Ki'iri: Excerpt

Arion was waiting for him the very next morning. As Daro bent to touch the proffered snout and neck, he asked, "How is it that you can come so often? I thought the priests didn't want to let you out."

It is winter and the season of storms. The Lady's restlessness makes us all restless. I tell the priests that the hrill in me must go out. It is not uncommon. There are several in the Blue House who are even now walking about in their ki'iri forms. Are you not pleased to see me?

Daro pulled his hand back to the railing as Arion slid back into the water. "I don't want you to get in trouble with the priests."

I do not care what they think.

"But they would shut you away and I wouldn't see you again." The emotion that accompanied the clicking laughter was a lightness Daro had never experienced with hrill, a certain flirtatiousness he sometimes found among the neighborhood girls. So you enjoy my visits?

He blushed furiously. "I...well, I couldn't help but wonder what...what you're like in the flesh. I-I mean, what do you really look like?"

Ah, so you wish to see me, then, is that it, Daro?

It was the first time Arion had spoken his name, and the sound had such a sensual quality to it that Daro was at once embarrassed. "I-I'm sorry, I shouldn't ask. But it's odd to talk to a creature you know is a man and not a hrill."

It is not possible. It takes so much of my strength to change shape that I could not shed my ki'iri skin for you and then take it up again for the priests. I would like to see you as well. A hrill's senses are not those of a man. Not less, but...different. But even in a hrill's flesh, I have the desires of a man.

Daro burned with those words, and heard them echoing in his head for the rest of the day.