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  :This is our way, young one,: the elder said. :It is who you are.:

  Nwah dropped her gaze and continued down the hill.

  As they walked out of sight, Maral gave a barking howl.

  • • •

  :I’m sorry,: Kade said when they arrived back at the cave they were using as their home. :I thought you were being attacked.:

  The sky was darker, now. The air was thick and the breeze had quieted.

  :It wasn’t an attack.:

  :Looked like it to me.:

  :It wasn’t.:

  :How do you know?:

  Nwah considered the question.

  It was true that she had felt intimidated, but she understood what it meant to be attacked, and looking back on it, she knew the males had not moved against her in that way. Patock had a sense of nobility about him, and the boys had not actually gotten out of line toward her. Yes, they were forward, but even Maral had been controlled. She could also not deny that her body shuddered with the memory of being so close to males of her kind.

  She wasn’t certain what the confrontation had exactly been, but it most definitely wasn’t an attack.

  :I just know,: she finally said.

  Kade waited to see if she was going to say more.

  When she was silent, he turned and went to start the fire he would use to cook today’s catch.

  Nwah was surprised to find his silence hurt.

  She had wanted him to ask for more.

  He clearly knew she was shielding something, but wasn’t going to press the issue. At the same time, she was certain he’d been hiding his own desires from her for some time, too. He was not the type to come to the decision to leave the woods on the flip of a tail.

  How could he be linked with her and not want to talk about this?

  She considered opening her senses to him right then and there, just dumping them out for all to see, hitting him with the entire situation at once. But Kade was her link-mate, he deserved more from her, especially after he had come crashing to her rescue, as clumsy as the effort had been. She loved Kade, in her way. That was true. Their link would always be the most important thing in her life.

  But Patock’s parting words clung to her.

  Nwah was proud of being a kyree.

  She liked being able to run and to feel the forest as deeply as she could. She liked thinking of her mother. The memory of wrapping herself into a warm pile with her siblings as pups would always make her happy. She liked the way her coat warmed in the sunlight. She liked the way the elder male had appeared above her, silhouetted in the evening glow, strong and beautiful.

  And she was young.

  These sensations she was feeling, all of them, were who she was.

  Everything was so confusing.

  Nothing about her life seemed fair.

  She watched Kade pick up wood and make sure the ring of stone that would keep the embers from traveling was properly placed. It struck her then that she might be looking at things the wrong way. Sometimes life is about sacrificing for someone else, she thought. But other times it’s about letting yourself be who you truly are.

  If that was right, the key was knowing when to give and when to take.

  Then again, if it was done correctly, perhaps it’s all giving.

  Life was hard in this way.

  Confusing.

  She wanted him to know who she was. But just as much, she wanted Kade to trust her enough to show her who he was.

  He struck the kindling, and a flame was born.

  :Kade,: she said.

  :Yes?:

  :Where would we go?:

  :What do you mean?:

  :You want to leave the woods. Where would you like to go?:

  :It’s all right,: he said. :I know you don’t want to.:

  She felt the truth under his tone, though.

  :I know there are colleges,: she said. :But I thought maybe we could go to Oris first. That’s where Rayn lived. I would like to see that place, if you don’t mind too much.:

  :Are you serious?: Kade said.

  :Yes,: Nwah replied. :I think we should go.:

  He smiled. :I would love to see where Rayn was from.:

  The heat of his heart made her happier than she could say.

  Nwah stood, then walked to the lip of the cave to breathe the air around her. The scent of burning kindling filled her, but underneath that she sensed soil and damp wood from near the creek. The sound of leaves rustled in the wind, and a branch creaked. Birds called in the distance. Over it all, the rising wall of maleness that had been calling to her for days rode as strong as the rumble of thunder across a cloudless sky.

  Her body responded to it, but this time she felt a sense of power that hadn’t been there before.

  :Where are you going?: Kade said.

  :Back to the kyree,: she said. :There’s something I want to do.:

  :Something you want to do?:

  :Yes,: she said.

  :What?:

  Nwah hesitated for just a moment, recognizing, despite herself, the sense of taking a blind leap into the dark forest. Then she opened her thoughts carefully. She peeled back the essence of what she had been feeling and gently laid herself bare before him for perhaps the first time in her life, letting him see everything about her decision.

  He blinked once, blushed, and then smiled in a silly, adolescent kind of way. Then the smile turned to a simple grin, and something clicked into place somewhere in Nwah’s heart that she never knew existed. His need to see new things, to travel and learn, was strong. If he didn’t do them he would shrivel—slowly, yes, but one by one the things that made him Kade—the passions and the desires she knew and loved—would dry up and die.

  She felt the image of him standing in the creek with his net.

  Then she turned to the cave opening, and peered out into the valley.

  She was no different. If she didn’t live her own life as well as theirs, she would be no better off than Kade cloistering himself in the woods.

  :Have a good time,: he said. :I’ll save some fish for you.:

  :That would be great,: she replied. :We’ll leave in the morning.:

  She left the cave and padded down a path that was growing toward nighttime. Her eyesight was fine, though, and she understood the lay of the land here well enough she could trace the path blindfolded. Not that she needed directions with the trail of musk in the air that was strong enough to raise the hair along her neck.

  Her whiskers extended, and her body responded to the call in ways she was already beginning to enjoy.

  She would choose Maral, she thought—the one who had charged to her defense, the one with the lean flanks who had flung himself into the open air at the onrushing human without regard for himself.

  Yes, she thought, her heart pounding in her chest.

  She would choose Maral.

  The young one may be foolish now, but if a litter came from this pairing, she wanted her pups to be brave.

  Haver Hearthstone

  Fiona Patton

  The dawn air was electric with unshed rain, the dark clouds piling up on the eastern horizon heralding a potentially violent storm to come. As Hektor Dann and his older brother, Aiden, of the Haven City Watch stepped from their tenement house onto the smooth cobblestones of Iron Street, he glanced up with a speculative expression. Autumn storms were commonplace in Valdemar’s capital and usually welcome. They swept the summer heat and stink away, leaving everything clean and shining and everyone calm and eager for cooler weather, but only if the storms broke quickly. If they lingered on the plains or, worse, if they passed by the city all together, then . . . well, their granther, himself a twenty-five year veteran in the Watch, had summed it up years ago.

  “Days like this gets everyone antsy wi’ fights an’ squabbles breakin’
out all across the city ’tween regular, honest folk. Everyone looks to us to sort it, an’ there’s nuthin’ harder than sortin’ regular, honest folk. They all think they’re right an’ the other’s wrong, they won’t see sense an’ you can’t make ’em, not even with a few hours in jail. Give me a nice, simple lurcher or lifter any day. At least they don’t go callin’ on yer own Ma to get ’em out.”

  Hector could see his point. The regular, honest folk of Iron Street had a sullen, resentful look in their eyes, as if they were already piling up grievances. But, he smiled to himself, the Watch had just the thing to put everything right today. Their youngest brother, Padreic, had been to the Iron Market first thing that morning, and had come back bursting with news.

  Haver was back in town.

  As the two men headed down the long, ten blocks to the Iron Street Watchhouse, he couldn’t help but grin as the first test of their news presented itself in the form of local ribbon-weaver, Holly Poll, seated on the front steps of her tenement house, her day’s work laid out beside her and her customary scowl set firmly in place.

  “Good mornin’, Missus Poll,” Hektor said with a broad smile.

  “What’s good about it?” she snapped. “I been after your worthless lot to do somethin’ about them back there for three days now, an’ no one’s come near. I want ’em seen to, you hear me?”

  “Who seen to?”

  “‘Who seen to,’ he asks? Who do you think, you addle-pated half-wit? Them two what lives in the flat behind mine. They been at it for three days now; day an’ night, night an’ day, like a couple of randy alley cats, window wide open an’ no curtains to speak of, right in my plain sight. I tol’ your useless younger brothers, Constables Jakon and Raik, to get ’em sorted two nights ago, an’ again last night. Yesterday I tol’ just-as-useless him beside you—don’t you roll your eyes at me, Corporal Aiden Dann—an’ now I’m tellin’ you, Sergeant. That’s four useless Dann boys told in three days. Who do I have to go to, your mother? Don’t think I won’t! I used to watch Gemmee in her cradle for her own Ma when she went to take her Egan’s supper to ’im at the Watchhouse years ago . . .”

  Hektor let the diatribe flow past him as he tried to think who she might be upset with. The two in the flat behind hers . . . “You mean Deem an’ Kiera?” he asked when she finally paused for breath.

  “Who’d you think I mean, her gran an’ granther?”

  “Well, Deem’s jus’ back from five months on the river. Kiera’s bound to be happy to see him. They’ll settle down after a day or two. They always do.”

  “It’s been a day or two. It’s been three. Happy’s one thing, causin’ a disturbance is somethin’ else. You get it sorted, Hektor Dann, or I will. I know what’s what around here.”

  “I’ll send a constable ’round to ask ’em to close their window as soon as I get to the watchhouse, all right?” Hektor glanced down at her basket with an innocent look. “New ribbons?”

  Her expression softened at once. “They are that. Haver’s back in town,” she declared, as if passing on a state secret. “’E got in late last night, an’ a course the gate guard let ’im in as ’e should ’ave, knowin’ Haver as ’e does. My Jez had a dram with him up to the Cooper’s Arms. Brought me home some lovely colors, all the way from the Sweet Grass Valley, with a little bottle of scented hand salve thrown in for good measure. An’ ’e picked up a bottle of hair tonic fer ’imself. Haver says it works wonders—takes years off a man. My Jez had a fine head of hair in his younger days. Lookin’ forward to runnin’ my fingers through it like I used to. Show them two back there what real lovemakin’ looks like.”

  Hector and Aiden made their escape before any more details were forthcoming, but if Jez Poll had spent the night at home instead of in a watchhouse cell, Haver really did have magical powers.

  They carried on their way until the next test, local iron merchant, Benj Granstil, stuck his head out the door of his shop and motioned them over with an imperious wave. Hektor and Aiden shared a conspiratorial smile as they crossed the street.

  Most of the businesses along Iron Street were as expected: small metalmongers selling anything from used hand tools to cutlery and nails from narrow shops with narrow closes between them leading to small workshops at the back used for limited repair work.

  Benj owned one of the larger establishments on the corner of Iron Street and Saddlers Row, with two display windows flanking a stout wooden door banded with iron strapping and a large, complete workshop and forge in the back. Consequently, he felt himself to be in a somewhat higher social class than his neighbors, with typical results: The local youths liked to hang about across the street from his shop, pretending to look menacing and generally annoying him on purpose.

  Today was no different. Two Bardic students lounged against the wall of a local wireworker’s shop, gitterns at their backs and equal expressions of crafted disinterest on their faces.

  “Master Granstil,” Hektor said formally—Benj had never been one for what he called frivolous familiarity.

  “See those young miscreants off at once, Sergeant Dann,” the merchant ordered without bothering to return his greeting. “They’re driving away business.”

  Of the belief that Benj was managing that all on his own, Hektor tried a conciliatory smile. “They’re jus’ waitin’ on Peggi an’ Sally,” he said. “You know they always walk ’em up to lessons this time of day.”

  “Miss Peggi and Miss Sally have already gone past with their new beaus,” Benj retorted. “Apparently they’ve had some kind of falling out. And I’m not surprised,” he added. “They’re always causing some embarrassing commotion or another. Last week it was at the Hart an’ Star, the week before that it was at the King’s Arms. Musicians, my Aunt Fanny, noisemakers and mischiefmongers is all they are. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were both in the employ of some petty criminal or another, paid to keep a look-out here.”

  “Oh, come on, Benj,” Aiden said, unable to keep the impatience from his tone. “You’ve known Ken since he were a little. He’s yer own cousin Marla’s boy. You made ’im ’is first whistle.”

  “Tell you what,” Hektor added before Benj could formulate a retort to this impertinent remark. “Why don’t we ask ’im to hie up to the market an’ fetch yer parcels down from Haver for you? Didn’t you tell us last spring you’d ordered up a new shawl for Missus Granstil all the way from Langenfield? ’E’ll have it unpacked by now, I expect. She wouldn’t have to wait for it ’til after shop hours that way. How ’bout that?”

  Benj eyed him with suspicion, but he unbent enough to nod stiffly. “Very well. I have some ointments I have to pick up myself later; I’ll not entrust him with the money for those, Marla’s boy notwithstanding,” he added, glaring at Aiden. “But if Haver trusts him enough to give him the shawl, he can bring it around back. I’ve already paid for that.”

  He stomped back into his shop and would have slammed the door if it hadn’t been made so well that it only swished shut behind him with the sound of well-oiled hinges. Hektor and Aiden shook their heads, then crossed the street to where the two youths were already bristling with innocent indignation.

  “We’re not doin’ anythin’ illegal, Hek,” the older one said at once.

  “I know, Ken, but how’s about you do us a favor an’ go do it somewheres else?”

  “What’s in it for us, eh?”

  “I’ll put in a good word for you with Jakon and Raik tonight.” Hector cocked his head to one side. “’S it true about Peggi an’ Sally? I don’t need the particulars,” he continued as both youths deflated, “but look, Haver’s back in town, yeah? An’ he’s usually got a whole whack of gittern strings an’ tunin’ forks an’ the like. Why don’t you get on up to the market an’ buy Peggi an’ Sally a few musical trinkets or a bottle of scent an’ then apologize to ’em for what ever you said or didn’t say.”

  The youths brighten
ed. “That’d work, yeah,” Ken agreed. “Peggi always needs new strings.”

  “Right, an’ while yer at it, bring Benj’s parcel back for ’im, will you? Mind, it’s for Ruby,” Hektor added sternly as Ken’s expression took a mischievous turn, “so don’t dally. The sooner he gets it given it to her, the sooner we’ll have peace back on the street.”

  “That was easy,” Aiden noted as the two youths hurried off.

  “It was,” Hektor agreed. “Thanks to Haver, I think it’s gonna be a good day.”

  “You are optimistic, but I think I might just agree with you.”

  • • •

  The mood at the watchhouse, however, was somber. Night Sergeant Jons gave Hektor a warning look from under his bushy eyebrows.

  “The Captain has a visitor in from foreign parts,” he said, jerking his head toward their commander’s closed door. “Neither of ’em seemed particularly happy this mornin’.”

  “Visitor?”

  Jons shrugged. “’Bout his age. Military bearing. We weren’t introduced. Stop bouncin’ about like you’ve got to pee, Runner.” Sergeant Jons turned a jaundiced eye on Padreic, who’d come up behind them, almost vibrating with excitement. When the boy made some effort to stand still, Jons nodded. “That’s better. Now then, is there some piece of information you’d like to add to our discussion?”

  “’E’s a cap’n from the Lower Devin garrison,” Padreic blurted out at once. “Name’s Willan Elbert. Old friend of our Cap’n Torell from way back. He’s stayin’ with ’im for a fortnight or two, on account of him just been retired an’ his wife dyin’ last year. ’E might be stayin’ here permanent. They took a tour of the street first thing and came in wi’ faces like thunder. Somethin’ about the market.”

  “There’s been no official report on a problem at the market. Still . . .” Jons and Hektor exchanged a look. Padreic’s fountain of knowledge and gossip was already legendary. No one quite knew where or how he got his information, but he was unfailingly accurate.

  “Best get up there an’ scout around, Paddy,” Hektor said.