Arthur leaned forward. “A what?”
“A man.”
“The wolf turned into a man?”
“Yes.”
Arthur stared at his old tutor. Philip had told him some unlikely things in his youth, but this took the prize. “Are you certain they weren’t just drunk and took a couple of bad stumbles?”
Philip chuckled. “I asked Tiro the same thing.”
Arthur glanced at Bedwyr, trying to suss his reaction. Wolves? Becoming men? “Is this a test?” he asked Philip.
“A test?”
Arthur stood, frustrated. “Rhys sent us out here with nothing to do but wait, and now here you are, with your new status, and I’m starting to believe we’re being tested.” He looked at the men around him. They seemed uncertain, but of him as much as Philip.
The old man stood. “It’s not a test, Arthur, I promise. It’s only something we didn’t know the Saxons had. Not for certain.” Philip took a great breath and acknowledged their confusion. “I heard enough about the possibilities over the years that I did my own research. From the time I began my education in Constantinopolis, I spoke to many scholars about these men who could allegedly alter their physical form. Opinions varied. Most put the notion up to fancy. Some acknowledged the possibility, in the spirit of keeping an open mind. A few, however, claimed to have seen it happen. I gathered what I could about the phenomenon, but there were always more pressing matters to deal with on my diplomatic trips, so I kept the information to myself. So as not to lose my fellows’ confidence,” he added pointedly.
For good reason. Arthur wasn’t entirely confident that Philip hadn’t lost his fucking mind.
“Couldn’t these wolves have been men wearing pelts?” Bedwyr asked.
Thank the gods for his ddraig’s clear head. They’d seen plenty of men fight wearing full skins and skulls.
“I asked the same, Bedwyr. But Uthyr and Tiro both swore there was no pelt to be found near your father. Only a dead man with a sword through his heart. But…I need to be completely honest with you.” Philip looked around the group, meeting each man’s eyes. “We weren’t completely taken by surprise.”
“You just said you weren’t certain the Saxons had these wolf-men.”
“No, but we did know such men exist.”
Arthur stared at him. “We?”
Philip nodded. “Uthyr knew. He told me a few years ago. I shared it with Tiro.”
“How did Ta know?” Bedwyr demanded.
“Because he’s acquainted with such a man.”
“What?”
“Who?” Arthur said.
“It doesn’t matter just now—”
“The gods’ blood it doesn’t,” Bedwyr spat. “If these beasts are among us, we deserve to know it!”
“They’re not beasts,” Philip said. “They’re men with extraordinary capabilities.”
“They’re liars and monsters.”
“No more than you are.”
“They attacked my father!”
“Because he’s Uthyr and they’re Saxons. They only used the weapons at their disposal. Wouldn’t you do the same? Haven’t you, as far as you’re able?”
“Well, I’m not a fucking wolf-man, am I?”
Arthur gripped his arm, for which he got the full force of Bed’s scowl. He turned to Philip. “For the sake of argument—”
Bedwyr scoffed.
“—the Saxons have these wolf-men. How many?”
“We don’t know.”
“Are they especially vulnerable?”
“They’re as mortal as any man.”
“So now any wolf we see could be a Saxon—”
“Gods,” Bed groaned, “stop this, cub.”
Arthur’s mouth was open to continue, but then something else occurred to him. “Hold.” He fixed a pleading gaze on Philip. One that begged the man to deny this next question. “Are wolves the only animals we need to watch for?”
Philip’s reaction to that was not a comfort. It was, however, one he’d gotten several times back when he’d been the man’s student. It was the look Philip gave him when he’d discovered something on his own.
“Fuck.”
“Just hold a damned moment,” Bedwyr growled. “This is getting ridiculous. If we’re to believe we’re surrounded, I want proof.”
A reasonable request. Arthur expected Philip to fetch his satchel and pull from it some variety of scholarly scrolls. Only, the man didn’t seem to have a satchel nearby.
Instead, he began to strip off his clothes.
They all watched, dumb with surprise, as Philip shed layer after layer until he stood before them, as naked as if he intended to have a bath. Then he used one of the benches to climb onto a table.
He looked hard at Arthur. “Do you trust me?”
“Do I have a choice?”
Philip shook his head.
Then his lean, sinewy body shrank, and sprouted feathers and wings and claws and a beak, and amid the shouting that ensued, Arthur found himself staring into the great, round, unblinking eyes of an owl.
Morien stared in horror, trying to quell the panic flashing over his skin.
Master Philip was a shifter!
And his father had known. The bundle he’d told Morien to hide in the stable… It had held clothes for Philip. Clothes that now lay draped over a bench—he recognized the cloak as one of Rhys’s.
Around him, the men were scrambling. “Fucking Greeks!” Palahmed shouted and shoved Gawain behind him. Bedwyr tried to do the same with Arthur, but their leader was too tall, too strong. Too hypnotized by what he was seeing. Beside Morien, Safir’s eyes were as wide as the owl’s. “Good God,” he breathed.
Morien might have been tempted to call on his own gods then, but it wouldn’t do him any good. Philip had just revealed the existence of shifters to a group of humans, and when men witnessed something like this, they never forgot it.
Especially when it seemed dangerous.
Bedwyr grabbed Arthur’s arm. “Step away, cub!”
But Arthur only shook his head, so that the long copper queue of his hair wavered down his back like a snake. He looked around and then stooped to peer under the table. “Excellent trick, Master. Where’ve you gone?”
He straightened again, and now all the men were looking about the hall for evidence the old man had simply performed an illusion of the sort a traveling bard might perform for the crowd in Rhys’s hall. But they soon realized Philip was nowhere about.
Or rather, that he was.
That he stood on the table.
Arthur stepped toward him and held out his fingers.
“Don’t!” Bedwyr said, but Arthur didn’t seem to hear him.
Philip ducked his head into his shoulders, then lifted it again and gazed at Arthur. Slowly, cautiously, the man touched his fingertips to the owl’s head.
Bedwyr hissed. “It’ll take your fingers off, you fool!”
“It won’t,” Arthur murmured. He followed the grain of Philip’s feathers down to his back. “He won’t. Gods, Philip. Is it true?”
The owl took a step back and spread its great wings. With a rush of air Morien felt on his face, the owl flapped up, up, up to the rafters. There wasn’t room enough in the hall for him to fly. He perched on a beam for a moment, then flapped back down to the table and shifted back into his human form.
The air in the hall felt as if lightning had struck the floor. The storm in Morien’s belly was much further along, roiling his insides with fear. And yet he couldn’t run. His feet felt as if they had sprouted roots into the flagstones.
Philip crouched on the table, watching the men. “Do you trust me?” he asked Arthur again.
Arthur’s hands clenched, but then they rose in a silent order for his men to keep their peace. “Help us understand.”
Philip began to pull on his clothes again. His hands shook, more so than Morien recalled them doing before, and he knew why. Shifting took something from a man. Not to a perilous degree, but it made a man hungry and thirsty. He managed to free his legs from their immobility and fetched two apples from the crate by the ale. He poured a healthy cup of the brew as well and took the whole back to Philip, setting them on the table.
“Thank you, Morien.” Philip met his eyes, and there was acknowledgment of a different sort there.
But no comfort. No promise that Philip wouldn’t expose his secret.
Damn. He shouldn’t have fetched the food. None of the others had thought to do so. He retreated to Safir’s side. He felt the man look at him and reluctantly met his eyes.
They were wide with wonder. “Have you ever seen such a thing?” Safir’s voice was as hushed as when he spoke to Morien in the bed they shared.
But if he’d known the truth—if he discovered it now—he’d have nothing more to do with Morien.
That thought brought with it a shocking sorrow.
Oh, no. He was in too deep—
“Please,” Philip said. “Come sit with me by the fire. I need its heat.”
One by one, the men followed him there. Morien noted with grim self-preservation that Bedwyr and Palahmed required the encouragement of their partners to comply. Aware of his position in relation to the hall’s one door and only escape, Morien sat down with the rest.
“You haven’t always been able to do that,” Arthur said. “Have you?”
“No.” Philip raised his hands to the fire to warm them. “Mabyn performed the charm just before she died.”
“Mother Mabyn could turn men into animals?”
“Worked on me.”
“Are you the only one she turned?”
“She wouldn’t tell me that.”
“And that helped you trust her?” Bedwyr said.
Philip chuckled. “I didn’t really have another option. According to Mabyn, every Myrddin has been a shifter.”
Gawain leaned forward. “Shifter?”
“A shapeshifter. Someone who can alter their form between human and animal.”
“Any animal?” Safir asked. “Did you choose yours?”
No, Morien thought, and Philip shook his head. “It chose me.”
“How?”
“There are two ways to become a shifter. Rather, three. One is to take in the semen of a shifter. Through sex, usually. The second is to be born of a union of that seed. The ability passes down the male line. Sons of shifter men will be shifters themselves. The third way is to have the charm spoken over you. In that case, your animal form is predetermined.”
“By the gods?” Arthur asked.
“I suppose.” Philip glanced at the roof beams. “Mabyn said our fated forms are written in the stars.”
Arthur jerked upright and turned to Bedwyr. Some silent thing passed from one to the other.
“The once and future?” said Gawain.
Philip looked at him. “That’s what folk in the north call it, yes?”
“Aye.” Gawain turned to Palahmed, and even from across the fire, Morien could see the first pale tendril of an idea taking form in Gawain’s eyes.
“Don’t be foolish, hawk,” Palahmed growled.
“But what if—”
“Don’t,” Palahmed told him, then turned to his brother with a worried expression that transformed into outrage. “Not you, either!”
“What?”
“You’ve got that look, Safir.”
“Look—”
“Don’t play coy, and don’t even fucking think it.” Palahmed thrust his chin at Morien. “Talk sense into him, Morien.”
He opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
“Sense!” Safir exclaimed. “How much of the past quarter hour makes sense to you, brother?”
“The past quarter hour,” Palahmed growled, “has only proven to me that there are those we can trust and those we can’t.”
“Palahmed—”
The older brother stood, taking a grip on Gawain’s arm. “Come, hawk. This is sorcery, at best.”
Gawain pulled his arm away. “You don’t direct me.”
Arthur stood. “Palahmed, wait. I’ve known Philip my entire life, and my grandfathers knew him for twenty years before that.”
“And yet in the past month or so, he’s agreed to undergo some curse to take the shape of an owl whenever he pleases. How well do you truly believe you know him? Are you even certain he’s the same man?”
“Hold now,” Arthur said. “Of course he is.”
“Is he, though?”
Every man looked at Bedwyr. His quiet question reverberated in Morien’s ears.
Bedwyr looked around their group before meeting Philip’s eyes. “Are you the man we knew?”
“I’m still Philip of Athenai, Bedwyr.”
“But you aren’t. Not wholly.”
“I am, wholly. I am still that man. It’s only that…now I’m more than who I was.”
Bedwyr frowned, and Morien wasn’t sure he’d ever seen such mistrust on a man’s face. “Why are you here?”
Each word landed in the stillness like stones dropped from a height. Morien held his breath, and it felt as if every man present was doing the same. Even the flicker from the firepit seemed to slow to a slither.
Old Master Philip squared his thin shoulders. “I’m here because shifting presents Cymru with another possible weapon against the Saxons.”
“Why us?” Bedwyr said through a clenched jaw.
“Because,” Philip said, “you’re the men who step up when no one else has the courage.”
The hall erupted, each man shouting to another.
Morien took the few steps he needed to reach the door and fled.