Dream of Me/Believe in Me

area, until within minutes he was back on the forest trail and trotting north. Half a mile on, where the road forked, he moved left unerringly.
    “Good dog,” Thorgold said and whistled him back up into the saddle.
    “How did you know about the clearing?” Thorgold asked as they rode on.
    “I've used it myself,” Hawk replied. “Just beyond are rapids. You either portage around them or go on by horse. It's the second of the main routes into Mercia. I thought there were too many of them fleeing court to go this way and it seems most didn't. But Udell had other ideas.”
    His face was grim as he spoke. They had ridden relentlessly since earliest day. It was now afternoon but no hint of fatigue marked the Hawk or any of his men. Nor could they afford to let any creep over them. Udell had far too great a lead. To catch him they would have to press themselves to the limits of endurance and beyond. Or they would have to get very lucky.
    The dog was luck, Hawk thought. Without him, they would not have known for certain that they were on the right road and they could not afford to go wrong again. But it would take more. Much more.
    They continued on upriver. Long ago, when his life had seemed to consist of nothing but battles, Hawk had learned the trick of falling into a watchful reverie. It allowed his weary mind and body some measure of rest while keeping him alert to danger. Now he sought that state purely for release from the anguish that had tormented him from the moment he learned that Krysta was in Udell's hands, but he did not find it.
    A thousand times he berated himself for not anticipating what the Mercian might do. He had been too confident of being able to defeat Udell, too certain the traitor would fall neatly into the trap set for him. And perhaps hewould have if Krysta had not been at court to draw his eye and spark his rage. She should have been left safe at home in Hawkforte, even if he'd had to keep her locked up to do it. But no, he had put his own belief that confronted by king and court she would give up any notion of rejecting their betrothal above all other regard.
    And now she could die.
    He inhaled sharply, stabbed through by a thought more painful than any blow he had ever taken in his life of battles. He could not lose her! By God, he could not! Please God, he would do anything, bargain with anything, promise anything.
    Hawk had rarely prayed. He saw little point in it since it was not his observation that God favored any side in battle. He had seen men he would have given his life for die in an instant while others escaped death time and time again. His own continued life he credited to his skill, to luck, and to whatever fate might have planned for him. He found some pleasure in the mass, if only for the brief respite it offered from worldly concerns, but he did not consider the recitation of prayers to be prayer itself.
    Now he prayed as he had not known he could do, prayed with all his heart and soul while the long miles passed and time inched by. If God would spare her, he would do anything, even give her up if that was what was needed. He could live without her, however barren that life would be, if only he knew she yet lived somewhere in the world. To imagine a world without Krysta was more than he could bear.
    The dog barked.
    Hawk returned from his bleak reverie to see Thorgold struggling to contain the animal, who was trying to leap out of the saddle. “Something's spooked him,” Thorgold said. He gave up trying to hold the dog and let him down.
    Barely had he done so than the animal began rushing in circles, seeking a scent.
    Hope flared in Hawk. Mayhap they were closer than he had thought. If something had happened to delay Udell—
    The dog continued in circles, nose to the ground, but without success. He grew increasingly agitated as he failed to find what he sought. Thorgold dismounted and went to him. “What's the trouble, boy?”
    The dog lifted his head and whined softly. His tail drooped.
    “Have we lost him?” Hawk asked. He could not imagine how. Udell would have no greater goal than to reach Mercia and his stronghold. Leaving the road would slow him down tremendously, and he could not return to the river because he had left his boat below the rapids. Unless he had arranged for another boat, but there was no sign of that, no clearing where boats could be brought ashore, no indication of horses milling about as riders dismounted.
    “Nay,” Thorgold said, “he's