Your battle was from death to life no less than Ash's is now; would you deny it? But you have not accepted your own gift to yourself, your gift of your own life. Ash is looking forward to running through meadows again; can you not give yourself leave to run through meadows too?'
Lissar woke, finding herself crying, and finding Ash, rolled up on her belly from her side, where she had lain for so many hopeless days, feebly licking the hands where the tears fell.
PART THREE
THIRTY-FOUR
SPRING
BEGAN
TO
COME
QUICKLY
AFTER
THAT.
SOMETHING-several somethings-discovered the half-thawed remains of the toro one night; Lissar, who still slept lightly, woke up to hear a growling argument going on outdoors. The puppies were all awake, ears cocked, but none of them showed any desire to go to the door and ask to be let out. The next day, amid the bits of fresh fur and blood, Lissar dismembered what remained of their kill, and hung it from a few branches at the edge of the forest.
Pur's flank was healed; Harefoot's leg Lissar left in its splint perhaps longer than necessary, in fear of further accidents. When Harefoot ran, more so even than usual with fleethounds, it was as if some sixth or seventh sense took over, and she became nothing but the fact of running. Lissar's belief in her had come true for all to see when the kennel staff had set up an informal match-race between her and Whiplash, considered the fastest fleethound in the prince's kennels. And Harefoot, only seven months old, had won. Lissar remembered how the blood vessels had stood out in her neck and upon her skull, and how wild her eyes had looked, and how long it had taken her to settle down again-how slow she had been to respond to her own name-after this. She would not take care of herself--could not be trusted to take care of herself-so Lissar would take extra care of her. The leg was setting straight; but Lissar wondered if it would ever be quite as strong as it was before, if Harefoot might have lost that edge of swiftness she had been born with. She remembered Ossin's comment on racing: a waste of a good hunting dog, and she tried not to mourn; but she wondered how it would look to Harefoot.
This year there was a new urgency to her preparations to leave, to the impatience that spring infected her with. The year before she had known it was time to leave, time to do ... something; her pulse was springing like sap, and she could not be still.
But this year there was a strange, anxious kind of compulsion, an uncomfortable haste, nothing like the calm delight of the Lady's peace last year. Some of the discomfort too was because Ash was regaining her strength only slowly. Lissar wanted to believe that she was anxious about this only because she wished to be on her way; but she knew it was more that it troubled her to see Ash still so weak and slow and unlike herself. If Harefoot might have lost just the least fraction of her extraordinary speed to a broken leg, what debt might Ash have paid to recover from a mortal wound in the belly?
Days passed and became weeks. Lissar, half-mad now with restlessness, had even cleaned the eaves and patched the shutters, making do with what tools she had and what guesses she could make about a carpenter's skills. Her own slowness was perhaps a boon, for it gave her that much more occupation, doing things wrong before she got them somewhat right. As she had spent two winters in this small house, she thought, as she missed the shutter entirely on a misguided swing with her hammer and narrowly avoided receiving the shutter in her gut as a result, she perhaps owed it some outside work as well as inside. It was a pity, though, that mending roof-holes required more skill than scrubbing a floor.
Every sunny day Ash spent lying asleep, dead center in the meadow; the puppies played or slept or wandered. Lissar had salted the rest of the toro meat-the gamy flavor was somehow more bearable when it was so salty it made the back of her tongue hurt-so she did not take them hunting. They were all badly unfit after the long weeks' inactivity, and she did not want to distress Ash by leaving her behind, nor tax her by trying to bring her along.
The first wild greens appeared; with double handsful of the bitterest young herbs, the toro meat became almost palatable, although she noticed the puppies inexplicably preferred it plain.
The first day she caught an unwary rabbit with one of her throwing-stones, she permitted herself to have the lion's share of the sweet, fresh meat, which she ate outdoors, so that she did not have to be distracted by the smell of the puppies'
dinner.
All the dogs were shedding; when she brushed them, short-haired even as they were, the hair flew in clouds, and made everyone sneeze. This occupation was performed exclusively out-of-doors, and downwind of the hut. It took about a sennight for Lissar to realize one circumstance of one spring coat: Ash's long hair was falling out. It was hard to notice at first, because she was in such poor condition, and her fur stuck out or was matted in any and every direction; Lissar had sawn some of the worst knots off with her knife, so poor Ash already looked ragged.
But as the long fur came out in handsful the new, silky, gleaming coat beneath it was revealed ... as close and short and fine as any other fleethound's. The scar, still red, and crooked from too few stitches, glared angrily through; but Ash was recovering herself with her health, and when she stood to attention, her head high and her ears pricked, Lissar thought her as beautiful as any dog ever whelped. And, what pleased Lissar even more, as she began, hesitantly, in tiny spurts, to run and leap again, she ran sound on all four legs, and stretched and twisted and bounded like her old self.
They began sleeping outdoors as soon as the ground was dry enough not to soak through Lissar's leather cloak and a blanket om top-Ash must not take a chill. Lissar watched Ash's progress hungrily, still fearing some unknown complication, still in shock from having believed she might lose her, still not believing her luck and Ash's determination to stay alive, still reliving in nightmare the fateful, unknowing opening of the door, seeing Ash streaking across the snow toward the toro, ignoring Lissar's attempt to call her back-and knowing, as she had not known at the time, how it would end.
