Copyright

HarperVoyager

An imprint ofHarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

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London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2018

Copyright © Tamora Pierce 1994

Map copyright © Isidre Mones 2017

Jacket design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2018

Tamora Pierce asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008304102

Ebook Edition © August 2018 ISBN: 9780008304119

Version: 2018-09-11

PRAISE FOR TAMORA PIERCE

‘Tamora Pierce didn’t just blaze a trail. Her heroines cut a swathe through the fantasy world with wit, strength, and savvy. Pierce is the real lioness, and we’re all just running to keep pace.’

LEIGH BARDUGO, #1 New York Times bestselling author

‘Tamora Pierce creates epic worlds populated by girls and women of bravery, heart, and strength. Her work inspired a generation of writers and continues to inspire us.’

HOLLY BLACK, #1 New York Times bestselling author

‘Tamora Pierce’s books shaped me not only as a young writer but also as a young woman. Her complex, unforgettable heroines and vibrant, intricate worlds blazed a trail for young adult fantasy – and I get to write what I love today because of the path she forged throughout her career. She is a pillar, an icon, and an inspiration.’

SARAH J. MAAS, #1 New York Times bestselling author

‘I take more comfort from and as great pleasure in Tamora Pierce’s Tortall novels as I do from Game of Thrones’

Washington Post

‘Tamora Pierce and her brilliant heroines didn’t just break down barriers; they smashed them with magical fire.’

KATHERINE ARDEN, author of The Bear and the Nightingale

Dedication

To Raquel Wolf-Sister, once again,

To Thomas, who has taught and still teaches me to keep my mind flexible and my creativity from stiffening up,

And to Tim, always, each and every book, whether I say so or not.

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Praise for Tamora Pierce

Dedication

Map

Chapter 1: Encounters

Chapter 2: The Valley of the Long Lake

Chapter 3: Fugitives

Chapter 4: Brokefang Acts

Chapter 5: The Trap

Chapter 6: Rebellion

Chapter 7: Counting Soldiers

Chapter 8: Friends

Chapter 9: War Is Declared

Chapter 10: The Fall of Tristan and Yolane

Epilogue

Afterword

Acknowledgements

Read on for a preview of Emperor Mage: Book Three of the Immortals Quartet

Also by Tamora Pierce

About the Publisher

Map

CHAPTER 1
ENCOUNTERS

The wolves of the Long Lake Pack, gorged on a careless mountain sheep, slept as they digested their meal. Only Brokefang, their chieftain, was awake to see the moon rise. He sat on a stone outcrop, thinking – an odd pastime for a wolf. In the last full moon of summer, on the advice of Old White, the wolf god, he had sent his best travellers, Fleetfoot and Russet, in search of a two-legger who once belonged to his pack. Their orders were to bring her to him, to speak to the local humans on his behalf. The sight of that night’s full autumn moon reminded him that winter was coming. What if his messengers couldn’t find Daine? What if something had happened to them?

He did not like ‘what if’ thoughts. Until he’d met Daine two winters before, he had worried about nothing but eating, mating, ruling his pack, and scratching fleas. Now he had complex thoughts all the time, whether he wanted them or not.

Soft chatter overhead made him look up. Two bats had met a stranger. Clinging to a branch over his head, the three traded gossip in the manner of their kind. The newcomer brought word of a two-legger on the other side of the mountains, one who was human outside and Beast-People inside. She carried news from bats in the southwest, and if a Long Lake bat was hurt, she could heal him with her magic. She travelled in odd company: two horses, a pony, an extremely tall human male, a big lizard, and two wolves.

The local bats exclaimed over the news. Their colony should hear this, they decided. Would the visitor come and tell them in their cave-home? Along with their guest, the bats took the air.

Brokefang stretched. One new thought had been that he could learn much if he listened to the talk of nonwolves. Now he could see it was a good thought, so perhaps the others were good, too. He was interested to hear that Daine also had learned new things since leaving the pack. Before, she could not talk directly with bats. Her healing was done with stinging liquids, needles, thread, and splints, not magic.

He stopped in midstretch as he remembered something. When Fleetfoot and Russet had gone, the pack was laired near the valley’s southern entrance, where a river flowed from the lake. While they eventually could find the new den in the valley’s western mountains, it might take them days to locate the pack.

He would take his wolves south and guide his visitors home.

Two days later, the girl called Daine watched rain fall outside the cave where she and her friends had taken refuge. For someone Brokefang regarded as Pack, she looked quite human. She was five foot five, slim for her fourteen and a half years, with blue-grey eyes the colour of the clouds overhead. Her curly brown hair was tightly pinned up, her clothes as practical as her hairstyle: a blue cotton shirt, tan breeches, and soft-soled boots. Around her neck a heavy silver claw hung on a leather thong.

She played with the claw, thinking. She had been born in mountains like these, in a town called Snowsdale over the border in Galla. The first twelve years of her life were spent there, before she lost her family. When she left Galla to serve the king and queen of Tortall, she had hoped that she might never see the mountains again. And here she was, in a place that could be Snowsdale’s twin.

Soon she would be with the wolves that had hunted in her old home. They had left soon after she did: Fleetfoot and Russet, her guides, had told of fleeing human hunters to find their new home by the Long Lake. What would it be like to see them again? To be with them again?

‘What are you thinking of?’ a light male voice asked from deeper inside the cave. ‘You look grim.’

Daine turned around. Seated cross-legged by the fire, a travelling desk on his knees, was her teacher, the wizard Numair Salmalín. He wore his springy mass of black hair tied into a horsetail, away from his dark face and out of his brown eyes. His ink brush was dwarfed by the hand that held it, an exceptionally large hand that was graceful in spite of its size.

‘I’m just wondering if Onua is managing the Rider horses all right without me. I know the king told her he needed us to come here, but I still feel as if I should be helping her.’

The man raised his eyebrows. ‘You know very well Onua managed the Rider horses for years before you came to work there. What’s really bothering you?’

She made a face. She never could distract him when he wanted to know something. ‘I’m scared.’

He put down his brush and gave her his full attention. ‘What of?’

She looked at her hands. They were chapped from cold, and this was only the third week of September. ‘Remember what I told you? That I went crazy and hunted with wolves after bandits killed Ma and Grandda and our animals?’

He nodded. ‘They helped you to avenge the deaths.’

‘What if it happens again? When I see them, what if I forget I’m human and start thinking I’m a wolf again? I’m s’posed to have control of my wild magic now, but what if it isn’t enough?’ She rubbed her arms, shivering.

‘May I remind you that the spell that keeps your human self apart from your magic self is one I created?’ he teased, white teeth flashing in a grin. ‘How can you imply a working performed by your obedient servant’ – he bowed, an odd contortion in a sitting man – ’might be anything but perfect?’ More seriously he added, ‘Daine, the spell covers all your contacts. You won’t lose control.’

‘What if it wasn’t the magic? What if I simply went mad?’

Strong teeth gripped her elbow hard. Daine looked around into the bright eyes of her pony, Cloud. If I have to bite you to stop you feeling sorry for yourself, I will, the mare informed her. You are being silly.

Numair, used to these silent exchanges, asked, ‘What does she say?’

‘She says I’m feeling sorry for myself. I don’t think she understands.’

I understand that you fidget over stupid things. Cloud released Daine’s elbow. The stork-man will tell you.

‘Don’t fret,’ said the mage. ‘Remember, you allowed me into your mind when you first came to Tortall. If there was a seed of genuine madness there, I would have found it.’

Daine smiled. ‘There’s folk who would say you’re the last man to know who’s crazy and who’s not. I know a cook who won’t let you in his kitchen, a palace quartermaster who says he’ll lock you up if you raid his supplies again—’

‘Enough!’ Numair held up his hands in surrender.

‘Just so you know.’ Feeling better, she asked, ‘What are you writing?’

He picked up his ink brush once more. ‘A report to King Jonathan.’

‘Another one?’ she asked, startled. ‘But we sent one off a week ago.’

‘He said regular reports, magelet. That means weekly. It’s a small price to pay for being allowed to come to the rescue of your wolf friends. I just wish I had better news to send.’

‘I don’t think we’ll find those missing people.’ In March a group of the Queen’s Riders – seven young men and women – had disappeared in this general area. In July twenty soldiers from the Tortallan army had also vanished. ‘They could’ve been anywhere inside a hundred or two hundred miles of us.’

‘All we can do is look,’ Numair said as he wrote. ‘As wanderers we have seen far more than soldiers will. Even so, it’s a shame the whole northeastern border is opaque to magical vision. I hadn’t realized that a search by foot would be so chancy.’

‘Why can’t you wizards see this place with your magic?’ Daine wanted to know. ‘When I asked the king, he said something about the City of the Gods, and an aura, but then we got interrupted and he never did explain.’

‘It has to do with the City of the Gods being the oldest centre for the teaching of magic. Over the centuries magic seeped into the very rock of the city itself, and then spread. The result is a magical aura that blanks out the city and the lands around it for something like a five-hundred-mile radius.’

Daine whistled appreciation of the distance involved. ‘So the only way to look at all this mountain rock is by eye. That’s going to be a job and a half.’

‘Precisely. Tell me, how far do you think we are from our destination?’

Fleetfoot and Russet had measured distance in the miles a wolf travels in a day. Daine had to divide that in half to figure how far humans might go on horseback. ‘Half a day’s ride to the south entrance to the valley, where the Dunlath River flows out of Long Lake. From—’ She stopped as something whispered in her mind. Animals were coming, looking for her. She ran to the mouth of the cave as their horses bolted past.

Here they came up the trail, wolves, three in the lead and four behind. Two of the leaders were her guides to the Long Lake: the small, reddish white male known as Russet and the brown-and-grey female called Fleetfoot. Between them trotted a huge, black-and-grey timber wolf, plumed tail boldly erect.

‘Brokefang!’ Daine yelled. ‘Numair, it’s the pack!’ She ran to them and vanished in a crowd of yelping, tail-wagging animals. Delighted to see her, they proceeded to wash her with their long tongues.

Standing at the cave entrance, waiting for the reunion to end, the man saw that the rain was coming down harder. ‘Why don’t we move the celebration inside?’ he called. ‘You’re getting drenched.’

Daine stood. ‘Come on,’ she told the pack, speaking aloud for Numair’s benefit. ‘And no eating my friends. The man is Numair. He’s my pack now.’ Two wolves – Numair was touched to see they were Fleetfoot and Russet, his companions on their journey here – left the others to sit by him, grinning and sprinkling him with drops from their waving tails.

Once out of the rain, the newcomers greeted Cloud, sniffing the gray mare politely. Brokefang gave the mare a few licks, which she delicately returned. The pony, the sole survivor of the bandit raid on Daine’s farm, had stayed with Daine in the weeks the girl had run with the pack. In that time, wolves and pony had come to a truce of sorts.

Next Daine introduced her pack to Spots, the easygoing piebald gelding who was Numair’s mount, and Mangle, a gentle bay cob who carried their packs. The horses quivered, whites showing all the way around their eyes, as the wolves sniffed them. They trusted Daine to keep the wolves from hurting them, but their belief in her couldn’t banish natural fear entirely. Once the greetings were over, they retreated to the rear of the large cave and stayed there.

‘Kitten,’ Daine called, looking for her charge. ‘Come and meet the wolves.’

Knowing she often scared mortal animals, the dragon had kept to the shadows. Now she walked into the light. She was pale blue, almost two feet long from nose to hip, with another twelve inches’ worth of tail, a slender muzzle, and silver claws. The wings that one day would carry her in flight were, at this stage, tiny and useless. Her blue, reptilian eyes followed everything with sharp attention. She was far more intelligent than a mortal animal, but her way of knowing and doing things was a puzzle Daine tried to unravel on a daily basis.

‘This is Skysong,’ Daine told the pack. ‘That’s the name her ma gave her, anyway. Mostly we call her Kitten.’

The dragon eyed their guests. The newcomers stared, ears flicking back and forth in uncertainty, tails half-tucked between their legs. Slowly she rose up onto her hindquarters, a favourite position, and chirped.

Brokefang was the first to walk forwards, stiff-legged, to sniff her. Only when his tail gave the smallest possible wag did the others come near.

Once the animals were done, Daine said, ‘Numair, the grey-and-black male is Brokefang.’ When the wolf came to smell Numair’s hands, the mage saw that his right canine tooth had the point broken off. ‘He’s the first male of the pack, the boss male.’ Numair crouched to allow Brokefang to sniff his face and hair as well. The wolf gave a brief wag of the tail to show he liked Numair’s scent.

‘The brown-and-grey male with the black ring around his nose is Short Snout,’ Daine said. ‘The tawny female is Battle. She fought a mountain lion when she was watching pups in Snowsdale – that’s how she got her name.’ Short Snout lipped Numair’s hand in greeting. Battle sniffed the mage and sneezed. ‘The brown-and-red male is Sharp Nose. The grey-and-tawny female is Frolic.’ The girl sat on the floor, and most of the wolves curled up around her. ‘Frostfur, the boss female, and Longwind stayed in the valley with the pups.’

Greetings done, Numair sat by the fire and added new wood. ‘Has Brokefang said why he needs you?’ he asked. ‘His call for help was somewhat vague.’

Daine nodded. ‘Brokefang, what’s going on? All you told Fleetfoot and Russet was that humans are ruining the valley.’ As the wolf replied, she translated, ‘He says this spring men started cutting trees and digging holes without planting anything. He says they brought monsters and more humans there, and they are killing off the game. Between that and the tree cutting and hole digging, they’re driving the deer and elk from the valley. If it isn’t stopped, the pack will starve when the Big Cold comes.’

‘The Big Cold?’ asked Numair.

‘It’s what the People – animals – call winter.’

The man frowned. ‘I’m not as expert as you in wolf behaviour, but – didn’t you tell me that if wolves find an area is too lively for them, they flee it? Isn’t that why they left Snowsdale, because humans there were hunting them?’

Yes, said Brokefang. They wanted to hurt us, because we helped Daine hunt the humans who killed her dam. They killed Rattail, Longeye, Treelicker, and the pups.

Daine nodded sadly: Fleetfoot and Russet had told her of the pack’s losses. The older wolves had been her friends. The pups she hadn’t met, but every pack valued its young ones. To lose them all was a disaster.

Brokefang went on. We left Snowsdale. It was a hard journey in the hot months, seeking a home. We found places, but there was little game, or other packs lived there, or there were too many humans. Then just before the last Big Cold we found the Long Lake. This valley is so big we could go for days without seeing humans. There is plenty of game, no rival pack to claim it, and caves in the mountains for dens in the snows.

Scratching a flea, Brokefang continued. The Long Lake was good – now humans make it bad. They drove us from the valley where I was born, and my sire, and his sire before him. Before, it was our way to run from two-leggers. Yet I do not run if another pack challenges mine – I fight, and the pack fights with me. Are humans better than another pack? I do not believe they are.

Will you help us? Will you tell the humans to stop their tree cutting and noisemaking? If they do not stop, the Long Lake Pack will stop it for them, but I prefer that they agree to stop. I know very well that if the pack has to interfere, there will be bloodshed.

Daine looked at the other wolves of the pack. They nodded, like humans, in agreement. They would support Brokefang in the most unwolflike plan she had ever heard in her life. Where had they got such ideas?

Will you help us? asked Brokefang again.

Daine took a deep breath. ‘You’re my pack, aren’t you? I’ll do my best. I can’t promise they’ll listen to me, but I’ll try.’

Good, Brokefang replied. He padded to the cave’s mouth and gave the air a sniff. The breeze smelled of grazing deer just over the hill. Looking at Daine, he said, Now we must hunt. We will come back when we have fed.

They left as Daine was translating his words. She followed them to the cave mouth, to watch as they vanished into the rain. It was getting dark. Behind her was a clatter as Numair unpacked the cooking things. Thinking about the pack and about her time with them, she was caught up in a surge of memory.

The bandit guard was upwind of a wolf once called Daine. The night air carried his reek to her: unwashed man, old blood, sour wine. Her nose flared at the stench. She covered it with her free hand. The other clutched a dagger, the last human item she remembered how to use.

He did something with his hands as he stood with his back towards her. She slunk closer, ignoring the snow under her bare feet and the freezing air on her bare arms. Forest sounds covered the little noise she made, though he would not have heard if she’d shouted. He was drunk. They all were, too drunk to remember the first two shifts of guards had not returned.

She tensed to jump. Something made him turn. Now she saw what he’d been doing: there was a wheel of cheese in one hand, a dagger in the other, and a wedge of cheese in his mouth. She also saw his necklace, the amber beads her mother had worn every day of her life. She leaped, and felt a white-hot line of pain along her ribs. He’d stabbed her with his knife.

Brokefang found her. She had dragged herself under a bush and was trying to lick the cut in her side. The wolf performed this office for her.

It is dawn, he said. What must be done now?

We finish them, she told him, fists clenched tight. We finish them all.

‘I think I know why Brokefang changed so much,’ she said. ‘I mean, animals learn things from me, and probably that’s how most of the pack got so smart, but Brokefang’s even smarter. I got hurt, when we were after those bandits, and he licked the cut clean.’

‘It’s a valid assumption,’ agreed Numair. ‘There are cases of magically gifted humans who were able to impart their abilities to non-human companions. For example, there is Boazan the Sun Dancer, whose eagle Thati could speak ten languages after she drank his tears. And—’

‘Numair,’ she said warningly. Experience had taught her that if she let him begin to list examples, he would not return to the real world for hours.

He grinned, for all the world like one of her stableboy or Rider friends instead of the greatest wizard in Tortall. He had begun to cook supper: a pot of cut-up roots already simmered on the fire. Daine sat next to him and began to slice chunks from a ham they had brought in their packs. Kitten waddled over to help, or at least to eat the rind that Daine cut from the meat.

—This is very nice,— a rough voice said in their minds. —Cozy, especially on a rainy afternoon.—

They twisted to look at the cave entrance. It shone with a silvery light that appeared to come from the animal standing there. The badger waddled in, the light fading around his body. He stopped at a polite distance from their fire and shook himself, water flying everywhere from his long, heavy coat.

Daine fingered the silver claw he had once given her. She liked badgers, and her mysterious adviser was a very handsome one. Big for his kind, he was over a yard in length, with a tail a foot long. He weighed at least fifty pounds, and it appeared he could stow a tremendous amount of water in his fur.

When he finished shaking, he trundled over to the fire, standing between Daine and Numair. Seated as Daine was, she and the badger were nearly eye to eye. She was so close that she couldn’t escape his thick, musky odour.

‘Daine, is this—?’ Numair sounded nervous.

The badger looked at him, eyes coldly intelligent. —I told her father I would keep an eye on her. So you are her teacher. She tells me a great deal about you, when I visit her.—

‘May I ask you something?’ the mage enquired.

—I am an immortal, the first male creature of my kind. The male badger god, if you like. That is what you wished to ask, is it not?—

‘Yes, and I thank you,’ Numair said hesitantly. ‘I – thought I had shielded my mind from any kind of magical reading or probe—’

—Perhaps that works with mortal wizards,— the badger replied. —Perhaps it works with lesser immortals, such as Stormwings. I am neither.—

Numair blushed deeply, and Daine hid a grin behind one hand. She doubted that anyone had spoken that way to Numair in a long time. She was used to it. The badger had first appeared in a dream to give her advice sixteen months ago, on her journey to Tortall, and she had dreamed of him often since.

‘Another question, then,’ the mage said doggedly. ‘Since I have the opportunity to ask. You can resolve a number of academic debates, actually.’

—Ask.— There was a studied patience in the badger’s voice.

‘The inhabitants of the Divine Realms are called by men “immortals,” but the term itself isn’t entirely accurate. I know that unless they are killed in some accident or by deliberate intent, creatures such as Stormwings, spidrens, and so on will live forever. They don’t age, either. But how are they “lesser immortals” compared to you, or to the other gods?’

—They are ‘lesser’ because they can be slain,— was the reply. —I can no more be killed than can Mithros, or the Goddess, or the other gods worshipped by two-leggers. ‘Immortals’ is the most fitting term to use. It is not particularly correct, but it is the best you two-leggers can manage.—

Having made Numair speechless, the badger went on. —Now, on to your teaching. It is well enough, but you have not shown her where to take her next step. I am surprised. For a mortal, your grasp of wild magic normally is good.—

Numair looked down his long nose at the guest who called his learning into question. ‘If you feel I have omitted something, by all means, enlighten us.’

The badger sneezed. It seemed to be his way of laughing. —Daine, if you try, you can learn to enter the mind of a mortal animal. You can use their eyes as you would your own, or their ears, or their noses.—

Daine frowned, trying to understand. ‘How? When you said I could hear and call animals, it was part of something I knew how to do. This isn’t.’

—Make your mind like that of the animal you join,— he told her. —Think like that animal does, until you become one. You may be quite surprised by what results in the end.—

It sounded odd, but she knew better than to say as much. She had questioned him once, and he had flattened her with one swipe of his paw. ‘I’ll try.’

—Do better than try. Where is the young dragon?—

Kitten had been watching from the other side of the fire. Now she came to sit with the badger, holding a clump of his fur in one small paw. She had a great deal to say in her vocabulary of chirps, whistles, clicks, and trills. He listened as if it meant something, and when she was done, waddled over to talk with Cloud and the horses. At last he returned to the fire, where Daine and Numair had waited politely for him to end his private conversations.

—I must go back to my home sett,— he announced. —Things in the Divine Realms have been hectic since the protective wall was breached and the lesser immortals were released into your world.—

‘Do you know who did it?’ asked Numair quickly. ‘We’ve been searching for the culprit for two years now.’

—Why in the name of the Lady of Beasts would I know something like that?— was the growled reply. —I have more than enough to do in mortal realms simply with keeping an eye on her.—

‘Don’t be angry,’ Daine pleaded. ‘He thought you might know, since you know so much already.’

—You are a good kit.— The badger rubbed his head against her knee. Touched by this sign of affection, Daine hugged him, burying her fingers in his shaggy coat. To Numair he added, —And I am not angry with you, mortal. I cannot be angry with one who has guarded my young friend so well. Let me go, Daine. I have to return to my sett.—

She obeyed. He walked towards the cave’s mouth, silver light enclosing him in a globe. At its brightest, the light flared, then vanished. He was gone.

‘Well,’ said Numair. She thought he might add something, but instead he busied himself with stirring the vegetables.

Suddenly she remembered a question she had wanted to ask. ‘I think he puts a magic on me,’ she complained.

‘How so?’

‘Every time I see him, I mean to ask who my da is, and every time I forget! And he’s the only one who can tell me, too, drat him.’

Kitten gave a trill, her slit-pupilled eyes concerned.

‘I’m all right, Kit,’ the girl said, and sighed. ‘It’s not fair, though.’

Numair chuckled. ‘Somehow I doubt the badger is interested in what’s fair.’

She had to smile, even if her smile was one-sided. She knew he was right.

‘Speaking of what is fair, what do you think of the advice he gave you, about becoming a magical symbiote?’

Most of the time she was glad that he spoke to her as he would to a fellow scholar, instead of talking down to her. Just now, though, her head was reeling from Brokefang’s news and the badger’s arrival. ‘A magical sym – sym – whatsits?’

‘Symbiote,’ he replied. ‘They are creatures that live off other creatures, but not destructively, as parasites do. An example might be the bird who rides on a bison, picking insects from the beast’s coat.’

‘Oh. I don’t know what I think of it. I never tried it.’

‘Now would be a good time,’ he said helpfully. ‘The vegetables will take a while to cook. Why not try it with Cloud?’

Daine looked around until she saw the mare, still at the rear of the cave with Mangle and Spots. ‘Cloud, can I?’

‘Cloud, may I,’ the man corrected.

You can or you may. I don’t know if it will help, said the mare.

The girl went to sit near the pony, while Mangle and Spots ventured outside to graze again. Numair began to get out the ingredients for campfire bread as Kitten watched with interest.

‘Don’t let him stir the dough too long,’ Daine ordered the dragon. ‘It cooks up hard when he forgets.’ Kitten chirped as Numair glared across the cave at his young pupil.

The girl closed her eyes. Breathing slowly, she reached deep inside to find the pool of copper light that was her wild magic. Calling a thread of fire from that pool, she reached for Cloud, and tried to bind their minds with it.

Cloud whinnied, breaking the girl’s concentration. That hurt, the mare snapped. If it’s going to hurt, I won’t do it! Try it with less magic.

Shutting her eyes, Daine obeyed. This time she used a drop of copper fire, thinking to glue her mind to Cloud’s. The mare broke contact the minute Daine’s fire touched hers. Daine tried it a second, and a third time, without success.

It’s the same kind of magic, she told Cloud, frustrated. It’s not any different from what’s in you.

It hurts, retorted the pony. If that badger knew this would hurt and told you to try it anyway, I will tell him a few things the next time he visits.

I don’t do it a-purpose, argued Daine. How can I do it without paining you?

Without the fire, Cloud suggested. You don’t need it to talk to us, or to listen. Why should you need it now?

Daine bit a thumbnail. Cloud was right. She only used the fire of her magic when she was tired, or when she had to do something hard. She was tired now, and the smell of cooking ham had filled her nostrils. ‘Let’s try again tomorrow,’ she said aloud. ‘My head aches.’

‘Come and eat,’ called Numair. ‘You’ve been at it nearly an hour.’

Daine went to the fire, Cloud following. Digging in her pack, the girl gave the pony a carrot before she sat. Numair handed over a bowl of mildly spiced vegetables and cooked ham. Kitten climbed into the girl’s lap, forcing Daine to arrange her arms around the dragon as she ate. Between mouthfuls she explained what had taken place.

Cloud listened, nibbling the carrot as her ears flicked back and forth. When Daine finished, the mare suggested, Perhaps I am the wrong one to try with.

‘Who, then, Cloud?’ Daine asked. ‘I’ve known you longer than anybody.’ She yawned. The experiment, even though it hadn’t worked, had worn her out.

But I am a grazer – you are a hunter. Why not try with a hunter? It may be easier to do this first with wolves. You are practically a wolf as it is.

‘And if I forget I’m human?’

(‘I wish I could hear both sides of this conversation,’ Numair confided softly to Kitten. ‘I feel so left out, sometimes.’)

The man said you won’t, replied Cloud. He should know. Brokefang is part of you already. Ask the stork-man. He will tell you I am right.

Daine relayed this to Numair. ‘She has a point,’ he said. ‘I hadn’t thought the predator-prey differential would constitute a barrier, but she knows you better than I.’ He watched Daine yawn again, hugely, and smiled. ‘It can wait until tomorrow. Don’t worry about cleanup. I’ll do it.’

‘But it’s my turn,’ she protested. ‘You cooked, so I have to clean.’

‘Go to bed,’ her teacher said quietly. ‘The moon will not stop its monthly journey simply because I cooked and cleaned on the same meal.’

She climbed into her bedroll and was asleep the moment she pulled up the blankets. When the wolves returned much later, she woke just enough to see them group around her. With Kitten curled up on one side and Brokefang sprawled on the other, Daine finished her night’s rest smiling.

It was damp and chilly the next morning, the cold a taste of the months to come. Breakfast was a quiet meal, since neither Daine nor Numair was a morning person. They tidied up together and readied the horses for the day’s journey.

The wolves had gone to finish the previous night’s kill. They were returning when Numair handed Daine a small tube of paper tied with plain ribbon. ‘Can we send this on to the king today?’ he asked.

Daine nodded, and reached with her magic. Not far from their campsite was the nest of a golden eagle named Sunclaw. Daine approached her politely and explained what she wanted. She could have made the bird do as she wished, but that was not the act of a friend. The eagle listened with interest, and agreed. When she came, Daine thanked her, and made sure the instructions for delivering Numair’s report were fixed in Sunclaw’s mind. Numair, who had excellent manners, thanked Sunclaw as well, handing the letter to her with a bow.

Brokefang had watched all of this with great interest. You have changed, he commented when Sunclaw had gone. You know so much more now. You will make the two-leggers stop ruining the valley.

Daine frowned. I don’t know if I can, she told the wolf. Humans aren’t like the People. Animals are sensible. Humans aren’t.

You will help us, Brokefang repeated, his faith in her shining in his eyes. You said that you would. Now, are you and the man ready? It is time to go.

Daine put Kitten atop the packs on Mangle’s back. Numair mounted Spots, and the girl mounted Cloud. ‘Lead on,’ the mage told Brokefang.

The wolves trotted down the trail away from the cave, followed by the horses and their riders. When the path forked, one end leading to the nearby river and the other into the mountains, Brokefang led them uphill.

‘If we follow the river, won’t that take us into the valley?’ Daine called. ‘It won’t be so hard on us.’

Brokefang halted. It is easier, he agreed, as Daine translated for Numair. Humans go that way all the time. So also do soldiers, and men with magic fires. It is best to avoid them. Men kill wolves on sight, remember, pack-sister?

‘Men with magic fires?’ Numair asked, frowning.

Men like you, said Brokefang, with the Light Inside.

‘We call them mages,’ Daine told him. ‘Or sorcerers, or wizards, or witches. What we call them depends on what they do.’

Numair thought for a moment. ‘Lead on,’ he said at last. ‘I prefer to avoid human notice for as long as possible. And thank you for the warning.’

The humans, Kitten, and the horses followed the wolves up along the side of the mountains that rimmed the valley of the Long Lake. By noon they had come to a section of trail that was bare of trees. The wolves didn’t slow, but trotted into the open. Daine halted, listening. Something nasty was tickling at the back of her mind, a familiar sense that had nothing to do with mortal animals. Getting her crossbow, she put an arrow in the notch and fixed it in place with the clip.

Numair took a step forwards, and Cloud grabbed his tunic in her teeth.

‘Stormwings,’ Daine whispered. Numair drew back from the bare ground. Under the tree cover, they watched the sky.

High overhead glided three creatures with human heads and chests, and great, spreading wings and claws. Daine knew from bitter experience that their birdlike limbs were steel, wrought to look like genuine feathers and claws. In sunlight they could angle those feathers to blind their enemies. They were battlefield creatures, living in human legend as monsters who dishonoured the dead. Eyes cold, she aimed at the largest of the three.

Numair put a hand on her arm. ‘Try to keep an open mind, magelet,’ he whispered. ‘They haven’t attacked us.’

‘Yet,’ she hissed.

Brokefang looked back to see what was wrong, and saw what they were looking at. These are harriers, he said. They help the soldiers and the mages.

Daine relayed this to Numair as the wolves moved on, to wait for them in the trees on the other side of the clearing.

‘Stormwings that work in conjunction with humans,’ the man commented softly. ‘That sounds like Emperor Ozorne’s work.’ The emperor of the southern kingdom of Carthak was a mage who seemed to have a special relationship with minor immortals, and with Stormwings in particular. Some, Numair included, thought it was Ozorne’s doing that had freed so many immortals from the Divine Realms in the first place. He had his eye on Tortall’s wealth, and many thought he meant to attack when the country’s defenders were worn out from battling immortals.

‘Now can I shoot them?’ Daine wanted to know.

‘You may not. They still have done nothing to harm us.’

The Stormwings flew off. Vexed with her friend, Daine fumed and waited until she could no longer sense the immortals before leading the way onto the trail once more. They were halfway across the open space when Numair stopped, frowning at a large, blackened crater down the slope from them. ‘That’s not a natural occurrence,’ he remarked, and walked towards it.

‘This isn’t the time to explore!’ Daine hissed. If he heard, he gave no sign of it. With a sigh the girl told the horses to move on. ‘The wolves won’t touch you,’ she said when Spots wavered. ‘Now go!’

Follow me, Cloud told the horses; they obeyed. Daine, with Kitten peering wide-eyed over her shoulder, followed Numair.

Blackened earth sprayed from the crater’s centre. Other things were charred as well: bones, round metal circles that had been shields before the leather covers burned, trees, axeheads, arrowheads, swords. The heat that had done this must have been intense. The clay of the mountainside had glazed in spots, coating the ground with a hard surface that captured what was left of this battle scene.

Numair bent over a blackened lump and pulled it apart. Daine looked at a mass of bone close to her, and saw it was a pony’s skeleton. Metal pieces from the dead mount’s tack had fallen in among the bones. Looking around, she counted other dead mounts. The smaller bone heaps belonged to human beings.

Grimly Numair faced her and held up his find. Blackened, half-burned, in tatters, it was a piece of cloth with a red horse rearing on a gold-brown field. ‘Now we know what happened to the Ninth Rider Group.’

Daine’s hand trembled with fury. She had a great many ties to the Queen’s Riders, and the sight of that charred flag was enough to break her heart. ‘And you stopped me from shooting those Stormwings.’

‘They don’t kill with blasting fire like this,’ Numair replied. ‘This is battle magic. I have yet to hear of a Stormwing being a war mage.’

‘I bet they knew about this, though.’

Numair put a hand on her shoulder. ‘You’re too young to be so closed-minded,’ he told her. ‘A little tolerance wouldn’t come amiss.’ Folding the remains of the flag, he climbed back up to the trail.

CHAPTER 2
THE VALLEY OF THE LONG LAKE

Three days after leaving the cave, the wolf pack led the humans and their ponies through a gap in the mountains. At its deepest point they found a spring, where they ate lunch; from there they followed a stream downhill, until Brokefang stopped.

You must look at something, he told Daine. Leave the horses by that rock – they will be safe there, with the rest of the pack to guard them.

Daine, with Kitten on her back in a sling, and Numair followed them up a long tumble of rock slabs. When they came to the top, they could see for miles. Far below was the Long Lake. Daine noticed a village where a small river – part of the stream they had followed – met the lake. Not far offshore, linked to the village by a bridge, was an island capped by a large, well-built castle.

Numair drew his spyglass from its case. Stretching it to full length, he put it to his eye and surveyed the valley.

What is that? asked the wolf, watching him.

‘It’s a glass in a tube,’ Daine replied. ‘It makes things that are far away seem closer.’

‘This is Fief Dunlath, without a doubt.’ Numair offered the spyglass to Daine. ‘I can’t see the northern reaches of the lake from here. Is that where the damage is being done? The holes and the tree cutting?’

Most of it, Brokefang replied. That and dens for the soldiers, like those they have at the south gate.

‘Soldiers at the northern and southern ends of the valley?’ asked Daine. ‘Then why not here, if they want to put watchdogs at the passes?’

Most two-leggers follow the river in and out, answered Brokefang. Few come here as we did. When they do, usually the harriers catch them outside, as they did those Riders you spoke of.

Numair listened as Daine translated. ‘This is not good,’ he muttered, squinting at Dunlath Castle. ‘There is no reason for this fief to be heavily guarded. Under law they’re only entitled to a force of forty men-at-arms … May I see that again?’ He held out a hand, and Daine returned the glass.

They continued to examine the valley until Brokefang said, Come. We have a way to go still. Let us find the meeting place, and my mate.

Daine and Numair followed the wolf back to the spot where they had left the horses. A strange wolf had joined the others, a grey-and-white female with a boldly marked face. Brokefang raced to meet her, tail erect and wagging gaily.

‘Well, he’s glad to see this one,’ Numair remarked as they followed more slowly. ‘Who’s the stranger?’

‘His mate, Frostfur. The boss female.’

Where were you? Frostfur was demanding of Brokefang. What took so long? You said you were going only to the other side of the mountain and you have been gone four nights.

Daine sighed. She’d forgotten how much she disliked Frostfur. During her time with the pack, Rattail had been Brokefang’s mate. A sweeter, gentler wolf Daine had never met. After her death, Brokefang had chosen her sister. The new female pack leader was a cross, fidgety animal who had never accepted Daine.

We were travelling with two-leggers and horses, Brokefang told his mate. They can’t run as fast as we can.

The only two-legger we need is her. Why didn’t you leave those others behind? We can hunt if we are hungry. We don’t need food brought to us, like the humans’ dogs.

At this, Cloud, who stood between Frostfur and the horses, laid back her ears. Kitten reared up in her sling, bracing her forepaws on Daine’s shoulder, and screeched at the she-wolf. Daine was shocked to hear her friend voice something that sounded so rude. Frostfur looked at them and bared her teeth.

‘Enough!’ the girl ordered. ‘We’re friends. That means you, Frostfur, and these horses. If you disobey, you’ll be sorry.’

Frostfur met her eyes, then looked away. You are different, the wolf said. You and the pony both. I suppose you don’t even realize it. The pack never was the same after you left it. How much will you change us this time?

Brokefang nuzzled his mate. It will be good, he told Frostfur. You’ll see. Take us to the pups. You’ll feel better when the pack is one again.

Without reply, Frostfur ran down a trail that led north. The wolves and their guests followed. The path took them on a line that ran parallel to the lake. For a game trail it was wide and, if the tracks and marks on the trees and shrubs were to be believed, used by many animals, not only wolves.

‘Mountain sheep,’ Daine commented, showing Numair a tuft of white fur that had caught on a bramble. ‘A wolverine, too – keep an eye out for that one. They’re nasty when they’re crossed.’ Looking up the trail, she saw each of the wolves stop to lift a leg on a pile of meat. Even the females did so, which was odd. Marking territory was normally done only by males. ‘Graveyard Hag, what are they doing?’ she asked, naming one of Numair’s gods. She trotted to the head of the line. ‘What is this?’ she asked. ‘What’s wrong with the meat?’

Brokefang replied, One of the two-leggers is a hunter of wolves. He leaves poisoned meat on our trails. We are telling him what we think of this. When he comes to check the meat, he will curse and throw things. It is fun to watch.

Daine laughed, and went to explain it to Numair.

They made several stops to express such opinions: twice at snares, once at a trap, and once at a pit covered with leaves and branches. Each time the wolves marked the spot with urine and dung, leaving a smelly mess for the hunter. At the last two stops, the horses and Cloud also left tokens of contempt.

‘That should really confuse him,’ Daine told Numair and Kitten. ‘He’ll never figure out how horses came to mark a wolf scent post.’

A lesser trail split from the one they walked; the wolves followed it into a cuplike valley set deep in the mountainside, hidden by tangles of rock. There the woods opened onto a clearing around a pond. At the water’s edge trails crossed and recrossed, and large, flattened areas in the brush marked wolf beds.

A challenge-bark came from a bunch of reeds, and five half-grown wolves, their colours ranging from brown to frosted grey, tumbled out. They still bore remnants of soft baby fur, and were in the process of trading milk teeth for meat teeth. Eyeing the strangers, they whined and growled nervously, until the pack surrounded them and shut the newcomers off from view.

Another grown wolf, a black, grey, and brown male, pranced over to say hello. ‘He’s Longwind,’ Daine informed Numair. ‘He was babysitting.’ To the wolf she said, ‘Say hello to my friends. Cloud you know.’ As Longwind obeyed, the girl walked up to the pack. The moment the pups noticed her they backed away.

Frostfur said with grim satisfaction, I knew bringing strangers was a mistake. Brokefang nuzzled his mate, trying to sweeten her temper.

Fleetfoot stuck her nose under the belly of one of the male pups and scooted him forwards. We know this isn’t what you’re used to, she told him, but you may as well learn now as later.

Russet gripped a female pup by the scruff of the neck and dragged her to the girl, adding, Daine is Pack, and if she is Pack, so are these others.

The female was the one to walk forwards, still clumsy on her feet, to sniff Daine’s palm. She is Leaper, Russet said, and Leaper wagged her tail. The male pup trotted over. He is Chaser, commented Russet. These others are too silly to have names. At that the remaining three pups approached timidly, whining.

Daine introduced the young wolves to her friends. The pups came to accept Numair, the horses, and Cloud, but nothing could make them like the young dragon. When she went near them, they would run to hide behind an adult wolf. At last Kitten turned grey, the colour that meant she was sulking, and waddled over to the pond. There she played with stones, pretending to ignore everyone.

Why is she sad? asked Russet. They are pups. They don’t know any better.

‘She’s no more than a pup herself,’ Daine replied. ‘I can’t even talk to her as I could to her ma. She looks big, but as dragons go she’s a baby.’

I see. Getting up, the red-coated wolf trotted over to the dragon and began to paw at her rocks. Soon they were playing, and Kitten’s scales regained their normal, gold-tinged blue colour.

Daine was wrestling a stick out of the jaws of a pup she had decided to call Silly when Brokefang came to say, We hunt. Since the pups accept you and Numair and the horses, will you guard them?

‘We’ll be honoured to guard your pups,’ Daine told him.

The pack left, and Numair began to cook as Daine groomed the horses. The smell of frying bacon called the pups to the fire, their noses twitching. The new scent cancelled some of their fear of Kitten: as long as she kept to one side of the fire and they to the other, the young wolves didn’t object. When the first pan of bacon was done, Numair gave in to the pleading in five pairs of brown eyes and one pair of slit-pupilled blue, and doled it out to his audience.

After Numair, the pups, and the horses went to bed, Daine lay awake, listening to the chatter of owls and bats. At the fringe of her magic she felt immortals pass overhead. They weren’t Stormwings, or griffins, or any of the others she had met before. She sensed she would not like these if they did meet. There was a nasty undertone to them in her mind, like the taint of old blood.

The pack returned not long after the creatures’ presence faded in her mind. Was it good hunting? she asked Brokefang silently, so she wouldn’t disturb Numair.

He came to sit with her. An old and stringy elk. He gave us a good run, though, he replied. Cloud says you are trying to fit into her skull. It sounds like an interesting thing.

I tried it once, said Daine. Cloud thinks I might do better with wolves. I would have asked before, but I needed to rest first.

Are you rested now? he wanted to know. I would like you to try it with me.

She smiled and said, All right. And thank you.

Must I do anything in particular?

No. Just wait.

She closed her eyes, took a breath, let it out. Sounds pressed on her: Numair’s snore, Short Snout’s moan as he dreamed of rabbits, the pups chewing, Battle washing a paw. Beyond those noises she heard others belonging to the forest and air around them.

She concentrated on Brokefang until she heard fleas moving in his pelt. He yawned, so close that it felt as if he yawned inside her ears. She listened for his thoughts and found them: the odour of blood from his kill, the drip of water from the trees overhead, the joy of being one with the pack. Brokefang sighed—

Daine was sleepy; her belly was overly full and rumbling as it broke the elk meat down. She could see young Silly from where she lay; he was asleep on his back with his paws in the air. She crinkled her whiskers in a silent laugh.

The smells, the sounds. She had never been so aware of them in her life. There was the wind through pine needles, singing of rocks and open sky. Below, a mole was digging. Her nostrils flared. Here was wolf musk, the perfume of her packmates. There was the hay-and-hide scent of the horses-who-are-not-prey, enticing but untouchable. A whiff of flowers, animal musk, and cotton was the girl-who-is-Pack. She looked at the girl, and realized she looked at herself.

It was a jolt to see her own face from the outside, one that sent her back into herself. Daine opened her eyes. ‘I did it!’

Numair stirred as the pack got up. ‘You did what?’ he asked sleepily.

Brokefang washed Daine’s ear as she explained. ‘I was Brokefang. I mean, we were both in Brokefang’s mind. We were wolves – I was a wolf. It was only for a few minutes, but it happened!’

The man sat up, hugging his knees. ‘Good. Next time you can do it longer.’ He looked at Brokefang. ‘Did it hurt you the way it hurt Cloud?’

No, the wolf replied as Daine translated. We will do it again.

The girl yawned and nodded. At last she was sleepy. ‘Tomorrow,’ she promised, wriggling down into her bedroll.

Brokefang yawned when she did. Tomorrow, he agreed, as sleepy as she was.

When she woke, it was well past dawn. Numair crouched beside the pond, with Kitten and the pack behind him, watching what he did with interest. Faint black fire dotted with white sparks spilled from his hands to the water’s surface, forming a circle there. At last he sighed. The fire vanished.

‘What was that?’ Daine asked, dressing under the cover of her blankets.

‘There’s an occult net over the valley,’ he said, grimacing as he got to his feet. ‘It’s subtle – I doubt many would even sense it – and it serves to detect the use of magic. It also would block all messages I might send to the king. To anyone, for that matter. And since this valley is hidden beneath the aura cast by the City of the Gods, no one outside can even tell the net is here.’

‘Wonderful,’ she said dryly. ‘So Dunlath is a secret within a secret.’

Numair beamed at her. ‘Precisely. I couldn’t have put it better.’

‘And this net – will it pick up any magic?’ she asked, putting her bed to rights. ‘Will them that set it know you just looked at it?’

‘No. A scrying spell is passive, not active. It shows what exists without influencing it.’

‘What’s here that’s so important?’ Daine asked. ‘Stormwing patrols, two forts, a magical net – what has Fief Dunlath got that needs so much protecting?’

‘We need to find out,’ Numair said. ‘As soon as you’ve had breakfast, I think we should see the northern part of the valley.’

She ate as Numair set the camp in order and saddled Cloud and Spots. Mangle agreed to stay with the pack after Daine convinced them – and him – that he was to be left alone. The girl then offered the carry-sling to Kitten. The young dragon looked at it, then at the still-nervous Mangle. She shook her head and trotted over to the pack horse, clearly choosing to stay and keep him company. With the small dragon by his feet, Mangle relaxed. Daine, who knew Kitten was well able to protect herself, relaxed as well, and mounted Cloud. Brokefang, Fleetfoot, and Short Snout led the way as she and Numair followed.

The group used a trail high on the mountainside, one that was broad enough for the horses, and kept moving all morning, headed north. Daine listened hard for immortals, and called a halt twice as Stormwings passed overhead.

Stop, Brokefang ordered at last. We must leave the trail here.

We will hide, Cloud told her, with Spots’s agreement. Don’t worry about us.

Afoot, Daine and Numair trailed the wolves through a cut in the ground that led up into tumbled rock. Brokefang crawled up to the edge of a cliff, Fleetfoot and Short Snout behind. The two humans kept low and joined them. Lying on their bellies next to their guides, they looked over the edge of the cliff.

Few trees stood in the upper ten miles of the lake’s western edge: most lay in a wood between the fort structure and the river that flowed into the north end of the lake. Much of the ground between that fort and their vantage point was heaped into mounds of dirt and rock, some of them small hills in their own right. The only greenery to speak of was patches of scraggly weed.

Roads were cut into the dirt, leading down to deep pits that lay between the mounds. Men and ogres alike toiled here, dressed in loincloths and little else. Some pulled dirt-filled carts out of the pits. When they returned with empty carts, they vanished into the black, yawning holes of the mines.

Wherever she looked she saw ogres, aqua-skinned beings that varied in size from her own height to ten or twelve feet. Their usually straggly hair was chopped to a rough stubble that went as low as their necks and shoulders. They had pointed ears that swivelled to catch any sound, bulging eyes, and yellowing, peg-like teeth. She was no stranger to their kind, but most of her meetings with them had been fights of one sort or another. This was the first time she had seen any used as beasts of burden, or as slaves. All of them appeared to be at the mercy of the armed humans who patrolled the entire area. One ogre, a sad and skinny creature, slumped to his knees. Three humans came after him, their whips raised.

Daine looked away. On her right was the lake. Barrack-like buildings, some big enough to house ogres, had been erected of raw wood on the near shore. Between them, human and ogre children played under the watchful eye of an ogre female. The fort on the town’s north side was well built and, to judge from the many tiny human figures that came and went, well manned. Boats lay at docks on the lake between town and fort, guarded by men.

She closed her eyes, listening for animals. In the pits she heard only a few rats and mice. Every other animal had fled the zone of destruction, and its fringes were loud with battles fought over every bit of food. In the lake she heard death. Filth lay in the water: garbage from the town and fort, waste dirt from the mines. The fish gasped for air in the lake’s northern waters. Their kinfolk in cleaner water went hungry as food sources died.

Brokefang stuck his cold nose into the girl’s ear. I told you, he said.

‘Those are mines,’ Numair commented, his voice low. He unhooked his spyglass from his belt, opened it, and put it to his eye. ‘But what are they for? The opal mines around here were emptied nearly half a century ago.’

‘What are opals?’ asked Daine.

‘They are used in magic, like other gemstones. Mages will do anything to get opals, particularly black opals.’

Daine was puzzled. Since her arrival in Tortall she had seen all kinds of precious stones, but not those. ‘What do they look like?’

Numair lifted a chain that lay around his neck, under his shirt. From it hung a single oval gem that shimmered with blue, green, orange, and gold fires. ‘Opals are power stones. Black ones like this are the best. They store magic, or you may use the stone to increase the strength of a spell. I saved for years to purchase this. Emperor Ozorne has a collar made of them – six rows, threaded on gold wire. He has a mine somewhere, but he guards the location even more carefully than he guards his power.’ He glared at the mines. ‘Surely we would know if opal dirt were found here once more. Dunlath is a Tortallan fief.’

The ground shook last autumn, Brokefang said. See the raw earth on the mountains, behind the fort? Cliffs fell there. In spring, when the pups were new and still blind, a mage came and exploded holes where the pits are now.

‘Let us speculate,’ Numair said when Daine finished translating. ‘Something of value – opal dirt, for example, or even gold – was seen in the fallen cliffs, after the earthquake. The lord of Dunlath sent for a mage with blasting expertise, doubtless a war mage, on the chance he would uncover more – and he did. It may be the same mage who destroyed the Ninth Riders. But who buys what is taken from the land? It isn’t the king, or he would have told us.’

Daine looked back at the mines. The ogre who had fallen was on his feet again, blue liquid – his blood – coursing down his back in stripes. ‘I don’t care if they are ogres,’ she said quietly. ‘That’s slavery down there, and we aren’t a slave country.’

‘It appears they are expanding, too.’ Numair pointed over Daine’s shoulder. Here, in a direction she had not looked before, humans and ogres with axes were hard at work, cutting down trees and dragging the stumps from the ground.

Now you see why we need you, Brokefang said, baring his teeth as he watched the tree cutting. This must stop. It will stop. Soon there will be no game, and everyone here will starve, even the ones who ordered this.

‘We need to learn more,’ Numair replied. ‘We need to speak with those in charge, in the fief village and the castle. Then I want to get word to King Jonathan. Something is badly amiss.’ He inched back into the cover of the trees, Daine, Fleetfoot, and Short Snout following.

Realizing Brokefang had not come with them, Daine looked back. The chief wolf stood on the cliff, his fur bristling, his ears forwards and his tail up as he growled defiance at the ruin below.

On their return to the campsite, Daine let the others go ahead as she took her crossbow and went hunting. She was in luck, finding and bagging two plump rabbits soon after leaving the trail.

Human friends often exclaimed to see her hunt. They seemed to think, because she shared a bond with animals, that she ought to go meatless.

‘That’s fair daft,’ she had said when Princess Kalasin mentioned it. ‘Some of my best friends are hunters. I’m a hunter. You eat what you’re made to eat. I just make sure I don’t use my power to bring game to me, and I stop listening for animal voices with my magic. I close it all off.’

‘You can do that?’ Kally had asked, eyes wide.

‘I must,’ Daine had replied. ‘Otherwise my hunting would be – dirty. Vile. When I go, I hunt like any other two-legger, looking for tracks and following trails. And I’ll tell you something else. I kill fast and clean, so my game doesn’t suffer. You know I can, too. I almost never miss a shot.’

‘I suppose, if that’s how you do it, it’s all right,’ the girl had said, though she still looked puzzled.

Daine had snorted. ‘Fairer than them that kill an animal for its horns or skin, so they can tack it on their wall. I hunt to eat, and only to eat.’

When she reached the camp, it was nearly dark. The pack had gone, leaving Russet, Numair, and Kitten with the pups and horses. Once Daine appeared, Russet left to hunt for himself. Numair, who had started a pot of rice, smiled when he saw her, but he looked preoccupied. From experience she knew it did no good to talk when something was on his mind, so she let him be.

Once her rabbits were cleaned, spitted, and cooking, she groomed the horses and Cloud, oiled rough patches on Kitten’s hide, and wrestled with the pups. She ate quickly when supper was done, and cleaned up without bothering Numair. He wandered to the opposite side of the pond, where he stretched out on the ground and lay staring at the trees overhead.

Russet came back, grinning. All that was left of a pheasant who had not seen him in the brush was a handful of bright feathers in his fur. He panted as Daine pulled them out, then licked her face.

‘Would you help me do something?’ Daine asked, and explained the badger’s lesson.

It sounds interesting, the young wolf answered. What must I do?

‘Nothing,’ the girl said. ‘I have to come into you.’ Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath and let it go. All around she heard familiar noises. Numair had gone to sleep. Cloud drowsed where she stood, dreaming of galloping along an endless plain. Kitten sorted through a collection of pebbles, muttering to herself. Daine closed out everything but Russet’s sounds: his powerful lungs taking air in and letting it go, the twitch of an ear, the pulse of his heart.

She drew closer and closer until his thoughts crept into her mind. On the surface were simple things, like the shred of pheasant caught on a back tooth, the coolness of the packed earth under his body, his enjoyment of being with her. Below that was the powerful sense of Pack that was part of any wolf, the feeling of being one with a group where everything was shared.

The change from her mind to his was gradual this time. It felt as if she were water sinking into earth, becoming part of him in slow bits. When he blinked, vision came in blacks, whites, and greys, and she knew she saw through his eyes. Her ears picked up the tiniest movement, from the scratch of Kitten’s claws on her pebbles to the grubbing of a mouse in the reeds. He inhaled, and a rich bouquet of odours came to her: the individual scents of everyone in the clearing, wet earth, pines, the fire, moss, traces of cooked rabbit and plants.

He sniffed again, and caught a whiff of scent from the trench Daine and Numair used as a privy. The girl was amazed. She disliked that smell, and had dug the trench far from the clearing where they ate and slept on purpose. She certainly couldn’t detect it with her own nose. Not only could Russet smell it clearly, but he didn’t think the trench odour was bad – just interesting.

Silly galloped over to leap on Russet’s back, and Daine was back within her own mind. ‘Thank you,’ she told Russet in a whisper.

Thank you, he replied, and trotted off to romp with the pups.

She stretched, not quite comfortable yet in her skin. The change to her own senses was a letdown. As good as her ears were, they were not nearly as sharp as the wolf’s, and her nose was a poor substitute for his. While she was glad not to be able to smell the trench once more, there had been plenty of good scents available to Russet.

‘At least I see colours,’ she told Kitten. ‘That’s something.’

The pack returned with full bellies as she was banking the fire. They had fed on a sheep that had strayed from its flock, reducing it to little more than a handful of well-gnawed bones.

Daine frowned when she heard this. ‘But that’s one of the things that make two-leggers hunt you, when you eat their animals.’

They will not find out, Brokefang said calmly. When you ran with the pack before, you warned us about human herds. We cannot stop eating them. They are slow, and soft, without hard feet or sharp horns to protect them. What we can do is hide signs of the kill. We sank what was left in a marsh, and we dragged leafy branches over the place where we killed, to hide the blood.

Instead of reassuring her, his answer made her uneasy. Here was more unwolflike behaviour, a result of the pack’s involvement with her. Where would it end? She couldn’t even say the change was only in Brokefang, because the rest of the pack helped him. She had to think of a way to protect them, or to change them back to normal beasts, before humans decided the Long Lake Pack was too unusual – too dangerous – to live.

That plan would have to wait. The badger’s lesson had tired her again. She went to bed, and dreamed of men slaughtering wolves.

In the morning Daine and Numair rode to the town of Fief Dunlath, leaving the wolves behind. Reaching the village at noon, they entered the stable yard of the town’s small, tidy inn. Ostlers came to take their horses. Dismounting from Cloud, Daine took the pack in which Kitten was hidden and slung it over her shoulder, then followed Numair indoors. They stood inside, blinking as their eyes adjusted from the sunny yard to the dark common room. In the back someone was yelling, ‘Master Parlan! We’ve guests!’

The innkeeper came out and bowed to Numair. ‘Good day to you, sir. Ye require service?’ he asked with a brisk mountain accent.

‘Yes, please. I’d like adjoining rooms for my student and me.’

‘Forgive me, mistress,’ Parlan said, bowing to Daine. ‘I dinna see ye.’ He looked her over, then asked Numair, ‘Ye said – adjoinin’ rooms, sir?’

‘Yes,’ Numair replied. ‘If there’s a connecting door, it must be locked.’

The innkeeper bowed, but his eyes were on Daine. ‘Forgive me, sir – locked?’

Daine blushed, and Numair looked down his nose at the man. ‘People have sordid minds, Master Parlan.’ Despite his travel-worn clothes, he spoke like a man used to the obedience of servants. ‘I would like my student to be spared idle gossip, if you please.’

Parlan bowed low. ‘We’ve two very nice rooms, sir, overlooking the kitchen garden. Very quiet – not that we’ve much excitement in these parts.’

‘Excellent. We will take hot baths, as soon as you are able to manage, please.’ A gold coin appeared in Numair’s hand and disappeared in Parlan’s. ‘And lunch, I think, after the baths,’ added the mage.

‘Very good, sir,’ the man said. ‘Follow me.’ He led the way upstairs.

Kitten wriggled in the pack, and chirped. ‘Hush,’ Daine whispered as Parlan opened their rooms. ‘I’ll let you out in a moment.’

The room was a small one, but clean and neatly kept, and the bath was all Daine could hope for after weeks of river and stream bathing. The food brought by the maid was plain and good. Daine felt renewed afterwards, enough so that she took a short nap. She was awakened by a scratching noise. When she opened her eyes, the dragon was picking at the lock on the door between the two rooms.

‘Leave it be, Kit,’ Daine ordered, yawning. ‘You’ve seen locks at home.’

The young immortal sat on her haunches, stretching so that her eye was on a level with the keyhole, and gave a soft trill. The door swung open to reveal Numair in a clean shirt and breeches. He was holding a piece of paper.

‘Did I know she could do that?’ he asked with a frown.

‘No more did I,’ retorted Daine.

Numair glared at the dragon, who was investigating his room as thoroughly as she had her own. ‘That door was locked for a reason,’ he told her sternly. To Daine he added, ‘Though actually I do need to speak with you. We’ve been invited to dine tonight at the castle.’

‘Why?’ the girl asked, rubbing her eyes.

‘It’s typical of nobles who live out of the way. A newcomer is worth some attention – it’s how they get news. I don’t suppose you packed a dress.’

Since her arrival in Tortall, when her Rider friends had introduced her to breeches, she had worn skirts rarely, and always under protest. When the village seamstress showed her the only gown that would be ready in time, Daine balked. The dress was pink muslin, with lace at collar and cuffs – a lady’s garment, in a colour she hated. She announced she would go in breeches or not at all.

Numair, usually easygoing, sometimes showed an obstinate streak to rival Cloud’s. By the time their escort came, Daine wore lace-trimmed petticoats, leather shoes, and the pink dress under a wool cloak to ward off the nighttime chill. A maid had done up her stubborn curls, pinning them into a knot at the back of her neck. Kitten’s mood was no better than Daine’s: told she could not go with them, the dragon turned grey and hid under the bed.

Their escort came after dark to guide them across the causeway to the island and its castle. Ostlers took charge of Spots and Cloud, and servants took their cloaks, all in well-trained silence. A footman led them across the entrance hall to a pair of half-open doors.

Behind those doors a man was saying, ‘… know wolves like th’ back of m’hand. I tell ye, these have got to be werewolves or sommat from th’ Divine Realms. They don’t act as wolves should act. See this? An’ this? Laughin’ at me, that’s what they’re doin’!’

‘My lord, my ladies,’ the footman said, breaking in, ‘your guests are here.’ He bowed to Numair and Daine and ushered them in ahead of him. ‘I present Master Numair Salmalín, of Corus, and his student, called Daine.’

They were in an elegant sitting room, being looked over by its occupants. The footman announced, ‘My lord Belden, master of Fief Dunlath. My lady Yolane of Dunlath, Lord Belden’s wife and heiress of Dunlath. Lady Maura of Dunlath, my lady’s sister.’

Numair bowed; Daine attempted a curtsy. Yolane, in her thirties, and Maura, a girl of ten, were seated by the hearth fire. Though introduced as sisters, there was little resemblance between them. Yolane was beautiful, with ivory-and-rose skin, large brown eyes, a tumble of reddish brown curls, and a soft mouth. Her crimson silk gown hugged a trim body and narrow waist; deep falls of lace at her wrists drew the eye to long, elegant hands. Diamonds glittered around her neck and at her earlobes. Maura was painfully plain, a stocky child with straight brown hair, attired in a blue dress that fit badly.

Lord Belden was of an age with his wife, a lean, bearded man who showed more interest in his wineglass than in his guests. His brown hair and beard were clipped short. His clothing was equally businesslike, though his maroon brocade tunic and white silk shirt and hose were of the finest quality.

Before the nobles stood a man in rough leather. He bristled with weapons, and held a pair of wolf traps. Yolane fanned herself, trying to disperse the aroma that came from the traps; Maura held her nose. The wolfhounds that sat or sprawled at the hunter’s feet rose when they saw Daine. Slowly they went to her, their wire-haired faces eager. She offered her hands for them to sniff.

‘Here!’ barked the hunter. ‘Them ain’t ladies’ dogs! They’re fierce hunters, and no’ t’ be cosseted!’

Daine snickered as the hunters crowded around her, tails wagging.

‘Yes, you’re fine dogs,’ she whispered, returning their welcome. ‘You’re lovely dogs, even if you do hunt wolves.’

We try to hunt them, the chief of the wolfhounds said. The man would like us to succeed, but how can we, when wolves do such strange things?

‘Tait, take those brutes away,’ commanded Yolane. ‘This is a civilized gathering.’

The huntsman stalked out, whistling to his dogs. They followed obediently, with an apology to Daine.

As they went, they brushed past another man who entered, smiling wryly. He was broad-shouldered and handsome, dressed neatly in a white shirt, brown silk tunic and hose, and polished boots. His brown-blond hair was clipped short over a clean and open face. Coming up behind Numair, he said, ‘I hope you forgive my—’

Numair turned to look at him, and the stranger’s jaw dropped. His hazel eyes opened wide in shock. ‘Mithros, Mynoss, and Shakith,’ he whispered.

Daine frowned. Until now, the only one she’d ever heard use that particular oath was Numair himself.

‘Arram?’ the man asked in a melodic voice. ‘Is that Arram Draper?’

Numair gaped at him. ‘Tristan Staghorn? They told me you were still in Carthak, with Ozorne.’

CHAPTER 3
FUGITIVES

‘Oh, Ozorne,’ the newcomer scoffed. ‘No, I felt too – restricted, serving him. I’m my own man now – have been for a year.’ He and Numair shook hands.

‘Tristan, you know our guest?’ The lady rose from her chair and walked towards Numair, as graceful as a dancer.

‘Know him?’ replied Tristan. ‘My lady, this is Master Numair Salmalín, once of the university at Carthak, now resident at the court of Tortall.’

Yolane offered Numair a hand, which he kissed. ‘How wonderful to find such beauty in an out-of-the-way place,’ he said gallantly. ‘Does King Jonathan know the finest jewel in Tortall does not adorn his court?’

The lady smiled. ‘Only a man who lives at court could turn a compliment so well, Master Salmalín.’

‘But Tristan didn’t call you that,’ Lord Belden said coolly. ‘He called you Arram something.’

‘I was known as Arram Draper in my boyhood,’ explained Numair.

Tristan grinned. ‘Oh, yes – you wanted a majestic, sorcerous name when you got Master status. Then you had to change it, when Ozorne ordered your arrest.’

Yolane and Belden looked sharply at Numair. ‘Wanted by the emperor of Carthak?’ the woman asked. ‘You must have done something serious.’

Numair blushed. ‘The emperor is very proprietary, Lady Yolane. He feels that if a mage studies at his university, the mage belongs to him.’ He looked at Tristan. ‘I’m rather surprised to see you here. You were the best war mage in your class.’

War mage, Daine thought, startled. That’s who Numair said blasted the mines and killed the Riders.

‘I brought the emperor to see reason,’ Tristan replied, looking at Daine. ‘I’m sorry, little one – I didn’t mean to be rude. Who might you be?’

‘May I present my student?’ Numair asked. ‘Master Tristan Staghorn, this is Daine – Veralidaine Sarrasri, once of Galla.’

Yolane’s lips twisted in a smirk. ‘Sarrasri?’

Daine turned beet red. The lady knew it meant ‘Sarra’s daughter’, and that only children born out of wedlock used a mother’s name. She lifted her head. She was proud she was named after Ma.

‘Are you a wizard?’

Maura’s question startled Daine; she’d forgotten the girl was even in the room. ‘No,’ she replied. ‘Not exactly.’

A manservant entered and bowed. ‘Ladies and lords, if it pleases you, your meal awaits.’

Numair offered his arm to Yolane. She accepted it and guided him towards a door in the back of the room. ‘Would you explain something? We heard you were at the attack on Pirate’s Swoop last year. Wasn’t it from an imperial fleet? I was surprised His Majesty didn’t declare war on Carthak.’

‘He nearly did,’ replied Numair. ‘They used Carthaki war barges, but the emperor claimed they were sold to pirates. As the king was unable to prove we were attacked by anyone other than pirates, he was forced to drop it.’

Tristan offered Maura his arm with a mocking bow. The younger girl sniffed and took it. Belden, who appeared to spend much of his time in a brown study, followed them and left Daine to bring up the rear alone. For the first time in many, many months, she felt like a complete outsider. She did not like the feeling.

The dining hall was large enough to seat a household. Daine had been in many homes in the last year where servants and lords ate together, but tonight, at least, Dunlath’s nobles dined alone. Four other guests were already seated at a table placed lower and at an angle to the main board. They rose and bowed when the nobles entered. Daine saw Numair halt, dark brows knit in surprise.

Tristan said, ‘Numair, I think you know Alamid Mokhlos, and perhaps Gissa of Rachne?’ A man in a silk robe and a dark, striking woman bowed to Numair, who hesitated, then bowed in return. ‘They were on their way to the City of Gods and stopped to pay me a visit.’

‘My lord’s hospitality is so good, we fear we shall be here forever,’ the woman said in a heavily accented voice. ‘It is good to see you again, Arram.’

‘Not Arram any more,’ Tristan corrected her. ‘Numair Salmalín.’

‘That’s right.’ Alamid had a high, cutting voice. ‘We’d heard you were the Tortallan king’s pet mage.’

Tristan introduced the remaining two men in plain tunics as Hasse Redfern and Tolon Gardiner, merchants. Yolane and Belden had taken their places at the main board, and waited with polite impatience for the introductions to end. A maid gave Daine a seat beside Maura, at a table across the room and opposite the four less important guests. Tristan steered Numair to a place next to Yolane. Daine was interested to see that Numair’s seat was so far from Alamid, Gissa, and the others that he wouldn’t be able to talk to them during the meal.

Her own place beside Maura was entirely out of the stream of conversation. If they strained, they could just hear what was said by the adults on the dais.

‘If you’re waiting for them to talk to us, you have a long wait,’ Maura informed her at last.

Daine came to herself with a jerk. It occurred to her that she was being rude. ‘I’m sorry,’ she apologized, and tasted her soup. It was cold.

Maura correctly interpreted the face she made. ‘My sister doesn’t want servants eating here, as they did when our father was alive. She says the king doesn’t eat with his servants, so we won’t, either. That made the servants angry, so they take their time bringing meals.’

A mouse was exploring Daine’s shoe. She broke off a scrap of bread and fed it to him. When he finished, he whisked out of sight. ‘Why should the way the king eats decide how you take your meals here?’

‘We’re his closest relatives – third cousins or something like that,’ replied Maura, eating her soup. ‘Yolane says if he hadn’t married and had children, she might be queen today. If you’re from Galla, why do you live here? And what was your name again?’

Daine looked at her dinner companion, really looked at her, and smiled. The girl’s brown eyes were large and frank under a limp fringe, and freckles adorned her cheeks and pug nose. Perhaps to preserve her ivory skin Lady Yolane never went into the sun, but her sister was a different kind of female.

‘I’m called Daine, for short,’ she replied. ‘And it’s a fair long story, how I came to Tortall.’

‘It’s to be a fair long meal,’ said Maura. ‘She insists on having all the courses, just like at court.’

The mouse had returned, with friends. The feel of their cold noses on her stockinged legs made Daine smother a giggle.

‘I keep telling her, if she likes court so much, why doesn’t she live there all year, like some nobles. She doesn’t take the hint. Uh – Daine, don’t jump or screech or anything, but there’s a mouse in your sleeve.’

Daine looked. A pair of black button eyes peered up at her. ‘That’s hardly a safe place,’ she commented.

The mouse replied he liked it there.

‘Who are you talking to?’ asked Maura.

Daine blushed. ‘The mouse,’ she explained. ‘I understand what animals say, and they understand me. Oftentimes I forget that we aren’t speaking as humans do, and I talk to them as I might to you or Numair.’ To the mouse she added, ‘Well, if a cat sees you, there will be all sorts of trouble.’

‘No cats in the dining hall,’ interrupted Maura. ‘Yolane hates ’em.’

‘I knew there was something about her I didn’t like,’ muttered Daine.

Servants took the soup bowls, replacing them with plates laden with meat and vegetables. Daine was glad to see steam rise from her food, although none came from those that went to the head table. She mentioned it to Maura as she coaxed her mouse friend to sit beside her, rather than in her sleeve.

‘The servants like me, so they try to keep my food hot. It’s just hard with soup – it cools fast.’

Daine hesitated, trying to decide how to ask her next question. While she thought, she continued to feed bread to the mice. ‘You two don’t seem like sisters,’ she commented at last.

‘Half sisters,’ Maura said. ‘Her mother came from one of the oldest families in the realm. She died a long time ago, and Father remarried when Yolane got engaged to Belden. She tells everyone my mother was a country nobody.’

Daine frowned. ‘Forgive my saying so, Lady Maura, but your sister doesn’t sound like a nice person.’

‘She isn’t,’ was the matter-of-fact reply. ‘She cares about how old our family is and how close to the throne we are, not about taking care of Dunlath and looking after our people. And Belden’s as bad as she is. Father said he’s just a younger son, so he has a lot to prove.’

Daine shook her head, thinking you could never tell with nobles. Sometimes they were normal humans, and sometimes they worried about the silliest things.

Maura watched the mice for a moment. ‘I don’t understand. Do they all come up to you that way?’

‘Yes. They like me,’ Daine replied. ‘I like them.’

Maura sighed. ‘I wish they liked me. I get lonesome. She won’t let me play with commoners. All my friends in the village think I’m stuck-up now.’

‘Why should it matter who you play with?’ asked Daine. Go and sit with her, she urged the mice silently, so Maura wouldn’t think Daine felt sorry for her. She’s perfectly nice, you’ll see.

‘I don’t think it should matter to anyone, but she says I have to think of our house and our honour.’ The girl turned a dangerous shade of pink. ‘I care more than she does. She thinks it’s a big secret, but I know what’s going on with her and Tristan. Oh!’ She stared at her lap. A mouse stood there on his hind feet, looking her over. ‘Can I stroke him? Will he mind?’

‘Gently,’ Daine said. She felt sorry for Maura. From the look of things, no one seemed to care what happened to her or what she wanted. ‘They’re shy. If you feed him, he should stay with you.’ Won’t you? she asked the mouse.

If she feeds me, he replied. Please tell her I am partial to fruit. Humans seem to think all we eat is cheese. That’s boring after a while.

Hiding a smile, Daine relayed his words to Maura, who proceeded to stuff him, and his friends. They had gone to sleep in her lap by the time the servants cleared the plates and a bard came in, carrying a lap harp. Taking a seat in front of the nobles, he tuned his instrument as the servants returned to find places around the walls. The bard played traditional songs for an hour or more. Long before he was done, Maura had gone to sleep.

Daine barely listened. Watching the adults at the main table, she realized that here was the opportunity to do what Brokefang expected her to do, deliver his request for a halt to the mining and lumber efforts. She cringed at the thought of giving such a message to these polished, self-assured humans. She also knew Brokefang wouldn’t understand if she held back. Mockery and shame meant nothing to wolves.

I wish they meant nothing to me, either, she thought, making up her mind as the bard ended his last song and left the room. Forcing herself to get up, she walked out into the open space in front of the dais.

Numair looked at her, clearly puzzled. Then he guessed why she was there. He shook his head, trying to signal for her to return to her seat, but Daine fixed her eyes on Dunlath’s lord and lady and ignored him.

Yolane and Belden were deep in conversation. It was Tristan who saw Daine first. Breaking off his talk with Alamid and Gissa, he looked at Daine with a raised eyebrow, then smirked. Gently he tapped Belden on the shoulder. Numair was now pointing at Daine’s seat, giving her a clear order, but she shook her head. He did not have to answer to the pack; she did.

Belden called his wife’s attention to the girl in pink before them. Yolane’s brows snapped together. ‘What is it?’ she asked impatiently.

Daine clenched her hands in the folds of her skirt. ‘Excuse me, my lord. My lady. I’ve been asked to speak to you by the wolves of this valley.’

‘Wolves?’ asked Belden, looking haughty. ‘What can they say to anything?’

‘Plenty,’ the girl said. ‘They live here, too, you see. They take food out of these forests, and they drink from the streams. They told me when they came, this place was near perfect.’ She knew her face was red by now. The huge room had gone completely silent. She’d never felt so small, or so alone, in her life. ‘Then you began digging and cutting down trees. Mine trash has started to poison the northern end of the Long Lake, did you know that? And the digging and the lumbering is scaring the game out of the valley.’

To her surprise, a rough voice in the rear of the hall called, ‘She’s right, about th’ game, at least. I tried to tell ye m’self, three weeks back.’

Daine looked over her shoulder. She had forgotten that the huntsman, Tait, had come to hear the bard. She ventured a smile, and he winked. Drawing her breath, feeling better, she went on. ‘The Long Lake Pack asked me to tell you they want you to stop. If you don’t, they’ll do something drastic.’

‘How do you know this?’ Tristan’s voice was too even and sincere. His eyes danced with amusement. ‘Did the wolves come to you in a dream, perhaps, or—’

‘She has wild magic, Tristan.’ Numair came to stand with Daine, resting a hand on her shoulder and squeezing gently. She smiled up at him in gratitude.

‘Surely you do not yet insist “wild magic” is real,’ scoffed Gissa. ‘You are too old to pursue fables.’

‘It is no fable,’ Numair replied. ‘You and the Carthaki university people are like the blind man who claims sight cannot exist, because he lacks it.’

‘We lost sight of the point of Mistress Sarrasri’s argument.’ There was a strangled note in Yolane’s voice. ‘A pack of four-legged beasts wants us to stop mining. And cutting down trees.’

‘That’s right,’ Daine said, bracing herself for what she knew was coming.

‘And – if we don’t’ – the choked sound was thicker than ever in the woman’s throat – ’they’ll do something – drastic. Do you know what? No, of course you don’t. Perhaps – perhaps’ – the strangling began to escape her now, as giggles – ’they will piddle on the castle walls, or – or—’

‘Howl at the sentries,’ Tristan suggested, grinning.

‘Has she been mad for long?’ Yolane asked Numair.

‘You laugh at your peril,’ Numair warned. ‘This is a very different breed of wolf you’re dealing with, Lady Yolane.’

Yolane began to laugh, and laugh hard. Briefly she fought to get herself under control. ‘Maybe they’ll bury their bones in my wardrobe!’ she said, and began to laugh again.

Tristan smirked. ‘Suppose for a moment – just a moment – that you are right. Do you think we can’t deal with a pack of wolves? Brute creation is in this world to serve man – not the other way around. This valley is ruled by humans.’

Daine couldn’t believe what she had heard. ‘Is that what you really think animals are here for?’

‘No. That’s what I know they are for. Men do not shape their concerns for the benefit of wild beasts, my dear.’

Yolane had got herself in hand. ‘You are a foolish child. Master Salmalín has indulged you too much. Why, in Mithros’s name, should I care in the least about the tender feelings of a pack of mangy, flea-bitten curs?’

‘Think selfishly,’ Daine said, trying to make these arrogant two-leggers see what she meant. ‘You can’t go on this way. Soon you will have no forests to get wood from or to hunt game in. You poison water you drink and bathe and fish in. Even if you keep the farms, they won’t be enough to feed you if the rest of the valley’s laid waste. You’ll starve. Your people will starve – unless you buy from outside the valley, and that’s fair expensive. You’ll ruin Dunlath.’

Yolane’s eyes glittered. ‘Who are you to judge me in my own castle?’

‘Daine,’ Numair said quietly.

Daine looked at Yolane, Belden, and Tristan. They stared back at her, sure of themselves and their right to do as they wished. ‘Well, I tried,’ she muttered.

Numair bowed. ‘My lord, my lady – with your good will, we take our leave.’

As they walked out, Daine glanced at Maura. The girl had awakened and now watched Daine with a worried frown. Daine smiled, but her lips trembled a little. She hoped Maura wouldn’t think she was crazy.

Servants left the dining hall ahead of them to fetch their cloaks and to bring their horses. Within minutes they were trotting across the causeway.

‘I’m sorry I didn’t keep my mouth shut when you wanted,’ she said, trying to keep a pleading note out of her voice. ‘I had to speak. Brokefang wouldn’t understand if we came back and said we didn’t say anything to them.’

He reached over to pat her back. ‘I know. Please calm down. You aren’t the kind of girl who plunges without thinking. I wish I were more like you.’

She was glad the darkness covered her blush. It was the highest compliment he had ever paid her. ‘But you don’t plunge without thinking,’ she protested.

‘You mean you haven’t seen me do so. What, pray, was entering that castle tonight? If I were more cautious— Enough. What’s done is done.’ Reaching the innyard, they gave their mounts to the only ostler still up, then went to their rooms. ‘Good night,’ he said cheerfully. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’

Her door closed behind her, Daine used a glowstone from her belt purse to find her candle, which she lit. Kitten, sprawled on the bed, peeped drowsily.

‘You prob’ly would’ve hated it,’ Daine told her, shedding her clothes. Hanging them up instead of leaving them on the floor, a habit she’d learned in months of living in the Riders’ barracks, she then slipped into her nightshirt. ‘The little girl is nice – Maura. But the grown-ups—’ Daine shook her head as she climbed under the blanket.

Kitten, listening, chirped a question. Though she was too young to hear or to answer in mind-speech as older immortals did, talking to her was never a problem. Kitten understood Common better than some humans they had met. Daine was glad this was so, since from all she had learned in months of study, Kitten would be an infant for thirty years.

‘Well, they look nice, but they’re cold and proud. And something’s wrong. Maura says the mage from Carthak is canoodling with her sister – Lady Yolane, she is.’ Daine yawned. ‘If Lord Belden knows, he doesn’t seem to care. Put out the light, Kit, there’s a girl.’

Kitten whistled, and the candle went out. Muttering softly, she curled up with her back against Daine. Within seconds they were asleep.

She was dreaming that she ran with the pack, the scent of elk full and savoury in her nostrils, when a voice boomed in her skull. ‘Daine. Daine.’

Wolf body whirling, jaws ready to snap, she realized she was in bed, waking up. A gentle hand on her shoulder tugged her upright. For a brief moment she saw as a wolf saw, with greys and blacks and white the sole colours of her vision. The shadowy figure over her, lit by pale fire, doubled, then steadied back into one form. It was Numair. He had lit no candles; instead, the shimmer of his magic filled the room with a dim glow.

She felt as if she hadn’t slept. ‘What’s the hour?’ she asked, yawning.

‘Just after midnight watch.’ His voice was so quiet it wasn’t even a whisper, but she heard it clearly. ‘Pack. We’re leaving.’

She blinked, wondering if she still dreamed. ‘Leaving? But—’

‘Not here,’ he ordered. ‘I’ll explain on the road. Pack.’

She tumbled out of bed and did as she was told. Within minutes her saddlebags were ready and she was dressed. Numair poked his head through the inner door, which stood open once more, and beckoned for her and Kitten to follow.

He left the saddling of Spots, Mangle, and Cloud to her. She did it quietly, not wanting to rouse the ostlers. Kitten went into her carry-pack, an open saddlebag on Mangle that allowed her to see everything as she rode. At the last minute Numair gave Daine a handful of rags, and motioned for her to cover their mounts’ feet to muffle the sound of their shoes on the streets. ‘Did you leave money for our host?’ she asked as she held Spots for Numair to mount.

‘With a good tip over that, and a note of apology.’ He got himself into the saddle, a process she could never watch without gritting her teeth, and motioned for her to mount up. She did so without effort.

Go, she told Spots. He wants silence over speed, I think.

It is just as well, the patient gelding replied, passing the inn’s gate with Daine and Cloud close behind. He is so tense, I think if I trotted, he would fall off. What’s the matter?

He’ll tell us, the girl promised. Do what you can to make him less tense.

I am a riding horse, not a god, was Spots’s answer.

When they reached the trees where the road along the lakeshore crossed the river that flowed down from the western pass, Numair dismounted. Kneeling on the northern side of the crossing, he scratched a hole in the road, put something in it, and covered it over, patting the earth down firmly. Walking to the southern branch of the road, he performed the same curious rite.

‘If you’re leaving an offering to the crossroad god, his shrine is over there.’ Daine pointed to the little niche where the god’s statue rested.

‘I’m not,’ he replied, dusting his hands. He bowed to the small shrine. ‘No offence meant.’ Remounting, he guided Spots onto the track that led west, and beckoned for Daine to ride beside him.

‘What’s all this?’ she asked. ‘Usually you give warning if we have to skip out in the middle of the night.’

‘I wanted things to seem normal when we got back to the inn, in case someone was listening. We have to get out of here and warn King Jonathan, but I can’t send a message from under this shield. Even if I were to succeed, Tristan and his friends would know of it.’

‘And I guess you don’t want them running off before we can get help.’

‘Exactly. Whatever is going on in Dunlath is big. Anything in which Tristan Staghorn is involved is a danger to the kingdom.’

‘But he said he didn’t work for the emperor any more.’

‘In addition to his other talents, he is an accomplished liar.’

Hearing iron control in his voice, Daine shivered. It took a great deal to anger Numair Salmalín. She would not give a half copper for the well-being of someone who did make him angry. ‘Then why let us go? Surely he knew when he saw you that there’d be trouble.’

‘He let us go because he dumped enough nightbloom powder in my wine to keep me asleep for a century. As far as he knows, I drank it.’

‘Did you?’

He smiled mockingly. ‘Of course not. Those years of working sleight-of-hand tricks in every common room and village square between Carthak and Corus weren’t wasted. The wine ended up on the floor, under the table.’

‘He should’ve known you’d see the potion.’

‘Not particularly. When we were students, I had no skill in the detection of drugs or poisons. I knew nothing practical. People are impressed that I am a black robe mage from the Imperial University, but black robe studies cover esoterica and not much else. Yes, I can change a stone to a loaf of bread, if I want to be ill for days and if I don’t care that there will be a corresponding upheaval elsewhere in the world. Much of the practical magic I have learned I acquired here, in Tortall. From the king, in fact.’

‘But if it’s just Tristan shielding this place, can’t you break through? Oh, wait – you think those other two wizards are helping him.’

He smiled. ‘There were five mages in that banquet hall. Tristan called Masters Redfern and Gardiner merchants, but if they are, it is only as a cover occupation. They have the Gift, too.’

Daine guessed, ‘Another thing Tristan doesn’t know you can tell?’

The man nodded. ‘From the way the others defer to him, he is in charge of what is transpiring here. That means this affair is the emperor’s business. Tristan has been his dog for years – only Ozorne can tell him where to bite.’

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