Free Fires of Azeroth by C. J. Cherryh

to think on these things. Perhaps I can give you what you ask: permission to travel Shathan. Perhaps we shall have to reach some further agreement. But fear nothing from us. You are safe in this camp and you may be at ease in it."
    "My lord, now you have asked me much and told me nothing. Do you know what passes at Azeroth now? Do you have information that we do not?"
    "I know that there are forces massed there, as you said, and that there has been an attempt to draw upon the powers of the Gate."
    "Attempt, but not success. Then you do still hold the center of power, apart from Azeroth."
    Merir's gray eyes, watery with age, looked on her and frowned. "Power we do have, perhaps even to deal with you. But we will not try it. Undertake the same, lady Morgaine, I ask you."
    She rose and inclined her head, and Vanye gathered himself to his feet. "On your assurance that there is yet no crisis, I shall be content to be your guest, . . . but that attempt of theirs will be followed by worse. I urge you to protect the Mirrindim."
    "They are hunting you, are they not, these strangers? You fear that Eth betrayed your own presence there, and therefore you fear for the Mirrindim."
    'The enemy would wish to stop me. They fear the warning I can give of them."
    Merir's frown deepened. "And perhaps other things? You had a warning to give from the very beginning, and yet you did not give it until a man was dead at Mirrind."
    "I do not make that mistake again. I feared to tell them, I admit it, because there were things in the Mirrindim that puzzled me ... their carelessness, for one. I trust no one whose motives I do not know ... even yours, my lord."
    That did not please them, but Merir lifted his hand and silenced their protests.
    "You bring something new and unwelcome about you, lady Morgaine. It adheres to you; it breathes from you; it is war, and blood. You are an uncomfortable guest."
    "I am always an uncomfortable guest. But I shall not break the peace of your camp while your hospitality lasts."
    "Lellin will see to your needs. Do not fear for your safety here, from your enemies or from us. None comes here without our permission, and we are respectful of our own law."
    "I do not completely believe them," Vanye said, when they had been settled in a small and private tent. "I fear them. Perhaps it is because I cannot believe that any qhal's interests-" He stopped half a breath, held in Morgaine's gray and unhuman gaze, and continued, defying the suspicion that had lived in him from the beginning of their travels, "-that any qhal's interests could be common with ours . . . perhaps because I have learned to distrust all appearances with them. They seem gentle; I think that is what most alarms me ... that I am almost moved to think they are telling the truth of their motives."
    "I tell thee this, Vanye, that we are in more danger than in any lodging we have ever taken if they are lying to us. The hold we are in is all of Shathan forest, and the halls of it wind long, and known to them, but dark to us. So it is all one, whether we sleep here or in the forest."
    "If we could leave the forest, there would still be only the plains for refuge, and no cover from our enemies there."
    They spoke the language of Andur-Kursh, and hoped that there was none at hand to understand it The Shathana should not, having had no ties at all to that land, at whatever time Gates had led there; but there were no certainties about it,... no assurance even that one of these tall, smiling qhal was not one of their enemies from off the plains of Azeroth. Their enemies were only halflings, but in a few of them the blood brought forth the look of a pure qhal.
    "I will go out and see to the horses," he offered at last, restless in the little tent, "and see how far we are truly free."
    "Vanye," she said. He looked back, bent as he was in leaving the low doorway. "Vanye, walk very softly in this spider's web. If trouble arises here, it may take us."
    "I shall cause none,