Wings of Omen

Her name was Mignureal and she was Moonflower's daughter and she had seen him as no one should see any man, doubly one so cocky and full of needs as Shadow spawn: she had seen him gibbering in sorcery-induced fear one night. She had taken him home with her and tended him with her nervous mother staying close, having seen Mignue's soft eyes admiring Hanse. On another occasion he had been about to set forth on a dreadful mission she did riot even know about when a look of strange intensity came over her face. "Oh Hanse-Hanse, take the crossed brown pot with you."

With an eerie feeling, he did that. It was the night on which his mission was to get a pitifully maimed Tempus out of the dripping hands of one Kurd, a man whose occupation bore that which was surely the ugliest word in any language: vivisectionist. Cutter-up of the living-and not as physician, either. As it turned out, the brown pot's contents saved his life that night, and he knew that Mignureal the S'danzo had some of her mother's power of Seeing. And then.. .and then it had been Mignureal's form the goddess Eshi had taken, to fetch him to that final dreadful confrontation with Vashanka.

And Eshi seems to love me-at least wants me, he mused, wending his full-bellied, red-cloaked way homeward. Does Mignureal?

And after a few steps more: How old is she, anyhow?

Ah Gods ofllsig-what has that to do with anything? I don't even know how old I am!

Yet he knew that he knew, as he walked on all wrapped in his thoughts and new cloak, who and what he was: the son of some woman of Downwind and... Shalpa. A god. Demi-mortal, Vashanka had called him. That was a phrase that implied another half: demigod. Hanse was a demigod.

How in Ten Hells can I live with that?

How in Eleven Hells can I live with this wishing business?! Anything I want-it's well nigh boring already!

He reached home, and his room, and she was there, small and lovely and vulnerable-looking in her nakedness, sitting up in his bed to smile and stretch forth her shapely arms to him as he entered. Mignureal, little Mignureal daughter of the woman Hanse loved but did not even know he wished were his mother.

"Darling! I thought you'd never come home to me!"

He turned to close the door and pretended to have trouble with the latch, keeping his back to her while he frowned and wrestled with thoughts and emotions.

So she slid out of the bed and came to him. She was all willowy and even lovelier, naked and softly lit, for there was only the light of the bright moon that smiled boldly through the window.

Unable to resist her nearness and upraised arms, he stepped into her embrace and as they kissed his hands moved all over the back of her, from nape to sulcus and back. Both of them trembled, and both longed.

"Mignue, Mignue... what are you doing here?"

She smiled, pressed to him, and nuzzled his neck. "You know what I am doing here, Hanse."

"Please... why did you come, Mignue? Why tonight? What prompted you to come tonight?"

"Because I wanted to be with you, darling-to be yours."

He squeezed his eyes shut. Oh damn, damn. Six more questions elicited similar lovely yet unsatisfactory answers. It was all circular. She has no idea and probably didn't really want to do this at all, he thought in growing agony, she's here because I wished it and Ils sent her, that's all, and I feel... I feel just so, so... rotten!

She had just unbuckled and removed his belt, both sheaths included, and laid it carefully aside on the old keg he used as nightstand. She turned only her head, to give him an arch look over her shoulder. Hanse swallowed hard, and again. He felt truly evil, truly a monster.

She turned to face him with her hands behind her back and her head partly down, flaunting her breasts, and swung her torso this way and that far more in the ma

"Us and Eshi-who could not want you, Mignue? I-"

But that was the wrong thing to say, under the circumstances, which involved his mental state; a joyous smile su

He stroked her thick and very soft hair. Revelation and inspiration hit him and he said it aloud: "Ah, Mignue, Mignue... I wish that you wanted to wrap yourself in my nice new cloak and just talk a while."

"This may sound awful," she said against his chest, "but know what I'd like to do?"

Yes, he did.

She looked unequivocally and downright dangerously fetching in that wine-dark cloak, especially sitting on his bed with her legs drawn up (within the cloak, gods be thanked). Yes, of course she remembered telling him to take the crossed brown pot-and hadn't he? -Yes. And had it proven useful? -Yes. And he told her of that night, and she was astonished that he had done all that, rescuing the mighty and apparently immortal Tempus. Yet, that she had saved his life did not astonish her.

"It is the S'danzo, Hanse. You must know that a S'danzo never tells a client that she foresees his death. Never. Nor does a S'danzo dare try to interfere with the way of a world and the will of the gods, other than to suggest that that person have a care." She sat with her arms enwrapping her drawn-up legs and her hand clasping her wrist, and she was not looking at the young man who sat on the windowsill with his feet on the floor. He had drawn the drapes almost closed, but the room was as if twilit, not nighted.

"On the other hand... with those we love, we S'danzo ca

Hanse blinked. She is telling me that she loves me... and has for over a year! Oh! Oh, g-Ils, Ils, god of my fa-hmp!-my mother. God of Gods... I wish that I knew whether that were true or not! Or not, I say!

"There... I've said it. Now you know, Hanse, oh, Hanse. Now you know... I have loved you, loved you, oh loved you for years-ever since first I saw you, surely, although I was only a girl then."

Hanse swallowed. He felt like melting wax and his eyes had gone all blurry. Me! Shadowspawn! Who ever loved me?! It's all I ever wanted-but I had to pretend, didn't I, so that when it happened, if it happened, I would know it was real... but I never would because I've always had to test, to try so hard not to be hurt....

He tried to be unobtrusive about wiping the damned unmanly embarrassing glistening tear off his cheek. As soon as he had done, the other eye let go. I hope she doesn't see, he thought, and was not even thinking about the power of the wish.

He asked her question after question about the whole Ils/Eshi/Vashanka business. She remembered none of it. She had had a horrible dream about his being forever lost to her, beyond her, because he was in the arms of a goddess, and she had wakened weeping. Her mother had held her and held her and crooned and spoken soft words to her and made her see that was silly, not at all logical or likely or possible.

Of course, Hanse thought, and said, "Me! With a goddess? Oh Mignureal!"