“But my sister—”

“There’s food enough for her,” Lord Odfrey said, already wheeling his big horse around. “Get out of this cold water before you freeze to death. I’ve a prince to escort and my hold to secure in case the Bnen keep coming west.” Dain stared at him in dismay, knowing he had to do or say something that would change the chevard’s mind.

“Please!” he called, splashing clumsily. “May I go with your huntsman? If I bring her to your hold, will your healer give her aid?”

Lord Odfrey barely glanced back. “The huntsman will not be going into the Dark Forest this night. Not with Bnen as near as Jorb’s forge. Now get out of the water and build yourself a fire to thaw. You’ll freeze if you don’t.” Dain opened his mouth to call out again, but Lord Odfrey spurred his horse and rode away, splashing water behind him as he went.

It was dark by the time Dain reached the little burrow where Thia lay hidden.  His legs felt leaden, and he was breathing hard. He’d taken no time to build a fire. Running and trotting to keep warm, he’d hoped his clothes would dry on the way. But it was too cold, and they were still damp. The air felt as piercing as needles. When he reached the tiny clearing, he stumbled to a halt at its edge, exhausted but still cautious. Clutching the food pouch in his arms, he ignored the hollow rumbling in his stomach and focused his attention on the clearing.  The forest lay silent and still around him—too still. Dwarf scent came to his nostrils, and he felt the hair on his neck lift. Friendly or hostile, he knew not, but they had been in this clearing within the last hour or so.  He drew in an unsteady breath and reached out with his mind: Thia?  Her pain flooded him. Gasping, he broke contact with her, then leaned his shoulder against a tree trunk and drew in several deep, shuddering breaths. He could tell she was worse, much worse. Grief and worry filled him.  He had to do something to save her. She was all he had left. He could not bear to lose her too.

He crossed the clearing, finding it heavily trampled and littered with blackened fire stones and small heaps of still-warm ashes where the dwarves had camped. It was a mercy of the gods that they had not decided to bed here for the night.  On the opposite side of the clearing lay an immense log as thick as Dain was tall. Rotting and half-covered with the vines and brush that had grown up around it, the log must have fallen years ago. Fallen leaves drifted deep against it.  Dain dug with both hands, scooping dirt aside until he cleared away the shallow layer of soil that covered a lattice of woven twigs. It was perhaps the size of a fighting shield. Pulling it out of the way, he thrust his head and shoulders into the shallow hole it had covered, and inhaled the damp scent of soil and worms.

“Thia?” he whispered. “I’m coming. Don’t be afraid.”

He wriggled through the tunnel, his shoulders scraping the sides and the top of his head bumping from time to time. It was barely large enough for him. If he grew as much this year as he had last year, he would no longer fit. Little trickles of the loamy soil fell into his hair and ears, working down his neck and beneath his tunic of coarse-woven linsey.

The tunnel angled up. Dain popped his head up into the hollowed-out center of the huge log. He found Thia lying where he’d left her, wrapped in a threadbare blanket, with leaves packed around her for additional warmth.  It was warm and quiet in here. An array of glowstones resting on small niches chiseled into the wooden walls cast a soft, dim, lambent light. The burrow was snug and dry, though cramped for the two of them. It belonged to the Forlo Clan, to be used by travelers on their road to trade with upper Mandria.  Spell-locked so that only members of Forlo could see its rune markings outside, the burrow was fitted with the glowstones, the musty old blanket, and a mug and a plate Dain had found spun over by spiders when they’d first sheltered here last night. They could build no fire inside the burrow, of course. It was warm enough this autumn night, provided someone wasn’t afflicted with fever or shivering in wet clothes.

Lying still, Thia gave him no greeting. He frowned at her before looking to see if leaves were sprouting or sap had beaded up along the wooden walls. Thia’s presence, he knew, should be bringing this great log back to life, but he saw no signs of it. He knelt beside her, breathing in her scent, which was mixed with the wood, leaf, and worm odors of the burrow. He smelled life in her, and relief gripped his heart so hard he squeaked out her name.  “Thia!” he said, gripping her hand. It was clammy and cold. “I’m home,” he told her, stroking her long, tangled hair back from her brow. “I’m here with you.” She moaned, stirring beneath his touch as though even the gentle sweep of his fingers across her brow hurt her.

“I’m back,” he said again. “And look, look at what I have brought. Food for us.

Good food. Look.”

He dug into the pouch Lord Odfrey had given him, pulling out a generous chunk of cheese, fresh and soft, along with bread made of fine, pale flour and apples newly picked. The food’s mingled aromas made his mouth water, and his stomach growled louder than ever.

“Thia, open your eyes and see the wealth of our supper,” he said in excitement.

“This will give you strength. Wake up, dear one, and see our bounty.” She moaned again, turning her head away. Dain tossed the food aside and pulled her into his arms, rocking her against him while she lay limp and unresponsive.  Her long hair, usually constantly moving as though stirred by a mysterious wind, fell lank and snarled across his lap.

Pain filled his chest, a pain so deep and sharp he thought he could not breathe.

Tears spilled down his cheeks as he pressed his lips to her temple.

“Live, dear sister,” he pleaded with her. “Please, please live.”

Once again she stirred. “Jorb?” she asked in confusion.  “He is not here,” Dain said, tears streaking his face. He did not want her to think about the brutal attack. She had suffered enough. “Jorb is not here. Open your eyes, and try to eat. You must regain your strength.” She said something so soft he could not understand it. Cradling her against his knees, he broke off a small bite of the cheese and put it against her slack lips.

“Try, Thia,” he said, his voice shaking now even though he was trying not to sound afraid. “Please, try.”

She lifted her head, tipping it back against his shoulder so that she could gaze up into his face. She smiled, yet her face looked so ghostly and wan in that dim, glowing light she seemed to already have entered the third world, where spirits dwelled.

“Dain,” she said, her voice a light, insubstantial sigh. She tried to lift her hand to touch his face, but lacked the strength.

He gripped her fingers, willing his strength into her. Sobs shook his frame, and he bowed his head, unashamed of his tears. He had tried so hard to save her. The alternative was impossible, inconceivable, unbearable.  “Dain,” she said again. “I cannot go on.”

“Don’t say that! Don’t give up. We’re very close to a hold. We can seek help

there. They are kind, these men of Mandria. I met one today who gave me the

food. He will—”

“I am dying,” she interrupted him.

“No!”

“Dying,” she said. “Little brother, don’t weep so.”

But he could no longer listen. Shaking with grief, he bent over her, holding her tightly in his arms, and gritted his teeth to hold in his cries of anguish. She was all he had. She had been sister and mother to him, his dearest companion.  Thia was beautiful, a maiden of slender form and infinite grace. Her blonde hair fell in luxuriant waves to her knees, and in the springtime she liked to wear it unbound with a wreath of flowers upon her brow. Her eyes were pale sky-blue and wise, able to sparkle with teasing merriment or gaze steadily into the depths of someone’s heart. When Dain was little, she would rock him to sleep at night, singing snatches of incomplete songs and fragments of rhymes that she said she remembered from the before times. Sometimes, she would spin tales of a fabulous palace that stretched in all directions, a palace as large as the world itself, and filled inside with all the colors of the rainbow. She would weave tales that fired his imagination. She’d defended him from bullies until he’d become big enough to handle himself. She’d taught him manners and honesty and to be gentle with all defenseless creatures. From her, he’d learned woodcraft, how to walk through the forest without disturbing the wild denizens, how to find the pure streams that coursed hidden in thicket-choked gullies, how to tell direction from bark moss and the stars, how to let the wind sing to him, and how to hear what the ancient trees themselves had to say.

He could not imagine a world without her in it. He could not think of a day when she would not be waiting in Jorb’s burrow to welcome him and their guardian home, her hair smelling of herbs and her eyes as placid as still water. She had but to sing, and her garden seeds would sprout forth, growing vegetables bursting with intense flavor. She had but to smile and the sun brightened in the sky.

That she should now lie here in this burrow far from home, battered and bloody, her slender body racked with pain from the arrow that had brought her down, spoke of great wrong and injustice. It violated all that was true and good in the world. It was a crime that called for punishment and retribution.  “Thia,” he said, moaning her name as he wept over her, “don’t go. We’ll find a way. You can hold on just a little longer until I carry you to Thirst Hold.” “A hold?” she whispered, and this time she found the strength to smooth back his dark hair from his brow. “A man-place? You would trust men, little brother? Has Jorb taught you nothing?”‘ “I would indenture myself for a lifetime if it would gain you the help of a healer,” he replied.

She smiled, but her eyes filled with sadness. “My papa has been a long time coming. I tried to wait. He told me to be good and to wait for him, Dainie, but I’m so tired.”

A sob filled Dain’s throat. He clutched her. “Thia!”

“Find our papa,” she whispered. “Go home and find him.” Dain frowned bitterly. “Why should I? He cast us out and abandoned us. Orphans, he made us. Jorb is the only father I have known, or would call so.” A tear slipped down her cheek. She opened her mouth to speak, but the sound never came.

Just like that, she was gone.

He didn’t believe it at first. He couldn’t.

“Thia?” he said, his voice carrying his shock and disbelief. “No!” He called her name again and shook her hard, but silence was his only answer as she lay dead in his arms. He rocked her, moaning her name, and his tears soaked into her hair.

In Prince Gavril’s modest suite of rooms in the west tower of Thirst Hold, a fire roared on the hearth, casting a bounty of warmth and light against the icy drafts. Outside the shuttered windows, the night wind sighed and moaned, but inside Gavril and his two companions sat around a small table, cups of cider in their hands, and plotted their raid on Lord Odfrey’s cellars.  “We could wait till the household sleeps and sneak in,” Kaltienne suggested. A thin, wiry boy with straight black hair and the eyes of an imp, he grinned impudently and quaffed another cupful of cider. “Wait for lights-out and take ourselves into the cellar while the cook’s off watch. He snores enough to conceal any noise we might make. If we each carry out a pair of kegs apiece, it should take us only about forty nights of work to—” “Hush your chatter,” Mierre said gruffly. “Fool’s talk is not what his highness wants to hear.”

“What other plan have you?” Kaltienne retorted. He laughed. “Oh, I see.  Nocturnal raids would interfere with your own plans, eh, Mierre? You’ve caught the eye of that lusty housemaid Atheine, the one with the mole on her—” “That’s enough,” Mierre growled.

Frowning, Gavril drew back from them and reached inside his fur-lined doublet to touch his Circle. Cardinal Noncire, his tutor back at Savroix, had warned him that his fellow fosters might already be well versed in the coarsest habits of carnality. Mierre, bigger than the rest of them, with his bullish shoulders and muscular neck, seemed afflicted with a steady lust that pursued any young female servant in the hold. Several ambitious wenches had offered their wares to Gavril, but he had been warned about that, too. He wasn’t going to destroy his piety for a few minutes’ release in the grimy arms of some turnip-scrubber.  “Be glad you aren’t a Netheran and forced to stay celibate until you’re knighted,” Kaltienne said with a sly grin. “I saw you with Atheine behind the barn yesterday morning. Those white legs of hers are longer than—” With a quick, apprehensive glance at Gavril, Mierre turned on Kaltienne and whacked him hard across the back. Whooping for breath, Kaltienne doubled over.  His empty cup dropped from his fingers and rolled across the floor.  Gavril ignored him and glared impatiently at Mierre. The burly foster met his prince’s gaze and turned a faint shade of pink.

“I beg your highness’s forgiveness,” he said. He was large, gruff, clumsy, and unpolished, but he was learning courtly ways fast. Gavril valued him for his strength, his growing loyalty, his ambitions, and his natural shrewdness. Mierre frowned at Kaltienne, who was still wheezing. “Kaltienne never knows when to hold his tongue.”

“Pardon is given,” Gavril said, but his tone was purposely curt to let them know he wanted no more nonsense. “If we may return to the matter at hand?” Mierre bent over the crudely drawn diagram of the oldest section of the hold.  His sandy hair was thin and brittle, sticking out from beneath the edges of his dark green cap, which he wore tilted rakishly on one side of his head just like Gavril did. “I can try to steal a key, your highness, but there’s always a guard posted at the—” “That won’t do,” Gavril interrupted. Turning away in frustration, he flung up his hands. “What kind of miser keeps a guard posted on his own cellar? Morde a day, but the chevard is impossible.”

By now Kaltienne had his breath back. He straightened with a wince, keeping a wary distance from Mierre. “Damne, Mierre, that hurt like the devil.” “You’ll get worse if you don’t behave.”

Kaltienne snorted. “Behave? Thod’s teeth, but you’re the one who can’t behave.