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He had always thought the ache was akin to the dull throb his father sometimes complained of in the stumps of his severed fingers. Or the twinges his mam got when the joint-ill stiffened her hands and made it hard for her to mix her healing brews.
    Everyone had wounds—of the body and the spirit. Some were just slower to heal than others.
    And some never heal.
    Because concern etched deeper lines in his father’s face and because he trusted him more than anyone in the world, Keirith said, “It’s hard. Harder than I expected. To give it up. The way you felt, I suppose, when you stopped being a hunter.”
    â€œThen talk to Gortin. Get him to release you from your oath.”
    â€œWhat I did was forbidden. Have you forgotten that?”
    â€œNay. Nor have I forgotten that I lost fifteen years of my life trying to be something I wasn’t. Gortin knows you would never use the power to hurt any creature.”
    He thought of Xevhan whom he had killed. And Urkiat whose death he had caused, even if it had been his father’s hand that drove the dagger home. Flying with the eagle was a pleasure he didn’t deserve.
    Faint shouts from the village saved him from answering. With a muttered curse, his father pushed himself to his feet, ignoring the hand Keirith thrust out to help him.
    As they started down the slope, Keirith said, “It can’t be strangers. The sentinels would have blown their horns. . . .”
    He glanced over his shoulder and found his father standing perfectly still, one fist pressed against his chest and a distant expression on his face, as if he were listening to voices only he could hear.
    â€œFa?”
    â€œI just got up too quickly.” His father took a careful breath, then smiled. “You can let go of my arm now. Before you twist it off.”
    Keirith relaxed his fingers, but kept a grip on his father’s arm as they made their way down the slope. As they started up the rise to the hill fort, his father’s breathing grew labored, but when they neared the top, he fell into the long, loose-limbed stride his mam liked to compare to a wolf on the prowl. Keirith thought of it as his “chief’s gait”—purposeful and calm. Combined with his height, it gave him an air of authority few would contest. At another moment, he might have teased his father, but now he simply doubled his pace to keep up.
    â€œDon’t tell your mother,” his father said quietly. Without waiting for him to agree, he strode through the narrow break in the earthworks and into the village.
    The crowd was already drifting away, old folk shaking their heads and muttering, mothers shooing children into their huts for supper. When Keirith saw his brother’s bright red hair, he suppressed a groan.
    Clearly, the dispute had something to do with the doe lying on the ground before Gortin and Nemek. Two arrows protruded from her side. Their owners glared at each other. Mam dabbed Rigat’s nose with a blood-spattered cloth, while Madig, Rothisar, and Jadan stood behind Seg, shoulder to broad shoulder. The three hunters were so inseparable that Faelia had once speculated sourly that they probably pissed in unison.
    His father surveyed the scene dispassionately. “What happened here?”
    Although he had addressed his question to Gortin, Madig stepped forward to stand at Seg’s side. “Just a quarrel over which of them has the right to claim the kill. Nothing to concern yourself with. Alder-Chief.”
    The hesitation was just long enough to be noticeable. Madig had been chief of his tribe, and although he served on the council of elders, it still stung him that the title belonged to another.
    Keirith’s father eyed the two arrows. “Neither shot would have been a clean kill. But you don’t need me to tell you that.”
    â€œNay.”
    â€œSo why was there a quarrel?”
    â€œWe were hunting together,” Rothisar said, then