"Say it, Dion. Say the words."

Her violet eyes glinted dangerously, and Hishn rose slowly to her feet. The

hackles on the wolf's neck rose into a bristly mass. Dion didn't notice. "I'm tired of hearing the words, Gamon," she said, her voice hard. "And don't give me that 'you have to go on' line again. If you haven't lost a son, you can't understand what I feel. If you haven't caused the death of your own child, you'll never understand what I live with."

"You're wallowing in guilt."

"Why shouldn't I?"

"Because you'll kill yourself if you keep on."

Her voice was suddenly quiet. "And why shouldn't I do that, Gamon?"

The older man stared at her. He realized suddenly that the strain that pulled

at the wolf walker's face was so much a part of her body that it could break her very bones. And that Hishn didn't hover around Dion because the wolfwalker called the wolf, but because Hishn was herself afraid of losing her wolfwalker.

Dion's eyes were dark. "Why should I go on?" she repeated. "Why should I let myself live? Just because I have a skill that the county needs? Because there are people who want to use my body, my skills?" Her fist clenched.

"Am I nothing more than a tool to the people I've counted as friends?" Her knuckles, white before, began to shake. "What part of me is allowed to be human? What part of me may grieve?"

Gamon's face hardened slowly. "You think you're the only one to lose a

child?"

"Yes." Hishn's snarl was in Dion's throat, and the wolfwalker's voice was harsh. "At this moment, right now, I am the only one who has lost a child. I don't care who else feels grief right now. I don't care how many ghosts you've hung on your sword. And for once, I don't give a damn about another person's loss. Don't talk to me about others' deaths, about going

on, about being strong. I can't feel anything but myself right now-don't you at least see that?"He nodded slowly. He glanced at Hishn, then back at the wolfwalker, noting the almost yellow glint to her shadowed eyes. "I can see that," he said quietly.

"Then why can't you leave me alone?"

"I'm not doing this for me, Dion, but for you and Aranur. My nephew never was one to run away from his problems, and he won't let you do that either.

Take too long to heal out here, and he'll come after you and force you to face yourself. You'll hate him for that, Dion. It will be a knife between you."

Her face tightened. "I understand knives."

"Yes," he agreed, "more than most, you do. But do you need to wound your own mate as you wound yourself ?"

"Gamon-"

"Whether you face yourself now or later, the circumstance doesn't change,

Dion: Danton died. You didn't." His voice was suddenly hard. "Deal with it."

"I need time."

"You have the rest of your life to grieve, Dion. How much time do you have to love those who are still near you?"

"I don't have any more love to give," she cried out.

"You do, Wolfwalker. You wouldn't feel this strongly about Danton if you

didn't have more than enough love in you for the rest of your life."

"You haven't a clue how I feel, Gamon. Don't speak to me of love."

Like a wolf himself, the lean older man rounded on her. His gray eyes were

suddenly as steely as Aranur's, his hands like vises on her arms. Hishn was up and beside Dion in a flash. Gamon ignored the wolf, but the Gray One's teeth were bared. "I lost my mother, my father," he breathed in Dion's face.

"I lost all my brothers but one because of raiders. I lost two nieces who were like daughters to me, and you and I both know I could have stopped their deaths if my sword had been a little faster. There was a woman I would have Promised with who died in my arms before I could tell her what I felt." His voice tightened to a snarl. "There was another woman I lost to my own reluctance to Promise. Don't tell me I don't know what you feel, Wolfwalker. I've lived long enough to lose a dozen lifetimes."

Dion eyed the older man warily. Gamon's calm wisdom had ripped away, leaving only the steel behind, and it was a hard, bright, bitter knot. She knew suddenly where Aranur got his iron will-it had been forged here, in his uncle Gamon. She tried to speak, but her lips were curled back with Hishn's, and her throat tightened as if to tear out the gray-haired man's words. She sucked in a breath. Nothing loosened in her chest, but suddenly, Hishn backed down.

Gamon studied Dion's face as if to find a hint of anything insincere. Then

he nodded, shortly.

Kiyun gave Dion a sharp look when he and Tehena rejoined her and Gamon. But she shook her head at him, and the burly man said nothing. He just reined in by the wolfwalker and led the way out onto the road.

It was midmorning by the time they reached the turnoff for one of the farming villages. But as they came around the hill, Kiyun, in the lead, signaled for them to pull up rather than ride on. "Smoke," he said quietly, pointing through the trees. The bare wisp of gray was battered apart by the slight wind, but not before it made a faint, but distinctive streak.

Automatically, Dion sent Hishn into the woods. The gray wolf snarled at her, and Dion felt the pull of the pack as Hishn tried to get her to fade back in the forest with the wolf. Dion resisted. Her toes clenched in her boots as Hishn's mind sucked at hers.

Enough, Gray One, Dion sent sharply.

Come with me, sent the wolf. Come home to the pack. You have no need to hunt here.If the hunt finds me, who am I to fight it?

Hishn glared at her balefully, then faded back so that she disappeared. Beside Dion, Gamon squinted at the dull morning sky. For the last day and a half, the clouds had gathered into a gray pallor relieved only by the near-hidden passage of the moons. "That's Prandton," he said softly. "We're close enough to the last raider strike that this town could have been hit on the same run." Automatically, Dion touched her healer's circlet, then pulled her warcap down to make sure it covered the silver. Her finger caught for a moment on the seam that was concealed in the design of the silver. The hidden blade was like a needle in her mind, reminding her that even the silver symbol of healing she wore hid unbalanced death within it. Abruptly, she dropped her hand. She didn't notice that it fell to the hilt of her sword as she closed up in a knot with the others.

The riders slowed as they rounded the last bend before entering the village hub. It was summer, but instead of being filled with activity, the clumps of houses were shuttered against the gray, humid daylight. Two homes and their shared stable were gutted and smoking, and a third home around one of the commons was still smoldering with glowing coals. Tools were discarded, and woodpiles scattered between the clustered homes. And there were two bodies in the street, surrounded by rocks and chunks of wood.

In the distance, a woman stepped out, caught sight of them, and ducked hastily back into her house. A flash of paleness from another structure showed where someone had peeked from a window.

As if their moves were choreographed, Kiyun and Tehena spurred their dnu ahead of Dion so that she fell behind with Gamon. A moment later, they skirted the bodies in the street. Both dead men had been brutally beaten.

Soberly, Kiyun dismounted. The others remained warily on their dnu, their weapons resting but ready on their saddles and thighs.

Kiyun looked up. "Raiders," he called softly. He stood and studied the town, absently kicking aside one of the clubs.

"Looks like a trial block got out of hand," Gamon murmured to Dion.

Soberly, she nodded. They dismounted. Dion knelt by the two bodies,

studying them. Then she sat back on her heels.

Wolfwalker? Hishn called. The smoke you smell is harsh and old. Leave this place with me.I need to stay. Don't worry. There is no danger here.But the gray wolf snarled. There is death in your nose.And in my eyes. Dion couldn't help her answer, and she almost flinched with the strength of the howl that Hishn sent up from the forest. The

massive wolf moved then, back to the street, following Dion's voice.

Gamon caught a flash of face at another window as the gray wolf loped into town. He started toward the house but had barely put his hand on the gate when the door opened. A stocky man stepped out. Behind him, a woman and two youths peered out from the doorway. The farmer had a sword in one hand, the steel newly cleaned and oiled but the blade itself too small for his grip. He held it firmly, but as if it were a tool, not an extension of his arm. "And who will you be?" he asked finally.

"Gamon Aikekkraya neBentar," the older man answered first.

"I've heard of you," the other man returned. "A weapons master, you are."

"Ah, Moriko, I told you someone would come." The woman's voice, low as

it was, sounded hard to Dion's ears. "I told you we couldn't hide. And one of the weapons masters here. We'll all be blamed, for sure-"

"Quiet," the man said harshly over his shoulder.

"What happened?" Gamon asked soberly.

"Raiders," he said shortly, "as any fool can see."

Gamon ignored the bitterness in the farmer's terse words. "When did they

strike?" he asked instead.

The farmer regarded him for a long moment. "Near dawn," he said finally.

"They were waiting in the hills for first light when we went to the fields for the second planting."

"How many?"

"Fourteen, fifteen. Maybe more." Moriko glared at one of the gutted houses. "I wasn't exactly counting their pretty faces."

"You drove them off?"

The farmer eyed the older man. Finally, he said, "They caught us off guard.