Soul of Fire by Sarah A. Hoyt Page A

voice. “Damned thing to get used to a new name at my time of life.” Then he frowned. “And not much chance Marty will believe that I have any men of business in India, or that Father had one. He knew Father well enough to know all Farewell money has long ago done what the name indicates.” He shrugged. “Then again . . . Mother had properties, and perhaps he’ll think it has something to do with her dowry. Who knows?”
    She didn’t, and therefore forbore to speak until he asked directly, “Ready, Miss Warington?”
    She nodded, once. “Yes.”
    “Very well,” he said. “We’ll go, then. It would be best leave the way we came, through the garden, and for me not to change shapes until we’re a while away from the house, so that—” He stopped, as a series of loud roars split the night. “The devil,” he said. “Tigers within the city?”
    In Sofie’s mind, the image of the creature on the veranda appeared. “Lalita said . . .” St. Maur turned to look at her, his eye gazing with a vague expression, as though he didn’t really expect her to say anything important or as if he wondered why she was talking at all.
    “Lalita said that the raj my parents wanted me to marry . . . She said he came from a place that was called the realm of the tigers, and that anyone who went there . . . wouldn’t . . . that Englishmen did not come out of it.”
    For just a moment the vagueness in Farewell’s eye remained, and he looked at her deliberately, from head to toe. It wasn’t an interested look. More a considering look, as if he was trying to decide how trustworthy she was. Sofie wanted to scream at him, and possibly throw things. Her quick anger surprised her, so she held herself still by an effort of will.
    But then he blinked and nodded. “Kingdom of the Tigers. I’ve heard. . . . Mind you, I’ve seen no evidence of it in all my time here; but then, I’m very much an outsider. I’ve heard that India is shot through with shape-shifters, and with realms and clans of shape-shifters, all holding nothing but their own kind in loyalty.”
    The roars sounded closer now.
    “It’s like they’re calling to one another,” Sofie said. “Showing one another the way.” She reached down, almost involuntarily, to pick up her bag. “Like they’re telling one another where we are.”
    “It’s possible.” Farewell said. “I was never around weres myself. They’re not that common in England. Well, other than myself, I mean. I’ve been around myself, but it’s not the sort of thing—” Having muddled his words, he ground to a halt, his brow furrowed above the patch that hid his eye. “The legends say,” he said at last, “that witch-sniffers can smell out a were. It is said the Royal Were-Hunters have trained sniffers for that purpose, though I don’t believe it, as I’ve often been quite near companies of them. . . .”
    She blinked at him, in turn, confused as to what he could possibly mean by that. “I haven’t noticed any particular odor,” she said tartly.
    His mouth quirked, just briefly. “No,” he said. “I bathe.” Then seriously, “But you see, if there is an odor to the magic of transformation, then witch-sniffers who are used to having more of our kind around and . . . who are organized might very well have developed a method of smelling us out. And perhaps even recognizing what kind of were.”
    “How could they smell your path?” she asked. “We flew.”
    He shook his head slowly. “I don’t know, but listen to the roars multiplying out there. If the creature is in town and has a number of his subjects with him, wouldn’t he have . . . I mean, how hard could it be to send them to crossroads and . . . and to places a dragon might shift without being seen, and then send them out. To sniff the way the beast went.”
    “We shouldn’t have landed,” Sofie said, as a black panic welled within her, threatening to submerge her reason, “We should never have landed. We should have