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well, to let them out, to beg their forgiveness for
putting the collars on them, was strong.
    But each time he forced himself to turn back again. He’d
made his choice. They were creatures of another age—one where magic existed and
might made right. They were stuck in this modern world, as he was, but that
didn’t mean they were going to play by modern rules.
    * * * * *
    She awoke in the dark.
    Mirela rubbed her eyes, opening and closing them several
times. She had a moment of panic, thinking she was blind, but then she picked
out a faint strip of light. It wavered, as if the light were dancing. She laid
her head back—on a surface that was not hard but not soft either.
    Had she dreamed what had happened?
    Her fingers crept to her throat, finding the necklace there.
    But it was no necklace. It was a collar. He’d collared her
as if she were a dog. She twisted her fingers around it and pulled.
    Try as she might she could not get it loose. She remembered
the way the collar had snapped together.
    Panic scurried up her spine on little mouse feet.
    Reaching her hands out, she oriented herself then sat up.
Pressing her face against her knees, she chanted quietly. After a few moments
she was calm enough to lift her head.
    The light, which had seemed to waver, was really a thin
strip of daylight showing beneath what had to be a door. There was no other
light, meaning no windows.
    That gave her a moment’s panic, but Mirela reminded herself
that at some point the lord would have to come back, and when he did she would
fly out.
    Standing now, she moved around the bar-walls of her prison.
Along two of the walls she could push her hands through the bars and touch
stone. She carefully passed her hand over them, feeling for air that might
indicate a shuttered window. Nothing.
    It did not matter a great deal, because only as a falcon
could she fit through the bars.
    How foolish she’d been to believe the lord was anything but
a monster. She could see now why her mother and sisters had wept at her fate.
Had they known this was what he intended to do to her and, knowing that, sent
her here anyway?
    That was an unfair thought, because she knew that if her
mother had the choice she would have kept Mirela from this fate.
    She turned back to the strip of light. What time was it? What
day? She didn’t know how long she’d been unconscious. Would the lord be
returning soon?
    Either way, she wanted to be ready to escape when he came
back.
    Mirela backed away from the bars she’d been leaning against,
crouched and spread her arms. The cold bite of high air, the scent of
sun-warmed leaves and wind-caught flowers surrounded her.
    But the scent faded.
    With a frown, Mirela lowered her arms. She’d never before
failed to call her falcon.
    Raising her arms, she tried it again.
    And again.
    She stopped to clear her mind, counting to one hundred in
several Romani dialects, then tried a fourth time.
    Her falcon would not come.
    “No, no,” she chanted, jumping to her feet and pacing back
and forth across her prison. Panic came again, though this time it was like a
wave, drowning her. “No. I need the sky. No.”
    “Can’t change, can you?” The voice came from the dark, warm
and rich. Mirela thought she smelled the forest, musky and wild.
    “Who’s there? My lord?” Her heart beat wildly.
    “No, he’s gone.”
    “The wolf?”
    “Present.”
    “Oh.”
    “Try not to sound too enthusiastic,” he said, voice dry.
    “Can you get me out of here?”
    “No.”
    “Then why should I care about you?”
    Silence filled the dark and a part of Mirela was aware of
her rudeness, but she was too panicked and scared to care.
    “Indeed, why should you or anyone care?”
    He fell quiet and the only sound was her footsteps. Mirela
stopped pacing long enough to try to call her falcon, but again failed.
    She sank to her knees, throat tight with panicked tears. “I
cannot live like this.”
    “Yes, you can.” His voice was hard and angry.
    “I