Changing the World: All-New Tales of Valdemar

Tanya Huff lives and writes in rural Ontario with her partner, Fiona Patton and nine cats. One more and they officially qualify as crazy cat ladies. Her twenty-fifth novel,

The Enchantment Emporium

, a stand-alone urban fantasy, was recently published by DAW Books. In her spare time she practices barre chords instead of painting the bathroom.

Jors stiffened in the saddle, head cocked. He could hear bird song. The wind humming in the upper canopy, leaves and twigs rubbing together as percussion. Small animals moving in the underbrush.

:Chosen?: Gervais turned to stare back over his shoulder with one sapphire eye.

:I thought I heard a baby crying.:

:Out here?:

It was a good question. They were more than a day’s ride from Harbert on a path that would lead, by the end of the day, to a new settlement set up by three foresting families who’d been given a royal charter to harvest this section of the wood. Besides the usual responsibilities of a Herald on circuit, Jors had specific instructions to make sure they weren’t exceeding their charter.

Jors had never met one of the near legendary Hawk-brothers, wouldn’t actually mind meeting a Hawkbrother, and had less than no desire to meet a Hawkbrother because a forester had gotten greedy and begun cutting outside the territory they’d been granted. He’d grown up in such a settlement, his family still lived in one, and he knew exactly how tempting it could be to harvest that perfect tree just on the edge of the grant. And then the tree just beyond that.

Go far enough just beyond in this particular corner of Valdemar, and problems became a lot more serious than reestablishing the boundaries between feuding families.

An infuriated shriek pulled Jors from his reflections and sent a small flock of birds up through the canopy, wings drumming against the air.

:There! Did you hear it?:

:Given that I haven’t gone deaf in the last ten paces, yes, Chosen, I heard it. But that didn’t sound like an infant.:

:No.: Jors had to admit it did not. :Whatever it is, it sounds furious. And if there’s also a baby . . . :

As Gervais picked up his pace, Jors readied his bow. He was reasonably proficient with a sword—he wouldn’t be riding courier if he weren’t—but even the Weapons Master agreed there were few currently in Whites who could match his skills as an archer. It came from wanting to eat while growing up, as foresters depended on the woods for most of their meat. Small game, large; by the time Gervais had appeared outside the palisade with twigs tangled in his mane and an extraordinarily annoyed expression on his face, Jors had learned to place his arrows where they’d do the most good.

But there were predators in the woods as well, and it wasn’t unusual for the hunters to find themselves hunted by something just as interested in a meal.

:I smell smoke.:

Jors flattened against the pommel as Gervais took them off the main track onto what might have been a path, might have been a dry water channel. Either way, branches had not been cleared for a man on horseback.

He could smell the smoke now too, but it wasn’t the heart-stopping scent of leaves and twigs and deadfall going up, it was more pungent. Slower. Familiar . . .

“Charcoal burner!” he said just as they emerged into a clearing.

There, the expected cone of logs over the firepit. There, the expected small . . . well, in all honestly, hut was probably the kindest description. A little unexpected to see three scruffy chickens in a twig corral by the hut, but eggs were always welcome. Completely unexpected to see the half-naked toddler straining to reach the firepit, held back by a leather harness around his plump little body and a rope tied to a cedar stake.

The toddler turned to face the Herald and his Companion; tiny dark brows drew in, muddy fists rose, and he shrieked.

In rage.

:Well?: Gervais said after a long moment.

:It’s a baby. I’m not . . . I don’t . . . : He sighed and swung out of the saddle.

The toddler stared at him in what could only be considered a highly suspicious manner and shrieked again.

“Hey there, little fellow.” Jors kept his voice low and nonthreatening, as he would when approaching a strange dog. And he’d rather be approaching a strange dog. Two strange dogs. A pack of strange dogs. He’d know exactly what he had to do to rescue this child from a pack of dogs; he just wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do with a child alone.

:I doubt he’s going to bite.: