piss. Rain fell in heavy drops from the branches overhead, splattering her hair and shoulders, which were near bare. She was only dressed in her linen undertunic. Following the slaying of the woodstalker and Aerax’s sweet vow, she had a vague memory of bathing in a freezing stream, then washing every piece of her clothing from her boots to her cloak. Little beyond that could she recall, though much must have been happening around her.
She and Aerax were not the only ones in the camp. All the Parsatheans seemed to be, and Lady Junica’s tent. She quickly washed and returned to the clearing—which seemed nowhere near where she’d left her horse, though she had no memory of riding.
Out of the shadows came one of the Parsatheans on watch. Seri, who’d spoken little to Lizzan since the night she’d taken the corpse vine. Now she carried a small clay pot that had been kept warm by the fire but not too hot to hold, and the meaty scent wafting from it made Lizzan’s stomach roar its neglect.
“Ardyl saved this for you,” the girl whispered.
“I thank you.” She glanced at the sky, found the faint glow of the moon through the clouds. Near dawn. “You are on second watch?”
Seri nodded.
Then she had slept a half day. “You did not stay at the inn?”
In the faint glow from the fire, she saw the girl’s fierce frown. “After they chased one of our number away? Never would we.”
A hot lump filled Lizzan’s throat. She had not thought that they considered her one of their number.
“And we took the heads of the woodstalkers back to the village, and told them who killed those monsters.”
Not much difference would it make. Still they would believe Lizzan was the reason the woodstalkers had come to their forest. Yet sweet pressure built in her chest that the attempt had been made.
The girl hesitated slightly before adding, “It is said you leapt in front of the woman who threw an axe at your back.”
“I did.”
“Why?”
“She’d lost her child. And she was afraid. So many people are,” Lizzan said. “And they need someone to blame so they don’t feel so helpless. So you may be right when you say that this will be an alliance born of fear. But when all those who are terrified come to understand that something is truly being done, and that they aren’t helpless anymore . . . perhaps the fear will turn to hope.”
For a long moment, Seri said nothing. Then, “You should not have fought the woodstalkers alone. We would have helped you.”
Lizzan hadn’t been alone. Caeb had come—and then Aerax. But she understood that this was something near to an apology. “Next time I will ask you to fight with me.”
“I would like that,” the girl said, then drew a line from her throat down to the center of her chest. “The beast’s talons would have hung down to here.”
“A fine trophy,” Lizzan agreed dryly, eyeing the shorter claws on her necklace and the girl’s bare chest. “Until it stabs your tit.”
Seri grinned, then broke into a laugh as Lizzan’s stomach roared again, and handed over the clay pot. Carrying her supper, Lizzan headed for the tent, ducking to crawl inside where the heat generated by Aerax and Caeb warmed the air. There Lizzan sat hunched over beneath the falt pelt, slowly spooning up the thick stew.
Aerax’s voice was a low rumble through the dark. “When you have eaten your fill, then I will eat mine.”
Sudden heat unfurled through her belly. A flush spread across her skin, leaving her hot and shaking as she took another bite.
Swallowing hard, she whispered, “So we are not strangers again?”
“Does it matter?”
Not when she recalled his voice in her ear, telling her of all the things strangers did in the dark. When I covered your body with mine, you would not see my face. You would only feel me deep inside.
He would not be inside her this night. Not in the way she craved.
Yet she would take all that he gave.
His big hand curved over her knee, gently squeezing. “I will be whatever you wish me to be, Lizzan. But know this—I will never let you fulfill your quest.”
Heavily she sighed. “I do not truly know if I have a quest.”
He came up onto his elbow, the shadows of his face deepening into a frown. “What do you mean by that?”
“Exactly as I say.” She scraped the spoon around the bottom of the pot. “When I went