Chapter Three

Into the Desert

I missed Raine more than I could ever have imagined.

 

As I rode on that first day after he left, his face appeared before my eyes. I scarcely saw the terrain we rode over, paid little heed to where Mikk put his feet, and spoke only when spoken to. I saw only his weirdly cold eyes with that wicked black ring, his handsome lips twist into a sweet smile, his shaggy black hair that fell, unmanageable, to his shoulders. I craved his voice, wanted to feel the touch of his hand with a physical ache, and yearned for his massive presence. Yet, I allowed my tears to trickle down my cheeks only in the dark when I was alone.

If my days without him were bad enough, the nights were worse. Tossing and turning, I woke frequently, trying to find comfort in sleep. Though when I accomplished it, I slept uneasily. Tossing about in my blanket, I dreamt of my huge black wolf.

I witnessed his attempt to cross a vast expanse of a desert valley filled with men, beasts and activity. For the first time, I saw the Great Caravan Route, the highway upon which Brutal and his Khalidians made their fortunes. Horses, mules, and disgusting camels travelled both east and west, camping at night in protective clusters. Raine, in his tremendous wolf body, tried in vain to sneak past the fortified camps under the cover of darkness. Time and again he retreated from panicked horses, cursing mercenaries, barking dogs, and loped back into the covering, concealing night.

Yet, I caught flashes of his cold strange eyes as they swept southward, seeking. He paused on a hilltop, his long pink tongue caught between his sharp fangs, his huge head swiveling backward, over his massive shoulder. He gazed long, as though seeing past the leagues, the mountains, all the distance that stood between us. He gazed ever south.

Toward me.

I heard his voice, the mellow, quirky voice that combined so oddly with his huge size, say ‘I love you, oh how I love you.’

I tried to speak to him, tell him I’m sorry, I love you, yet the words never left my tongue. Yet, as though I had, his eyes danced with love as he stared southward, his jaws wide in a lupine grin.

I woke the next morning grouchy, tired, feeling as though I hadn’t slept at all.

“Sleep well?” Kel’Ratan asked cheerfully, shaking dust from his blanket and rolling it up.

Shardon eyed me sidelong, sympathy gleaming from beneath the silver fall of his forelock. If he knew I lied, at least he’d keep his mouth shut.

“Quite well, thanks,” I replied, feigning a sleepy stretch. My spine popped audibly. That felt good. Raising my hands high over my head, the yawn that erupted wasn’t entirely fake.

Bringing me warmed bread and roasted beef to break my fast, Alun bowed as he placed the meal in my hands. Yet, his fingers lightly brushed my cheek, and his lips pursed in a swift air kiss. If I managed to fool Kel’Ratan, I certainly didn’t fool Alun. Did that damnable Shardon give him lessons on reading me?

“Good,” Kel’Ratan said heartily. “Very, very good. We have a long way to go today.”

Somehow, I reckoned he saw through me after all.

That might be why he stuck to my side all through that day, and those that followed, as though bound there by chains. Perhaps that was also why Silverruff and Thunder loped to either side of Mikk’s stirrups, forcing me into unwanted laughter. Through Rygel’s interpretation, Silverruff told a wild tale of his first hunt, of how his father, Tuatha the Elder, set him up to track a wild bull. Only the bull, in rut, not only knew he was there, but lay in wait. As Elder laughed his ass off, the bull chased Silverruff an entire league before finally giving up.

What’s the big deal? So I couldn’t sleep, missed that big, black-haired boor, wanted to kiss him and kill him both. Did I suddenly require a babysitter? While I wanted to snap at Kel’Ratan, at Shardon, at Witraz, who also brought unwilling grins to my face with his lewd jokes, my mood eased under the attention. I snapped less and less, laughter closer to the surface than my scowls. I didn’t want to feel better, dammit, but I did.

Why then did I still find panic my best friend? By day I rode, laughed, jested, and displayed a smiling and uncaring face to the world. Inwardly, I shook with a dread that owned no name. I rode myself into exhaustion, rested little, and dreaded the nightfall. I feared to sleep. What will I see in my dreams? How could I see him, hear his voice, speak to him without words, all from a hundred or more leagues away? I did. We did. Somehow, that frightened me more than anything.

Supper eaten and cleared away, Yuri and Warrior Dog on watch, I sat, cross-legged by the fire. My bridle didn’t need mending, but I mended it anyhow. Kel’Ratan frowned as he rolled into his blanket, but I pretended I didn’t see the significant message he sent: go to sleep. Arianne, yawning, took Tuatha into the tent we shared as Rygel saluted me and sat across the roaring conflagration from my spot. I caught him watching me, a small frown on his aristocratic face, more than once.

One by one, my boys eyed me sidelong while pretending not to, and sought their rest around the fire. Those wolves not interested in hunting curled into furry mounds to sleep the dark away while their hungry brothers loped into the night and vanished like spirits.

Silverruff sat near me, interested in neither sleeping nor hunting, but gazed into the dancing fire as though absorbed. Thunder, too, kept me company, pushing his head under my hands in a quest for an ear rub. His constant, and annoying, need for affection tossed my unrepaired bridle into the dirt more than once. Bar lay down next to the tent, his lion tail coiled about his haunches, the black-tufted tip flicking back and forth.

Sitting cross-legged on his pallet, Alun broke out his flute. Fingering its silken wood, he tested its wind for several moments. My heart thumping in thick slow strokes, I watched. My pretend task idle in my hands, Thunder’s head across my lap, I held my breath.

Like my emotions, Alun played his instrument.

His haunting melody rose on the night air, making me wish he’d broken the bloody thing. I shut my jaw tight against the raw grief that rose to swamp me. Dammit. Why now? After all these months of silence did he choose now, of all times, to immerse himself in the music he loved? As he grieved for the one he lost, as I grieved for the one I lost, he offered up the haunting notes like a sacrificial goat. He played for us both, his ethereal music wafted upward on the dark breeze. His melancholy song drifted like lingering shadows against the light of the moon, rising higher and higher. Unable to stop him, demand he put his instrument away, I shut my eyes against the stinging tears. Sele, Raine – I’m so sorry –

A warrior to the core, Alun yet owned the sensitivity of a poet, a dreamer. In years past, he often gathered an audience of us young warriors-to-be and created tunes to entertain us. Not to be undone, my father often commanded he play at court, lulling the greedy nobles and aristocrats into thinking they held the upper hand during sensitive negotiations. By dawn’s break, those idiots discovered the King actually took advantage of their negligence and, not only stole their inheritances, but by doing so he expanded his royal influence.

In later years, Sele often sat beside him, her eyes shut, listening to the haunting melodies his flute inspired. His natural talent for bringing music from a slender piece of wood enthralled all who listened, and brought comfort where comfort was needed. Sele’s love brought the music out in him. He felt no despair, no agony of the spirit, no hate and no remorse as he bewitched the King’s court and witnessed his love blossom and grow.

Funny. He hadn’t played his flute since Sele died.

So why did he choose to play it now? For Sele? For me? For Raine? However hard I tried to dismiss it, his sweet attentions smoothed my troubled nerves and set my bed to calling. Tired. I was so damn tired. Surely I’ll sleep tonight, without the dreams.

His soothing notes lulled my aching heart, just as he intended. His song drifted over the quiet camp, rising on the smoke, and wafting gently to the heavens. Do you hear him, Sele? He plays as much for you as he does for me.

Comforted, feeling Alun’s love caress me, I shut my eyes and permitted myself to flow along the gentle song’s currents. Nor was I the only one. Around me, whispered voices ceased, restless tossing in bedrolls halted. The wolves drew heavy sighs in their sleep. Music hath charms indeed.

Despite Alun’s best, I dared not sleep. What danger will I see Raine in if I close my eyes? Should I see him killed, I know I’d will my heart to cease its healthy beat. To die, with him, meant I’d spend eternity at his side. I’d easily embrace death than live a barren life without him.

I gave up the pretense of trying to fix my bridle and crawled into the tent to lie down on my pallet. I turned over, uncomfortable, Arianne’s soft snores mingled with Tuatha’s steady breathing. Stubbornly keeping my eyes open, I yawned. I won’t sleep, I won’t –

Of course, my willpower collapsed under the sweet melody from Alun’s flute. And sheer exhaustion. Dozing off, I slid deep into the depths of refreshing, healing sleep.

 

 

I dreamt yet again of the huge black wolf I loved.

I saw him, lit by fires in his huge handsome human form, fighting both Khalidians and Tongu assassins. Bodies piled up at his feet as he cut, stabbed, sliced, and ripped his enemies into bloody pieces. Blood and gore covered him from head to toe. So savagely did he kill, the surviving soldiers and assassins backed away, afraid. They lowered their weapons, and feared his skills, his blade, his rage. I wanted to cheer, to scream, and shriek my own defiance into the teeth of his enemies. I tried to cry a warning – look out – when a Tongu archer aimed his bow. Raine’s wolfish snarl of rage roared forth the instant the arrow struck him –

I woke, barely preventing the scream in my throat from erupting.

I managed it. Though I don’t know how I accomplished it, none woke from their slumber by my outraged cry of anguish and grief.

I blinked, panting. Sweat turned the cool night into a torment. Arianne’s body warmth added fuel to a fire already over-spilling its bounds. Hot. Too hot. I kicked the blanket off me, and sat up.

The fire had burned down low, and only the glowing embers cast a weak light over the slumbering camp. My warriors still lay rolled into their blankets, oblivious to the night and my distress. Furry mounds of sleeping wolves, humorously resembling bundles of tied laundry waiting for maids to pick up, basked in the dim light. No few buried their muzzles under bushy tails. Perhaps they dreamt of the easy hunt, for no few paws twitched, uneasy.

In the tent, Arianne slept on, her light snores loud in my ears. I tried to quash the irritation that rose within me, but failed. Between us, Tuatha half-woke when I did, his questing muzzle seeking my hand. I gently pushed him back into the warmth of Arianne’s side, dropping her limp arm over him.

He settled immediately back into slumber, allowing me the freedom to crawl under the tent’s flap and sit cross-legged outside. I shivered in the chilly, late-night air as the night-sweat cooled rapidly. Dragging a fur to cover me, I sat by the nearly-dead fire, adding wood to its coals and built it up. My chattering teeth eased a fraction as I warmed under the flames.

Only Shardon lifted his head from beyond the firelight. I met his sympathetic gaze and dropped my chin in a quick nod of acknowledgement.

“Are you all right?” he asked, his voice so light and soft I knew none but I heard it. Not even Alun, on watch several rods away with Black Tongue at his side, caught his words.

I merely offered him a half-shrug in reply, and huddled beneath my fur to await the sun and the new day. For I dared not sleep again, fearing what I may see in my dreams. Was he dead even now, killed by the soldiers and the Tongu? I quaked inwardly, fearing to wake Rygel and ask him if Raine still lived. For he’d, of course, want to know how I knew Raine was in danger in the first place.

I didn’t want to share my visions of him with the others. They’d think me crazy, disbelieve me and insist my dreams were just fantasies conjured up by his absence. I feared to admit to them that I saw him in truth. They didn’t need to know that I heard his voice as he spoke to me over the massed leagues between us. Or that he heard me cry my longing as I slept and he loped north.

This should stay between Raine and me.

As the sun’s first rays shot, orange, pink and purple, over the horizon, my boys rolled out of their blankets. Stretching, grumbling and yawning hugely, they greeted the new day with far more enthusiasm than I. Alun and his new pal wandered in from their watch, Alun’s hand tickling Black Tongue’s chin as the huge wolf danced, tail waving, at his side.

“I detest mornings,” Kel’Ratan muttered sourly as he sat up. “Rising this early ought to be banned.”

Nahar, his tail wagging happily, licked his cheek before Kel’Ratan fended him off with a coarse oath. “I also detest folk who like rising this early.”

My fears from the night’s dream interfered with the witty comment I might have uttered. Instead, I huddled under my hide covering and watched, bleary-eyed, as Tor started his early chores of feeding us all. My boys, wolves wagging happily beside them, took horses to water. Shardon ambled along after them.

Arianne crawled out of the tent, yawning mightily, with plump Tuatha tumbling out from under the flap. Her midnight hair, snarled from sleep, cascaded around her like a shroud. Unable to avoid it, she stepped on it with her knees and her feet before she could rise and walk. Straightening her gown, she tossed the heavy mass behind her and smiled like the rising sun as her loves sauntered across camp to greet her.

I stifled a scowl. Arianne mourned Raine’s disappearance for perhaps two hours before delighting in the attention both Rygel and Darkhan offered. I half-wondered if she even remembered she had a brother. I bit my tongue on a caustic comment.

She remembered her duties, at least, and ceased hugging and kissing on her pair of adoring worshippers. She waved them off, murmuring of chores and tying her midnight wealth back, out of the way. Bending, she tried to pick Tuatha up.

With a snarl no less fierce for his small size, Tuatha snapped his needle teeth within an inch of her hand before she jerked it back.

“Tuatha,” she cried as Darkhan growled.

Tuatha snarled again, his baby fuzz stiff and erect along his rounded spine. My boys halted to stare, open-mouthed, and Tor almost dropped his load of meat and bread into the fire. Silverruff woofed, but, as usual, I had no clue what it was he said and no one translated.

I alone felt no surprise at his savage behavior.

Of all of us who loved Raine and missed him sorely, Tuatha alone couldn’t get past his loss. He’d refused to eat the previous day, dozing in his sack for much of the day. Arianne, too fond of the attention she received, offered Tuatha little in the way of the care he obviously needed.

“Tuatha,” I said quietly.

Still growling, his fur rigid, the pup turned around and tottered toward me. His growls coalesced into sharp whines of grief as he crawled into my lap. I enfolded him into the warm hide and my arms, feeling his uncontrollable shiver.

Arianne huffed in insulted irritation before turning away to assist Tor with breakfast. Rygel offered me a one-shoulder shrug and a half-salute before glowering down at a growling Darkhan.

“What was that all about?” Kel’Ratan asked. He still sat, but he’d raised his knee and rested his left arm across it. Blue eyes considered me and Tuatha with kindness and compassion.

“He grieves,” I replied, soft. “He lost his papa.”

“Poor bugger.” Kel’Ratan groaned his way to his feet. “He’s taken to you, obviously. Maybe you should be his mama.”

Me? Take the place of his mother? Obviously, Arianne couldn’t control him and Tuatha didn’t want her to. I couldn’t see Corwyn, Tor or any of my warriors coddling the grieving pup, or caring for him, or coaxing him to eat. Nor would Rygel. That left me, the most unwolfish of all present.

I couldn’t even understand his speech, for goddess sake.

“You and me, baby,” I murmured. “We’ll get through this together, eh?”

His low growl, rising on a whine, answered me. Promise?

“Promise.”

Thus I took him up with me, guiding Mikk with my knees, holding Tuatha in my arms as we rode. I paid close attention to his needs, his anguish, soothing his grief and fears as best I could. I felt his pain, his feelings of abandonment, for they were my own. As he slept in my arms, needing his sleep as babies did, even his rest was broken with whimpers and restlessness. I certainly related to that.

At the noon break, I spent most of my time coaxing his delicious mush down his throat. Tuatha cried and avoided the food as though fearing I’d poisoned it. I hardly ate myself, but I felt cheered when he finally swallowed down almost half of what Rygel had prepared.

Kel’Ratan nodded, his mustache bristling, his own mouth full. “It’s a start.”

Arianne, between Darkhan and Rygel, ate only a handful of meat and bread, watched me with faint hurt in her glorious eyes.

I stood up, dusting off my leathers to check on my horse. I thought to leave Tuatha behind, to seize a short nap before we rode again, but he obviously had other ideas. On stumpy legs, Tuatha marched behind me, huffing along to keep up. I reckon he doesn’t want me out of his sight, I thought, slowing my pace.

Mikk nickered in welcome as I caressed his neck and shoulder. Inspecting my saddle and girth, I adjusted several straps and retied my pack. Curious, Mikk lowered his head, his black nostrils flared to suck in Tuatha’s scent. Sitting on his butt, tiny tail swishing in the dirt, Tuatha regarded him solemnly.

“Your Highness,” Rannon said, walking up beside me.

I glanced around, seeing his new friend, Shadow, at his side. The huge silver and grey Shadow grinned at me, his tongue lolling and his tail fanning the air behind him. His head on level with my chest, the wolf wuffed his salutation.

I half-smiled, my mouth opened to greet them both when a storm broke apart at my feet. A savage sound that surely emerged from a much larger predator erupted from the vicinity of my boots. Tuatha’s fury boiled over like an overcooked stew. His baby fur stood on end as he attacked, needle teeth bared. His latest perceived enemy?

Shadow.

“What the –“ Rannon began as Shadow leapt away from Tuatha’s charge. Tuatha, as enraged as lion defending his pride, charged mercilessly toward Shadow’s dancing feet.

“Er, excuse me,” I said breathlessly, bending over and lunging forward.

Poor Shadow, bewildered and confused by the unprovoked violence, jumped aside. I couldn’t help but notice he politely refrained from retaliating against his small assailant. High-stepping in a circle around Rannon and me, he kept his feet intact and out of reach. As Tuatha followed him up on quick legs, still snarling, I missed seizing his torso. I did, however, grab his tail.

He yowled and screamed, still enraged, as I dragged him into my arms. I half-thought he might try to bite me, but despite his fury, Tuatha knew better. He struggled, yapping, snarling, his sapphire eyes slitted almost shut. I held him tight to me, my palm over his muzzle and eyes.

“Um,” I said diffidently. “You better go.”

Offering me a puzzled salute, Rannon backed away. He snapped his fingers, taking Shadow with him.

Only when Shadow departed did Tuatha finally lick his lips, cease his screams of hate and rage, and calm down. Once more, Tuatha’s drama halted all the camp’s activity. Turning, I discovered a frozen tableau of serious inactivity. Warriors stood, gaping like fools, holding the reins of horses, or halted in the act of tightening girths. Kel’Ratan and Corwyn, in close discussion, stood with their bodies facing one another. Yet, their confused expressions turned toward me. Darkhan and Rygel halted their growls at one another and gawped. Arianne, among them all, scowled in dark disapproval.

“This is absurd,” Kel’Ratan grumbled, his red brows lowered over his snapping blue eyes. “Doesn’t he like anybody anymore?”

I tried to shrug, Tuatha’s heavy weight allowing for only a tiny lift of my shoulders. “He likes me.”

Kel’Ratan snorted and continued his interrupted conversation with Corwyn. With a jerk of my head, I silently ordered the others back to their tasks. Carrying Tuatha back to my spot by the fire, I sat him down, and firmly pushed him into a seated position. He yapped up at me, his blue eyes unrepentant. I smoothed his soft ears back over his head as new worries engulfed my gut.

In their happy ignorance, my people failed to recognize the deep reason behind his aggressive demeanor.

I had my suspicions.

That fateful night the wolves came to stay, Shadow was the wolf who stole Tuatha from his adoptive father.

Tuatha never forgot or forgave.

I can’t allow him out of my sight. I feared the thirty pound Tuatha might challenge the three-hundred pound Shadow very soon. Shadow, of course, had too much sense and too much honor to fight a baby, no matter how belligerent that baby might be. Tuatha, of course, didn’t understand the difference.

I’d have to keep them separate, not an easy thing with men and wolves and horses in one huge massive, milling group. Sooner or later, Shadow and Tuatha would cross paths again.

“What am I going to do with you?” I sighed, bending over to plant my lips between his eyes.

Tuatha growled.

“Not a chance, kid,” I replied. “You’re grounded.”

 

 

I reined in Mikk at the top of a high hill, shivering under my warm hides. Up here, near the top of the Mesaan Mountains, the temperatures dropped to mid-winter levels. Stunted trees, their branches growing only on the south side of their trunks, bore silent testimony to the constant cold wind that ever blew down from the north. Unlike the high, snowy ranges that bordered our beloved Kel’Halla from Khalid’s Federation, these mountains played hell with our resources. We made slow but steady progress northwest, and climbed quite high over the last few days.

Though, thus far, the weather remained good, the altitude continued to suck. We’d consumed much of our stored food, used every blanket, cured skin and piece of wood to stay warm. By camping early each day, we hunted enough game to stay fed and used the skins to stay alive.

“I’m so not ready for winter,” I muttered, wrapping my hide around my legs and Tuatha more tightly. That north wind really cut to the bone.

Reining in beside me, Kel’Ratan glanced around. His red mustache contrasted sharply with his purple lips. “Are you calling a halt?” he asked, his teeth chattering.

Other than those outriders and wolves with them, the rest of my band also halted. Bar sat down outside the nearest rider and extended his left wing to preen. Whether out of a strange disinclination or concern for my welfare, Bar hadn’t flown much. Instead, he trotted beside Mikk for leagues upon leagues, his wings tightly furled to his massive lion shoulders. During our mid-afternoon breaks for rest, water or hunt, he’d beat hard for the sky, rising higher on the icy northern blast with wings spread. Up there, he’d stalk his own midday meal. Hours later he’d return, bloody and sated, and bitch about the icky climate.

Silverruff sat down, panting lightly, his steaming breath whipped away on the fresh wind. He growled as he glanced up at me.

“He says game is scarce here,” Rygel translated.

“Nor is there any water,” I observed, shading my eyes to see better in the glare. “We ride for an hour or two. Lower down, among those bluffs to the west, I’ll wager we’ll find better accommodations.”

“Righty - o.“ Kel’Ratan sighed. “Will you hunt with us today?”

I nudged Mikk into a canter down the steep hillside; Kel’Ratan stuck like glue to my right hand. Complaining bitterly, Bar spread his wings and soared alongside us a few feet above the rock and scrub oak covered ground. In an orderly procession, the others galloped hard on our heels. Arianne swore under her breath as Rufus slid halfway down the precipitous slope on his haunches.

Though Silverruff and Thunder held hard to Mikk’s flanks, the remaining wolves weren’t as trusting. They fanned away from the hard hooves of our mounts. If a horse tumbled ass over ears, he’d not roll over to crush a wolf under his terrible weight.

I gave Mikk his head and shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Come with us,” he urged. “You love hunting.”

“I know.”

“Someone else can stay behind and babysit.”

I stifled a laugh as the ground beneath us leveled out. We reached the shallow valley where a small river flowed and cut a tiny canyon through its heart. Bar returned to earth to gallop on all four feet, and kept an even pace with Mikk. Arianne ceased her string of choice oaths while Rygel praised her riding skills. Darkhan growled.

“I’d love to, but –“

“No buts today. Come with us.”

I stroked my hand down Tuatha’s small face. “He’ll let only me look after him,” I murmured.

“Oh, for –“ Kel’Ratan snapped, impatient.

“If you’re concerned I like serf’s work,” I said, smiling. “You can quit. I don’t, but it’s necessary for the good of all of us.”

Kel’Ratan grumbled under his breath a bit before sighing. “If you hadn’t said that, I’d doubt your ability to reign.”

“Don’t you?”

He snorted, offended. “You’re an obnoxious sort.”

I laughed. “That’s why you love me.”

“Go hunt,” Arianne called from my rear. “I can handle the camp duties.”

I considered the prospect before shaking my head. “Thanks, but I think I’d rather huddle beside a warm fire while you attend camp duties.”

Kel’Ratan guffawed as Arianne huffed.

I didn’t sit beside the warm fire as I threatened, tempted though I was. Kel’Ratan, Corwyn, Tor, and Rygel accompanied my boys as they galloped, whooping, across the bluffs. All the wolves save Tuatha joined the hunt, tails high and jaws parted in happy grins as they chased the horses around the hill and vanished.

“Maybe they’ll bring back something interesting,” Arianne said, speaking over her shoulder as she unsaddled her Rufus. She accomplished the feat only by bullying the flashy stallion into standing still beside a large rock. Fortunately, the saddle and cloth weighed less than she did. After a quick curry, she sent him to graze on the thin tufts of tough grass and set her saddle down beside our tent.

“Like what?” I asked, currying Mikk’s cream hide of dirt and sweat.

“Oh, I don’t know,” she replied, hopping down. “We haven’t had any bird meat for a while. I’m rather tired of venison.”

“Perhaps today is your lucky day.”

Interestingly enough, today was her lucky day.

Among the two deer, a feral piglet and a wild cow the hunters returned with, Alun shot a mountain grouse. Small, a bead of blood trickling down its open beak, it went into the pot over the fire after Arianne, in delight, plucked it featherless and cut it into pieces for a stew.

Of the wolves, only Black Tongue and Thunder reappeared with the successful hunters. After assisting their human friends, the pack loped away to track down a meal for themselves. Not as hungry as they were, Black Tongue curled next to the fire, gazing into the mysterious flickering depths, mesmerized. Thunder bent himself in half and chewed annoying burs out of his tail.

The sun set behind the tall mountains to our north, clouds trailing red, purple and orange flames over their peaks. The wind dropped at the same time the temperature slid downward. I huddled under my hide covering, my teeth biting into my lower lip to prevent them chattering. Tuatha, not complaining, sheltered in my lap under the warm hide I wrapped us both in.

Reduced to serf’s work, I skinned the deer of their hides as Tor spitted the piglet over the fire to roast. My boys cared for their horses, and Tor’s placid mare, their duties for the evening only begun. Left and Right, with clean-up duty in their future, sharpened their swords. Witraz and Rannon’s chores included dissecting the deer and the cow of their meat to roast for later. Yuri and Yuras spiked a large chunk of beef to cook alongside the piglet. Alun wandered away to stand his watch. Black Tongue trotted after him.

“Where’d you find those?” I asked as Tor dropped several tubers into the pot to simmer alongside the grouse.

He half-shrugged, surprised. “I just found them.”

“He has a nose for it,” Kel’Ratan said, squatting and warming his hands at the fire. “Always jumping off his horse to pluck, dig or shove something into his saddlebags.”

Thunder yawned and ambled over to me for an ear scratch, his cold nose nuzzling my neck. “Dammit,” I yelped. “Don’t do that.”

Thunder merely lay down beside me and rested his head across my lap. As he both interfered with my work and risked suffocating Tuatha, I pushed hard, grunting with the effort, and displaced him. With a low growl, he cooperated by curling up beside me instead.

“He says you work too hard,” Rygel translated.

“Someone in this outfit has to,” I replied.

“You –“ Arianne began, but Rygel cut her off with a quick kiss.

“Will the pack be as successful?” I asked the air in general.

“Of course, Your Highness,” Rannon answered. “They’ll also bring back the intact hides.”

“Jolly good,” I muttered. “More work.”

Kel’Ratan opened his stupid mouth to comment, but I forestalled him with a glare. “Don’t.”

He turned his face away, grinning.

Without Darkhan’s growls to annoy him, Rygel flirted with Arianne shamelessly as she both helped Tor with our evening meal, fed the conflagration and bullied Left and Right into erecting our tent. I scraped the deer hides of their fat, blood vessels and staked them out to dry beside the blazing fire. The process of curing them took several days, and I worked on the each batch at every opportunity. As we travelled, I rolled them up and strapped them to Rygel’s black gelding. He soon learned that when I approached, he was given more work. As a consequence, that boy disliked me on sight.

Bar floated in, his beak and breast feathers bloody, to land a rod away from me, as close to the fire as he could get.

“Weenie,” I muttered, scraping.

Bar hissed, complaining of the cold.

“Do me a favor,” I retorted. “You don’t have to work.”

Bar’s returning utterances, at length, told me of how well he’d earned his just rewards by guarding my life at the expense of his own. After listening to his tirade for ten whole minutes, I held up my hand an inch from his beak, palm out. “Do I look like someone who cares? Shut up and go away.”

While he didn’t go away, he did shut up.

The thirteen hunters returned after we devoured the piglet, the beef roast and Arianne’s delicious grouse stew. Feeding themselves lavishly on the wild cattle they pulled down, they loped into the firelight, grinning, tails wagging with blood still staining jowls and chests. Silverruff greeted me with a meaty lick to my cheek, his pack dispersing among their human friends.

Nahar and Darkhan bore two rolled-up shaggy hides across their backs. I sighed, eyeing my new workload.

“Yuri and Yuras,” Kel’Ratan called, stifling a laugh. “Your turn. Stake ‘em out and scrape ‘em.”

The blonde brothers rose from their spots by the fire, saluting absently, and took the heavy hides off the wolves. Nahar shook himself and trotted to Kel’Ratan as Darkhan bristled, seeing Rygel sitting so close to Arianne. Yet, he said nothing as he curled up in the vacant spot beside her. She ruffled his ears, but otherwise gave him no other greeting. Oh, that’s not fair. If I were Darkhan, I’d -

Darkhan suddenly bared his very sharp fangs, gleaming white against his dark muzzle. Rygel, that bastard, kissed Arianne’s hand under his very nose, lingering over her skin, his grin flashing in the firelight. Arianne sighed and fluttered her lashes. Where did she learn that trick? I never learned how to flutter my lashes like that.

I eyed them with concern, worried their antagonism might flare into violence. One powerful wizard and one very large wolf could do untold damage to one another. Keeping one hand on an irritated Tuatha, who watched Shadow stroll past, I leaned toward Kel’Ratan.

“Doesn’t Darkhan realize she’s a girl and he’s a wolf?” I whispered.

“Maybe he’s hoping he’ll win her heart and Rygel in his gallant defeat will turn her into a wolf for him,” Kel’Ratan replied, chuckling.

Being Kel’Ratan, he found the entire thing funny and wagered in undertones with Witraz and Rannon.

“Remember what Elder said about their god liking a human too much?” I hissed at him. “And look at what happened to him.”

Kel’Ratan laughed and gestured toward Darkhan with an airy hand. “That’s his problem, isn’t it?”

I grumbled under my breath. “This is going to get real old, real quick.”

Arianne found their enmity and the courtship they each paid her delightful, and reveled in it. I watched them, half-expecting their animosity to explode into violence. Would Rygel forget his training and blow Darkhan into dust with his magic? Or take his blade and stab the wolf in the heart? Would Darkhan lie awake while Rygel slept, awaiting his chance to open the wizard’s throat? Even if the dreams of a black wolf hadn’t kept me awake, the worry over those two killing each other certainly did.

 

 

I yawned, covering my mouth with my wrist as I curried Mikk.

Two hours till sunset, we broke for the day beneath a sheltering bluff, with good water and grazing for the horses. The tails of my boys’ mounts vanished behind it along with the majority of our wolf pack. Outside of young Tuatha, only Thunder and Nahar hadn’t been hungry enough to hunt. Thunder imitated me, his own yawn huge and gusting out on a high-pitched whine.

Even Bar flew away, in a different direction, seeking his own late afternoon meal.

Left and Right stayed behind to begin camp chores, as did Kel’Ratan, who didn’t feel like hunting. Arianne, standing on a rock, finished grooming Rufus and eyed me sidelong.

“You’re tired,” she commented, as I stifled yet another yawn, my eyes tearing.

“I don’t know why,” I replied, trying to shake off the drooping weariness.

Arianne pushed Rufus’ shoulder, sending him off to graze and stepped down from the rock. She tipped her head slightly, as though examining me. “You’re not sleeping at night.”

“We all know that,” Kel’Ratan interjected, unpacking the black gelding. Left and Right helped him by taking and sorting the packs of food and other necessities, setting aside the small tent.

I tried a scowl, which didn’t work when another yawn almost dislocated my jaw. “Like either of you’re awake to notice anything.”

Kel’Ratan offered me a sharp stare over his shoulder, his blue eyes annoyed. “I notice plenty.”

I caved in when Left and Right, with identical minute frowns creasing their mouths and their dark eyes concerned, shook their heads at me, in unison.

“Don’t worry about it.”

Arianne set her hands on her hips and tried a scowl of her own. “I’ll worry if I want,” she stated firmly.

I shrugged. “Knock yourself out,” I muttered, slapping Mikk on the rump as his signal to graze. He ambled away, snorting down his nose, and munched the high meadow green. Setting about my own task of gathering firewood, I walked away to find some. Tuatha toddled at my ankle as Thunder strolled at my shoulder. In affection, I threw my arm over his neck as we walked companionably side by side.

“Take a nap,” Arianne said.

I stopped, turning. “I’ve my share of chores.”

Surprisingly, Kel’Ratan agreed with her. He gestured toward a pile of tanned skins. “A short sleep won’t hurt the workload and you need it.”

“I don’t –“

“Don’t make me call Thunder,” Kel’Ratan growled.

I laughed. Until I caught Thunder’s eye. I gulped, seeing the calm threat in those gentle brown eyes. I may not understand his vocal speech, but those eyes spoke volumes. Rest, or else.

“Am I a baby who needs her naptime?” I groused, following Thunder back to the campsite.

“No,” Kel’Ratan said calmly, kneeling to pound in the tent stakes as Left – or was it Right? raised the tent pole and Right – or was it Left? held the far edge firm. “You’re our leader whom we need healthy and strong. Besides,” he added, grinning a little, “you know we’re right.”

A short nap won’t hurt, I thought, stifling another yawn at just the thought of sleep. Thunder lay down close enough to the pile of skins that I could rest my head on his shoulder. Tuatha, whining low in his throat, burrowed into my arms as Arianne tossed a blanket over me. I expected a terse comment from her, but all she did was smile before walking away to find firewood.

Just a few minutes, I told myself. Only a few moments to rest, then I had to get up and resume my work. Only –

Sleep captured me before I finished my resolve.

I saw him.

He walked into a crowded tavern, shoving a dispirited, filthy soldier before him. His weird eyes took in the place, shifting here and there, before finding a table and sitting down. He lowered his shaggy head to speak to the soldier, who then shambled away.

What the bloody hell was he doing in a town, for goddess sake?

While I felt relief that the Tongu and Khalidians hadn’t killed him as I’d feared, I found new concerns. Outside of Raine walking into a tavern full of folk who might recognize him, that was. I suspected why he walked into that place.

He’d lost weight. His cheek bones stuck up like jagged mountains from his face, his stained tunic hung off his broad shoulders as though one size too large. His massive biceps, still massive, lay under only a very thin layer of skin and no fat. Raine, I tried to say, but no sound emerged. Raine, what are you doing –

He waited with the patience only a wolf knew, his head down. Yet, I caught a glint of his eyes beneath the fall of his oily hair. He may appear just one more merc in a room full of them, but his sharp instincts were on high alert. Still, no one in the busy common room paid him the slightest attention.

The soldier returned, bearing a platter of food and ale. He knelt – he knelt? – and served Raine from his knees, depositing his meal onto the table. Raine tossed him a coin, his mouth speaking words I didn’t hear. The man shuffled away.

The vision failed to reassure me. Raine must have been desperate enough to enter a town in order to find a meal, but where did the soldier fit in and why did I want Raine out of there like yesterday?

Ja’Teel was why.

No sooner had Raine filled his mouth when that tattooed monster walked through the door. Raine remained where he was, his back daringly turned on the dark wizard. I knew they spoke, but heard not what they said to one another.

I caught my breath as Ja’Teel hurled a fireball at my beloved. Gods -!

It broke apart and splashed harmlessly against Raine’s invisible shields. Unfortunately, the fire sparked a panic among the common room’s occupants. They fled to the back of the inn where they dammed up, turning on one another in their panicked bid to escape the now burning building. Many people went down, trampled by others, or stepped on with as much notice as one might trip over a rock. As Raine and Ja’Teel hurled flames and dark magics at one another, several people fell, killed by Ja’Teel’s flames. I almost cried aloud when that evil son of a bitch slew a young man with a lightning bolt in front of his hysterical, screaming young wife.

Raine answered with smoke.

Dark, roiling smoke rose from nothing to conceal him, to hide everyone in that place of death from Ja’Teel’s eyes and his wickedness. The entire hall filled with thick, black clouds and mist, only the firelight on the hearth and the lightning from Ja’Teel’s fists flickering through. All vanished before my dreaming eyes save the sight of billowing, covering smoke.

Raine –

I woke, panting, hot against the skins I lay upon and the warmth of my two wolves. I flung off my blanket, feeling the chilly mountain breeze against my sweaty skin. I drew in a ragged breath, then another, calming my trembling, my racing heart.

Beside me, Tuatha cried out in his sleep. Thunder lifted his head from his paws to gaze down at me, my head still pillowed on his shoulder. He whined, a short question: are you all right?

I shook my head at him, unable to answer.

I sat up, blinking sleep from my eyes. As I napped, my boys set the camp in order. The fire, ringed with stones, burned bright and hot. The tent I shared with Arianne sat behind us, ready with our pallets of furs and blankets. All that was required was ourselves.

Tor, busy cooking and ordering Yuri and Yuras to fetch that and stir this, hadn’t noticed I woke. Nor had Alun, Witraz and Rannon, who were engaged in skinning and cutting up two young does, joked and insulted one another as Tor, cutting up vegetables into a bubbling pot, yelled for the meat.

Shadow, White Fang, Digger, Warrior Dog, Scatters Them and Kip crunched deer bones in their strong jaws. Silverruff, Lightfoot, Dire, Black Tongue, Little Bull and Nahar shared another two deer among them. The hunters returned successful, I surmised. Sunset, in full swing, set the sky over the northwestern mountains aflame with clouds streaking red, orange, yellow and purple. Evening’s chill also returned with the growing dark, pimpling my sweaty skin in gooseflesh. I didn’t want my blanket, not yet.

Rygel flirted with Arianne as she helped Tor with the cooking, Darkhan bouncing around her like a puppy, wagging his tail. Corwyn fed sticks to the fire, his blue eyes somber as he stared into the flickering flames.

None of them, humans or wolves, paid me the slightest heed, as busy as they were in their respective work, their jokes, their laughter or feeding their hunger.

Three did notice, however.

I discovered myself under the scrutiny of Kel’Ratan, Shardon and Bar.

Kel’Ratan eyed me from under his red brows as he sat, crossed-legged before the fire, sharpening his sword. He watched me closely, sweeping his blade with the whetstone in smooth strokes. He made sure I noticed he watched me. Once he received my full attention, he dropped his eyes to his task, the scrape of the stone over steel jangling my already ragged nerves.

Shardon raised his head from his grazing, his eyes gleaming a dull red in the light of the fire. I half-expected him to speak, yet he simply stared until I felt naked, exposed and vulnerable and reached for my blanket to cover myself while still hot and sweating.

Bar, sitting on his haunches just to Thunder’s other side, stared down at me, his raptor’s eyes unblinking. Had I missed the glint of love and worry in them, I might have thought myself his next meal. Grateful he refrained from his usual acerbic comments, I swallowed down my fears to feign nonchalance.

Covering Tuatha with a nearby rabbit fur, I rolled to my knees and smoothly to my feet, raking my fingers through my hair. As though I woke from a nap every afternoon, I projected a casualness I didn’t feel, finding a smile that didn’t fit.

“Supper already?”

 

 

Raine!

I woke gasping, sweating, tears on my cheeks from a dream I couldn’t remember. Maybe I screamed. Arianne’s silent, still form beside me told me I hadn’t. Tuatha, crying in his sleep, sought my warmth that wasn’t there.

I sweated, hot, panting, yet chilled to the bone. What did I dream of? Of death? Of Raine? What?

I couldn’t remember.

Only the coppery taste of panic filled my mouth as the nightmare faded away, leaving me thirsty. Fear-sweat died on my body as the night’s chill settled in. But I couldn’t lie down again. If I did, I might actually remember what frightened me so.

Arianne snorted and rolled over, taking our shared blanket with her. Gently, I shoved Tuatha under it, next to her warmth. He sighed, breathing deep, his sleep settling him into its welcoming folds. On my knees, I crawled under the tent’s flap, drawing it shut behind me.

Running my hand through my hair and casting it back over my shoulder, I sat down and glanced around. My night sweat finally chilled me enough that I flung an elk hide around my shoulders. The camp lay asleep under the dim moon, the fire burned down to embers. Dark humps showed me wolves and men sleeping the sleep of the innocent. Vaguely, I wondered who was on watch, then remembered: Rannon and Shadow. They were but one of the many human-wolf pairs that struck up very strange friendships in the last week.

Water. I needed water. Licking my dry lips, I cast about for a full skin. Damn, but I’d kill for a drink of clear, cold mountain nectar. I found one, just beyond the tent where one of my boys dropped it after taking a drink, within the glow of the fire. I reached for it.

Movement caught my eye and I froze, tense. The hide slid, unnoticed, down my back. My hand fell to the hilt of my sword, just behind me where I’d set it before lying down to sleep. The shadow moved into the firelight. A man. A black eye-patch. Long hair. Recognizing the intruder, I relaxed. I sighed, still thirsty, and I watched.

Witraz raised a finger to his lips in a shushing gesture. His white-toothed grin outshone the moon as he crept toward a soundly sleeping Joker. The black patch over his missing eye drank in what light there was, his remaining good eye gleaming with high good humor.

Joker slept, not on his back this time, but as one additional furry mound in the midst of many. His muzzle rested on his curled front legs, his tail swept around to cover his paws and his black nose. His ears lay slack against his head. He even snored, light rumbles of breath emerging from his loosened lips.

As I watched, confused, Witraz dusted Joker with something pinched from his belt pouch. Wincing, shaking his hand, he upended the pouch over the fun loving wolf. Whatever the contents were, I’d no idea. With another finger over his lips, Witraz retreated to his own pallet beyond the ring of red-orange glowing coals.

Bemused, I once more gathered the hide close to my body, sat outside my tent and waited. Within moments, Joker rose, and with his muzzle extended upward, his hind leg thumped the stony soil as he scratched his neck. Lying back down, he chewed frantically at his flank. Rolling onto his other side, he once more dug his hind foot into his neck, whining in agony. His eyes slitted against the torment, his breath rasped through his gritted teeth. Wheeling, he chewed his rump, all but yanking out the fur over his tail.

I glanced away from the itchy wolf. Witraz looked to the world a sound sleeper, but I caught the tiny glimmer of his eye in the light of the coals.

Joker rose, now frantic in his need to scratch all his itches at once. First one hind leg clawed at his neck, only to lose importance to yet another on the other side, his shoulder. He bent into an almost impossible angle to chew savagely at his back. He flapped his ears, his front paw scraping his face. He turned over, seeking some small measure of relief scratching with his hard, hind toenails.

His whimpers and thumps eventually roused the camp. Grumbles, snarls and curses abounded as his desperate scratching, chewing and whining woke the sleepers. Joker couldn’t get enough of the desperate measures to ease the itch and pain of whatever insinuated itself under his skin.

With a final howl, he broke and ran. Toward the thin stream that gave us water, he bolted. Startled, Shardon stepped aside to let him pass. Bar woke with an irritated hiss, then dropped his beak to his forelegs, eagle eyes closing in an attempt to regain his slumber. The rest of the camp yawned, scratched sleepily before returning to dreamland as peace once more reigned over the camp.

“Ants.”

I heard the faint word quivering from Witraz’s direction as the weary camp sought its rest in the remaining hours till dawn. I didn’t need to hear more. Witraz proved more clever, and resourceful, than anyone, including Joker, realized.

Giggling uncontrollably, I wanted least to know how Witraz managed to gather enough biting ants to making Joker’s life, and fur, a living hell.

Smothering my laughter, I crawled back into my warm bed, my nightmare forgotten under the faint but firm words I heard across the fire.

Paybacks are a bitch, Witraz murmured in the dark.

 

 

“I’m sooo not ready for winter.”

More than a week after Raine’s departure and my mystery enemy’s latest attack, we climbed the highest peak yet. In the distance, snow covered the mountaintops to our right, the east. Their jagged tops stood higher than we did, immense cliff tops and sheer drops made riding across them impossible. Sharp winds gusted through the pass we rode through, making me shiver inside the deer hide I wrapped myself with to keep warm. My feet felt like blocks of ice inside my thin kidskin boots. Snow blew in thin flurries about us, whirling like a mist.

“I’m with you,” Kel’Ratan said, sitting his stallion beside me, huddled under his own thick hide. “I’m not ready for winter, either.”

Bar grumbled as he dropped in to land just ahead of me, complaining of the cold.

“Fair weather flyer,” I remarked, earning myself a sharp stare from his raptor eyes and a haughty rebuke.

Yuri’s horse galloped up the steep hill, Yuri guiding him in serpentine loops to avoid a difficult climb straight up. Reaching us, he saluted smartly.

“Alun is reporting a good camping spot, Your Highness,” he said.

“Isn’t it a bit early to camp?” I asked, glancing at Kel’Ratan.

He shrugged. “Neither we nor the wolves have killed much lately. Our stores are low.”

“I want out of these mountains like yesterday.”

Kel’Ratan huffed. “It’s not like we can simply sprout wings and fly down.”

“Will there be game down there?” I asked Silverruff at my stirrup, ignoring my cousin.

He woofed, jerking his muzzle to the northeast.

“He says yes,” Rygel said from behind Kel’Ratan. “Black Tongue already scented a good sized herd of elk.”

I twisted in my saddle, my hand on the cantle. “How long is the ride to the desert?”

Rygel ran his thumb up the side of his sharp nose as he pondered, his narrowed amber gaze on the hills below. “Three, maybe four days, Princess.”

I bit my lip. “It’s been a week already and we’re no closer to answers or Raine.”

Rygel lifted his shoulder in a shrug as Kel’Ratan put his hand over mine.

“I know,” he said, his tone mild. “These mountains proved more difficult than we thought. But these horses need the rest and we need to eat.”

I scowled. “I’m female. I’m allowed to fume if I want to.”

Kel’Ratan actually chuckled. He nodded to Yuri. “Lead us to Alun, boyo.”

Looking back along the line of riders from Arianne to Corwyn on his ugly roan behind her, the twins and Tor, I raised a smile. The great wolves, many reaching the stirrups of the horses, sat or stood close by. “Ready, kids? It’s all downhill from here.”

 

 

At dawn, four very cold days later, with the sun’s rays weak and not very warming, I stared down into the next valley. Our descent from the peaks above put the worst of the icy wind and weather behind us. Bar actually flew again, and circled high overhead. The mountains ended abruptly at Mikk’s hooves. Only a few leagues of rolling, grassy hills separated us from the flatlands. Below lay gleaming gold sand, the sun’s rays there strong and hot. The great Tanai desert.

Look at all that warm sun, I thought, gazing down into an oven. Personally, I hated deserts, with all that dry sand and little fodder for horses. But it beat freezing to death up in the mountains.

“The Great Caravan Route,” Rygel said as he sat astride Shardon’s broad back beside me. “After we cross that, we’re in the Mesaani territory. They don’t much like outsiders.”

“I told you that,” Witraz said.

Rannon cuffed him.

“M’lord.”

Nothing much ever changed, I thought.

I sighed and led my band downhill.

 

 

After riding hard until late midafternoon, I called a halt in a grassy meadow with a tumbling stream cascading down from a sheer cliff behind it. The high peaks we had just spent the last four days traversing lay above, their tops shrouded in snow. The sun actually felt hot enough to make me comfortable again in my leathers. Rygel’s black gelding once more groaned under the weight of the skins and furs.

With Bar rounding up the outriders, I dismounted Mikk and loosened his girth. Slipping the bridle from his head, I hung it over the pommel and caressed his face. He rubbed against me affectionately for a moment, then ambled away to graze. Around me, my boys did the same with their own mounts. Tor assisted Arianne from her Rufus, and took the bridle from his head. I was pleasantly surprised that the stallion, who once tolerated only Raine, allowed Tor so close to him without offering to bite. His close association with Arianne had improved his nasty disposition considerably, I thought. Only then did Tor attend to his own sweet-natured mare.

Discovering a rock outcropping that fit my backside nicely, I sat down, tugging on Arianne’s right hand. With no choice but to obey me, she seated herself beside me. When she tried to rise to assist Tor and the twins with doling out food, I pressed my hand to the top of her head.

“Sit,” I commanded. “Stay.”

She recoiled, fending off my hand with irritation. “I’m not a dog,” she snapped.

“A dog is a slave,” I said smoothly. “Are you one of those or are you a princess?”

She huffed, indignant. Arranging her skirt about her, she glared at me for a moment. Yet, she sat quietly beside my rock as our human and wolf guards loped into our makeshift camp. As though attaching himself to my side, Silverruff sat on my right. Darkhan took his place to Arianne’s left, arriving first, leaving Rygel to glare and find a spot on the ground at her feet.

“One of these days,” I commented conversationally. “You two will have to find common ground.”

“Not if I turn him into a worm first,” Rygel retorted.

Darkhan growled. Arianne smacked Rygel on the ear, making him yelp. When Darkhan smirked, Arianne seized his furry ear and twisted. Darkhan’s pain-filled cry sounded suspiciously like Rygel’s. I turned my face into my shoulder, concealing my shocked grin.

Arianne slashed her hand across her brow. “I’m up to here with your crap.”

“Only now?” Kel’Ratan muttered sourly. “I had my fill after day one.”

“Hear, hear,” Corwyn commented, his voice low, from where he groomed his tired roan.

Arianne’s voice, with enough of Raine’s steel to make my heart ache, ground out through gritted teeth. “You’ll both learn to get along. Or I’ll kick you to the curb.”

“What?” Rygel exclaimed in the midst of Darkhan’s sudden whine.

“You heard me.” Arianne’s glare could have split their skulls had it been made of steel.

This time, I was forced to smother a laugh in my shoulder, not just a grin. Sitting cross-legged across from me, Kel’Ratan laughed aloud. He had no reason for subtlety. Corwyn’s expression lightened in what passed for a smile on his craggy face.

“I’ve had quite enough of your bickering,” Arianne went on. “Behave.”

Glowering at each other, both Darkhan and Rygel subsided. Darkhan lay down and put his muzzle on his paws. Rygel scooted away to find a nice rock he could lean against while still keeping Arianne close by. I noticed with interest neither of them glanced at one another.

I sat and waited, my mouth buried in my shoulder, my eyes sliding sideways to watch. I winked at Kel’Ratan, warning him to also remain silent. He obeyed, and pretended to watch the camp organize, but his fierce blue eyes also watched from the corners with amusement.

When Tor arrived with meat, bread, white cheese and hanaps of fresh water, he sensed the tension in the air. With downcast eyes, he offered me the first choice, as the ranking princess. He then offered Arianne the platter, and waited until she accepted her fare. From then on, Tor offered food down the ranks.

He faltered a bit, undecided if Kel’Ratan ranked higher than Silverruff, hovering betwixt the two. Impatient and hungry, Kel’Ratan gestured for the platter and took what he wanted. Silverruff declined, as he had hunted earlier and wasn’t hungry. What he said per Arianne’s quiet translation, anyway.

Darkhan refused anything, while Rygel accepted only a small portion of meat, bread, a small piece of cheese and some nuts. I couldn’t help but observe the rivals still refused to look at one another. Arianne ignored them both equally, and only nibbled on the small heel of bread she took. I sighed. That damn girl needed to eat more or she’d die of starvation in front of me.

Alun arrived with cold venison and with what I called Tuatha’s feed bag. With Tuatha needing his lunch, Rygel found his excuse to leave, and stalked away, muttering in another tongue to himself.

“Don’t you dare,” Arianne warned when Darkhan raised a grin.

He subsided, lying with his muzzle on his paws once more, his yellow eyes dejected.

“If we had a room,” Kel’Ratan said. “We could lock them in together until they came to terms.”

Arianne brightened for a moment while Darkhan growled.

“I think they’re useless,” I said with an airy wave of my hand. “She should get rid of them both.”

Darkhan raised his head to stare at me, his yellow eyes wide with panic, at the same time Rygel returned with cold meat and his leather satchel. His own dread that my suggestion might prove to be something Arianne took to heart shone from his tightened aristocratic lips and pale skin. He refused to look at me as he sat down once more and began his task of creating Tuatha’s mush.

“What an extraordinary idea,” Arianne replied with a glare at each of them.

Darkhan raised his head and even I recognized the what-did-I-do expression on his face.

“Don’t pout,” Arianne said, “It’s not dignified and makes you look puppyish.”

Pretending to be busy, Rygel bent eyes and ears to nothing but his task of adding his herbal nutrients to the combination of meat and water in a small bag and mashing it all together. His humiliation rose in a faint but clear blush that climbed from his neck to his hairline. If he stirred the mixture any harder I knew he’d break the thin leather bag. I took it from him.

Tuatha’s tail wagged as I fed him his meal, but without the fury of before Raine’s abrupt departure. His blue eyes, all but opened, yet sagged at half-mast. His ate, but without the gusto I knew him capable of. With my free hand, I stroked his furry body, feeling the dryness in his puppy coat and noticed how it no longer gleamed under the sunlight. Despite my care, Tuatha might eat, but he failed to thrive.

Arianne owned a heart bigger than she was, and sappier than mine. She dragged Rygel to her with her arms around his neck and nibbled his ear. That brought a faint grin to his face and a deep sigh from Darkhan. Hearing the wolf’s misery, Arianne’s free hand caressed his face and ears, burying itself in his thick dark ruff.

“I love you both,” she murmured. “Can’t each of you see that?”

Apparently they didn’t, for neither of them commented and two sets of amber eyes met and dueled.

Tuatha ate only half of his meal. Setting aside the bag, I lifted him to my face with my hands under his armpits. He licked his tiny muzzle, staring unhappily into my face.

“Hang in there, little wolf,” I murmured, rubbing his black nose with my own. “We’ll find your papa soon. I promise.”

He whined, his warm meaty-scented tongue lapping my cheek. I kissed him, and wrapped him in my arms until he fell asleep.

The sun set early, as it often did in these higher climes, this late in the year. The first stars emerged from their day of sleep, glowing brightly in the western sky. Despite the firelight in my vision, I counted, five, no six, bright stars in the dusky heavens. I wished on every single one of them. I had only one wish: That one day Raine would be my own.

Gently disengaging himself from Arianne, Rygel cleared his throat. “I think we need to talk.”

Though he slept, I stroked Tuatha’s fur absently. I’d grown fond of the baby in the month or so that he’d been with us. No, fond wasn’t the right word. I loved the little bugger as I might love my own child. Kel’Ratan suggested I should be his mother. Did Tuatha look upon me as his mother in truth? I hoped so.

“What of?” Kel’Ratan asked.

I glanced at him, sensing a tone in his voice I hadn’t heard there for a while. His fierce blue eyes fastened on Rygel as though ready to devour him, absently nibbling on his thumbnail as I often did. Whatever Rygel wanted to say, Kel’Ratan already anticipated what that would be.

“Disguises,” Rygel replied.

Ah. Rygel was quite right. Brutal surely sent word throughout his kingdom of the escaped renegade Kel’Hallans. Now that we stood on the border of civilization once more, we’d need to appear anything but what we were.

I sat up, waving my arm to my boys and the wolves. “Come here, all of you. Shardon and Bar, you too. It’s time for a council.”

Taking their dinners in hand, my boys rose from their places around the fire and sat back down in a loose circle around us. The wolves sat amid their human friends. Shadow and Rannon paired up as though having been friends since time immemorial. Dire, and his brother Lightfoot, both as stolid and silent as the twins, sat between Left and Right. Identical hands left their meal to stroke soft ears in complete unison.

Warrior Dog and Scatters Them sat with Yuri and Yuras. Alun fed Black Tongue some of the meat from his trencher of bread, the huge wolf accepting it delicately. Kip lay with his head on Tor’s lap, his eyes bright in the firelight. With some surprise, Nahar lay down beside Kel’Ratan, my cousin’s hand running absently over his heavy fur and silken ears.

To my absolute shock, White Fang lay with his back comfortably against Corwyn’s hip, his tongue dropping as he yawned. Despite his care that I shouldn’t see it, I witnessed Corwyn’s hand creep to the huge wolf’s neck and work long, scarred fingers into the thick ruff around the wolf’s throat.

I glanced hastily away, before Corwyn’s astute blue eyes registered I noted his affection for the beast. Throughout that week, I’d never seen Corwyn acknowledge the wolves even existed much less ran with us as friends and allies. That he’d formed a strong friendship with one, and wanted to be unobtrusive about it, I felt quite happy to oblige him.

My jaw almost dropped when I saw Joker and Witraz sit down side by side, playfully cuffing one another. Joker grabbed Witraz’s hand, pretending to bite, while Witraz seized a fistful of ruff and yanked. I guessed that the session with the ants made them even. Despite Witraz’s fierce words to the contrary, the two were now fast friends.

I reckoned even Rygel needed his own companion. Little Bull sat beside the wheaten-haired wizard, while Rygel’s slender hand offered bits of cheese to the happy tongue that eagerly awaited them. Rygel, as usual, stared absently toward Arianne, but Little Bull caught my eye. He winked. Lady have mercy, a wolf just winked at me. Little Bull grinned, his tongue lolling, and accepted more cheese. I smothered my own giggle in my shoulder, peeping out from behind the fall of my hair.

I wondered absently if Little Bull would fight if Darkhan should attack Rygel. My gut clenched in dread at the thought. Like Raine, Little Bull carried his brains in his head and not his huge muscles. His wink informed me of his acute perception of the situation and though he loved Rygel, he also liked Darkhan. I hoped for all our sakes he’d find it wiser to stay out of it, like the rest of us.

I noticed Digger lying just outside the firelight, his head on his paws. He watched the activity with a detached, bored attitude, but I knew enough about wolf body language by now to see his longing. There were no humans left for him to form a pact with. While I didn’t quite understand this need for the wolves to find friends with us and vice versa, clearly Digger felt left out.

Silverruff, of course, sat beside me on my right, while Thunder all but squashed me on my left. Deep down, I knew Silverruff owed his loyalty to Raine and none other. He only stayed by me, protected me, as he’d protect Raine’s mate. He didn’t love me as he loved Raine.

On the other hand, Thunder and I formed a strange connection, a bonding that I felt but failed to understand. I loved him, felt as connected to him as I did Bar. I recognized in his brown eyes, love and his union with me. I couldn’t understand him when he spoke, but I knew that if he chose to leave me, my heart would break.

Digger seemed, to me, to crave that tie with a human that everyone else had formed. Nahar attached himself to Kel’Ratan, Little Bull with Rygel, Darkhan with Arianne, Kip with Tor and on down through my warriors.

Digger felt alone, and he hated it. My heart went out to him.

“Digger,” I called, my voice soft.

His ears perked instantly, and his head came up, muzzle pointed toward me.

“Do me a favor,” I said. “These two lummoxes are big, but they haven’t a brain between them. I need a wolf with some smarts to keep me safe. You interested?”

Silverruff growled at my words, but Thunder merely sighed. I knew both recognized what my words really meant. When neither objected when Digger trotted to me, tail waving happily, I surmised that, they too, recognized Digger’s need for companionship. Silverruff felt no need for jealousy, as he wasn’t mine. Thunder, as easy-going as Joker, hadn’t a jealous bone in his body and wouldn’t mind sharing me.

“Sit here, with me,” I said, urging him to lie at my feet, next to the fire. Hugging him close, I dislodged an irritated Tuatha, who snarled. Digger licked the pup’s face, earning himself another snarl and a snap. That didn’t deter him from giving Tuatha’s face a thorough washing. Tail thumping the ground, Digger lay against me, all but crushing Raine’s son.

Stroking his ears, I caught smile from Arianne. That smile told me she knew of Digger’s need, but dared not invite him herself. Darkhan would never stand for it. The warriors, of course, were oblivious to the poor fellow’s need to belong somewhere. I smiled back, and gave Digger a kiss.

“Thank you,” I murmured, bringing his muzzle up to my face. “You’re the best.”

Digger offered a half whine, half growl, and licked my neck.

“He says brains are better than brawn,” Arianne translated.

I didn’t need a translator, however. Thunder and Silverruff’s offended expressions told me what he said. I laughed, and hugged Digger close.

Darkness fell with a distinct thud, the heavens loosening the remainder of the imprisoned stars.

“I’m guessing you’ve an idea already,” Kel’Ratan remarked, continuing the conversation. He offered Nahar the remains of his meat and bread.

“Yes,” Rygel replied, shooting me a fleeting glance.

My appetite vanished. In the time since our first acquaintance, I’d learned to read Rygel as easily as I read my horse. Whatever his idea was, he feared I wouldn’t like it. This meant, of course, that I wouldn’t like it. Rygel learned early on how to read me, too.

Taking a deep swallow of my water, I washed down the piece of bread stuck in my throat. Distracting myself, I broke the rest of my heel of bread into pieces and offered them to Silverruff, Thunder and Digger. They accepted graciously, licking their muzzles as they waited politely for more. I gave them the rest of my meat as well. Kel’Ratan scowled.

“You need to eat,” he grumbled. “Or you’ll be as skinny as yonder child.”

He jerked his head toward an affronted Arianne. I shrugged and, as was my usual wont, ignored him.

“Go on,” I said to Rygel. “Pray explain.”

“Down below, within a day’s ride I’m thinking,” he said slowly, “lay the Great Federation Caravan Route. Caravans traverse the area constantly. Wagons loaded with goods bound for Soudan head east while others move west and south and north. Of course, it’s also the path of the slave trade. Traders use it constantly to ferry slaves to markets around the Federation. The desert tribesmen also raid now and again, resulting in strong Federate policing.”

I vaguely recalled Raine’s attempts to cross that very Caravan Route. A busy, industrious highway, filled with a moving mass of humanity. I nodded. “Go on.”

Rygel paused and swallowed his own water, avoiding my eyes. If he didn’t come out with it, I planned to sic Silverruff on him. Darkhan certainly wouldn’t object. Though Little Bull might, I thought, eyeing the huge wolf sidelong.

“Federates patrol the area in numbers,” Rygel finished.

“Nothing less than what we should expect,” Kel’Ratan said, clearly confused by Rygel’s hesitation. “Obviously, our lack of contact with anything remotely resembling human thus far is nothing less than a terrible good fortune.”

“Did you break your tongue on that one?” I asked sourly.

Kel’Ratan scowled and refused to answer.

“What’s the problem, m’lord?” Witraz asked, playfully yanking on Joker’s ear. “We simply stuff Her Highness into yet another Osimi priestess dress and no one will bother us.”

“Stuff me?” I glared at Witraz.

“That won’t work this time,” Rygel said. “There are too many of us. A priestess has an honor guard of only three or four.”

He gestured around the camp to the seating or lying wolves. “The wolves will have to pace us from a distance, obviously. If we ride down out of the hills with a pack of wolves in attendance, we’ll have the entire place about our ears.”

Silverruff grumbled and Digger whined, but I think I knew what they said. I rubbed both sets of ears.

“I’ll be all right,” I said. “So will Arianne. If we have to fight, you’ll not be far away.”

Silverruff relaxed and put his muzzle on his paws with a deeply fetched sigh. Rygel stared at me in surprise, while Arianne smiled. I shrugged. “I’m learning, slowly.”

Rygel now gestured toward Tuatha. “A priestess won’t have a wolf pup. Nor can he go with the rest. He’s too young. We certainly can’t stuff him into a saddlebag and hope he goes unnoticed. He will be noticed.”

“So then what?” I asked, my irritation getting the better of me. “Say what you have in mind and be done with it.”

He gulped, dew dotting his brow and upper lip. Damn him, he looked ready to die of fear on the spot. What was his problem?

“A priestess wouldn’t have a pet,” he went on, tawny eyes anxious. “But a royal lady of the Federation would.”

“A royal lady?” Kel’Ratan asked, confused by his nervousness. “I’m not getting you.”

Rygel wiped his sweaty palms on his tunic. Even Darkhan looked up, eyeing him with speculation. “Picture this: a great aristocrat from Soudan on a pilgrimage. She’s on a religious expedition to seek out the servants of the gods to pray for the soul of her dead husband.”

Kel’Ratan nodded slowly, blue eyes on the fire, his fingers stroking his thick mustache. Witraz shrugged, clearly unconcerned as he playfully pushed Joker onto his side. Joker laughed, fending Witraz off with his paws. Tor ignored the entire discussion, too enthralled with Kip to pay attention. Alun yawned, Left and Right drowsed while sitting up. Yuri and Yuras fingered weapons and eyed Tor sidelong, clearly impatient to teach him some lessons.

“We’ll need new clothing, of course,” Rygel went on. “All of us will need to be dressed in the clothing of Khalid. I’m offering my services to ride this night to obtain them.”

“Why don’t you just create them with your magic, m’lord?” Witraz asked, still cuffing Joker.

“You know well enough by now,” Rygel all but snapped.

Witraz glanced up, dismayed.

“My working magic like that will be heard by Ja’Teel,” Rygel went on. “If he doesn’t know where we are, then we won’t attract his attention needlessly.”

“Oh, right,” Witraz mumbled. “Sorry.”

“What’s bothering you, then?” I demanded. “My portraying a noble woman on a holy pilgrimage shouldn’t have you this uptight.”

My question caught the attention of all humans, Shardon, Bar and every wolf. Why did everyone shut up at once?

To my astonishment, Rygel rolled forward to his knees. He bowed low, hands in front of and placed square on the ground in an almost ritualistic gesture of obeisance. His sweaty brow touched the dusty ground. Even Kel’Ratan gawked.

“My queen,” Rygel said miserably, his face in the dirt. “Forgive me. You misunderstand.”

I swallowed. I hoped I was the only one who heard its dry click.

“Get on with it,” Kel’Ratan snapped when my mouth refused to work properly.

“My queen,” Rygel said, his voice muffled against the dirt. “I feel Princess Arianne should portray the royal lady.”

I blew out a deep breath. So that’s what was bothering him so. “Am I so high-handed that I couldn’t pretend to be less than a royal princess? Am I so transparent? Or shallow? And you, you idiot, stop that.”

Rygel obeyed me, and sat back on his heels, dirt clinging damply to his forehead. He looked more miserable than ever. Typically, Arianne hid behind her wealth of hair at having been suddenly drawn into the conversation.

“All right,” I said. “I can disguise myself as her sister or something.”

If he looked any more unhappy, I’d have to shoot him to put him out of his misery. And mine.

“A noblewoman on a quest would travel with her household steward.”

His slender hand dropped from his face on down to his knees, indicating himself, his tawny eyes almost tearing up.

“She’d also have with her the captain of her personal guard.” This time his fingers pointed toward Kel’Ratan, who nodded thoughtfully.

Rygel’s hand and eyes then marked Tor. “Her page.”

Tor looked up from his worship of Kip, huge brown eyes wide, his brow puckered in fear. “I don’t know how to be a page,” he said quickly.

“You’ll learn.”

“Her henchmen.” Rygel’s airy wave included my boys.

Wait, I thought, my eyes narrowing. He didn’t include Left and Right.

“And she’d travel with a few slaves.”

His wretched gaze rested on me.

My jaw dropped. “You want me to be a slave?”

“Please, my queen,” Rygel implored, near panic. His lips thinned to a slender white line, wrinkles cupping each end. His skin, so pale as to appear as transparent as he thought I’d be, grew more sweat droplets. Arianne emerged from behind her hair, curious and worried. “Any aristocrat would have slaves.”

Now, at last, his hand, palm up, extended toward a newly alert Left and Right. “Owning a treasure such as a set of identical twin slaves would bring her the envy of even the royal court.”

Left and Right both scowled dangerously.

Once more, his self-castigating eyes rested on me. “Of course she’d have a body slave.”

I didn’t feel affronted at the idea, but Kel’Ratan was. “Now wait – “ he thundered.

I silenced him with a flick of my hand. “Why me?”

“If it pleases Your Highness.” Rygel’s head struck the dust again. “Your skin and hair color marks you as either Kel’Hallan or Zhou. It’s not uncommon for Zhous to be either slaves or soldiers. Your people can pass as Zhou warriors attached to an aristocrat’s private entourage. You, unfortunately, look to be what you truly are: a royal Kel’Hallan princess.”

“Well, that certainly puts a new spin on it,” I said. “Since I appear to be a princess, I must play the part of a slave.”

“Why a slave?” Kel’Ratan demanded. “Why not a maid servant instead?”

“The same problem exists,” Rygel replied patiently. “She’s too beautiful. We must hide her beauty in lank hair, a collar and a beaten-down aspect.”

Absently, I caressed Digger, the closest. Thunder didn’t much like my lack of attention. He pushed his muzzle, then his entire head, until it rested on my lap. Silverruff growled, and tried to get his head on my lap as well. I wasn’t big enough for all three, plus Tuatha. Thus, I began the task of petting one, then pushing his aside in favor of another, and then yet again for the third. I busied both my hands in loosening tense neck muscles, scratching itchy ears, and offering much-needed love. I’d soon grow tired if I kept it up for long, however. Big tough wolves they may be, but under that vicious façade lay a bunch of furry, touchy-feely softies.

“And you think I’d be offended by that notion,” I said thoughtfully, my hands occupied.

Rygel gulped and nodded, his wheaten hair plastered to the sides of his face and neck.

“Your royalty shines forth as a beacon,” Rygel said. “Few would mistake you for nothing less than Brutal’s runaway bride. Arianne now.”

Rygel paused to lift her hand to his lips and linger over it, bestowing light, butterfly kisses. Darkhan growled. “Arianne now,” he went on, “can be taught quickly on how a noblewoman behaves. We can turn her into a spoiled aristocrat. Her dark hair and pale complexion fits the profile of a noblewoman who spends little time outdoors. If you three appeared to be a Zhou slaves, and the others Zhou soldiers, we may pass unnoticed and unremarked.”

Arianne glowed under the attention, tossing her hair back from her face and her skin flushing a faint pinkish tinge.

How’d she manage that? When I blushed, ‘twas like the dawn rising on a hot summer day: bright, red and hot.

“I beg pardon for any offense,” Kel’Ratan said, with a half bow toward Arianne. “Her Highness has been out of slavery for only a short time. Her mannerisms, too often, are that of a slave. I hate to be contradictory, but anyone she crosses will see that she wasn’t born to rulership.”

I shrugged, with a half-smile toward the tiny Arianne. “He has a point. My apologies, sweet sister, but you really do act more like a cowed slave than a royal princess.”

Rather than explode in fury as I half-expected, Arianne blushed a deeper pink. Her huge blue-grey eyes fell to her lap. “I know,” she whispered. “I’ll try to do better.”

“Start with this,” I said, gathering her attention. “Sit up straight.”

She obeyed, but her glorious eyes rested on the ground rather than me.

“Remember how you told Ja’Teel he’d die under the fangs of a wolf?”

Both Rygel and Darkhan sat up, eyes and ears switching between the pair of us. “What’s this?” Rygel asked at the same time Kel’Ratan asked the very same question. I ignored all of them and waited for my reply.

Arianne lifted her face defiantly, her eyes now ablaze. “Yes,” she replied firmly. “I do.”

“Then keep that attitude,” I said. “Always. Speak in that tone, with that confidence, and you’ll be fine.”

She smiled, a slave’s timid, shy smile. ‘Twas nothing more than the smile of an innocent child, hardly the expression of a spoiled aristocrat. I sighed.

Rygel took her hand. “I’ll work with her,” he promised. “We have a few days yet. The right hair style, the right clothing, a few jewels and a peer of the realm would never know she’d ever known slavery.”

At the affectionate touch the pair shared, Darkhan, of course, flattened his ears and growled.

“If she shows even half the sand she’s shown so far,” I said. “She’ll be fine.”

I sighed again. “She won’t be the only one with things to learn,” I said slowly. “I have no idea on how to act like a beaten slave.”

I exchanged a long glance with my faithful Left and Right. They stared right back at me, dark eyes as deep and mysterious as the deep sea. They’d do anything I asked them to. Was this perhaps too much?

“Can you two forget being proud Kel’Hallan warriors?” I asked. “Forget your heritage? Can you lower yourselves alongside me?”

Neither of them even glanced at the other. As though guided by one mind, Left and Right both bowed their dark heads in grave nods, small smiles playing about their lips. Twin dark eyes gleamed. For as long as I’ve known them, I’ve never understood how they each knew exactly what the other was thinking, feeling, dreaming, or how they matched each other exactly in expressions, movements, and coloring. They were, unto themselves, a new entity, a being not of an individual, but of the two combined. Perhaps such things were never meant to be revealed, or understood.

“Well, Princess?” Rygel asked.

I couldn’t help it. I grinned.

“Where’s my collar?”

“I’ll have to steal clothing,” Rygel went on, not concealing that he still held Arianne’s hand under Darkhan’s very nose. “If I buy them, suspicions will be roused.” He nodded around the camp. “I hope I get the sizes right. But you and the twins will need little more than frocks.”

“That’s all right,” I replied. “Give us enough clothing we can conceal weapons under. We can’t, for obvious reasons, carry bows or swords. Daggers can be hidden nicely and I’ll not have us unarmed. They excel at knife play, and I can stab along with the best.”

Left and Right nodded in unison.

“No, you can’t,” Kel’Ratan bristled, glowering at me. “Your talents lie with a bow. Your knife skills are at best mediocre.”

“In whose eyes?” I demanded, irritated.

“Mine.”

“Give me a knife and I’ll show you mediocre.”

Kel’Ratan grinned. “I know you will.”

Rygel put up his hand to stop my lunge at my cousin. “Peace,” he said. “Please? Cut each other up later, when we have time.”

I drew up my hand and pointed my finger at a smugly grinning Kel’Ratan. “You are mine.”

“Always and forever, my queen.” Kel’Ratan’s grin didn’t fade despite his low bow from a seated position.

Rygel cleared his throat. “Listen. The Federate patrols down below aren’t very well informed. They may not even know we exist.”

“All the better,” I said, still glowering.

“Not necessarily,” Rygel added. “They’re also poorly paid. They rely on bribes to feed their families. We’ll have to bribe every patrol that stops us.”

I frowned, ignoring Kel’Ratan for the moment. I cast about for my saddlebags, displacing an irritated and sleepy Tuatha. “I have Federate gold.” I said absently. “Somewhere.”

“That may work,” Rygel said. “Jewels are much better, however. More valuable and less chance of it being traced.”

“We’ve a few jewels,” I replied, growing worried. “Somewhere.”

“Don’t sweat it, Princess,” Rygel said easily, relaxing under Darkhan’s furious yellow gaze. “Raine’s collar provided adequate precious gems. We’ll have plenty.”

“Where are they?”

Rygel jerked his head toward the baggage pile. “In his saddlebags. He left them behind.”

“A hoity-toity female would spend jewels before gold anyway,” Kel’Ratan added.

“You’re a hoity-toity yourself,” Arianne snapped and promptly blushed.

She retreated behind her hair. Kel’Ratan gawked.

“She’s learning fast,” I said, giggling.

Kel’Ratan drew himself up like a barnyard rooster. “I will have you know,” he gritted behind his mustache. “I am not female.”

“One would hardly guess,” I muttered, earning myself a red scowl.

“That leaves one other minor problem,” Rygel continued, as though the heated exchange never took place.

“What’s that?”

Rather than answer, Rygel glanced at what was to him a minor problem, my own eyes tracking his. To me, however, he was a rather large, feathered and an angrily bristling problem.

Bar’s tail lashed from side to side as he stalked around the edge of the seated and lying occupants of our camp. His neck feathers stood on end, his eagle’s eyes flattened into that stare that could unnerve a block of granite. I couldn’t see his tufted ears against the starlight, so tightly plastered to his skull as they were. His great wings, furled against his back as he stalked, rustled faintly in the suddenly silent camp. Only the fire still made noise. I think they, wolves and men, all forgot to breathe.

My boys, cowards all, slid on their rumps, out of his way. My brave protectors, those huge savage wolves, capable of breaking an elk’s back with one bite of their deadly jaws, slunk like whipped curs to the side. Rygel, the most powerful magician on earth, turned his head away. Kel’Ratan studied his fingernails as though having never seen them before. Corwyn discovered the fire needed sudden tending and devoted his entire life to the task. Arianne, of course, hid behind her hair.

I looked around while those who claimed to love me crept like frightened kittens out of danger.

With Bar’s furious intent and predatory eyes on me, they, at least, were safe enough. His anger lay with me and me alone. Had I never before seen his stalk his prey before, I might have pissed myself in panic at being the prey Bar currently hunted.

Damn and blast, I thought. Bar would give us away as surely as though I marched with trumpets blaring and heralds crying my name at every step. Nor would he be content, like the wolves, to pace us and watch from afar.

But – he would have to.

“Bar,” I said, brushing my hair out of my eyes impatiently. “Cease and desist with the self-induced drama and sit down.”

My words brought him up short with a hiss. His yellow eyes glared.

“You aren’t fooling anyone,” I replied primly, patting the ground recently vacated by Thunder. “Least of all me. Sit down, I say.”

Reluctantly, he obeyed me, his ears still flat against his feathered head. His body took up more than half the ring about the fire, the wolves and humans crowding together in the other half. He peered down at me with another hiss, this one speaking of his anxiety and concern.

“I know you are,” I said firmly. “Lie down, dammit, I’m not going to break my neck to look up at you.”

Grumbling, he folded his legs and curled his still lashing tail about his coiled lion hindquarters. At least his ears rose and his predatory eyes now held his true feelings: fear I may be harmed. Now on a much improved level with me, I could speak to him without looking up, and stroke his face and ears without an impossible strain.

“Listen to me,” I said firmly. He opened his beak. “No, listen. And hear me.”

He closed it again, his misery quaking his entire body. He knew his presence placed me in mortal danger. He also knew we had no choice but to continue our present course, that we must find some answers as to who or what has such a demonic grudge against me. How well he knew that not even he could protect me from the wrath of an angry god. Beneath it all lay yet another fear that I, among all present or who ever knew us both, alone knew.

Bar feared to be away from my side.

“I will be safe enough,” I said.

I put my hands over his beak when it parted again. “Shut up and listen. You’ll be up there.”

I pointed straight into the dark, star strewn sky. Hope lit his anxiety ridden eyes as he understood my intent.

“Your eyes can see everything, Bar, my dearest love, my sweet protector,” I said, rubbing my hands over his closing beak, his soft ears, his feathered cheeks. “You’ll see danger before we will. You can drop from the sky in less time than it would take for a soldier to aim his bow. Up there, you’ll still be protecting me.”

I kissed his beak, smiling into his huge eagle’s eyes, sharing a moment that I could share with no one else. Not even Raine. Bar and I, we were one.

“With you, I can never be harmed.”

“Nor will he be seen,” Kel’Ratan said gruffly. “Who in the bloody hell ever looks up?”

Lowering his huge head, Bar bumped affectionately against me, toppling a snoozing Tuatha from my lap. Absently, my fingers shut his muzzle on his irritated snarl at having been, in his opinion, rudely woken.

“I know,” I replied to Bar’s unspoken love. “Me too.”

“So he’s not going to, you know, disembowel anyone?” Rannon asked, scooting back into his spot. Shadow slunk in to lie beside him, Rannon’s arm around his heavy neck. Both eyed us sidelong, as though we only feigned peaceful intentions and plotted to kill the first creatures that moved into talon-range.

“No,” I sighed, leaning against Bar’s lion-furred shoulder. “Not tonight.”

Tuatha had other ideas. With Shadow venturing too close for his own good, he lunged up and out of my lap, snarling. Though I grabbed for him, my hands clasped empty air, not wolf pup. Shadow backed up, his jaws wide in panic, knowing he couldn’t defend himself from Tuatha’s attack. To do so might harm his Chosen One’s adopted son and dishonor himself in not only his own eyes, but everyone else’s. What could stop Tuatha from chewing his paws to shreds?

Bar stretched out his huge, tent-like right wing.

Tuatha, small, furious, found himself blocked from his target. Unable to see past Bar’s white and brown feathers, he ducked and dodged, trying to find his way around them. Bar’s talons, as delicate as soft fingers, picked the snarling pup up by his ruff and gently dropped him in my lap.

As I soothed Tuatha’s rage, Bar refolded his wing across his shoulders and grumbled under his breath.

Tuatha snapped and snarled before admitting defeat. He snuggled back under my arm, resuming his interrupted slumber. I really must do something about his temper, I thought lazily, petting his downy fur.

Rygel glanced at him, his alarm subsiding. “As the noble lady’s body slave,” he said quietly. “You’d be in charge of her pet. This will keep Tuatha happier, I’m thinking, as he wants to be with only you these days.”

I stoked his thin dark body. “I hope so,” I murmured. “He’s so miserable.”

“This scenario might also work in other ways,” Kel’Ratan said, also resuming his spot and Nahar beside him.

The rest of my boys and their wolf friends once more crowded around the fire, Bar’s bulk taking up more space than several of them, wolf and human, combined. My three friends sat apart, eyeing me longingly. But I hadn’t the heart to ask Bar to move.

“We have yet another problem,” I said.

“What?” Kel’Ratan asked, his tone as stiff as his lip hair.

Half-smiling, I pointed to a quiet Shardon, standing behind Rygel. His eye peeped at me behind the thick fall of his forelock, glowing faintly in the firelight. I half-wondered if he missed his black brother as much as I missed Raine. In the last few days he had spoken little, yet his great eyes saw everything.

At my silent summons, he trotted forward obediently and willingly enough took his place at Rygel’s shoulder. During this council, he hadn’t spoken at all, though I’d expected him to offer opinions. By his liquid gaze on me most of the last half hour, I think he knew what I was about to say.

“You, dear one,” I said, “if I stand out like a beacon, you’re like a brilliant star falling to earth. You can’t possibly hide what you are.”

I glanced out, beyond the fire to the herd of horses, grazing on the sparse, tough grass. “And them? Arianne may well ride an animal as fine as Rufus. Perhaps my boys might, also. But the twins and me? Slaves would hardly ride horses of their obvious quality. If we rode horses at all.”

My gaze returned and rested on Rygel, our brains, our guiding light. “What say you, our renowned wizard?”

Rygel’s smile as I spoke told me enough. He’d planned for them as well. In typical Rygel fashion, he merely waited for me to bring the subject up. Sometimes I hated that aspect of the egotistical bastard.

“I can work a little magic,” Rygel answered. “It’s quiet and subtle enough that even if Ja’Teel were a mile away he’d fail to hear it.”

Of course, Rygel paused dramatically and wait for the obvious question. I almost refused to ask it, but if I didn’t someone else would. Damn him and his need for drama. “And that is?”

“An illusion,” he continued smoothly. “Whoever we meet will see Shardon as nothing more than a grey horse. I’ll not need to change his appearance, nor that of your horses. People will see that which I want them to see: thin, poor beasts of burden on which the mourning dowager mounted her slaves so they’d not slow her pace.”

I offered a half-nod and no congratulations on his cleverness. I knew he expected a pat on the back and a compliment or two, but I turned away and shut my eyes. I was in no mood to play his games. Not then, anyhow. I’d no need to look to see his crestfallen expression. I felt his disappointment on my skin.

“What do you mean?” I asked of the air in general, but knew Kel’Ratan would speak as though the previous discussion and the setting of the watches hadn’t occurred.

“A high-born lady on a religious pilgrimage,” he said smoothly, “would give us a chance to seek out certain monks.”

Rygel half-shrugged, his mouth working.

“Don’t say it,” I warned without opening my eyes. “We know: that’s why you planned it this way.”

Rygel again sought speech, and again I interrupted.

Without opening my eyes, I said. “I know everything, Rygel. You should know this by now.”

Defeated, he sighed.

“You said you needed to go tonight and steal clothing?” I asked, stirring finally and gazing into the fire.

“Yes, Princess,” he replied soberly. “I should go soon. Er, now, if I’m to return by dawn.”

“Then go,” I commanded softly. “May Nephrotiti guide your steps.”

Kissing Arianne’s hand, Rygel rose smoothly to his feet. Clearly, he wanted more from her: an embrace, a kiss, a heartfelt sigh. Arianne merely watched, impassive, as he vaulted onto Shardon’s bare back. He sighed, nudging Shardon about with his knee. Little Bull rose and stretched languidly, clearly intent upon accompanying him.

I pondered the idea of sleep, tormented dreams, dark dreams of a huge black wolf. Not again, Lady, bring me some peace, please, I thought. The flickering flames transfixed me, hypnotizing, calling me toward drowsiness when my attention caught, like everyone else, at the sound of Arianne imperiously snapping her fingers. I started, half-thinking she called me. Shardon paused mid-step, just outside the firelight. Both he and Rygel turned their heads, inquiring.

Darkhan wilted under her stern gaze.

“You go with him,” she said sharply, pointing toward Rygel with one doll-like finger. “You’ll help Little Bull to guard his back. See to it he returns safely.”

Ears flat, tail low, Darkhan didn’t even whine as he disappeared into the darkness behind Shardon’s silver shadow. Though I listened hard, I failed to hear hooves on the rocky soil, or claws scraping over rocks. ‘Twas as though the darkness had eaten them up in one smooth gulp and swallowed.