once.
Tal would not let them change the subject. 'Quickly had no right to tell you.'
'It's not as if we wouldn't have figured it out. You're missing only when the moon is full, and you're always missing when the moon is full. There's one coming up soon, isn't there? I can tell, because you're always cranky a few days before.'
'You don't know what you're talking about,' growled Tal. 'I thought you were my friends.'
'We are your friends,' said Ennis. The big man's voice cracked, and he looked near to crying. His childlike fear of confrontation made the other players teasingly call him Quickly's Puppy. 'Come on, Tal,' he pleaded. 'You know you can trust everyone here. We're like family.'
Tal choked on his reply.
'Maybe not the best analogy you could have picked,' said Chaney, grimacing.
'What are you children carrying on about?' Quickly emerged from one of the trapdoors to the Abyss below the stage. She held a bulging sack in both hands while clamping her pipe between her teeth. 'If you've got so much energy, you can help repaint the rest of these masks.'
All eyes turned to Quickly, then back to Tal to see how he'd react. He crushed the wolf's head mask in his hands and flung the fragments on the floor at Quickly's feet.
The pipe fell from Quickly's mouth, and she let the sack of masks slip through her hands onto the stage floor. 'Tal…' she began.
Tal whipped around and stalked off the stage. He had thrown open the back door by the time Chaney caught up with him. He let the little man through before slamming the door behind them.
Chaney took one look at Tal's face and shut his mouth tight. They walked quickly and in silence for several blocks before Tal cooled off enough to speak.
'I might as well go to Stormweather and get it over with.'
'You want me to come along?' asked Chaney.
'No, there's no telling how long Thamalon will want to bellow at me this time. Besides, you annoy him.'
'Want to meet up later? I'll fetch Feena, and we…'
'No!' said Tal. 'The day's been bad enough without another lecture.'
'What makes you think she'll lecture you? Maybe she can-'
'Dark and empty, I said no!'
'Take it easy, Tal. It's me. I'm just trying to help.'
'You can help by leaving me alone,' snapped Tal.
'Sure, sure,' said Chaney, holding up his hands and retreating. 'Whatever you say.'
Tal seethed, furious at… he didn't know what. Tha-malon, Quickly, Rusk, maybe-or himself. By the time he realized he owed Chaney an apology, his friend was gone. After all of the day's reversals, he hoped at least that Chaney would remain his friend.
Tal pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. Then he turned west and headed to Stormweather alone.
Chapter 11
Summer, 1371 DR
Darrow did not escape the People of the Black Blood. He had run less than five miles from the lodge before the wolves dragged him to the ground. In the panic that seized him upon first seeing his pursuers, he dropped his useless sword and begged for his life. His screams for mercy did nothing to save him from the ripping claws of the werewolves. Nor did his blubbering pleas stop the hungry mouths from feasting on his body. Only as his lifeblood seeped into the soft ground of the Arch Wood did salvation arrive.
It came in the form of a silver wolf. The three-legged beast chased the other predators from the kill, then sat beside Darrow's dying body and looked down into his face. As Barrow looked up at the big wolf, it shifted back into the form of Rusk, the Huntmaster.
'The Hunt is over,' he declared. Then with a chant to Malar, he pressed his burning hands on Barrow's gaping wounds and sealed them. He cast spell after spell, until at last Darrow could breathe.
'Why?' Darrow whispered 'Why did you save me?' Rusk chuckled deep in his chest. 'Because I have use for you.'
During his first month among the People of the Black Blood, Darrow was everyone's servant. He fetched wood and water, cleared the fanged circle, and scraped the hides of deer and boars for crude tanning. If someone told him to do a task, he made himself useful.
At night he huddled in a corner of the lodge while most of the pack roamed their territory. A simple smoke hole served as a chimney for the fire pit, which was flanked by two rows of rough-hewn timbers supporting the sod roof. Various pack members had carved their names or marks in the wood over the years. Others with some talent had engraved scenes of humans and wolves hunting together. One depicted a passionate embrace between a dire wolf and a woman. Darrow found the image at once revolting and compelling.
The Huntmaster's inner sanctum was divided from the rest by an old tapestry depicting scenes of wolves and humans hunting and living together as an antlered god held his cloak to form the night sky above them. Even when Rusk was away, Darrow did not dare part the fabric to peer inside.
When the werewolves returned to sleep away the daylight, Darrow went outside to perform his chores alone. He hated the smell of the lodge when the pack was there. The smoke stung his eyes, and the odor of so many dirty bodies reminded him of his father's pigsty. Even as a boy he knew he wanted nothing to do with farm life, and this was far worse. He was living among monsters.
Soon he learned that he had become one of them.
After his first transformation, Darrow was sick for days. He remembered little of what occurred those three nights, but the days were full of exhausted cramps and bloody retching. No one tended to him in his misery, not even Rusk, who had saved his life. He was too afraid to ask questions, and no one offered any answers.
'At least I'm still alive,' he told himself. But he did not know why or for how long.
A few days after his change, Rusk answered one of those questions. He led Darrow a short distance from the lodge, where they sat on a grassy knoll.
'Tell me about the Malveens,' he said.
Darrow nodded, eager to be useful. 'What would you like to know?'
'Everything,' said Rusk. 'Start with what they want with Talbot Uskevren.'
Despite Rusk's interest in Darrow, the other werewolves did not accept him as one of their own. Even as the days grew long and the nights warm, the pack spoke to him when necessary, but never in anything approaching the rough camaraderie they enjoyed among themselves. They were a community unto themselves, albeit a savage one. Among the men and women were a few children. They frightened Darrow more than any others, for they had never known a life apart from the Hunt. How much more monstrous than their parents would they become?
'What do you and Rusk talk about?' asked Sorcia one day.
Rusk had not forbidden him to tell, but Darrow sensed it was best not to reveal too much. 'The city,' he said.
Sorcia must have detected his reluctance, for she let the subject drop. 'Rusk usually leads us throughout the forest this time of year,' she said, 'but now all he does is talk with you and pore over those scrolls. What's in them, I wonder?'
'I wouldn't know,' said Darrow.
