06



“Did you hear me? You go back where you came from, or we’ll kill you. And don’t think we won’t.” The gray-haired spokesman beckoned urgently, and two youths with bows came forward. “Well, go on, turn around.”

“Hang on a second,” said Kastor, as gently as he could manage under the circumstances. “This is weird. You’re too far south to have been raided, I’d think, and besides --”

“Go on! Get!” He made more frantic gestures at his boy-bowmen. The boys reluctantly drew, obviously unaccustomed to seeing human beings on the other end of the arrow. Let alone a child -- for they’d each taken the nearer target, and one of those was Charis.

At this, Kastor stopped trying to look friendly. “How about you quit pointing that at my son before something bad happens to you.”

The lad who’d been drawing down on Charis looked startled, and shifted his aim to Kastor. Kastor gave a dry laugh.

“That’s better. Now, we had in mind to pass through without bothering you, or maybe buy some supplies if you looked like you had any to spare. But we can go around, if that makes you feel better. The problem is, I don’t want to turn my back on you, the mood you’re in.”

“We don’t shoot folks in the back,” a man with a hay fork piped up. “Not like you!”

“Excuse me?”

The spokesman shook his cudgel. “It’s no good lying, we know a Kyri arrow when we see one! It’s a lot of nerve you’ve got, acting all innocent after what you did to poor Bel! Now you just turn around and --”

“Whoa, hold up. What?”

For just a moment, the gray-haired man looked unsure, but then he visibly shouldered aside his doubts. “You shot him in the back, you barbarian son of a whore! For a lousy pair of boots!”

Charis gasped. “Da! He said a bad word!”

“I say worse all the time, kid.” As he spoke, he was setting hands to hilts. His swords whispered as he drew them. “But not about my mother.” He drew his anger to a fine point, used it to propel the words of a charm. With a simultaneous sharp twang, both bowstrings broke. One whipped a bowman in the face, cutting his cheek, and both yelped in shock. The arrows clattered on the frozen ground.

Kastor levelled a blade at the spokesman. “You,” he said tightly, “need to calm down. I honestly don’t care what you accuse me of, but there’s something weird going on around here and I’m not going to ride into it blind. I’m going to find out what the hell it is. Or,” he added in a sharper voice as the spokesman opened his mouth with a panicked inhalation, “you can attack me, and I can kill you all. Believe me, I can kill you all. I’d rather not. But you could make me. Is that the plan?”

The man with the cudgel, though he was trembling and purple-faced with the anger of fear, managed a jerky headshake. The crowd behind him was thinning, as some in the back crept away. The boy with the cut face was crying silently.

“Good. Now, for the sake of argument, take my word that I’ve never in my life shot a man in the back. Besides, I’ve come from south of here, so I haven’t even been in the area. That being the case, why don’t you tell me what you were talking about, with a Kyri arrow and so forth?”

It took the spokesman a while to be able to speak; he seemed to be fighting against an urge to order an attack. At last he said, “Go get the arrow.”

The villagers looked at each other. No one moved.

“Calen. Go get the arrow.”

The boy with the bleeding face dashed into a house. No one spoke while he was gone. Kastor and the village spokesman stared at each other, while most of the others studied the ground -- or snuck away. The crowd had thinned considerably by the time the boy came back carrying a single arrow. He handed it to the gray-haired man.

Kastor sheathed his swords and held out his hand. With great reluctance -- and great care not to touch Kastor’s glove -- the man gave up the arrow. It was in bad shape, the fletching mussed, the point rusty. No, bloody. Or -- on closer inspection, both rusty and bloody. There was corrosion under the dried gore. The shape of the point, the style of the fletching, the weight of the shaft, were all distinctive, their meaning unmistakable.

“This is a Kyri arrow, all right. Davath, I’d say, though people trade arrows between clans, so I can’t be sure. Not mine, though. You can see.” He took out one of his, let them see the difference. “But it’s weird; I won’t say there’s not a single Kyri on the Sei who’s lazy enough to let his arrows get all crappy like this, and dog enough to shoot a man in the back, and petty enough to steal boots, and crazy enough to roam this far south -- but it’s real damn unlikely.”

“You’re this far south,” the man accused.

“I’m heading north from Rilleine. I can’t prove that -- but I don’t need to,” he warned. “We’re not accusing me. That’s not what we’re doing here. I assume none of you actually saw this Bel fellow get shot.”

Headshakes all round. Someone said, “We found him on the road, a mile north,” which earned him a glare from the spokesman.

“Is this the first thing like this that’s happened?”

The spokesman said, “There are rumors. Travellers disappear. Next town north lost someone as well. A girl. She was missing for weeks, then they found her dead. The shape she was in -- only a barbarian could’ve done that to her. And in her hand they found some long black hairs.”

“Well. Hm.” That ruled out the possibility that had worried him most -- that Alys had passed through here with a force of raiders, killing the locals on the way. Not that she would have allowed her men to use rusty arrows. But a sloppy bowman might have escaped her notice, while kidnapping and rape certainly wouldn’t. He assumed rape was what the fellow was hinting at. Alys ran a tight camp; she’d never allow that kind of thing.

Long black hairs. Somehow that just seemed so... obvious. And again, while he wouldn’t say there were no Kyri who’d do that sort of thing -- he knew for a fact there were -- it just seemed a bit far-fetched, considering the location.

“Da?” Charis was looking at him expectantly. “Are you going to find out who did this? You’re going to catch them, right?”

“Depends.” A weak answer. “For now, let’s quit making these folks nervous. Sorry about your bowstrings, gentlemen.” He gave them a mocking salute and turned his horse.

“Wait!” The word came out strained, as if the spokesman had to force it. “Wait. I... I believe you.” He took a grudging step to the side. “You can pass through.”

“Does your faith extend to selling us some supplies?”

“If you pay for them.”

“That would be what ‘sell’ means, yes, unless my Nestrian’s a lot worse than I thought.”

“No need to get snippy.” But as he grumbled this, the gray-haired man finally seemed to relax a little. “If you’ve got the coin, I guess we could spare a bit. Just tell us what you need.”



Charis wouldn’t let the subject drop, even when they camped for the night. He kept pestering Kastor while he was supposed to be gathering firewood, and he’d gotten Serifar backing him up.

“We can’t just let someone run around doing that kind of thing, Da,” Charis said yet again. “It’s not like you couldn’t win in a fight. Don’t you feel bad for that man who got shot, and the girl they talked about?”

“It’s awfully sad,” Serifar seconded. “It would be horrible if that happened again.”

Kastor sighed, trying to keep his temper. “For the zillionth time, I don’t know. It depends on a lot of things, not least of which is whether we get any further information. As for winning in a fight, it only takes one lucky shot, and goodnight all. Skill isn’t everything. Now quit bugging me, or instead of grass soup you’re going to get thin broth with egg lumps.”

“Grass soup?” Serifar wrinkled his nose. “That doesn’t sound very nice.”

Charis rolled his eyes. “It doesn’t have grass in it. It has little threads of egg in it, so it sort of looks like grass. It’s good.”

“And it’s not going to happen if you don’t leave me alone for a minute,” Kastor said. “You’re supposed to be getting wood.”

“Fine.” Charis heaved a theatrical sigh. “But if that murderer sneaks up and shoots me, you’ll be sorry.”

“So stay in sight of camp. Are you scared?”

“No!” Making a show of being not scared, Charis went to gather wood.

Taking advantage of the brief quiet, Kastor gave the soup his whole attention. Cooking wasn’t exactly his best skill. He was capable of roasting meat without burning it, or stewing rice or barley until it wasn’t crunchy, but that was his limit. Grass soup, however, was his absolute favorite food, so he’d made a point of learning to cook it. It would’ve been better with chicken than rabbit, though.

He felt Serifar’s eyes on him while he drizzled egg into the boiling broth. The Mara waited until he’d finished before speaking.

“Would you have killed those people? I thought you were just threatening, but then I wasn’t sure. You made the bowstring cut that boy’s face.”

“I warned you I’m not a very nice person. No, I wouldn’t have killed them, or at least not all of them. I would’ve hurt them pretty badly, though, if they’d attacked.” And if they’d shot Charis, he added mentally, I probably wouldn’t have left a stone standing for miles around. He tasted the broth, added more salt. “That can’t have been the first hostility you’ve witnessed. Four years, you said. Watching people.”

“No, not even a year watching people. Before that I don’t remember. I told you. All I know is what I kept when I forgot: my name is Serifar, Stiaan made me, I’m a Mara and immortal. And some bits I missed.” He paused so long that Kastor looked up to see what was wrong. He was staring at Kastor with furrowed brow. “I’ve been meaning to ask you for some time now: is there any chance you and I have met before?”

“I doubt it.”

“Oh. All right. It’s just that you seem... never mind.”

“What, familiar?”

Serifar nodded.

“Well, there’s no way you could have seen me before. Unless, I suppose...” Kastor paused, realizing that he’d seen new Mara other than Nevbelis last spring. Three of them. They’d been silent and blank-faced, and he’d been too occupied to pay them any attention, but he knew that one had had pale skin and dark hair. Whether that dark hair had been Serifar’s particular shade of chestnut, he didn’t know, and their faces had all been so uniformly, blandly perfect that he couldn’t recall them.

He said, “Make your face blank, for a moment. As if you have no thoughts in your head.”

Serifar obediently relaxed his face, but there was still too much personality there at first. After ten seconds or so, though, he began to daydream for real, staring into the fire, and all expression smoothed away.

“Aha! You’re right!”

The Mara looked up with instant eagerness. “I am? We have met?”

“You held the reins of a white horse made from a fox. Later, you tried to hit me with a chair.”

Serifar was taken aback. “I did? Why did I do a thing like that?”

“You were defending Stiaan. I was attacking him at the time.”

“But why?”

“It’s a long story. Anyway, if I remember right, you were about the clumsiest fighter I’ve ever seen, so I’m not surprised the wyr got you. I hardly had to hurt you at all. I sliced up your arms a bit and you dropped the chair and ran.”

“It’s true, then.” Serifar looked a bit distressed. “The first thing after the forgetting, I had scars still on my wrists. They took three days to fade. I must have cleared my mind right after we fought. But I was here, in the green lands, and I know where I was made is always icy. Now I wish I hadn’t forgotten.”

Kastor took the chance to clear up a question that had been lurking in his mind for a while. “I’ve heard Mara have the power of forgetting. Or at least, that’s how it was phrased when I heard of it. What is it? Do you just decide to forget something, and it’s gone?”

“Precisely. It’s done with shtedtzaar, though, so I can’t do it now.”

“Doesn’t seem very useful to me.”

“Have you never wanted to remove something that hurt you to recall?”

“Sure, but that doesn’t mean it’s a good idea.”

“You think it’s a bad thing?”

“It might be.”

“Then... I may have erred.”

After a moment’s thought, Kastor said slowly, “That’s why Mikah seemed so young; how he could have functioned at all, with four thousand years pressing on him. And why Stiaan doesn’t know better. They must have been forgetting constantly.”

“I remember the name Mikah. He has something to do with Stiaan, and has yellow hair. I’m afraid I was sloppy, and lost the rest.”

“Stiaan’s brother. Not in the sense of blood kinship, of course, but the tie was the same. He’s dead.”

“Dead? Mortal?

“Mara. He sacrificed himself; he was unmade.” Kastor stated this flatly, without emotion. That much, he could tell anyone. More than that, Serifar wasn’t going to hear from him.

The following silence stretched until Charis dropped an armload of wood, making both of them jump. Charis said, “Mikah was Da’s boyfriend. Da likes boys, not girls. Weird, huh?”

Serifar tilted his head. “But he was pleasant enough to the women in the village.”

“No, not like that, I mean, like like,” Charis tried to explain. “You know. The kissy kind of like.”

“That’s enough, kid,” Kastor growled.

“I’m just explaining.”

“If I want it explained, I’ll explain it myself.”

“All right.”

“It’s private.”

“Che ghanhar, Da, I said all right.”

“Good.”

“Good.”

Serifar, utterly bewildered, looked between them in incomprehension.

Kastor fed the fire, and Charis pestered the horses. Snow continued to fall as the sky darkened. They ate grass soup, and Serifar agreed that it was far better than the name implied. Kastor had padded it out with a handful of rice and some shredded dried gourd, so there was plenty to go around. After dinner, Kastor took the splint off Serifar’s arm. The bones were still a bit fragile, and he advised the Mara not to lift anything heavy for a while, but he could now scratch his head.

He made a big production out of it. He rolled his head back, fluttered his eyelids, and groaned with pleasure as he scratched. It was a bit unnerving, and Kastor had to contemplate snow until the noises stopped.

“I’ve been dreaming of that for such a long time,” Serifar said. “You don’t realize how itchy your head gets, until you don’t have arms to scratch with. Eh, I think there are things in my hair.”

“I’ll comb it,” Charis volunteered. He got out his comb and set to work. This brought more happy noises from Serifar, and Kastor decided to go walk patrol for a while.

In the gathering dark and thickening snow, it was difficult to see much. He didn’t expect his patrol to serve any real purpose. It was mainly to get away from the camp. The disagreement between his blood and brain on the subject of Serifar was getting really annoying. Whenever he looked at the Mara too long, pictures would flash in his head, scraps of sound, and the sounds in those involuntary thoughts were much like the ones Serifar made when his hair was combed. Except that those imaginings hadn’t held a candle to the real thing. Law’s teeth, did the creature have any idea how sexy he was being? No, of course not. He hadn’t even known what Charis had been getting at with his talk of liking. He was innocent. And Kastor was not a cradle-robber.

He paused on a ridge, leaning against a pine trunk to look down on the golden star that was his campfire. He heard faint voices, giggling, saw the little stick figure of Charis laughing as he scratched stick-figure Serifar’s back. Charis was a good kid. And so was Serifar. Just a kid.

Kastor forced himself to examine the subject honestly. He took out those little scraps of fantasy and made himself look at them. Once the initial flash of heat passed, they curdled his stomach. Serifar didn’t know anything about these kinds of thoughts. He’d learn someday, but Kastor was not the right person to teach him. Nor, now that he thought about it, was the prospect actually attractive, when seen straight on. He didn’t have the heart-room for a lover, and he’d come to dislike the idea of casual liasons. Besides, Serifar wasn’t his type. He liked his men experienced and cynical, a little bit nasty, and strong-hearted enough to stand without him. Serifar would be a clinging vine, he just knew it. He made himself construct a picture of what would happen if he let his lust show and Serifar responded to it: himself embarrassed and henpecked, Serifar needy and adoring, and everyone in the world having to deal with it, because tact was not Serifar’s strong point. Definitely an outcome to be avoided.

Then his subconscious put Serifar in a dress, and he snickered.

Something stopped moving.

He hadn’t heard the sound, but its absence pointed it up. Something had been moving nearby, and had frozen at the noise he’d made. He froze as well. Only his eyes moved, as he sought the source of the suddenly stilled movement. He tried to think exactly what sound he’d made, and exactly what sound he’d heard. To the best of his recollection, his laugh had just been a tiny whuff, the sort of sound a badger or a sleeping deer might make. He hadn’t necessarily given himself away. He thought that the sound which had stopped might have been a human noise. Someone sneaking. Naturally he thought of the murderer who used Kyri arrows. It wouldn’t be at all unreasonable for a Kyri raider to creep up on an unknown camp to find out who was there -- and whether it was possible to steal their horses -- and do it so quietly that he couldn’t be heard until he stopped.

If that were the case, he’d be patient. He’d wait until he knew for certain what made the noise that had stopped him. Southerners were sometimes astonished at how long a Kyri could wait, how still he could be, even in bitter cold or soaking rain.

But Kyri were surprised in turn by how long Kastor could wait, and when he wished to be still one couldn’t be certain he was alive at all. He knew it was perfectly possible that he’d imagined the whole thing, but he wouldn’t let that make him casual. He would outwait whatever was there; all night, if need be.

His patience wasn’t put to the test, though. After a mere ten minutes, the sound began again. It was definitely a human sound. That almost noiseless compression of snow was too regular, and too slow, to be anything but footsteps. It was fairly near, and moving; Kastor judged it would cross between him and the campfire in a moment or two. He let the sneaky fellow creep, and listened for others. It was important to know whether this one was alone.

Within a minute, a figure was silhouetted against the light from the camp. Just for a moment as he stepped from cover to cover, but it was long enough. His profile, with its heavy beard and stubby pigtail, showed that he was not a Kyri. Just an unusually quiet Nestrian. The moment’s clear view had also shown Kastor that the man was armed with a bow, as well as a knife at his belt.

He was near enough the camp now that all his attention would be focused forward. Kastor slipped his knife noiselessly from its sheath and set out after the lurker. He matched his footsteps to the other’s, but his longer strides quickly ate the distance between them. He didn’t spring, though; he waited to see what the fellow would do. If the man put arrow to string, his life was forfeit. He might, however, be innocent, just a trapper curious about a campfire. And if he wasn’t alone, he might betray his comrades by looking for them.

The stranger didn’t signal anyone, though, nor did he attack. He appraised the two fine horses, the child and the one-armed man, the bulging saddlebags, with a grin that increased in avarice by the second. He glanced up at the sky, hunting the moon behind the snowclouds, checking the time. Then, grinning as if he could barely contain himself, he turned away. As he turned, the dim light showed what was in his quiver.

The man startled and spun when he heard one loud footstep behind him, but it didn’t do him any good. Kastor had snatched away the lurker’s knife and put his own under the fellow’s chin before the other could move; after that, the man’s stillness was self-preservation, not shock.

In a quiet voice, so as not to alarm Charis, Kastor said, “Drop your bow. Put your hands on your head. Do exactly what I tell you, and you might live through this.”

The man held his bow out to the side and dropped it. He couldn’t nod or speak without impaling himself on the point of Kastor’s knife, but the fear in his eyes was agreement enough.

“Good,” said Kastor. “In a moment you’re going to walk into that camp and sit down, and we’ll talk for a while. But first you need to understand that if I want you dead, there is absolutely no way you can keep me from killing you. You can’t run from me; I’m faster. You can’t fight me; I’m better. You can’t hide from me; I could spot a white mouse in a blizzard halfway up Mount Edrhuun, let alone some clod-footed Nestrian bandit. The only way you’ll ever see the sunrise again is by making me very, very pleased with you.” He saw fear change to resignation, and judged the man convinced. He took the knife away. “March.”

The man took two steps, and his body tensed as if he were about to run. But he was observant enough to see that, while Kastor’s left hand still held the clumsy skinning knife that was only good at close quarters, his right was toying with two knives designed for throwing. The man behaved himself.

“Now you keep your hands on your head like that,” Kastor instructed him as they neared camp. “Make sure you don’t give me the idea you might be trying something. You really don’t want to set off my protective urges.”

“Da? Who are you talking to?” Charis was peering into the woods, which must have seemed impenetrably dark from where he stood.

“We have a visitor,” Kastor said. “I caught him sniffing around. Keep your distance, son. You don’t want to end up in the middle if I have to hurt him.”

Wide-eyed, Charis backed away as the bandit entered the circle of firelight, Kastor three paces behind him. The boy snatched his scabbarded sword from his baggage, then scrambled to Serifar’s side and stood over him.

“Don’t worry, Serifar. If there’s more of ‘em, I’ll protect you.”

“Thank you.” The Mara took him seriously. “Someday I’ll return the favor, when I have two arms again.”

“Have a seat right over there, stranger.” Kastor pointed to a spot of clear ground, just snow on thin grass. He put away his little knives, but kept the big one out, played with it as he stood over his captive, still three paces away.

“I didn’t mean no harm,” the man said. He was an ugly son of a bitch. Some of it was a misfortune of birth, which had provided him with a heavy forehead and thick lips, but most of the ugliness was the result of hard living. His nose and ears had clearly seen a number of fights, and possibly some frostbite. His hair and beard were matted. His clothes were patched, but he had a good pair of boots on, and his bow had looked decent enough. He wasn’t too thin, either.

Seeing that Kastor was just staring at him, the man began to squirm a little. “I wasn’t gonna do no harm,” he repeated. “Saw the fire and got curious, that’s all.”

“Of course,” said Kastor coolly. “You wouldn’t have harmed a single hair on these people’s heads -- not before you could come back with the rest of your gang. I saw you checking the time. How far are they from here? Two hours? Three?”

The captive’s eyes widened. “There’s nobody else. I swear.”

“Charis, Serifar,” Kastor called without looking around. “Close your eyes.”

“But -- what --?”

“Do it.”

A quavering voice. “Yes, Da.”

Kastor flipped the skinning knife over so he could use the serrated saw-blade on the back edge, the one that was good for snapping tendons and breaking stubborn joints. He considered whether to take a finger or an ear.

He’d only taken one step forward when the man broke. “Wait, wait, I’m sorry! I’ll tell the truth, don’t go chopping bits off me. You don’t wanna do this in front of the kid, right?”

Kastor chuckled, and it wasn’t a nice sound. He went to one knee, putting the knife before his captive’s eyes. “Nothing compared to what your friends would’ve done to him, when they arrived. You can’t use my decency against me; I’m not some stuffy Pantheonist with my head full of Good and Evil. Why, what’s the matter, have you never seen a real Kyri before? Then where did you get the arrows? Who’d you kill?”

“We just found --” He broke off as he realized what he’d given away. He groaned.

“Now, who would leave arrows just lying around? I see you only brought one; who were you going to leave it in, man, the child or the cripple?”

The man glanced over his shoulder at his quiver, where one jay-fletched Kyri arrow stuck out among the goose feathers of the Nestrian style. He shook his head. “I wouldn’t hurt a little kid. I swear.”

“I see. An outlaw with a heart of gold. And let me guess, you steal from the rich and give to the poor.” Kastor’s empty hand lashed out, and the bandit’s head rocked. “Don’t fuck with me, thief. Tell me where you got the arrow, or I’ll use it to slice off your balls -- is it as rusty as the other one?”

The man whimpered. “Don’t kill me.”

“You idiot. I’m going to torture you, not kill you. Starting now, since you’re dimwitted.” Kastor took hold of the man’s earlobe and raised the knife.

“There was a girl!” the bandit blurted, and Kastor paused. The captive went on in a sobbing voice, watching the knife the whole time. “There was a girl. A Kyri girl. Maybe fifteen, sixteen. She was all by her lonesome, and she wandered into our territory, and, well, you can guess.” His eyes winced shut. “I swear I didn’t touch her, I’m nobody, they wouldn’t let me have none, I’m not the one you want to punish.”

Kastor snorted. “Punish? She knew better. If she came this far by herself, and couldn’t take on a few bandits, she was asking for trouble. If you remember what you did with the body when you were done raping her, I might tell her kin how to collect it. Whose idea was it to use her gear to shift the blame for your robberies?”

“Hayfer’s.”

“He’s your boss?”

“No. Green’s the boss. Hayfer’s his idea man, kind of thing. Hayfer thought it up, on account of we been in the place long enough the Legion might sniff us out, but there’s good pickings here if we can stay.”

“And where are they now?”

“About two hours off, a bit more.” He pointed. “I could take you there.” His ill-concealed eagerness told Kastor what he was thinking: that he could lead this threat right into the thick of his comrades, who would make short work of a man alone, however skilled. And then they’d have a whole fresh quiver of new Kyri arrows, and a Kyri bow to shoot them with, as well as the chance to rob the camp.

“How many?” Kastor said.

“There’s five of us.”

Kastor renewed his grip on the earlobe.

“A score!” the bandit squawked. “Give or take.”

“Which is it? Give, or take?”

“Uh... give. There’s twenty-two. Counting me.”

“Hm.” Kastor released the man’s ear and stood up, smiling. “Congratulations. You get to walk away from here.”

“I...?” The bandit wasted only a moment on wondering why. He sprang to his feet.

Kastor stopped him with a word before he could head uphill. “Wait. I don’t want you going back to your buddies just yet. So I think we’ll stroll down the road a bit, out to that straight stretch, and I’ll watch you out of sight. That way I know you won’t tell anyone about us until we’ve vanished.”

The man nodded frantically, just glad that he was going to live. Kastor felt sick to his stomach at what he was about to do, but he reminded himself of what the bandits would have done to Charis if they’d come to rob the camp. And despite what he’d said -- and believed, that the original owner of those arrows had been asking for trouble -- he was simmering with anger at what they’d done to her.

Kastor took up his satchel and gestured for the man to precede him. “I’ll be back shortly, Charis,” he said, as lightly as he could manage. “Keep your eyes open and don’t leave camp.”

“Yes, Da.”

They’d camped a few hundred yards from the road, in a hollow that shielded the light of their fire. Shortly they emerged onto the road. Kastor kept well behind. They walked south, toward the straight piece of road Kastor remembered. When they reached it, the bandit took one glance over his shoulder at Kastor, then set out with long strides.

Kastor was still for a moment, letting a wave of pity pass, waiting for his heart to grow as cold as the wind against his skin. He took his bow from his shoulder and strung it with one practiced motion. He set an arrow to the string.

He called out: “Hey, you forgot something!”

The bandit turned, and Kastor shot him.

“What?” The man looked down at the arrow that bobbed between his ribs. He opened his mouth for more, but that was all the time he got; he crumpled to the snowy road. The arrow had gone straight through his heart. He probably hadn’t had time to feel the pain.

Not, Kastor reminded himself, that an easy death absolved the killer. If you’re willing to kill at all, it’s stupid to pretend that the method matters. That had been Alys speaking, teaching him that sword forms vanished in real combat. Kastor examined his conscience, found it a bit sore but not cripplingly so, and went to collect his victim. The rest of his plan took only a few minutes. Then he stood back to appraise his handiwork.

The dead bandit hung by his own belt from a tree beside the road, visible for a long way in both directions. Kastor’s arrow still stood from his chest. The arrow he’d carried to place blame on Kyri raiders was thrust through his shirt front like a giant rusty cloak pin. It secured a sheet torn from Kastor’s journey-book, with a note written in grease-pencil:

You can steal a stinger, but that doesn’t make you a wasp.

It was a shame to have to leave his arrow, but it was a necessary part of the message. Its razor point and silk-smooth fletching would show up the weakness of the bandits’ ruse better than anything else. He turned back toward camp, where Charis waited to hear that everything was all right, and was suddenly tired to the bone. Nevertheless he took the time to do a wide sweep around the campsite, checking for more scouts, before going in.

Charis started up at Kastor’s return. He had his sword out, and Serifar had Charis’s eating knife in his single hand.

“It’s me,” Kastor said. “Sorry I took so long.”

The boy relaxed. His relief was painful to see. He’d never been truly afraid before, it seemed. Now he was finding he didn’t like danger very much after all. And the way he looked at Kastor wasn’t comfortable either; his eyes flicked to the skinning knife, and he looked a little sick.

Kastor sat on his heels a little way from the fire, arms hanging over his knees, staring out into the dark. He had some things to work through. He could feel Charis and Serifar staring, but he couldn’t afford to be distracted.

“Da?”

“I’m thinking. Give me a minute.”

“But -- shouldn’t we be leaving? That man will tell --”

“He won’t tell anything.” Kastor looked at his son, and with an effort of will was able to meet the boy’s eyes. “I killed him.”

Charis looked as if he didn’t understand. “But you said you were letting him go.”

“Yes. I lied. Then I killed him in cold blood. I hung his body by the road as a message. I did this even though I’m not sure there wasn’t another way, and it’s not the first time. I’m sorry you have to hear that tonight, what with everything else.”

For a long moment, they looked at each other. Then the look of childish bewilderment and fear faded from Charis’s face. His chin lifted, and he gave a short nod. “I won’t interrupt with questions. I’ll take care of Serifar, too. Just tell me if you want the horses saddled.”

The smile Kastor gave him was a bit off center, but there was gratitude in it. “Yes. We won’t be staying here, whatever else I decide.”

As he turned back to his contemplation of the dark sky, he heard Serifar whispering questions, and Charis soothing him. The sounds of breaking camp began. He left it to Charis and focused on his thoughts.

After what seemed only a moment, Charis spoke softly beside him, and he looked around to see that the camp was completely packed up, the horses ready to go. Serifar was standing; favoring one leg, but upright. Kastor was surprised to see how short he was. He’d thought all Mara were tall, but Serifar was a full head shorter than his maker. Theoretical question there, for when there was time for that kind of thing.

“Ready when you are, Da.”

Kastor stood up. He rested a hand on his son’s shoulder. “However I think about it, I can only come to one conclusion. I have to hunt down those bandits.”

Charis’s brows drew in. “Da, the man said there were twenty-two of them.”

“Well, I won’t take them all at once.”

“You... you have to kill them all, don’t you?”

“I think I do.”

The boy nodded. “Tonight’s the only time you know where they are.”

“Exactly. If I don’t deal with them now, they’ll be on our trail, and they know the terrain better than we do. We can’t shelter in villages; the townsfolk will be afraid of me. And if I don’t expose the lie, if I let them go on using those arrows, making people think the woods are full of Kyri ready to attack them... worst case, it could start a war. I won’t lie to you, Charis, I’m risking my neck, I could get killed. If I do, I want you to tell your mother all about this. Maybe she’ll be able to finish the job. And of course everything of mine is yours, if I don’t make it.”

“It’s bad luck to talk like that.”

“Just covering all the corners. I don’t really think this will kill me. I plan on being very, very careful. Serifar, does your worse leg work well enough to stay mounted?”

“I don’t know. I’ll need help getting on.”

Kastor put him on Aunethan. He now weighed as much as a man his size should; that still wasn’t enough to make him difficult to lift. He took the reins in his single hand, straightened his back, and nodded.

“I’ll be all right. Until I have to get down. Then I’ll fall over.”

After helping Charis onto the mare, Kastor stood back, arms crossed, making sure nothing in his bearing invited sentiment. This had to seem routine, or he couldn’t be sure Charis would have the will to go through with it.

He said, “What you have to do is ride north until you find people, and do whatever it takes to make them take you in. Promise them money, offer to work, just don’t let them put you out. If they’re really obdurate, you can work the cripple angle. Go ahead and tell them everything -- except that Serifar’s a Mara, you might want to leave that out. When I’ve finished, I’ll find you. It might take a few days. If I don’t show up within a week, send a messenger to your mother, have someone come get you. We’re more than halfway now, it should be possible. Have you got all that?”

“Yes. And Da...” He thought Charis was going to wish him luck, but instead the boy said, “This is like in the story, isn’t it? These bandits putting blame on the Kyri. Like Chehe Mahar and --”

“That hadn’t escaped me,” Kastor said dryly. “Go on, now. Don’t push the horses too hard, but keep moving.”

Charis nodded, raised a hand in farewell, and turned out. Aunethan, after a curious look at Kastor, followed the mare, with Serifar swaying useless atop him like a sack of flour.

Long after the sound of hooves had faded, Kastor still stood there, unmoving. He couldn’t go like this, couldn’t try something like this with his head full of fatherly concern and scruples. For the past handful of years, he’d done his best to master the viciousness he knew lived inside him. Not to smother it or deny it -- that would only make it erupt unpredictably. Just to turn it to a tool. From a brushfire to a forge. He had no illusions about the likelihood of winning the fight he was about to start; he’d need every strength he could muster. He had a chance, but only if he went in the right frame of mind.

So he stood, and he listened. Listened to the quiet of the night, let it wash over his skin. Listened to the sound of the wind, to the hush of falling snow, the rustle as snow fell from branches and dry leaves moved against each other. Listened with his skin to the movement of air, the prickle of melting snowflakes. Listened with his mind, with his soul, spreading out thin like water soaking into stone, until his body was only a marker for the center of his attention. Until the night wood ceased to be a threatening otherland and became his own flesh.

Then he turned his attention on himself, remembering his weight, his reach, his stride, the borders of flesh and bone.

It took too long. It had been too long since he’d done this. At last, though, there were no more questions, no more hopes or worries, no names and no faces, neither memory nor anticipation. Only the world before him. Whether he succeeded or died didn’t matter, because mattering wouldn’t change it. At the same time, his will to live grew strong, and he knew he would be hard to kill. He was ready.

The beast that had been Kastor loped into the forest, empty of all but the hunt.



* * *



“Charis, I’m scared.”

“It’s all right.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. We’ll be fine, Serifar. Don’t be scared.”

But I am, he thought. You can’t just tell me not to be. He didn’t say it, though. Charis had enough to worry about without Serifar fussing at him.

The child looked very brave, riding with his head high, though he must be tired. He had so much to lose tonight. He could lose his father. A father was more than just a maker, more than just a protector. That was a bond Serifar couldn’t understand, but which he had observed many times. Immature humans required a mother or father in order to thrive. Humans of all ages required family ties, webs of friendship, complex layerings of status and responsibility and mutual assistance.

Did Mara require these things? Serifar thought they might.

The relationship between Kastor and Charis was an uncommonly simple one, as human interactions went. Charis observed his father in order to become him, and wished to prove himself worthy of respect. Kastor would do anything for the sake of his child’s well-being, and wished to prove himself worthy of this responsibility. Serifar thought they had both succeeded admirably, at least so far as he’d seen.

This understanding did not, however, shed any light on Serifar’s own position. They had tended his wounds out of pity, and a sense of moral obligation. He had seen charity cases before, orphans and idiots; generally they were not treated very well. Some kind of debt was always implied. These two had not implied any debt, however, and treated him with such uncommon kindness that it made his heart ache every time they spoke. It was changing him. It was putting him in a place where he didn’t know the rules. It was filling a place he hadn’t known was empty, and filling it to overflowing.

Yet it could all end at any moment. Humans were so terribly fragile. Kastor was half Mara, and Charis a fourth, so perhaps they were more durable than pure humans, but they were still mortal, could still die.

What would happen to this fullness, if the people who put it there were taken from him? He didn’t want to find out.

Having seen that, he followed the thought to its natural conclusion: that he wished to stay with these people as long as they lived. But that would not be possible, since Kastor and Charis would part ways when they reached the Sei. Charis had told him this, told how his mother wasn’t anywhere near as interesting as his father, but was very powerful, and so he had to go back to her. When that happened, Serifar would have to choose which one to follow.

Just imagining that parting made his chest hurt.

“It’s all right,” Charis said again, looking back at him. The boy offered a thin smile. “Don’t look so worried. Da’s a great fighter. Even the people who hate him say so. He’ll make short work of those bandits and then come get us. You’ll see.”

“What about us? What if the people we meet are cruel? What if they throw stones to chase us away?”

Charis drew himself up, firming his expression. “Da told us to make them take us in no matter what. We’ll find a way. Che ghanhar, you worry a lot!”

“Che is tooth. Ghanhar...”

“Law’s teeth. It’s a swear word. Not a very bad one, though. Nobody ever let me swear, at home. I have to get my swearing in while I can.” He tried on a grin, but it faded too quickly. “How far do you think we’ve come?”

“Four miles.”

“Is that all?” Charis sighed, and gave up talking.

As they rode on through the night, Serifar thought about his desire to be with these people, and the difficulty of choosing between them. On the one hand, Charis told stories, and explained things, and was new like Serifar was. On the other hand, Kastor would protect him, and knew many useful things, and was...

Was what? What was the word for the special and alarming and pleasing thing about Kastor? Beautiful? That didn’t seem to go far enough. Though he was good to look at -- excellent to look at. Watching him move was endlessly fascinating. Listening to him talk was even better. His deep voice made something inside Serifar sound an answering note. Could that be the particular kind of liking that Charis had been referring to? The ‘kissy’ liking? Serifar knew what kissing was; it was something mothers did to their children, what mated pairs did upon greeting and parting, a gesture of affection. He thought it would be pleasant to exchange such a gesture with either of his friends. All the same, he didn’t think that was what Charis had meant.

He wanted to ask now, but didn’t think it was a good time. In any case, his gladness in both of them, and his soul’s need that was unrelated to the weakness of his body, might well be what people called love. That didn’t tell him what he ought to do about it, though.

And so the night passed, and day came. They were riding through untouched wilderness, birch forest so old that there was almost no undergrowth. Sometimes the forest was pine instead, and that was even more bare, the ground -- and the road -- layered deep with rot-softened needles. The crust of snow atop these needles crackled and creaked under the horses’ hooves when they rode over it. Snow was still falling, but thinly. The sun was a pink spot behind the clouds.

Cold and sleeplessness were wearing on Charis. His cheeks and nose were red, but his eyes were ringed with gray, and he warmed his gloved hands under his arm; first one and then the other. Serifar felt the cold, but was not harmed by it. He wished there was some way he could take on himself the cold that was seeping into Charis’s bones.

When Charis spoke, the breaking of silence was startling. “We should eat.”

“Yes,” said Serifar after a moment. “But Kastor said not to stop.”

“I think he meant not to camp and sleep. But --” Charis looked Serifar over, and with a disappointed expression shook his head. “If you dismount, there’s no way I can get you back into the saddle again. So I guess we’ll just eat on the go. Duaradda, sweet horse, now don’t do anything sudden...” He twisted carefully around, hunting in the saddlebags with his good hand, trying to keep the reins steady with the other. He came up with a handful of hard biscuits, tucked these inside his shirt, and dug further until he found the narrow wedge of cheese that was all that remained of the round they’d had a few days ago. Soothing his horse, he got her to sidestep near Aunethan.

The stallion gave a warning snort and moved away. Whenever Charis tried to get near enough to hand Serifar some food, Aunethan refused to allow it.

Scowling, Charis gave vent to his frustration. “Siacha! What is wrong with you, horse? I’m just trying to give something to your rider!”

“Didn’t Kastor say he was cavalry trained? I saw a troop of cavalry once. They all kept the exact same distance between their horses. There must be a specific command to get the horse to go closer than that.”

“That doesn’t help me feed you.”

“I have an idea. You eat what you want, and then toss the rest to me, one piece at a time.”

“If I miss, the food’s wasted.”

“I’m sure to catch something.”

Charis shrugged. “I guess it’s better than nothing.”

And so, after eating precisely half the food, Charis held up one of the biscuits, and Serifar took his hand from the reins.

“Ready? This is a ranging shot. The cheese comes last.”

“Fire away.”

Fatigue must have been weighing on Charis more than he thought. His throw was completely wild, high behind Serifar’s back.

So Serifar was surprised to find that he’d caught it.

“Whoa!” Charis gaped. “That was -- that was -- you’re faster than Da!”

“I am?” Serifar regarded the biscuit in his hand, trying to reconstruct the sequence of movements that had allowed him to catch it. He’d just reached back. He hadn’t seen it hit his hand. But he’d seen it leave Charis’s. “I think I predicted its trajectory.”

“It was still fast. Especially for a guy all busted up like you.”

“I’m not much injured anymore. One more rest and a good meal -- speaking of which --” He saluted with his biscuit and wolfed it down, then held up his hand for more.

After eating, he felt much stronger. This always happened, but it had become more noticeable since he’d been injured. He’d been watching the progress of his healing with great interest. It followed a pattern: after he ate, a sense of warmth and solidity would spread through him, and all his wounds would begin to itch and ache as they surged with healing. This would gradually taper off, though recovery would continue more slowly. The falloff could be reduced if he slept, presumably reserving all his energy for healing. He’d noticed that he was becoming heavier, as well. Perhaps he was storing food as mass, allowing his body to go on healing after the first surge. He wondered whether there was an upper limit, or whether he could go on accumulating mass until his feet sunk into the ground when he walked. The thought made him giggle.

“Well, you sound more cheerful,” said Charis. The way he said it, he didn’t share the feeling.

“I had a funny thought. I don’t seem to worry as much, in the daytime. And I’m feeling a lot better. I think I’m quite healed, except for scars, and my arm of course.” He rolled that shoulder, feeling new skin slide half-unpleasantly over bone. “Which I think is going to grow back. I can feel it still working.”

“Working? What’s that mean?”

“I suppose I mean my body working on healing. Can’t you feel yourself healing, when you get hurt?”

“No. It’s too slow. I’m mortal, remember?” He checked himself. “I mean, three quarters, anyway. I didn’t know until Da told me. I knew he was half something weird, but all I heard was Mother said it was a demon, and Grandma just said she’s not allowed to talk about it. I’m glad it’s Mara. I like you guys. I know Da says there’s bad ones, but I never met any.”

Serifar grew solemn. “I assure you, there are bad ones. I remember Nevbelis, before he left. He tormented me. I was so frightened of him that I hid behind Stiaan whenever I could, until Stiaan got irritated and sent Nevbelis away. And I remember Jeresh. He was... was...” He frowned, probing at the blank. “He was bad in a way that I seem to have removed from my mind.”

“Must’ve been pretty bad, then.”

“I expect so. But I’m not bad, I don’t think. I’m not, right?”

“Of course you’re not bad, Serifar. Don’t be silly. Me and Da wouldn’t like you so much, if you were.”

“You like me? Really?”

“Sure.”

“And Da -- I mean Kastor -- does too?”

“Sure.” Charis sounded less certain this time.

“Do you think he would really have cut that man’s ear off?”

Charis looked startled. Perhaps the two questions were not as related to him as they were to Serifar. He considered for a long time. At last, with a pained look, he nodded. “I was going to say no, of course not. But I think he would. If it was the only way to find out where the bandits were camped, and how many of them. It’s why he killed the man, too, when he could have let him go. He was doing it to protect us. And the other people around here. You saw those people, with pitchforks and things --” He pantomimed cringing terror. “He pretended like he didn’t care, but I know he felt bad for them.”

“How do you know?”

“I just do. Besides, he’s the Hunter’s -- I forgot the word.”

“Avatar.”

“You remember that? You were doped to the eyeballs!”

“I don’t usually forget things unless I want to.”

Charis gave him an envious look. “I’d ace all my lessons, if I could do that.”

“I thought he wasn’t sure if he was still entitled to that position.”

“Sure, but look at it. Right after I tell the White Cow story, we hear about those bandits doing the same kind of thing. Well, they must’ve been doing it for a while, right? So who do you figure told me to tell that story?”

“I did,” said Serifar, puzzled. “I said tell me a story.”

“Right, but I was planning to tell about Lariannad. Silverclaw. Hero with one arm. I didn’t think I even remembered the whole White Cow story. Da likes Chehe Mahar, but I think Chehe’s a prat. He’s always trying to mess with the gods, and they kick his ass every time, so why does he keep trying?”

Serifar knew this was a rhetorical question, but an answer came to him anyway. “Because he likes the attention.”

“Eh?”

“If he didn’t, he’d just be some dog. But because he made so much trouble, people are still talking about him.”

Charis sighed scornfully. “He’s not real, Serifar. I explained that. Stories are just for fun.”

“I know.” He didn’t think that invalidated his point, but he didn’t feel like arguing. Besides, there was a more important subject: “Is that smoke over there? Smoke from a chimney?”

Charis blinked his weary eyes, leaning forward as if that would help him see better. “I think so. But it’s off the road a ways. What if Da doesn’t find us there?”

“It’s the first house.”

“But if the fire’s out when he goes past, or if it’s snowing hard...” Then the road came from the wood to run between bare fields, and they saw something that answered the question. Beside the fork, there stood a pole with an old copper kettle nailed to the top. Hanging below it on a length of old gray rope was a wooden mallet. The meaning was unmistakable: announce yourself, and welcome.

Charis leaned from the saddle and rang the gong.