Free The Princess and the Snowbird by Mette Ivie Harrison

tottered outside. He welcomed the cold of the night on his cheeks, going as fast as he could to the edge of the village, limping a little on the side where his knee hurt still.
    He stared up at the stars and marked out a northern constellation that could have been a snowbird with one wing folded.
    Those are the edges of my new village, he told himself. He crossed the river when it grew light, and heard the sound of wolves crying out in the distance, as if they could already smell his blood. But he felt no fear, for he was going home at last.

C HAPTER E LEVEN
Liva
    “ D O NOT GIVE him your aur-magic!” the hound barked out harshly.
    Liva was astonished. “He is dying,” she said. “Even so. He gave you the aur-magic for a reason. Do not undo what he gave up so much to accomplish.” The hound stood between Liva and the bear, as if guarding him against his daughter.
    “You do not even care that he is dying!” Liva accused her mother. This was not what she wanted when she called out for help.
    “We all die,” her mother said more gently. “That is the way of being mortal. Animals and humans, it makes us the same. Your father has never wished to escape from that. It is living this long that has been the most difficult for him. Think how he has outlived all others he has ever known, for the sake of saving the true magic. Will you make him sacrifice again, live longer again, despite hisdesire for rest? Only because you are afraid?”
    Liva sobbed.
    “He knew this time would come,” her mother said.
    “But he left without a word,” said Liva. “At night.”
    “He thought it would be easier for you that way. It was only when I saw you leave the cave that I knew you had to make things difficult, and so I followed you for your own sake.”
    At this, Liva threw herself at her mother, a nearly grown bear cub against the full-grown but failing wild hound. Liva changed into the form of a hound herself, not thinking of anything but this moment, this battle. But her mother was ready for her and kept her position, all four paws on Liva’s body, in just the right place to keep her immobile.
    A wolf had no better effect, nor a moose, nor an elk.
    Still furious, Liva tried to change into an eagle, with powerful talons to cut at her mother, but her claws caught only at the air. Her mother shifted position and tugged at her wings until Liva cried out at the pain and changed back into the bear cub she had been before.
    That was when she felt the death of her father, in the sudden change of the magic all around her. His aur-magic had been draining out, but this last bit was palpable. It was like the last fall of a tree’s leaves or the final stilling of a river frozen at the beginning of a bitterly cold winter. It was the last moment of sunset before it was night, the last call of a bird as it flew north, never to be heard fromagain. It was the smallest of changes, yet it was everything.
    Liva sagged and found that she had no strength for weeping.
    Her mother tried to snuggle next to her, but Liva would have none of it.
    “Tell me,” she demanded, her voice harsh and bitter. “Why should he die for those with the aur-magic? When he had already given it up himself? Why should he go to help humans, when he had given up being human as well?”
    “He would hear them call to him, those with the aur-magic who had been accused, who were sentenced to death,” said the hound. “He could not ignore them.”
    “But he had given me his aur-magic.”
    The hound shook her head. “But not his responsibility. I told him that he should let it go, that he had no more power to do the task. He should have waited for you to take up the burden, but he said he could not allow you to do so until you were ready, and that he was needed now. I cannot say I was ashamed of him for that.”
    “And that night? Did he tell you who he was leaving us for?” asked Liva bitterly.
    “He told me he had dreamed of the same family for weeks. A mother and a