"What are they?" Baru's question was so faint it was little more than a warm ragged breath in Theris' ear as they crouched in the brush.

Theris eyed the squat shapes wrestling in the thicket below them. "I don't know."

Having crisscrossed the blighted lands, Theris had directed the Hunt further southwards into green fields. Skirting the southern villages, they spied on the inhabitants from the edge of the wilderness, searching for any sign of Theris' wife and daughters. The wild spaces in the hills and valleys between the villages were not empty, however. Strange, almost human-like creatures were hiding there as well.

They were squat creatures covered in short, dull brown, black and greenish fur. They waddled around on two legs like drunk old men, had broad stubby hands and feet, skinny arms and legs, and pig-like faces. The Hunt watched a group of the creatures fight over bloody strips of food from behind a hill.

"Do we hunt them?" Baru sucked up a bit of drool that had escaped his lips.

The men were starving, Theris knew. They were always starving. "Are they beasts or men?" He asked. "And if they're men, are they guilty or innocent?" They watched a moment longer in silence, except for the growl of Baru's stomach.

The creatures struggled with a piece of carcass, grunting and yanking it back and forth between them. Dragging each other around, they kicked up old bones, scattering ribs and vertebrae in every direction. A small round skull bounced away. It was a human child's skull.

Theris clutched his sword. "Guilty." He rose and charged screaming down the hill.

<====|==|====>

"Don't let me be buried in a foreign land."

After all these years, despite carrying his stiffening corpse across the miles between Nur and the Pelah valley, Bazma's dying face still haunted Macander. Now, some twelve years later, despite a vow to never again take up the spear, he was retracing that path and going back on his vow.

"Adra! Carry me!"

With an indulgent sigh, Macander stooped and knelt while Reavkin climbed onto his shoulders. Tokarha, holding the baby, smiled down from the back of the donkey with a mix of optimism and worry. The donkey ignored him and kept walking. Macander rose, staggering under Reavkin's weight and used his spear as a walking stick, shoving its sharp tip in the ground as he propped himself up. Amantis would have screamed at him for that in training. Right now, he didn't care. He angrily jabbed it at the ground as he followed the path northward. He'd have to sharpen it when he got to Har-Tor anyway.

Though Macander was in no hurry to return to Har-Tor, the mountain city seemed to rise up all too quickly before him. He guided the donkey toward the collection of tents at the mountain's base which comprised the military encampment, looking for someone who appeared to be in charge. A group of men in a nearby field were training with spears while a daikon yelled at them.

Macander interrupted him between tirades. "Where is your tacarch?"

The daikon, caught in mid-breath, turned his scowl on Macander. Whatever he was about to stay stuck in his throat. With an expression of wonder he slowly pointed at a large tent near the camp's central fire.

"Thank you." Macander gave him a nod and led the donkey away.

"Who's he?" One of the recruits behind him asked.

"More of a reaver than you'll ever be," the daikon snarled and began shouting at the recruits. "Get back to work!"

"That was odd." Tokarha looked back over her shoulder at the staring reavers. "What was he going on about?"

Macander shrugged. "Who knows?" He hoped she would forget about it.

They stopped outside the large tent and Macander pulled back a flap. Inside, a group of men sat in a circle talking and drinking. One man, sitting near the entrance, looked back with a startled squint into the sudden light. "Who are you? This is a closed meeting."

Macander poked his head into the tent. Reavkin, sitting on his shoulders, giggled as the tent flap landed on his head. "I'm looking for Karux. Do any of you know where he is?"

"He's gone down south. Recruiting."

"Void take it! I just came from there."

"I doubt it. He's south of the blight."

"Is there a south of the blight?"

"Mac? Is that you?" A man in the back put down his bowl and rose. "It's me, Tephra."

"Tephra?"

Tephra rushed forward and caught Macander in an awkward hug.

"I've hardly seen you since the battle of the vale," Macander said. "I thought you went back to herding."

"I did, for a time, but I guess I wasn't very good at it. Karux talked me into coming back and leading his tireavs."

Macander chuckled. "Yes. He can be persistent. He's been after me for years."

"Is that why you're here? Have you decided to return and lead a tireav of your own?"

"Sort of. I was hoping to borrow a tireav and take them south. We've been having some trouble with Nur lately."

"Nur, eh? I knew we weren't finished with them." Tephra slapped Macander on the shoulder. "You're in luck, though. Karux has decided we need to increase the number of spears we keep on hand. We've got another tireav returning from the dwerka within the fortnight that will need a tacarch. They're yours if you want them."

"Is Karux going to mind you giving his spears away like that?"

"Were it anyone else, yes. But for you, he would give over every spear he has."

Reavkin, who had been playing with Macander's hair in apparent boredom, suddenly grabbed Macander's ears and began lurching back and forth. Tephra smiled. "Let me help you hunt down Har-Tor's chief steward and get some rooms for you and your family." He stepped out of the tent and led the way back to Har-tor.

As they turned the donkey around, Macander heard one of the Tacarch's ask. "Who's he?"

"You know the dwerkan word for warrior? Maccari?" another Tacarch asked.

"Yeah."

"They took it from his name."

<====|==|====>

Karux dreamed he stood on Amantis' false mountain. Dark gray clouds swirled overhead in heavy turbid swells. Thick fog shrouded the dead city below so that Karux stood in a shadowed, undefined space. Karux looked up, hoping to see a gleam from the woman of light, yet guiltily fearing her arrival. He told himself that changing Labrose's mind had been necessary, that it had been the best for everyone concerned, yet Netac's objections still stung with the poison of truth. For the first time since he fell from the sacred mountain, he was unsure of his way.

"It is an unfortunate truth, that in any conflict, the most aggressive one sets the terms of the contest."

Karux whirled about and her radiance nearly blinded him. She smiled, love and joy curving a perfect cheek while a whisper of concern shadowed her brow. Her dress fluttered around her like tongues of white flame, yet he knew that the light was not her substance. The real woman was somewhere else. This skin of light stretched across personality merely made her invisible presence manifest.

"Must it always be this way?" he asked. "Aggression answering aggression? Each contestant in a race to outdo the other in savagery?"

The woman's smile faltered. "I'm certain many a prey has asked that question while locked in the jaws of a predator."

"But is there no way to limit the conflict? Are we left then with a world filled with nothing but predators preying on each other? Is there no room for mercy?"

"Only if both sides agree," the woman said, sounding a little sad. "Then the contest becomes a negotiation instead. But once force is involved, it always triumphs over reason."

Karux shook his head. "I refuse to accept that the only way to limit force is with a greater force."

The woman chuckled. "The world has many limits to the use of force, though few the prey can use. Fortunately force is self-limiting."

"In what way?"

"In the human sphere, unchecked power often leads to abuse and cruelty to others. Such actions are, ultimately, self-destructive."

"You are still talking about using force to limit force," Karux said.

"And that is the greatest challenge." The woman looked into his eyes, her pupils, within those orbs of light, as dark as the Void itself. "To be neither the prey nor the predator, to limit your own use of force while opposing evil so that you yourself don't fall into the same evil..."

He knew she was talking about Labrose and what he had done to the man, a gentle rebuke or word of caution. A sickening wave of guilt surged through him and he could no longer look her in the eye.

She reached out and he felt a gentle brush like a butterfly wing against the back of his hand.

He awoke. Something had touched him.

Karux bolted upright in his bed. Rubbing his eyes as he looked around, he sensed a lingering presence slowly fade from his tent as if someone had just stepped out. He listened intently for the sounds of movement or departing footsteps, but only heard the call of birds and the grumble of Eiraena playing outside.

He got up and poked his head out. "Eiraena?"

Eiraena played with one of his sand trays which she had set up near the tent's entrance.

"Eiraena?" he called again.

"Eiraena," she mumbled as she played, seemingly unaware he was there.

"Did anyone enter my tent?"

"Did anyone...mumble...tent," She repeated while drawing lines in the sand. She had dropped a stone in the middle of the tray and drew oddly shaped rings around it like the ripples in a pond, filling the spaces between with strange geometric shapes.

Karux shook his head and went back inside.