It is dark, and in this darkness is the cry of hungry death; It is cold, and with this icy breath of steel comes fearful chill; It is silent now, and in this quiet dawn lie bodies still; It is over now, and still I stand and feel the tears that freeze my cheeks, and search for life that once had been.

For now the steel is fed again, but when shall the silver shine?

-Second refrain, Lament of the Healer Dione, I Previous Top Next Dion forced herself to move toward the fight. Hishn's eyes saw the movement of the bow raised in her direction before she did, and the howl that hit her mind flung her to the ground. She dropped behind a tree just as the bolt whished through the ferns. A moment later the archer was killed, and Dion saw that too, through Hishn's eyes.

There were six raiders on the ground; two still grappling with Ariyens. Two more fought viciously near the cliff, and one last archer hid in the boulders. Another swordsman went down, and the Ariyens shifted their attack. Aranur was over there, his back to a boulder, righting a raider coldly, viciously. Dion stumbled forward, still trying to catch her breath. Her elbow still rang as if jammed, and her shoulder was wrenched where she'd taken the brunt of the raider's strength. Her ribs were not cracked, she knew, only bruised, but her breathing was painful and thin. She felt again those fists, that hilt... The man's voice echoing back in her mind... Urgency. Purpose. What had she become in Ariye, that a raider wanted her? The shudder that caught her was almost shocking in its depth.

Hishn caught her leggings in lupine teeth. Stay. You are hurt.It is nothing.Hishn growled at her. Your fangs are weak as old Neysha's. Your mate does not need your help. Dion glared at the wolf, but those yellow eyes gleamed with unrelenting truth. Her bow had been lost somewhere to her right. Her quiver was empty -the arrows had been lost in the draw. Her sword in that melee would simply be one more weapon in Aranur's way. She nodded shortly, jerkily. Besides, there was something wrong with her hands. They were shaking like the ferns.

She fumbled at her belt pouches for the small healer's kit. "I'll need Monteverdi," she muttered to the wolf.

Your packmate is already here.

She looked up. The lanky man had just ridden into sight on the road. The intern looked anxious, glancing nervously from side to side as he neared the fighting. But he slid quickly enough from his dnu to kneel beside one of the Ariyens. The man pushed him irritably away, pointing to another man lying nearby. A moment later, Dion joined them. "He's dead," she said flatly, as Monteverdi tried to find a pulse on the body.

Monteverdi's face shuttered. "All right," he said. He straightened up,

glanced at her, then took her arm firmly. "Dion-"

Absently, she looked down. The slash that had split the edge of the leather tunic had split skin as well, and blood now soaked her arm. Annoyed, she shook off Monteverdi's grip.

The tall intern asked something, taking her arm again, but she couldn't answer. Something about blood, he was saying, and shock. She shook her head. It was not shock she felt, but something else, deep and gripping and cold. This blood was not from a wound meant to kill her, but one from a stunning blow. And it was not the sight of her own blood that chilled her now, but the words she had heard from that raider.

Stubbornly, Monteverdi hung onto her arm. Hishn snarled at him, but the

intern snapped, "Back off, Gray One. I'm helping, not hurting her."Wolfwalker- Hishn's voice was caught between protecting Dion and her instinctive fear of humans. The wolf recognized the intern, but Dion's need for protection colored her response so that she stayed and snarled instead of slinking away.Back down, Hishn, Dion projected. Ease off now.But the wolf's projection was strong, and Dion was drowning with the sensation of lupine muscles, seeing foggily through two sets of eyes. Some part of her mind tried to draw back from that strength, pulling away from the gray bond. She took a deep breath and finally swallowed the eagerness that threatened her and the urge to spring away. How much of her mind was her own anymore? Had that puppet master been right? She wrapped her arms around herself and hugged herself till she quelled the violence. By the moons, she whispered to herself, was she more woman or wolf?

Your heart is gray as mine, said Hishn, baring her teeth at Dion. You fight with the fangs of the pack. She tried to concentrate on her shaking hands as the violence worked its way out of the set of her teeth. I run with the pack, Hishn, she acknowledged. But I've grown too used to your blood-lust. You swamp me with emotions that I must control.

Violence is the way of life. You cannot hunt without it.

Dion's hands clenched. Peace is also a way of life. And you can hunt from necessity, not violence, and still find your prey with your fangs. The wolf seemed to shrug. Gray thoughts blended with others until a mixed song filled Dion's head. Violence, peace... the gray wolf said. Each defines the other.

Dion shook her head, and Monteverdi misunderstood. "Dion-" He tried again to catch her arm.

"It's his blood," she forced herself to say. "Not mine-"

"Some of this is from you," he said stubbornly. He ignored her half-hearted gesture. Quickly, efficiently, he tugged a cloth from a pouch and wrapped it expertly around the light gash. By the time he had finished, Dion was pulling away, her mind again clear, her hands already reaching for one of the healer's kits he had brought. They moved quickly toward the other wounded Ariyens.

"Extra bandages are in here," he told her, jamming a bundle into her hands.

"Extra salve?"

"Couldn't get it. The lab workers are down with spring fever." He stopped

and knelt by another wounded man.

A hard voice cut into their words. "Where's the Healer?"

"Over there-by the cliff," another voice responded.

Dion moved quickly through the figures who stood strangely isolated now,

after the fight. There were bodies-some sprawled, some huddled, some like lumps of dough on the ground. One man half crawled toward another; one thrashed against the branches that, like hands, caught the last of his blood. A woman sat on her knees, trying to breathe, while another archer felt along her arm for the break they knew was there. But even the figures beside each other seemed somehow separated. Dion's chest seemed suddenly heavy, and the distance closed again over her eyes so that she wondered absently if there was something wrong with her bond to the wolves that she was having trouble with her vision. But she could see the tight expression on Tule's face clearly enough as the man beside him waved urgently for her attention.

It wasn't Tule who was hurt-or Royce, she realized in relief. Then she

cursed under her breath as she saw the woman, Mjau, who lay behind one of the boulders. Aranur was beside the archer, speaking steadily into the woman's wild, unfocused eyes, while Tule's single hand captured some of the guts that had spilled from the woman's split belly. The stain of fluids had washed across Mjau's jerkin, darkening it like paint; and the dawn mist was gathering on both the leather and the woman's gray-white hair like tiny stars. Mjau was barely conscious, but her hands cupped desperately around Tule's single hand, holding her own entrails.

Aranur didn't look up as he heard Dion shout for the intern. Instead, he kept his eyes on the archer. "Keep conscious, Mjau," he said firmly. "That's it. No-look at me, woman, not at your stupid belly. Don't close your eyes!" he said sharply. "Look at me. Look at me," he repeated urgently. He barely shifted as Dion dropped to the ground beside him. "Stay with me, Mjau. Keep your eyes open."

Quickly, Dion broke open the healer's kit. Gray Hishn sniffed Mjau's torso, then sat expectantly across the body from Dion. Her yellow eyes gleamed as she followed the wolfwalker's movements.

Dion looked up at the other three fighters who sheltered the downed archer from the falling mist. "Leave us," she said curtly, and they fell back without comment, their place taken by the intern. "Edan, wait," Dion called after them. "Bring a bota of water, and-" She tossed the short man a vial. "- mix this in it when you do." She turned back to Tule and Aranur. "Is this her only wound?"

The one-armed man didn't move his hand from the archer's guts. "There are two scratches on her leg, but both superficial. She took a clubbing blow to the upper back, but there was no blood on her jerkin, and she still moved fairly well after it."

Mjau still stared at the guts that pooled and slid in her hands. Dion thrust the tools at the intern and took the bota from the man who scrambled back over the boulders. "Mjau," she said to the archer as she poured the solution over her hands. "It's me, Dion. I'm with you."

The woman sucked in a ragged breath. Her lips moved. "Wolfwal-"

Mjau's eyes rolled wildly. "Dio-"

"I hear you, Mjau." Beside her, Monteverdi grabbed the bota and, after rinsing his own hands, began to bathe the entrails. Swiftly, Dion began repacking the archer's guts. The white-haired woman burbled a scream, and only Aranur's hands on the woman's shoulders kept her down on the ground. Monteverdi froze at Mjau's hoarse cry, and Dion snapped. "Get the ointment on the rest of her skin."

He reached for one of the vials, and Dion elbowed his hand away. "Not that one. Not yet."

"Are you... " He glanced at Tule, and his question trailed off.

But Dion answered tersely, "Yes."

In an instant, Monteverdi's manner changed. He put away two herb packets and reached for others. His hands, still gentle, seemed also suddenly eager.

Tule watched the intern without speaking, but when Dion had set the last of Mjau's guts back in her belly and gestured for the one-armed man to leave, he merely sat back on his heels.

Dion, already pinching the edges of the wound together and clamping them

in place, didn't glance up. "It would be easier for me if you stepped away,

Tule."

The one-armed man nodded. "Easier," he agreed But he didn't move.

Aranur looked up and met the other man's eyes, and Tule shrugged. "Heard some interesting stories about the way Wolfwalker Dione works. Thought I'd see some of it for myself."

Dion snorted, her hands working quickly as she crimped the clamps into semipermanent clasps. "It's window dressing, Tule. Remember?"

"I remember," he said meaningfully.She looked up then. Aranur made to get up, but Dion made a small sign with her hands.

"Dion," Aranur said softly, for her ears alone. "It's too many people."She spoke as quietly, projecting her words through the wolf so that Aranur heard her voice as a faint echo in the back of his head. He's already seen the damage up close, she whispered into his mind. He'll be more danger with suspicions and questions than he will be with a few straight answers."You don't know him.""No." Her hands stilled for a moment. "But Hishn does."Aranur eyed the wolf, then the wolfwalker. Hishn's yellow eyes gleamed.

The Gray One's lips parted to show the white teeth against blood-pink gums, and Aranur shivered as a faint sense of howling drowned out Dion's voice in his mind. Abruptly, he nodded.

Tule had watched their exchange without comment, but now he added his own voice. "How can I help?"

Dion's answer was terse. "Be ready to take Aranur's place."

"And do what?"

"Do what he does. Keep your hands on my shoulders, your eyes shut, and

be quiet. Don't fight me, no matter what happens. I will do the rest." She thrust the crimping tools aside. "Monteverdi, are you ready?" The intern nodded and placed his hands over hers so that he could follow her movements. "All right, then." She looked up. "Aranur-"

He placed his hands on Dion's shoulders.

"I'm going to need to go in fast," she said softly.

He nodded.

She looked down into the archer's still-wild, barely focused eyes. "Mjau,

listen to me. Listen to my voice. I'm here. I won't leave you. Just close your eyes and trust me. You've known me many years, Mjau. You know what I can do."

She reached mentally to feel the presence of the wolf. Hishn?

Growling, the wolf's yellow eyes met Dion's violet gaze. She is close to the moons. Her breath is weak; her blood too quick in her belly.Dion nodded and spread her hands over the wound, not quite touching the half-stitched gash. Beside her, Aranur's hands felt cold on her shoulder, but beneath his grip she felt a chill all her own. What she was doing was not of the Ancients and not of the human science that had brought the Ancients to this world. What she was doing was alien, from the heart of the Aiueven.

Here, human and not-human met through the mind of the wolf. And the lupine memories of what had once been a gift of the aliens were the only guides she had.

What science the humans had managed to keep was theory without technology. Technology meant activity; visible advances beyond growing houses and roads were a guarantee of death from the watchful alien eyes. But Dion's teachers had been old lupine memories locked into the packsong, not the old technology. And the medical theory she had learned all her years was suddenly life in her hands.

For more than a decade, she had been experimenting and manipulating chemical patterns. She had learned to recognize the feel of different kinds of energy. Once she understood it, she began teaching others to push a patient's heart, to seal tissues, to melt and mend shards of bone. And through the years, she had grown in strength and sensitivity. She was so sensitive now that Mjau's blood flow was like ten thousand threads in her fingers. She gathered those threads, let herself feel where the pulse was strong or weak. Let herself reach out for the woman's heartbeat. Then she looked up into the yellow eyes of the wolf.

Take me in, Gray One.

Then run with me, Wolfwalker.