Lupi 04 - Night Season

without a word.
    Nathan looked down at the injured woman. “You may tell me how you knew me, now. And your name.”
    â€œI shouldn’t have said anything about recognizing you.” She was bitter. “My brains are addled from the blow.”
    â€œBut you did speak of it,” Nathan said gently. “Your name? You may give me a call-name, if you wish.”
    â€œI am called Tash.”
    â€œAnd you recognized me because—?”
    At first it seemed she might not answer, but finally she gave a small sigh. “I’ve a bit of a healing Gift, nothing major, but it lets me sense bodies directly…I saw the Hunt once, you see.”
    â€œAh.” Nathan nodded. “I’m afraid I must make sure you don’t speak of this.” He bent and reached for her head with both hands.

THIRTY
    T HE Ahk were beyond hardy. They were machines, Cynna concluded, every muscle in her body protesting the need to stay in the saddle. Stupid, bloody, barbarian cyborgs.
    It was Cynna’s third solid “day” of riding up winding mountain trails, and the first when the snow hadn’t stopped. Her poor horse wasn’t happy, either. It had to be a bitch, climbing up this miserable excuse for a trail where the snow was several inches deep in places.
    The mountain trail coincided with the one only she could sense. But she hadn’t told her captors that. Chulak—the big son of a bitch who led them—had told her scornfully that he did not need her to tell him where an intruder had crossed Ahk land. He could follow that trail himself. She would be needed, he said, only after they left the mountains.
    Before they’d reached those mountains, Wen had ridden off in the other direction. She still didn’t know why he’d done it. Money or wealth of some sort, she gathered; Chulak had said something to him about his payment. But what payment could have made him betray so many? His own people would hunt him down if they found out. The Ekiba’s wandering existence was possible because of their neutrality.
    Maybe he hadn’t seen it as betrayal. She’d learned that the Ekiba were the only exception to the “no outsiders” rule about Ahk land, and Wen had served as one of the Ekiba communicators in these mountains several years ago. He’d lived with them; maybe his loyalties had shifted.
    Probably she’d never know. But she’d liked him, dammit. She’d liked him.
    No one had died since they left the village, at least. Cynna reminded herself of that, hunting for something to lift her spirits from dead zero. And Cullen had gotten safely away, even if that hadn’t been what he meant to do…and even if she wished fiercely that he were here with her. Stupid thing to wish, since the Ahk were determined to kill them all slowly, from exhaustion.
    She flexed her fingers on the reins, trying to get some feeling back. They’d given her mittens, even a furry cloak with a hood, but the higher they climbed, the colder it got. Even Chicago wasn’t this cold…though admittedly she’d never tried riding through that city on horseback for hours in the middle of snowstorm.
    At least she was uninjured. Cynna gripped the horse’s barrel as firmly as she could with her aching legs and twisted to look behind her.
    Through the snow she saw the dark horse of the Ahk behind her, the one riding double so he could support Daniel Weaver. Daniel had woken from his concussion soon after they left the village, but the damned Ahk wouldn’t stop. Daniel had thrown up twice that first day and been unable to eat before the sleep period last night.
    The next morning, though, the Ahk who doubled as healer had done something for him. His face was still the color of freshly churned slush on a city street, but he no longer threw up.
    He smiled at her now, trying to reassure her. Cynna stretched her lips in the best smile she could manage, and faced front again.
    Ahead of her was a horse’s rump, partly covered by the fur cloak of the Ahk riding it. Not much of a view, no distraction at all when her mind wanted to cruise back over everything that had happened, dipping into horror like it was a loose tooth, picking at the places where she might have done things differently. As if that could change anything.
    The horse’s rump rounded a curve of rock and vanished.
    That wasn’t especially interesting, since she’d seen it happen dozens of