Owlknight

parties come farther south every moon; they take everything of value, male children less than five, widows and unmated females of breeding age. If a tribe dares to resist, they cripple the warriors after they have won.”

“Ah, but first they come all smiles, and offer alliance - or rather, encourage their servitude to Wolverine - ” the Shaman interjected. “It is only if the tribe fights that they raid.”

Keisha was too tired to feel anything for herself, and too protected behind her walls to feel what the others felt, but the tension and concern beat against her protections and would flood her if she let it.

“Oh, but alliance means to surrender half of the provisions and goods, and all of the unmated females, and all boys down to the toddlers!” the Chief scoffed. “I do not call that generous!”

“They have not found us yet,” the Shaman confided to Keisha. “That is why we are unmolested. Our valley hides us well.”

She nodded; she had not seen the mouth of the valley until they were practically inside it.

“Your sentries are to be given credit, too, I would think,” Wintersky observed. Steelmind nodded, even as he frowned, and Shandi spoke up.

“It isn’t just your location or your sentries, is it?” she asked, and looked directly at the Shaman. “You are - concealing. Yow are hiding the tribe, Honored One, using your powers. Aren’t you?”

“Not I - the Snow Fox hides us, as he himself hides in winter,” the Shaman protested, but he looked pleased. Darian raised his eyebrow at Shandi and smiled at the Shaman in a conspiratorial fashion. The Shaman gave Darian the same smile - Mage to Mage, exchanging the compliment of recognizing each other’s handiwork.

“I do what little I can,” the Shaman said modestly. “But too much done to hide our people would reveal, rather than conceal them. Wolverine has a Shaman, too, whose power is of the Eclipse, and he will see the use of power should I overstep myself.”

“That’s why the hunting parties are on their own.” Darian made it a statement. He sighed. “I can’t think of any way of concealing them that wouldn’t betray them just as readily; you are perfectly right to be cautious.”

“Our skill will conceal us,” the chief hunter spoke up, with all the arrogant certainty of someone who has never met with failure - yet. “We can outwit any Wolverine scout.”

This time it was the Chief who exchanged a raised eyebrow with Darian. For all Darian’s apparent relative youth, it was clear that the Chief of Snow Fox realized he had a great deal of experience, and Keisha hid her own smile of pride.

“Why is it that you have no Wisewoman of your own?” Shandi asked, knowing now, after seeing so many other tribes, that when the Shaman was not a healer, his work was generally supplemented by a Wisewoman.

“She went to the ancestors before she could find a successor,” the Shaman told her, sighing heavily. “That was many years ago. My pupil has the healing touch, and there is another boy who I will train in my own work when he comes to his manhood trial, but it is not fit that I seek out a girl-child to become a Wisewoman. In other times, the Wisewoman of one of our allies would have found and trained such a girl, but we have had little contact with our friends since Wolverine began raiding. We have not had the great Midsummer Gathering for two years.”

Even as tired as she was, Keisha knew that was a very bad sign; even at the height of the mage-storms, the Midsummer Gatherings had taken place. They were the only time that all the tribes came together under a truce banner; a time for trading, finding mates in other tribes, exchanging information, making alliances. If they had not been held for two years, none of these things were happening, and the peaceful tribes were becoming more and more isolated from each other.

He looked hopefully at Keisha, who grimaced. “We have another task,” she said reluctantly. “It has been put upon us by both the Ghost Cat and the Raven spirits that we seek the Raven tribe.” She did not say why, but no one would ask if she did not volunteer the information. It would be assumed that it was private business between her people and the spirits.

The Shaman’s face fell; he had probably been hoping that she had been sent for the benefit of Snow Fox alone, and would remain until both his apprentice and a new Wisewoman had been chosen and trained. Keisha felt badly for him, and added, “I will do all I can to leave you with all that Snow Fox needs.”

Not that I have any idea how to do that, she added to herself. Healing isn’t like a language that can be dumped entire into someone’s head by a dyheli -

Or - was it? Could Neta extract everything that Keisha knew about Healing and deposit it in the minds of the young apprentice and anyone else who needed to have it? And if she could - would it be more dangerous to do that than leave them on their own? Having so much information dumped into his mind at once might drive the poor apprentice mad . . . unless there was a way to keep it out of his conscious mind until he needed it. I don’t know. There has to be some terrible price hidden in it somewhere. Inventive or not, it seems too easy somehow. In this world, we sometimes get lucky, but we never get things easy.

The best creature to ask would be Neta herself - arid that would have to wait for morning. Now she was sleepy, and a warm fire and full stomach were contributing to that; for the moment, it didn’t matter how much anxiety the rest of them felt, it couldn’t penetrate to keep her awake. She wasn’t the only