Free The Prophet of Panamindorah, Book One Fauns and Filinians by Abigail Hilton Page A

and
only a year passed on Earth, but hundreds of years passed here.
That would explain why I know your language, and yet it sounds a
little strange to me. Languages change. It would explain why
everyone says my speech is old fashioned, why I think cowries ought
to be money.”
    Capricia nodded wearily. “I understand what
you think, Corellian, but—”
    “ But ,” he continued, “that doesn’t
explain Dance. How could he know me? How could Dance possibly have
been alive long enough for the language to change?”
    “By all reports, Dance is just a wolf like
any other. No faun has ever heard him speak. He’s large, and that’s
what started the rumor that he’s a durian wolf, but Chance and
Laylan don’t think so. There are many reasons why he might have
seemed friendly towards you. Perhaps your scent reminded him of the
wolflings. You had been with them recently, after all. Perhaps you
unwittingly gave him a signal that he recognized—a hand sign or a
gesture that the Raiders use.”
    Corry looked out the window, annoyed. “You’re
wrong.”
    Capricia started to speak again, but he cut
her off. “I know the Raiders had something to do with your getting
the flute. Did you really ‘find’ it, Capricia? Or did you steal
it?”
    She stared at him. “How did you—?”
    “Syrill told me you began your study of the
wizards after becoming ‘lost’ in the forest during a Raider attack.
He thought it was me you’d found, but I’m sure it was the flute. I
want to know how you got it. I’ll tell Meuril if you don’t—”
    “You’ll find I don’t respond well to
threats,” snapped Capricia.
    “Alright. Don’t try to force me, and I won’t
try to force you.”
    A heavy silence. Then Capricia laughed.
“There’s not much to tell. You’ll be disappointed.”
    “I’m never disappointed with the truth.”
    “When the Raiders attacked our caravan, my
doe bolted. We were in unfamiliar country, and by the time I
stopped her, we were lost. As we were finding our way back to the
road, someone dropped out of a tree and tried to pull me to the
ground. It was the smallest member of the pack, the one that
doesn’t speak.”
    “Huali?” guessed Corry.
    “Hualien, yes. In the struggle, I caught hold
of something hanging around his neck. I tried to strangle him with
it. In the end, he broke free and fled, leaving the thing in my
fist. It was the flute. I took a day finding my scattered traveling
party. You see? Not a very revealing story.”
    “But it’s worth knowing.” Corry thought a
moment. “Is Hualien really one of the eight? I saw him in the
forest, but I thought he was only one of their children.”
    Capricia shook her head. “There are only
eight Raiders. Lyli and Xerous are mates, but they have no living
offspring. Hualien is an orphan, seven years old. Chance and Laylan
have copious dossiers on all of them. The Raiders don’t have many
secrets, except their den, of course. I’ve read everything
available on them and come up with nothing to explain the flute. I
concluded that Hualien found it or stole it, so I turned my
attention to the wizards.”
    “Do you think your father would have complied
with their ransom demands?”
    Capricia arched her brows. “Lift the bounties
laws? Of course not. The wood fauns would revolt.”
    Corry pursed his lips. “Fenrah makes these
demands for her nation? There’s nothing she stands to gain, other
than freedom to live in wood faun territory?”
    Capricia sighed. “Fenrah Ausla is of royal
blood. Chance believes she would be heir to the throne…if there was
a Canid throne to claim, which of course there isn’t since the
Filinian conquest.”
    “I can see why Syrill seemed sympathetic to
the Raiders.”
    “Syrill lives for the present. He’s too young
to have been involved in any of the wars with Canisaria before it
fell. Wolflings and fauns have always been uneasy neighbors. My
mother was killed by wolflings, but that is beside the point.”
    Capricia