“As much as I like this Gulliver overall, I think Quindlen made a mistake to have the Houyhnhnms be intelligent draftbeasts.”

“Why?” Spar asked. “Do you think he should have said they were intelligent... what was it in the original? Unicorns?”

“Take off that silly disguise, Verentsu, and tell me what's going on! And you, Shalasan — if that's really your name — what are you doing here?”

It didn't take them long to get out of their wet things, but it took them a lot longer to get into dry ones.

She undressed in the dark and stashed her clothes and shoes on the shelves, then looked inward at her structure, deciding what form she wanted for this purpose. She started making changes, reducing her size and altering her structure. Twitching her whiskers and sniffing gingerly at the door, she slipped quietly into the corridor and scurried down it towards the front parlor.

Launuru hated herself for her cowardice as soon as she'd run away, but was too ashamed to go back. It was too late to fix things; she'd gambled her relationship with Verentsu, hoping to turn friendship into love, but now she'd made such a mess that there was probably no way they could go back to being friends.

“What's your custom here in Niluri?” Kazmina asked. “Is a woman normally allowed to ask a man to marry her? It's hard to judge from Tsavila or you what women are normally expected to act like here; even in Setuaznu, enchantresses are allowed more privileges than mundane women, and as for you...”

Hadn't Tsavila said that he should be kind to her, for she'd suffered enough already? If she was compelled to act this part against her will, further probing could do no good; he had already learned enough to be sure she was no Vetuatsenu. Various moments of their conversations the day before came back to him: she had repeatedly changed the subject when someone brought up recent events in Netuatsenu, or asked more than a few questions about her family.

“Don't go away. Don't let him make you go away.”

“How? Is Kazmina strong enough to defend me against him?”

“No. But I am.”

“Love is a thing holy to Kalotse, and...” Just then she heard a wailing, which got momentarily louder; one of the servants came in holding a fussy, just-woken Miretsi. “A thing with unexpected consequences,” she concluded.

Launuru said little in the carriage on the way back to the wizard's house. She was thinking about her reaction when Kazmina had suggested that she change back into the man she'd been when she hired the room. It had been as appalling to her just now as the idea of becoming a woman had been when Kazmina suggested it two days ago. If that were so, how could she ask Tsavila to marry her, promising to become a man again soon?

Have you gotten Melisande with child yet?”

“She would know better than I,” he said, flushing. “But she had her monthly bleeding a few days ago.”

She was dirty and sweaty from working in the garden, but not much less beautiful for that. But it seemed odd that he did not recognize her; the wizard hired his human servants from among the peasants within a few miles of Harold’s farm, and Rodric knew everyone living in that region.

When she raised her eyes from the bush and saw him, she called out, “Help me!”

“Kazmina,” she said, gently shaking the wizard, “you've got to change me back now... Or tell me what's going on.”

Kazmina wasn't fully awake. “What's wrong?” she mumbled, propping up on her left arm.

“This doesn't feel wrong, that's what's wrong! I'm forgetting what I'm supposed to be, just like when we were geese. By the time we go to see Psavian, I'm afraid I'll have forgotten why I came back to find Tsavila!”

“I'll be lucky if my father even attends. He doesn't have much time for those of us who didn't inherit his power. But my brothers and my cousins on my mother's side will be there, they're fun to be with, and some of our neighbors I know well... and my sister. You'll like her; she's pretty.”

She was, and he did.