building its own lively quest narrative with these sure-fire building blocks so that one feels at home in the narrative very quickly; it also has a clean, often wryly funny prose.”

  —The New York Review of Science Fiction

  “Taut, inventive, often mesmerizing, with a splendid pair of predestined lovers.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “Excellent world-building, charming characterizations. A garden of earthly delights.”

  —Locus

  JOVAH’s ANGEL

  “Shinn displays a real flair for [music and romance], giving music a compelling power and complexity, while the developing attraction between Archangel Alleluia and a gifted but eccentric mortal should charm the most dedicated anti-sentimentalist and curmudgeon ... [A] book of true grace, wit, and insight into humanity, past and future.”

  —Locus

  “Some may raise eyebrows at Sharon Shinn’s less-than-saintly angels, but they make for far more interesting characters than the winged paragons of legend. Many will no doubt find her end results quite heavenly.”

  —Starlog

  THE ALLELUIA FILES

  “A warm and triumphant close to Shinn’s Samaria trilogy.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “A tale that makes for exciting, suspenseful, romantic, frightening, and even amusing reading.”

  —St. Louis Post-Dispatch

  Ace Books by Sharon Shinn

  ARCHANGEL

  JOVAH’S ANGEL

  THE ALLELUIA FILES

  ANGELICA

  WRAPT IN CRYSTAL

  THE SHAPE-CHANGER’S WIFE

  HEART OF GOLD

  SUMMERS AT CASTLE AUBURN

  JENNA STARBORN

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  THE SHAPE-CHANGER’S WIFE

  An Ace Book / published by arrangement with the author

  Ace mass-market edition / October 1995

  Ace trade paperback edition / August 2003

  Copyright © 1995 by Sharon Shinn.

  All rights reserved.

  This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission. The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  For information address: The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  Check out the ACE Science Fiction & Fantasy newsletter!

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Shinn, Sharon,

  The shape-changer’s wife / Sharon Shinn.

  p. cm.

  ISBN : 978-1-101-54969-8

  1. Triangles (Interpersonal relations)—Fiction. 2. Teacher-student relationships—

  Fiction. 3. Teachers’ spouses—Fiction. 4. Wizards—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3569.H499S55 2003

  813’.34—dc21 2003045361

  ACE®

  Ace Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street,

  New York, New York 10014.

  ACE and the “A” design are trademarks belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  For my mother

  One

  UNTIL AUBREY ARRIVED in the village to study with Glyrenden, he had no idea that the great wizard had taken a wife. At the time, drinking an ale in the warm, lightless tavern which was situated at the very center of town (in fact, the heart of the small community), he did not think it mattered one way or the other. Nonetheless, he was surprised. From what old Cyril had told him, Glyrenden did not seem like the kind of man disposed toward the softer passions. But then, it was obvious Cyril did not like the court magician, and perhaps his unflattering words could be traced to professional jealousy.

  It h
ad not been Aubrey’s idea to apprentice with the shape-changer. He had been certain Cyril could teach him what he wanted to know, for Cyril was renowned in this land and three lands farther west as the greatest wizard in seven generations. But Cyril, who had willingly and with patient generosity shared with him the spells and knowledge it had taken him eighty years to accumulate, flatly refused to instruct him in the matters of transmogrification.

  “But why not?” Aubrey had asked him, a dozen times, a hundred times. “You know the spells. You have cast them.”

  “They are barbaric spells,” Cyril had said, and would say no more. But Cyril’s conscience had troubled him. Alchemy of every sort was essential to the education of any well-rounded wizard, and Aubrey was, even this young, showing signs of being among the most gifted wizards of this century. So he wrote to Glyrenden and proposed Aubrey as a student; and Glyrenden wrote back to accept the charge. Cyril had sent Aubrey on his way with the briefest words of advice.

  “Learn everything he teaches you so well you can cast his own spells back at him,” the old wizard had said. “Glyrenden respects only those stronger than he is, and those he hates. If you cannot beat him, he will destroy you. Already you are a better magician than he in many of the branches, but if he sees he can best you in this one branch, he will use his skill against you. So you must learn everything, and forget nothing, and beware of Glyrenden at all times.”

  “You alarm me,” Aubrey said mildly, smiling. He was a fair-haired, open-faced, sunny-tempered young man who had a fearsome passion for knowledge and an absolute faith in his own abilities. He had never yet come across something he could not do; but this easy ability did not make him arrogant or malicious. Rather, it turned him benevolent and charming, happy with himself and his world. “Why do you send me to him, if he is so menacing?”

  “It would not do you much harm to face a challenge at this point in your career,” Cyril muttered.

  Aubrey laughed. “And why has he agreed to tutor me if he is such an ogre? He does not sound like the type to gladly accept troublesome pupils.”

  Cyril gave him a quick sideways look from his narrow blue eyes, the glancing look like sunlight glittering across water, a look that gave away more than the spoken answer if Aubrey could only read it. “Because he cannot conceive that you will prove to be better than he, and he wants a chance to prove it.”

  Aubrey gave it up. “I had best be on my guard during my whole stay at his house, then,” he said.

  “Yes,” said Cyril. “I think you had better.”

  So Aubrey had packed up his thin saddlebags and tossed his threadbare green cloak over his shoulders, and walked the three hundred miles to the wizard’s house when he could not beg the odd ride from the peddlers and merchants that traveled the North King’s Road. He had arrived late one evening and elected to sleep overnight at the town’s single hostel before presenting himself at Glyrenden’s door. And in the morning, there was the fair to see, and the pretty girls to flirt with, and flowers to buy for some of them in the market; so it was afternoon before he was ready to start on the final mile of his journey.

  He had fortified himself with a glass of ale at the tavern, and it was then he learned that Glyrenden had a wife. Aubrey had made friends with the tavernkeeper over his lunch of bread and cheese, and had told the man what he could remember about the condition of the roads between there and Southport. And then he had asked the man for directions to the home of Glyrenden, and he had seen the strangest look cross the fellow’s tanned and honest face.

  “On the way there, are you,” the man had said, and his voice became flat and distant, the voice of a man talking to a customer to whom he must be civil and not to a man he liked. “Well, you takes this road here, that runs outside me door, and follows it to where it forks left. After that, you’ll see three crossroads, and at each you takes the left cross. And when you comes to his house, you’ll know it.”

  Aubrey gave the man his easy smile. “Veering to the sinister,” he said. “That seems to fit. It should be simple to remember.”

  The man’s dark eyes gave back no hint of a smile, no hint that he had even comprehended the small joke. “Will you be leaving soon?” he asked politely.

  “As soon as my drink is done. Tell me, does Glyrenden come to town often? Or does he move only between his place and the king’s castle?”

  “He comes,” the barkeeper said coolly, “but not often. She comes even less.”

  “She?”

  The man lifted his hands involuntarily from the rubbed-wood counter, then deliberately set them down again. Aubrey wondered what gesture he had been going to make; the man’s whole body was stiff with distaste. “The wizard’s wife.”

  “He’s married?”

  “Aye. Or at least, the woman has lived there any time these three years now.”

  “Cyril didn’t tell me that.”

  “Pardon, sir?”

  “Nothing. Nothing at all.” Aubrey smiled again, laid a gold piece on the counter, and smiled privately once more to see the expression with which the barkeeper regarded the coin. Glyrenden was not much liked in this place, it seemed, and those who trafficked with him fell instantly under the same suspicion. “I hope I will see you again,” he added pleasantly. “This is the closest village, so I understand, to Glyrenden’s place.”

  “Aye,” the man said somewhat dryly. “It is that.”

  “Then no doubt I will be down now and then when I am thirsty for a drop or two.”

  “Of course. We’ll be looking to see you again, sir,” the tavernkeeper said.

  Aubrey grinned. “Well, good. Till then, my man.”

  “Till then.”

  The walk through the village and up through the forested foothills was a pretty one, the afternoon being cool for summer, and the slanting sun giving to all the late-green trees a luxuriant glow. Aubrey hummed as he walked, and now and then broke out into actual song, and he strode along at a brisk, healthy pace and laughed at his own youth and eagerness. Neither Cyril’s dour warnings nor the tavernkeeper’s hostility sobered him. It was a fine day and he was in a fine mood and on his way to a place he had never been, to acquire a knowledge he had long coveted; and he could not imagine a time when the world had seemed any better or full of more promise.

  As the villager had told him, the house of Glyrenden was impossible to miss. It was separated from the main path by an overgrown track scarcely wide enough to admit a cart to pass, and it was huge: three stories of iron-gray rock piled together in a careless fashion. It was somberly accented at the front entrance and at widely spaced intervals with panels of dark wood which served as doors and window shutters. Dead ivy striped the southernmost turret, and live ivy curled possessively around every other lintel, threshold and outthrust brick. An untended garden ran wild in a border five feet deep as far around the dwelling as Aubrey could see—roses twining with the ivy up the walls, yellow sunflowers heavy with the weight of their powdery brown hearts, hollyhocks opening their lush and vulgar blossoms to catch the last rays of the setting sun. The only sound was that of Aubrey’s boots crunching across the gravel, and the bend and sigh of the low-hanging branches and bushes that he pushed aside as he struggled up the path to the house.

  When he knocked, his fist created such a small sound against the heavy wood of the door, he doubted it could be heard by anyone inside those tumbled walls. He knocked again three times before he noticed the rusty chain hanging to one side of the door; then he crossed the porch to pull that vigorously. Distantly, he heard the clamor of warning bells inside the fortress and was satisfied that someone would now be alerted to his presence. He hammered on the wood one more time just in case.

  He waited, but there was no response. Impatiently, he stepped off the low, cracked stone porch to look up at what he could see of the face of the building: a few closed windows, and the fluttering ivy. From where he stood, it was impossible to tell if there was any smoke drifting up from the back kitchens or the front parlors, and h
e had not bothered to look for any as he cleared his way up the front walk. Perhaps no one was home. He stepped back on the porch again and gave the bell chain another hearty pull.

  On the instant, the door opened. Aubrey turned quickly toward the sound, his ready smile back on his face. A tall woman stood framed in the doorway, holding the door open with both hands as though it were heavy. Her hair, braided in a coronet around her head, was as dark as the wood of the door, her gown was as gray as the stone, and her eyes were a green so rich they were a startling source of color in this drab place. On her face was an expression of utter indifference.

  “What do you want?” she asked. She sounded neither friendly nor unfriendly; she did not even sound curious.

  Some of Aubrey’s smile had faded to be replaced by a quizzical look. “Hello,” he said, starting with his mildest grade of charm. “I am Aubrey. I was sent here by the magician Cyril of Southport to study with Glyrenden. I believe he is expecting me.”

  “Is he?” the woman asked. “I didn’t know.”

  Aubrey waited a moment, but that seemed to be all she had to say. He turned his charm a fraction of a degree higher. “Perhaps he has forgotten,” he said. “Is he here? May I come in and speak with him?”