Two days after he left home with little more than his weapons, his clothes, and his grandfather on his back, Sullen was attacked. It would have been one thing if those doing the attacking had been from a rival tribe, maybe those deranged, pink-skinned Troll Lions from the Grey Savannah, or their old enemies the Jackal People, but the sad truth was that Sullen was ambushed by members of his own clan. Shameful.

The attack came at Flywalk, the rope bridge that spanned the Agharthan Gorge. His people had hidden on the far side of the jagged trench that separated the Horned Wolf Clan's territory from that of the Falcon People, and as soon as Sullen stepped off the bridge they came at him. Due to the time-honored popularity of ambushes at this spot, the thick, mossy pines had been cleared for a good hundred yards on both sides of the crossing, and so Sullen had just enough time to process what was happening as five named Wolves and two pups rushed across the stumpfield at him.

"It's me!" Sullen announced, holding up his spear and sun-knife in a friendly gesture, hoping against hope that this was a misunderstanding. It wasn't, as evidenced by the sun-knife Oryxdoom hurled at him as the lead hunter closed the last dozen yards. Sullen sidestepped the multiflanged missile, and without putting any thought into it, really, whipped his spear around to meet Oryxdoom's charge. It sounded rather a lot like spitting a practice gourd when the weapon connected with Oryxdoom's armpit, the man's ax flying from his upraised arm as he was skewered. The other six Horned Wolves drew up short, forming a half-ring around Sullen and the ravine behind him, the hunting party in low stances, spears, axes, and throwing knives ready.

From his sling on Sullen's back, Grandfather shouted, "You've wanted the boy gone all these years, now you put up a fight when he tries to leave?"

Sullen knew Grandfather was only tying to help but blushed nevertheless. He could fight his own battles.

"I'm sorry," he said, well practiced in offering undeserved apologies to keep the peace. "I'm not leaving the clan. I just have to take Grandfather on a quest, then I'll be back. And I didn't want to hurt him. I didn't want to hurt you, Oryxdoom."

From where he lay on the black earth at Sullen's feet, Oryxdoom did not say whether or not he accepted the apology. This was probably because Oryxdoom was deader than donkey shit, the brother of One-arm Yaw sprawled on his side in the loam, blood pooling toward Sullen's flaking leather boots. Sullen tugged his spear free and took a slight step back from the mess he'd made, and would have taken another if he hadn't remembered the dropoff behind him. The bridge was just there to his left, if he broke past Swiftspear, but the two pups had taken up positions behind their older sister, and Sullen really, really didn't want to chop down the unnamed kids. And even if he somehow made it back across, what then? He'd be right back in the one place he knew his uncle wasn't-his homeland, where nobody wanted him. When none of his clanfolk broke the silence nor rushed him, he tried again to explain: "I'm not turning tail like Uncle Craven did. I'll come back," he said, but now that he thought about it, that was exactly what his uncle had done the first time around that made the council so mad: left the clan without permission, and then came back without invitation. Looking at the mean faces of his people, he supposed they'd be fine with his following Uncle Craven's footsteps as far as leaving the Noreast Arm went; they just wanted to make sure he didn't return.

What were they waiting for, then? Wise-eye would be the alpha, with Oryxdoom dead, but she just shifted her weight from boot to boot, her spear from hand to hand. Sullen told himself they hesitated because they didn't really want to fight him. That Oryxdoom had put them up to this. That each wasn't simply reluctant to be the first one to charge, or to lose their sun-knife by throwing it at him while he stood on the edge of the gorge. He could still talk them out of this, give a speech like the one from the ballads that Old Black had given the night-rovers, when she'd convinced those monsters not to eat her during the Worst Winter...

He could do this. Clearing his throat, Sullen said, "You thought I was just running away, shaming the clan, but it's not like that! I swear on my name it's not! I'm going to find out why Uncle Craven disgraced us the way he did! I'll get a worthy answer from his lips, or bring him back to face the judgment of the council! I vow it on the names of all my ancestors!"

Wise-eye relaxed her shoulders a bit, and from the corner of his eye he saw Swiftspear look to her for guidance. Witmouth was nodding thoughtfully, no doubt recognizing the cadence of Sullen's oath from the tales he himself had sung to the boy, back before Sullen had alienated himself from his people. They were hearing him out!

"I swear on my parents I never meant to break the codes the way I did," he went on, "and I don't want to hurt nobody else. So why don't we just-"

"Kill them all!" Grandfather yowled, and Sullen stumbled to the side as the old man strapped to his back hurled one of his sun-knives at Wise-eye. She tried to dodge it, but Grandfather knew a thing or two about his business and two of the weapon's curved points caught her square in the gut. She collapsed to the ground, the other woman and two men charged, the pups hurled knives in his direction, and Sullen obeyed the wordless impulse in his panicked skull-he charged straight ahead, slashing Witmouth out of the way with his spear and fleeing toward the tree line.

Someone cut his side with something.

Grandfather was boxing his ears, commanding him to turn and fight.

A sun-knife skimmed the side of his scalp, ripping through his hair and stinging like an icebee.

Sullen ignored everything but the rough, root-slippery ground beneath his feet as he crossed the stumpfield and gained the cover of the forest, sun-knives shying off the trees around him, another thunking into the earth just between his pumping legs. Whipping through the pine boughs, he immediately crossed the trail through the Raptor Wood, ignored it, plunged back into thick timber, underbrush clawing his calves and thighs, branches scratching his face.

His clanfolk howled behind him, close, and then the downward slant of the ground sharpened considerably. Sullen cut sideways along the incline to keep his balance, but even still he began to slide down the hill, only keeping himself upright by grabbing at branches with his free hand. The descent steepened, and he half fell down the wooded mountainside, his stride lengthening with each breath as though he wore the enchanted snowshoes from the Ballad of Cleverhands. A fallen tree reared out of the blurry forest, but he bounded over it, landing thirty feet down the slope with such force he felt it rattle his bones all the way to the marrow. He kept going until he hit a hollow in the hills and cut to his right, running up the narrow valley for all he was worth.

More howling came from back the way he'd come, farther off now, but he knew that only the ones in the rear would be announcing themselves until the lead Wolves caught him. This was not at all how he had pictured his morning. Grandfather hissed at him as a tree limb snapped at his neck, and the lad grunted an apology, barely able to hear himself over the sound of his own panting. He almost stepped on a startled armadillo, tore through sticky spiderwebs, abruptly changed direction, and plowed up the far hillside. The Raptor Wood was new terrain to Sullen, denser of tree than the lightly wooded steppes on the other side of the Agharthan Gorge, and beset with toe-breaking stones far fiercer than those of the Savannahs where his village lay. But then the song-singers said that all woods are home to a Horned Wolf.

"Enough," Grandfather said after they had scaled and descended half a dozen more hillocks with no sign of immediate pursuit. "Rest a moment, damn your face, rest and let me think."

"All right," said Sullen, promptly dropping into a crouch just over the crown of the newest rise and gulping the air. With a surge of nausea he realized the cramp in his side that he had been ignoring was actually a gouge that went clean through his hempen shirt and into the meat of his ribs. Half of the garment was dripping red. Prodding the wound, he wondered how he came by it. Swiftspear proving her name, probably, back when he first fled.

"You'll need to bind it before we go on," said Grandfather, leaning over Sullen's shoulder for a look at the mess. "Quick as you can, boy, they'll be on you like termites on a juicy log, and this is no place for a showdown. Never would have happened if you'd just stood your ground."

"Why would they..." Sullen tried to get his thoughts in order as Grandfather dug through the pack that strapped him to his grandson. "Why wouldn't they... Why did you... Why?"

"Why?" Grandfather whined, his imitation of Sullen cutting deeper than the wound in his side. "Whhhhhhy? Because they're not Wolves, they're dogs, that's why, dogs of their foreign masters."

That hardly seemed to explain anything. "Oryxdoom always had it in for me, but Wise-eye seemed kind enough, and Witmouth taught me every song I know. Why'd they all come so fast after us? Do they think we're cowards? Disgracing the clan?"

"Thank your uncle for that when we find him. When he came back they invented some special excuses for him, on account of all the treasure he gave the elders, but that only brought more embarrassment on the council when he quit the second time. You don't let a rabid dog flee, not when you have a chance to put it down, and since we all share the same blood, well, they assumed the worst. Fool a wolf once and all that shit." Grandfather unspooled a blanket from the pack, bit into the cloth, and tore. Passing the sizable strip to Sullen, he stowed the rest. "Oh, quit your pouting, I never said you were mad-they're the crazy ones, not us. They've suckled at the Crimson teat all right, and liked the milk. A pup like you should be appalled at the depths of depravity a soul will sink to, once it's been exposed to paganism, but I'm sorry to say it don't surprise me none. The only thing that caught me off guard was their waiting until we were across the bridge before springing the trap."

"I'm ready," said Sullen, tightening the bandage and tucking it in on itself. He'd packed some moss into it but already the blanket was darkening over the wound. "Hold on, I'm going to pick up the pace."

"Oh no you're not," said Grandfather, tugging on Sullen's puffy saddlehorn of hair. "Enough of this acting the oryx, laddie, it's time to be the Horned Wolf I know you are. They'll follow your trail easy, fast as you've been moving, so slow it down till we find a prime place to pounce."

"Pounce?" Sullen looked around nervously, but nothing moved on the hillside. Grandfather was making him twitchy with this talk. "Nah, Fa, I can outrun them, and they'll have to turn around at some-"

Grandfather flicked Sullen's ear, his old-man breath overpowering the smell of blood and sap and torn moss. "I told you, boy, it's not right to let a mad dog loose, not when you have the means to stop it, keep it from spreading its poison."

"Mad dog," repeated Sullen. How many times had they called him that? Still, the prospect of killing his clanfolk filled him with gloom. In all the songs he'd heard and hummed, not one had a hero doing for his own people like this. Maybe so long as he hated that he had to he could still be a decent Horned Wolf...

"You'll find me a good roost to wait in, then we'll set a trap of our own. You think a king wolf like you can handle a few rabid jackals, laddie?"

Sullen thought about all the times he had barely held in his tears when his people tormented him. Thought about all the songs he'd made up for himself, ballads where he taught them a bloody lesson. Thought about what it would mean, to lay a trap for the Horned Wolf hunting party instead of only fighting back when they cornered him. He set his jaw, and braced himself for the hardest act he had ever contemplated, something he never thought he would actually do. It would hurt, but he didn't see any alternative.

"I... I'm sorry, Fa, but there's no way I can take 'em. I want to, right, but a branch hit my head back there a-ways, and I'm having a real hard time even running straight. Forget about fighting; if I tried to I'd just fall over and get us both killed." Sullen couldn't believe he had actually lied to his grandfather, couldn't believe he was actually swaying in place a little to sell the song, acting all woozy. Couldn't believe he actually thought Grandfather would believe his stupid ruse, that he actually thought he had a choice in the matter. Grandfather was being dead silent, the way he got when he was real, real angry, but then the old man's hand gave Sullen's bushy dome of hair a gentle rap.

"All right, Sullen," said the old man softly. "If you say you can't, I believe you."

That hurt the worst, so bad Sullen almost fessed to the fib then and there, but then he remembered how scared those pups had looked after he killed Oryxdoom. He didn't want to ambush those kids. He'd always had a soft spot for the unnamed pups of the clan, maybe because while the adults had hated him as long as he could remember, he had actually had a few friends when they were all younger, before they'd come of age. He'd even been naive enough to think Stoutest might be his wife one day, good as they got along as teenagers, but after she earned her name she stopped spending time with him, same as the rest. Small wonder that when he thought about hurting kids, about them even seeing the kind of hurt he had endured, his hands got clammy and shaky.

"Better get moving if we're really just going to run out of here instead of doing the right thing," said Grandfather. "They catch us they'll kill us, and then I'll be able to tell you I told you so."

"They won't catch us," said Sullen, and smiled, because he had half a mind that Grandfather had known he was lying and still let him get away with it. The old man loved him that much, and next time Sullen had the chance to impress Grandfather, he'd do better. But for now he'd run like Count Raven when he was being chased out of the Seventh Void, back before the Frozen Savannahs got iced over and Sullen's ancestors had to run fast as leopards to keep their feet from being scorched on the blazing earth. A plain old Horned Wolf could never catch Sullen, if he ran that fast.

None even came close.

The next day was considerably quieter, and a week later they emerged from the Raptor Wood and stood on a hillside overlooking the withered plains that marked the border of the Crimson Empire, where Sullen's uncle had disappeared twice over. He hummed a verse of Rakehell to himself, swearing he would follow Uncle Craven's tracks only so far as they led him out into the Star and then back home, and once he returned he would never go away again. If Uncle Craven hadn't run off the second time, Sullen never would've had to leave the once.

CHAPTER.

9.

Winter in the north is liable to make a grumpy panther of anyone, even those fortunate enough to have a roof and a hearth to stave off the snow and wind. For those seeking shelter in the lees of rocks and the boles of ancient pines as the sleet blew straight across into their face, spoiling any hope of a campfire, it was a fair bit worse. A cave Zosia had provisioned two decades prior for just such an unhappy need had evidently been discovered and cleaned out by some lucky traveler through that desolate high country in the interim, and so while she passed the worst of the season sheltered from the constant gale, it was a lean and icy refuge. She wiled away the snowed-in weeks mourning her husband and village, plotting her vengeance, talking to herself and Choplicker, and sharpening a body gone dull with age and comfort. When the worst of winter passed, allowing her to resume her trek, her muscles popped beneath her taut skin from more than the mild starvation she'd endured.

In light of all this, Zosia's foul mood was well earned when she at last reached the border of the Immaculate Isles.

The sea was still miles away, but the persistence of the Immaculates had won them a rather tidy amount of coastline in ages past. As the recent years of internal Imperial squabbling had drawn the most able forces to the heart of the Crimson Empire, the holdings of the Immaculates had casually expanded inland. It was easy to see how far they had gotten; halfway down the foothills Zosia spied a giant fucking wall. The dark serpent of stone snaked across the whole of her vision, and it didn't take a tactician or scholar to hazard that it stretched from one end of the Norwest peninsula to the other. Nicely done.

Zosia's assumption that the wall came just short of Linkensterne proved to be off by less than a mile, as the (presumably former) Imperial city turned out to be on the far side of the fortification. Very nicely done. This part of the wall must have been built first, as there was none of the construction she had glimpsed farther to the east. A series of thick iron portcullises barred the tunnel through the wall, the gate absurdly narrow in contrast to the wide, ancient road. A solid defense, sure, but also a nice bite of the thumb to the Imperial traders who had once given the Immaculates such a hard time of it. As Zosia left the gorse and put her boots on the first real road she would stick to since leaving Kypck, she surmised that the encampment of caravans on this side of the gate must be a fixture of modern Imperial trade with the Immaculate.

"Mind your manners, or I'll sell your ass to the first merchant to make me an offer," Zosia told Choplicker. "Imperials have a taste for dog meat, and I doubt the Immaculate gourmands would turn their noses up at trying a new delicacy, either."

Reasoning she would have time aplenty to explore the caravan camp if they didn't let her through the gate on her first try, she made straight for the guardhouse. There wasn't one, she found, but the rampart dipped low over the gate, and as soon as she passed the last scowling merchant ensconced on his riding board at the side of the road, a guard poked her head over the edge. She couldn't have been twenty-five years old but had the simultaneously weary and haughty expression of a put-upon empress.

"Interviews are at dawn," the guard called down in Crimson. "Come back then."

"Hello, honored friend," said Zosia in the Norwest vernacular. She'd been brushing up on her Immaculate over the long months in the mountains. Since she hadn't had anyone to practice with, only Choplicker knew how much she'd actually retained, and he wasn't saying. A pleasant greeting was easy enough to remember, though, and it might be all she needed to get her toe in the gate.

"Hello, honored friend," the guard replied reflexively, then scowled and reverted to Crimson. "There's the queue behind you, and some of these rats have been waiting for weeks. You'll have to bribe one of them, and heavily, if you even expect an audience tomorrow."

"What if I just bribe you now?" Zosia smiled up at the gatekeeper. "And heavily."

"Would that it were that easy," said the guard ruefully. "We'd both be happier, eh? Take your bribes to your own people."

"These cheats and scoundrels aren't my people," said Zosia, well aware that in order to be easily heard on the wall she had to shout loudly enough for the merchants at the front of the line to hear her as well. "I come on the personal request of one of your court, and he will be displeased if I am late."

"Ooooh, a noble? Well, that changes everything!" The guard leaned farther over the wall, her scale-armored forearms crossed on the rampart before her. "Sister, I'm a noble, and so's my captain, and so's his commander, and so's a thousand handmaids and houseboys on a hundred different isles. I don't suppose this noble of yours was important enough to give you a stamped invitation we could see?"

"Alas, he placed his order with me before this wall of yours went up," said Zosia. "I'm an artisan who has spent two decades aging her briar for Lord Kang-ho of Hwabun, not some button-seller seeking entry to Linkensterne."

"Kang-ho, the Lord of Hwabun?" said the guard, but her tone seemed to have shifted from sassy to mildly interested. "Briar, eh? His husband gives him enough allowance for that sort of luxury?"

"Lord Kang-ho paid in advance," said Zosia, pleased for a change by the gossipmongering that was endemic to the Immaculate Isles. Get two royals together and the rumor mill will turn for hours; fill a nation with nobles and it'll run till the Sunken Isle rises from the deep. "So you understand why he will be eager to see me admitted at once."

"I suppose I might," said the guard, nodding thoughtfully. "The Flower Pot's in need of some pleasant news. Tell you what, toss up that ten-mun piece I dropped and I'll run it past my captain."

Zosia rooted through her purse and fished out the smallest coin she had. "Your eyes aren't great for a wall-minder-it's a Crimson krone."

"So it is," said the guard, catching it in a gloved hand. "My captain will want to have the name of a carver so illustrious as to wait on the King of Hwabun's husband."

"Moor Clell," said Zosia, an alias she hadn't used since the Brackett entanglement some thirty years past. What a fucking fiasco that had been. There had been many times she had missed her shock of blue hair, but now that she had cause to travel incognito she gave thanks that the alchemy of age had turned what was once as cobalt as her eyes to an innocuous silver.

"Get comfortable, Mistress Clell," said the guard, disappearing from sight.

So Kang-ho was alive. He'd always been the lucky one, and she'd hoped that of all the Five Villains he, at least, was still around and kicking, which was why she'd come to the Immaculate Isles first. Nice to know it wasn't going to be a totally wasted visit, though as the sun inched low over the wall she supposed the journey wasn't over yet. Bureaucracy, be it Imperial or Raniputri, Usban or Immaculate, put her in a foul mood. This was why she had left in the first place. Even the tribes of Flintland were supposedly succumbing to the allure of pomp and pretense, though they had the decency to spice up their hoop-jumping with the odd dash of ultraviolent ritual combat. She imagined Leib sitting beside her, wearing away at her ill temper with his effortless wit, but the ghost of his memory only darkened her mood.

"She's not coming back." The merchant at the front of the encampment had descended from his gaudily painted covered wagon and approached Zosia, who sat in the wiregrass on the side of the road with Choplicker curled at her side. The trader's embroidered sarong marked him as Usban, or a dark-skinned convert to the Ten True Gods of Trve. He had none of the paunch that merchants were notorious for, and his middle-aged face would almost have been good-looking, if not for the perpetual sneer. "I tossed that rogue, or one of them anyway, a copper dinar, and she said the same thing: wait here. It has been a week, and I am still waiting, having reached the front of the line a coin shorter and wiser, but, I fear, no quicker."

"What a song." Zosia yawned. "You have a gift for storytelling, friend."

"And yet you seem to have missed the moral," said the merchant. "While you have been lolling in the dust, waiting for the crow you fed to return with a jade ring, another train has arrived at the rear of the queue. By trying to hasten your entry, you have only delayed it further."

"The ballads just keep on coming," said Zosia. "I thank you for your concern, but if it's all the same to you I'll wait a little longer."

"In point of fact, it is not the same to me," said the merchant, crossing his beefy arms. "Nor will it be all the same to the dozen travelers behind, none of whom will be amused if you are still sitting here, at the front of the queue, come dawn. I have five stout swords in my company who will be more than happy to assist you to the rear, should you persist in this flagrant disregard for good manners."

"Or?" asked Zosia, unimpressed. "You would have brought your muscle if that was your first option, so what's the pitch?"

"My first option, as always, is those same good manners I mentioned, which seem so alien to your ear. But my second is a simple proposition, for you see, when I arrived here I had but three swords in my company. The other two I discovered some wheels behind me in the queue."

"Uh-huh," said Zosia, glancing at the dark wall. The sun had slipped behind it, but no torches were lit on the rampart. "How much does a sellsword make on your wagon, and what's to stop me from cutting loose as soon as we get through the gate?"

"Why, nothing is to stop you from going your own way once we enter the Immaculate Isles," said the merchant, his sneer teetering on the pleasant now that they were opening up negotiations. "Though I hear it is difficult to get far without an escort these days. As for payment, I regret that I will have to ask slightly more than the two men I already hired, seeing as your period of service will be so much shorter than theirs."

"Uh-huh," said Zosia, getting to her feet. Try as she had to get herself back into shape during her trek through the mountains, she still felt as haggard and run-down as a fat monk's pony after pilgrimaging to the Secret City of the Snow Leopard. "How much?"

"Hey-o!" The guard's voice came down through the gloaming. "Looks like you're coming in, Moor Clell. Step up to the front so the guards can get a good look at you."

"What's this!" cried the merchant as two guards with red paper lanterns began making their way through the small barred doors built into each portcullis. "I paid you a week ago!"

"Oh, it's you," said the guard. "Don't worry, it took some time but I've got it all worked out so you can come through first thing in the morning."

"May your kindness be rewarded in the next life, and hopefully this one as well," called up the merchant, then turned his forced smile on Zosia as the last door was opened before them. "I don't suppose you and your hound require a sword for your perilous journey through Immaculate customs? I could offer you a very competitive rate."

Once, Zosia would have laughed in his face, maybe even given him a light slap on the cheek. Once, she had been a really unpleasant, self-important kid. Now, heeding her beloved Leib's wisdom that it was much better to run into a friendly face in an unexpected location than it was to find yourself with enemies you didn't remember making, she extended her hand.

"I would if I could, friend, but we both know that won't work this time around." She nodded at the entryway cut out of the last portcullis, which wasn't wide enough for both guards to pass through abreast. "Unless you can fit your wagon through that door? I'm Moor Clell, by the by, pipemaker."

"My carriage has many marvelous properties, but that is not one of them," said the merchant as he took her by the forearm and shook. "Ardeth Karnov thanks you for the sentiment, though. Perhaps we shall meet again, Moor Clell, pipemaker, in Linkensterne, Little Heaven, or stranger markets still. I have amongst my treasures the finest latakisses, so perhaps we could sample one another's wares."

"I should like that," said Zosia, her mouth watering at the thought of the rich, smoky tubq of the Usba. She had burned through the last of her latakiss blend on the trail and was down to flue-cured vergins and dusty deertongue; she would have lingered to discuss a purchase on the spot had the guards not barked at her to get a move on. "Safe travels, Ardeth Karnov."

"And you as well," said the merchant, turning back to his wagon.

Not much hope of that, thought Zosia as she allowed the guards to escort her into the Immaculate Isles, Choplicker wagging his tail as they went.

CHAPTER.

10.

Maroto went along with Purna's scheme, because of course he did.