Talen motioned at the bloated and decayed bodies. "Look at that one. I bet he's that cattle thief from the Sinks." The man in question had obviously been dragged behind a horse. His flesh was torn and open. He had no eyes. He had no hands for that matter. Those had been cut off. Wasps mixed with the flies in a cloud, all of them buzzing in to get their tiny bites.

Nettle pulled his tunic over his nose.

Some of the bodies here had been hanging for weeks. The first was withered, but it was clear he'd been emasculated. When they rode close to the second, a hawk that had been tugging at the flesh of the man's face rose and flapped away, revealing a half-eaten, gruesome smile.

They passed another. Talen stopped the wagon by the fourth and fifth, a man and a woman. The man was hung with a thick rope punched through the skin and threaded through his ribs. The woman's dark hair hung over her ruined face. She tilted slightly, twisting gently in the evening breeze, one arm sticking out as if she were reaching for them. Both had been in the trees long enough for the maggots to hatch.

"Killed her mother-in-law," said Talen. "They said she struggled and bucked for the better part of an hour."

"I don't need a history," said Nettle. "Move it along."

But Talen didn't want to move it along. He looked up at the bodies hanging about him. If anyone found out about the girl and boy at his house, this is where his life would end.

Why would Da risk something like that?

Talen started Iron Boy again. When he put enough distance between them and the grove to erase the stink, he pulled his tunic from his nose.

Nettle did the same.

They were both quiet for a time, then Nettle produced another half loaf of bread pudding. Where he'd been hiding it, Talen had no idea.

Nettle took a big bite. When he'd gulped it down, he said, "So?"

"So what?"

"So, what did she do after she slid in?"

Good old Nettle, Talen thought. Not even death hanging about in the trees could sway him from girls or his gut.

"I was fearing for my soul," said Talen. "But not minding it either. The hunters were outside, and yet I could not think of them. Only the creature on my lap." Talen shook his head. "She took my hand and pressed it to her."

"Her side?"

"Oh, no," said Talen. And he gave Nettle a look that said she'd done nothing as innocent as that.

Nettle's eyebrows rose and Talen fought to suppress his smile.

"You mean?" said Nettle.

Talen nodded. "I tell you, I was paralyzed; my brain was cider muzzy. Her with a wicked gleam in her eyes, and me thinking to myself that she's done this before, these are experienced hands. I am only thankful she exposed herself when armsmen were about. Who knows what she would have forced me to do. As it is, I fear I've been touched."

"It is said that they make sounds."

"Sounds?"

"The beast in their natures takes over."

"There was no sound," said Talen. "But she did indeed bite."

Nettle narrowed his eyes. Talen could see he'd pushed the tale a bit too far.

"You're such a bad liar," said Nettle.

Talen pulled his collar down to show Nettle his neck. "Look for yourself."

"I don't see anything. Why I ever listen to you, I'll never know."

"Look," Talen said and pointed.

Nettle leaned in close. "There's nothing here."

Talen clopped him on the side of the head. "Of course, there isn't. No glamour, no petting, no grunts, or lustful moans. No wicked babies conceived. I told you. It was like kissing the wall." Except that wasn't entirely true.

"Look," said Talen. "If she's there when we get back, you can have a go. Tell her to not forget the tongue."

"She wasn't that bad-looking," said Nettle, as if considering the idea. "Better than most."

"Who cares?" said Talen. "She's a hatchling."

"You yourself said nothing happened."

Nettle was was considering it. "You can't be serious," said Talen. considering it. "You can't be serious," said Talen.

"Gotcha," said Nettle and grinned.

Talen pointed at him. "You can't fool me. You were actually thinking of kissing her."

"If if makes you happy to think that, go right ahead and think it."

Talen refused to rise to his bait, instead he fetched one of the last of his ginger cookies and plopped it in his mouth.

They had just entered the trees on the hill that lay beyond Gallow's Grove, and Talen wanted to see if there was any sign of pursuit. He stopped the wagon, hopped out, and went back to the tree line. Nettle followed.

About a mile back, well before Gallow's Grove, a group of mounted men followed the road. He watched them disappear behind a small hill. Talen groaned "You think they're looking for us?"

"I think we'd better act as if they are," said Nettle.

They scrambled back to the road and got into the wagon. Talen urged Iron Boy on, knowing there was no way two boys in a wagon could outrun mounted men.

SCENT.

H.

unger lost the scent of the Koramite and his son. At first, it didn't bother him. He watched the people and animals come and go. But toward late afternoon it occurred to him that the Koramite and his son might not have gone to the city at all. They might have simply ridden on by.

This gave him pause. What if they weren't coming back this way? What if they weren't coming back at all? Argoth might hold lands in that other direction. They might be gone visiting; they might be gone for a weeklong hunt for all he knew.

He shouldn't have let them go. No, he'd made a miscalculation. He should have given them chase.

But then he calmed himself. They were either in the city or they were beyond it. The wind was blowing in from the sea. All he needed to do was walk the edge of the forest in a line running toward the city.

If the Koramite and his boy were in the city or going to travel back, he'd pick up their scent. And if they weren't, well, then they had quite a start on him.

But Hunger would find them. Of that he had no doubt. He'd been a great hunter in his time. At least, one of those he'd eaten had been.

Hunger stood and began making his way down the hill. Below him on the road, three boys in red hats herded a large flock of sheep. Their long-haired, black and white dogs barked to keep the sheep from straying too far from the road.

Hunger stepped out of the brush into the middle of the flock and sent the sheep running. The second boy, walking perhaps only a dozen feet ahead, looked back. His expression of curiosity turned to horror.

Hunger could catch the shepherd and eat him. He paused. He could smell him, taste him on the wind. He could eat them all.

No, he told himself. He would not. If he did, he wouldn't be able to stop himself the next time.

One of the dogs began barking.

Something drifted to him on the breeze. He opened his mouth.

The burning boy. The scent was faint but unmistakable.

This time, Hunger thought, you won't get away. He turned from the shepherd and his sheep.

The dog followed him to the brush on the far side of the road, snarling. The young man found his voice and yelled a warning. But another three steps and Hunger was well into the wood, the sounds of the shepherds and their dogs receeding behind him.

TREES.

T.

alen peered out from the wagon bed. The men following them had begun to trot their horses.

"I'm jumping out around that next bend," said Talen. Nettle could continue with the wagon while Talen tried to escape on foot.

"They've already seen you," said Nettle.

"You don't know that."

"You don't know that they haven't."

"It's the only way."

"Just act normal," said Nettle.

"Will you shut up with your normal nonsense."

"I'm Captain Argoth's son. It will count for something."

"Yeah," said Talen. "That's why I was standing around this morning at the city gate batting horseflies from my naked body."

"As soon as they realize you're gone, they'll know. They'll send one back for help. The rest will watch the area. And the woods here don't run unbroken. They'll see you."

"No," said Talen. "They won't." But he knew they would. By the stinking lord of pigs, they would.

Unless he hid so well, so quietly, like a mouse in a tuft of grass, that they'd have to be standing right on him to know he was there.

"Just get me to the bend in the road," said Talen. They didn't have dogs, and it would be dark before they could bring them. That was the only thing he had in his favor.

Talen caught another glimpse of the men, perhaps a half-dozen rods behind. There were eight of them, all Shoka.

The wagon bumped along, making it difficult for Talen to keep himself flat and out of sight in the wagon bed. At this pace they weren't going to make the bend. "Speed it up," hissed Talen.

"We'll say you're sick."

"It won't work," said Talen.

Behind them, the men urged their horses into a canter.

"Faster," said Talen.

Nettle flipped the reins and Iron Boy began to trot. The wagon bounced off a rut.

Talen readied himself.

It was odd, but the sensation of energy and well-being he'd noticed passing through the city gate had not vanished. If anything, it had built. He felt as if he could keep pace with a horse, maybe outrun one.

Of course, that was stupid. Still, with every jolt of the wagon his strength grew. He could feel it, like a crazy itch seeping through him. He wondered about the ginger cookies. This would not be the first baker to mix a come-back into his breads. Come-backs were something to make a body depend on his bread, something besides taste to make a person come back and continue to buy. Of course, such herbs were outlawed in the New Lands, but it had been a Whitecliff baker. He probably didn't think such rules applied to him.

"We're almost to the bend," said Nettle.

The men were closing fast. One of them yelled out.

The wagon passed into the shade of trees and out of the the men's sight.

Nettle reined in Iron Boy to slow the wagon.

Talen rose to his feet.

"You're not going to have time to find cover."