Free The Cursed Towers by Kate Forsyth Page A

longer. Do no' be saying ye wish it had no'
    happened, or that ye should no' have done it. I've wanted nothing else since I saw ye again in Caeryla ..."
    "So what was ye in the square?"
    "Aye, and sorry I am indeed that I could no' be rescuing ye!" he cried. "I've been thinking o' nothing else since I heard it was ye. I wish I had known ye had been captured! I saw only the glimpse o' ye and could no' get any closer, what wi' the crowds—"
    Her downturned face was bitter. "Aye, throwing their rotten vegetables and stones," she said, and unconsciously she cradled her maimed hand in her other.
    Dide grasped it, peeling back her glove so he could kiss the pitted scars, but she snatched her hand away and would not let him see. He tried to draw her back into his arms, but she resisted, saying, "I had best be getting back, Iseult will be wanting me. Will ye see if ye can find Lilanthe, it's worried indeed I am about her."
    Dide watched her go, a troubled expression on his face, then kicked the tree with his shabby boot so snow fell in a shower onto his head and shoulders. With a curse he shook it from his crimson cap and followed after.
    It was several days before Isabeau at last found a weeping greenberry tree huddled in the shelter of a wall in the garden. She leant her hand against the smooth bark and called Lilanthe's name, but there was no quiver of the bare branches in answer, no indication that the tree was anything but a tree. Softly Isabeau pleaded with the greenberry tree, stumbling to explain and reassure, but there was no response and at last she left the tree-shifter to rest dormant in peace.
    The Red Stallion
    Isabeau was in the classroom at the Tower of Two Moons, her head bent over a scorched textbook, when she heard a timid knock at the door. All the pupils looked up as their teacher Daillas the Lame gave an impatient grunt and called, "Come in!"
    The freckled face of one of the stablehands peered rather nervously round the heavy door. "Be Isabeau the Red here?" the boy asked. "She's wanted at the palace." Isabeau got to her feet with a resigned shrug, the other apprentice witches looking at her enviously. They would have welcomed any interruption to their struggles with the alchemical tables, but few ever had the chance to escape their classes. Isabeau was often called away, however, to solve a problem in the infirmary or to assist the Keybearer Meghan.
    Isabeau cast a longing glance at the book and Daillas said gruffly, "Take it with ye, lassie. Ye may get a chance to study it, and it be a shame indeed to interrupt your lesson when ye were so close to solving the problem."
    She gave him a quick smile of thanks and tucked it under her arm as she followed the boy back through the snowy boulevard. Isabeau loved her lessons at the tower and wished she could devote more time to her studies, but it seemed someone always needed her elsewhere. Unlike the other apprentice witches her age, Isabeau found the hours at the Tower of Two Moons were never long enough. She had already progressed far beyond her classmates, thanks to her thorough grounding by Meghan of the Beasts, who had raised her. Although Meghan had rarely given her any lessons in witchcraft and witchcunning, Isabeau had been taught much about the theory and philosophy of the One Power, which her fellow apprentices were now struggling to understand. Most importantly, she had been raised to think of magic as natural and intrinsic, while the others all had to overcome a lifetime of indoctrination against the use of sorcery.
    To her surprise, Isabeau was led to the stables. Although she loved horses, she had had little time to visit the mews since her arrival at Lucescere Palace. Gladly she breathed in the rich odor of horse, hay and manure, lifting her skirts clear of the straw-strewn cobblestones. In the central courtyard ostlers were rubbing down steaming horses, carrying buckets of water and vigorously cleaning tack, while a group of excited grooms surrounded a