A Daughter of Kings, Part I



  A Daughter of Kings

  Part I

  A Daughter of Kings

  Part I

  Copyright 2016 by Louis Piechota

  All rights reserved to the author. No part of this work may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles or reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Cover art by Suzanne Restle

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  For my beautiful wife, Kerrie,

  and for my mom and dad, again.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter I - The Messenger

  Chapter II - The Message

  Chapter III - The Heir to the Throne

  Chapter IV - The Black Star

  Chapter V - The Free City

  Chapter VI - The Honor of a Warrior

  Chapter VII - The Caravaneers

  Chapter VIII - The Dance

  Chapter IX - The Fields of Caluran

  Chapter X - The Storm

  Chapter XI - The Princess’ Champion

  Chapter XII - The First Minister

  Chapter XIII - The Princess of the Kwi’Kiri

  Chapter XIV - The Golden City

  Chapter XV - The High King

  Chapter XVI - The Choice

  Author’s Note:

  This book is intended as a sequel to my first novel, A Rose in the Desert. While it should be understandable and (I hope) enjoyable in its own right, you may want to start your adventures in Irium with that story. In A Rose in the Desert you will learn more about Ethyrin and Nuara, and how the heir to the throne of Arandia came to live in the wilderness with the Kwi’Kiri people.

  Chapter I

  “The Messenger”

  Alirah crouched as low as she could into a thicket of gambrel oak and prayed its new leaves would conceal her. She cursed the colorful clothes she’d worn that day. Her heart pounded in her chest and her breath came in short, quick gasps. In her mind she could hear the voices of her mother and father and who-knew-how-many others warning her not to wander away on her own.

  About thirty yards away, three men sat astride big, brown warhorses. They were all clad in strange armor, fashioned from overlapping layers of hide and stiffened with metal rivets. Each bore a light shield and was armed with a long, curved sword. She did not know who the men were, but after hearing so many dreadful rumors about the Taragi barbarians surging out of the west, she felt sure of her guess. She had no idea if they’d seen her before she leapt into the bushes, or what they would do if they had.

  Worst of all, she had no idea if they were real.

  They had appeared suddenly and soundlessly. She’d bent down for just a few moments to gather up some of the medicinal kaisa plant for the healers back at the encampment. When she’d stood up again the riders were there. The three of them sat alongside one another. They were facing her, but while all three of them looked toward her with keen, dark eyes, none of them seemed to look quite at her. None of the men spoke, and the horses’ hooves seemed to make no sound as they stamped on the hard, dry earth.

  The men ought to have seen her. There were a few tall stands of gambrel oak growing out of the dry grass around her, along with a pine tree here and there, but no vegetation that would have hidden her at a distance. Even the fog, which also seemed to have blown in suddenly out of nowhere, was too thin to hide a person only a few paces away. Still, minutes passed and nothing happened. So Alirah waited, and waited, terrified and shivering in the misty cold.

  This can’t be real, she thought at last. Three men wouldn’t just sit there like that. They’d say something to me, or to one another, or at least just keep riding. And it can’t have gotten foggy so quickly. Slowly her heart ceased its hammering and the taste of bile receded from her mouth. Finally she clenched her hands into fists and whispered aloud to herself.

  “They’re… not… real!”

  With a great effort she forced herself upright. Her chest heaved up and down as she gasped for breath, but she stared steadily at the riders as if daring them to approach.

  For a long moment nothing happened. The riders remained perfectly still and silent. Then, suddenly, all three of them turned their gaze upon her. The motion was subtle but unmistakable; Alirah knew she had been seen. As one the three men urged their steeds forward. The horses moved slowly, as if they were exhausted and could only manage a shuffling walk. But they did not have much ground to cover.

  Alirah felt an icy stab of new fear and shrank where she stood. For an instant she hesitated, not sure whether she should scream or run or even just say hello. Before she could make up her mind, the mists around her suddenly billowed and swirled. The fog grew thicker, or else the sunlight itself dimmed, for all at once she could barely see the riders. Reflexively she rubbed her eyes. When she looked again there were five of them.

  A scream gathered in her throat, but even before it could pass her lips she saw six, then a dozen, and then more. Before she knew what was happening she found herself gazing upon a vast host of riders, hundreds if not thousands strong. All of them looked vague and dim in the growing shadows and all were as silent as a grave. Stricken with horror, Alirah covered her eyes and screamed at last. She staggered backwards. Her foot caught upon one of the hard roots of the oak bush. With a cry, she tumbled back into its branches.

  In a panic she scrambled up again as fast as she could. As she did so the vision changed again. The mist swirled away. The phantom horde blurred and faded like a whiff of a dream lingering after one’s eyes had opened. But for a split second she saw another rider, closer and clearer than all the others. He was tall and lordly, dark of hair and eye. He was clad in steel rather than hide, and rode upon a great, dark horse. He seemed at once to command all the others, and yet to be separated from them by a vast distance or time.

  Then all of a sudden he too had vanished. By the time Alirah got back on her feet she found herself blinking at empty, sunny grasslands. A warm, dry breeze fluttered her clothes and hair. A few thin clouds raced overhead, but there was no trace of fog upon the land.

  “Alirah!”

  She whirled about, looking for the source of the cry. Finally she caught sight of Berun. He had just come over a low rise to the south and was running toward her. He’d been out with her, hunting while she’d gathered herbs, but she hadn’t realized he was still so close by. Now he clutched his bow in one hand. His quiver of arrows bounced violently against his back as he flung himself down the little hill.

  “What is it?” He shouted wildly. “What’s wrong?”

  “Not again,” Alirah whispered. Her cheeks burned and tears of frustration started in her eyes.

  “Alirah…”

  “I’m all right,” she called back, wiping her eyes angrily. She was still trying to brush the twigs off her clothes and out of her hair when he rushed up beside her.

  “What happened?” He asked, panting. “You were screaming!”

  “Nothing! I… I’m fine,” she stammered.

  Berun looked pale and scared. His d
ark eyes were wide. Now that he’d seen her standing there unharmed, his alarm was fading, but it was clear he’d been terrified.

  “You saw something, didn’t you?”

  “I… yeah,” she murmured. She wished she could deny it but she could think of no other reason for having shrieked. Her heart still raced in her chest and she felt an odd sort of tingling all over, which she had come to expect after so powerful a vision, and which she imagined must show itself on her skin somehow.

  “Are you okay? What happened? What did you see?”

  “I don’t know,” said Alirah. She heaved a long, shuddering sigh. She wanted to just reassure him she was fine, that it was only a vision or an illusion or whatever – her father called it the Sight – and that no harm had come other than few scratches from the oak bush. But as always, whether the visions brought fear or joy, the feelings lingered after her sight cleared. Now she felt a deep, damp chill that the warm sun did not touch, and she could feel herself shaking. She wiped her eyes again and tried to say something light and carefree, but no words came out.

  “Hey,” murmured Berun. With the familiarity of long friendship he pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her. “It’s okay.”

  “I know,” she said, but she hugged him tight in return.

  Berun was seventeen years old, half a year younger than she was. They’d been friends as long as she could remember, and had grown up together like a brother and sister who just happened to live with different parents. Nobody who saw them standing next to each other would have mistaken them for siblings, however. Berun was both tall and broad, with heavy muscles becoming ever more prominent as he grew into manhood. Alirah was slim, and while she was not exactly short, no one would ever call her tall either.

  Anyone who knew of the Kwi’Kiri people could have picked Berun out as one of them at a glance. His short hair and his eyes were both dark brown, and his skin was a deep, copper-tan. Alirah’s complexion was somewhat more fair. Her hair and eyes were also brown, but a warmer, lighter shade with whispers of gold in its depths. Nobody who lived in a far northern country of mountains and forests, where snow lay upon the ground for a quarter of the year, would think that she was pale; but her friends among the Kwi’Kiri did.

  Alirah held on to him for a minute, then drew back.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry. I just wish there were something I could do.”

  “So do I,” she assured him.

  “So… What did you see, anyway?”

  Alirah hesitated. She had learned long ago that it was not always wise to tell people about the visions which plagued her. But she’d known Berun her whole life and had no secrets from him.

  “Horsemen,” she said at last. “Armed riders. Some of the Taragi, I guess, though I don’t know for sure. At first there were just three of them, but then there were more and more, and everything got dark and cold. I was afraid… It was so real this time!”

  Berun sighed. “Well it’s not hard to guess what that might mean. But we already knew the Taragi were coming this way.”

  “Yeah. Just as the vision ended there was someone else, though. A single rider. I had the impression he was their king, or something, but he seemed like a different kind of person altogether. He had different armor, a different skin tone, that kind of thing.”

  Berun took a breath as if he was about to say something, but then suddenly he stopped. His face blanched and his eyes widened.

  “What is it?”

  “You saw riders? A rider?” he stammered. “Did he look like that?”

  With one hand he turned her around and with the other he pointed. She felt a momentary shock of fear. For a split second she thought she’d see a thousand shadowy warriors about to ride them down. Instead, following Berun’s arm to the north, she saw that a solitary rider had just come over the low ridge which shortened the horizon in that direction.

  He was not one of the riders from her vision. This man’s horse was white rather than brown or black. The rider himself was wrapped up in a great, dark green cloak even though the May sun was warm. A long sword hung at his side, but it was straight and leaf-bladed rather than curved. Also, he did not ride his horse so much as he was carried by it. He slumped so far forward in his saddle that he may as well have been laying on the animal’s neck. He bounced and jostled at every step. Then, even as Alirah watched, he lolled to one side and slipped from his saddle. He fell hard to the ground, rolled over, and lay sprawled on his back without moving. The horse continued on for a few slow steps, then came to a halt. It turned about slowly to gaze at its fallen rider, and then stood there without moving.

  “Oh no!” cried Alirah.

  Without a thought she sprang up the slope towards the fallen man.

  “Wait!” cried Berun, hastening after her. “Be careful! Weren’t you just… You don’t even know who he is!”

  “I know he’s hurt,” she called back impatiently. “He might be dying!”

  It only took a moment to reach the man. She flung herself down in the grass alongside him, then hesitated. Her hands hovered, trembling, over his stricken form. She had no idea what to do.

  The man was covered in blood. Some of it was old and dried into his clothes, but some was still fresh. Its scent filled her nostrils and made her wrinkle her nose in disgust. He was also young: maybe a handful of years older than she was, but with a boyish look that made him seem more youthful. His light brown hair was matted with sweat and flecks of blood. His complexion was quite fair, and either pain or loss of blood made him even look more pale.

  Under his cloak but over his ordinary clothes he wore a stiff leather jerkin that must have served for light armor. The jerkin had been rent by sword-strokes, but she could see only two significant wounds upon the man. A slash cut across his thigh, and he had a stab wound high on his right shoulder. The wounds had been bound up with strips of torn clothes, but the makeshift bandages were soaked and red. Yet even together with a few other scratches, they did not seem adequate to account for all the blood that she saw; some of it must have belonged to others.

  As Alirah gazed at him, half appalled and half fascinated, his eyes fluttered slowly open. She saw they were a light, blue-gray color and were now clouded by pain and fever. He peered around himself in a vague, unfocused way, apparently seeing very little. At first he did not even seem to be aware of her leaning over him.

  “Um…. hello,” she said timidly, letting her hands fall to her sides.

  Her voice seemed to reach out to him like a beacon through a fog. His eyes focused upon hers with a sudden, fearful intensity. His expression became desperate but doubtful, like that of a wanderer long lost in the desert who sees an oasis in the distance. After a moment she could not endure his gaze any longer and she looked away, blushing furiously. She felt suddenly very grateful to have Berun standing big and solid beside her.

  As she looked away a spasm passed through the fallen man’s body. His hand shot out suddenly and seized her wrist in an iron grip. She cried out in pain and surprise.

  “Get off her!” roared Berun. He hurled himself down beside her and seized the man’s arm with both of his beefy hands, as if he meant to tear it from its socket.

  “No, wait, you’ll hurt him!” Alirah cried.

  “He’s hurting you!” yelled Berun, but he did hesitate.

  The fallen rider hardly seemed to notice Berun. His eyes remained focused on Alirah. He tried to say something but only croaked unintelligibly. He wet his dry lips with his tongue and tried again, but she still didn’t catch his words.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t understand you…” Alirah began, then stopped. She realized he was speaking in the common tongue, and she had to switch her own words out of the language of the Kwi’Kiri.

  “What? What did you say?” She asked in his language.

  “Ethyrin…” he croaked. “I… I’m looking for Prince Ethyr
in. Do you know who he is? Do you know where he can be found?”

  For many long seconds Alirah could only stare down at him, stupefied. At last, blinking and stammering, she found her voice.

  “Um… yeah. I know him… He’s my dad.”

  It was the stranger’s turn to stare at her in bewilderment. His grip on her wrist slackened. Alirah tore her arm away and clutched it protectively with her other hand. Then, as if the possibility of Ethyrin being her father was too terrible to endure, the man sank back down onto the dry grass. His eyes rolled back and his eyelids fluttered closed.

  Alirah gazed down at him in silence. For a moment she was terrified that he had actually died then and there, but soon she could see that his chest still rose and fell regularly. Still, nearly half a minute passed and she did not speak or move. The only sound was the wind rustling in the grass. At last Berun stirred beside her, speaking again in the Kwi’Kiri tongue.

  “Are you okay?”

  She nodded.

  “What could he want with your dad?”

  “I have no idea,” she said. Already her mind had begun to race with fear.

  Of course she knew her father’s story; everyone in the tribe knew it. He was not one of the Kwi’Kiri by birth, but rather a prince of Arandia. He had fled into exile thirty years before, and along the way had helped her mother to escape from slavery at the hands of the Jeddein. Alirah knew that most of the Kwi’Kiri only half believed in his royal ancestry, and those who did believe attached little importance to it. To them Arandia was little more than a rumor of power and wealth, far to the east. She herself had always believed his stories, however. She’d always wondered what it would be like to be a princess in a golden castle somewhere.

  “Well, there’s only one way to find out, I guess,” she said at last. “And we can’t just leave him lying here anyway. Help me lift him up.”

  She moved to try to get one of her shoulders under the man, but Berun put his arm out to stop her.

  “Here, let me do it,” he said. “You’ll get blood all over your clothes.”

  “So? So will you.”

  “These are my hunting clothes,” he said. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “Fine,” she said irritated. “I’ll get his horse.”

  On one hand he was right, Berun’s clothes were quite old and careworn. They’d once been green and brown, but along with his heavy boots they were now so faded and covered with old stains that their original color could only be guessed. Her own clothes, though also hand-me-downs from some other girl, were much newer. She had on a light blue shirt, a rose-red skirt that fell just past her knees, and supple leather boots. She had no desire to get the stranger’s blood on any of them, but she found it exasperating how helpless she’d apparently become over the last few years in the eyes of the boys that she knew. Berun was better than most, but he was not immune.

  Berun wedged his shoulder under the fallen man’s, and then with a thrust of his legs bore him to his feet. Luckily the man was not very big, neither quite as tall as Berun nor as muscular, though he was solidly built. Alirah walked over to the man’s horse, which she saw was a mare with big, intelligent eyes. She took hold of her bridle and murmured soothingly while Berun heaved her rider back up, more or less onto into the saddle. The violent motion made the man stir slightly, but he did not awake. He murmured unconsciously in a deep delirium.

  “Should we take away his sword?” asked Berun, eyeing the weapon suspiciously.

  The sheathed blade stood out awkwardly from the man’s belt. Its scabbard was made of fine, soft leather, though it was now thoroughly battered and travel stained. The sword itself looked a little crude in its shape, as though it had been forged by an apprentice who still had a few things to learn. Yet something about it drew Alirah’s eyes as surely as any gold or jewels would have. She could half see, half imagine a pale light shining around it that had nothing to do with the bright sun overhead. She knew without asking that Berun could not see this vanishing glow, but she’d seen something like it before, and she guessed at once what it meant: spells were wound about the blade.

  “Leave it alone,” she advised. “I don’t think he’s going to go swinging it at us any time soon. Let’s just get him back to camp. My mom and dad will know what to do with him. I think. At least, I hope they will.”

  The encampment of the Kwi’Kiri lay some three miles to the west of the little valley they’d chosen for hunting and herb-gathering. They walked back as quickly as they could, spurred on by fear and excitement. Alirah walked before the horse, leading her by her reins. Berun stalked warily alongside them. His eyes were constantly upon the stricken rider, and one hand hovered near the big hunting knife that hung at his belt.

  Broad, grassy hills spread out in all directions, broken here and there by stands of gambrel oak, thickets of pine trees, and outcroppings of weathered rock. The high grass was still a bright, spring green. In the distance to the north and east, higher buttes and mesas of pale sandstone arose like islands from a green sea. To the south and west a shimmer in the sky spoke of the real sea, twenty miles or so away. There was no path to follow, only the faint tracks they’d left on their way out a few hours earlier. However there was no chance of their getting lost. The hills across which they walked were called the Swaia’ee in the musical language of the Kwi’Kiri, and from one encampment or another Alirah and Berun had spent their entire lives trampling over them.

  Their current encampment lay at the bottom of a wide, shallow valley between two long swells of land. Through the center of the valley a clear stream meandered in long curves toward the nearby coast. Several dozen large tents had been erected on the high, eroded banks which rose upon either side of the water. Each tent had been painted in a different bright color, though the sun and the wind had long faded them all. A number of smaller tents were interspersed amidst the larger ones, along with numerous covered wagons.

  By the time Alirah and Berun returned, the afternoon had grown old. People were finishing up their day’s work. They’d kindled cook fires in the broad spaces between the tents. The blazes sent thin plumes of smoke up into the clear sky. Men and women had gathered about the fires, while children ran around and played everywhere the adults were absent.

  About three hundred people dwelt in the encampment. It was not the only such encampment of the Kwi’Kiri: at any time there were several such bands, called pana in their language, roaming that little corner of the world. Sometimes the different pana were separated by only a few miles and sometimes by long days’ of travel. Now with the growing threat of the Taragi they’d gathered closer together than Alirah could ever remember. Even as she gazed down at her own camp, she could see the tents of another as splashes of yellow, blue, and red in the distance to the west. Still, there were probably less than two thousand people altogether who called themselves the Kwi’Kiri. Compared to the oncoming Taragi, they were but one more leaf before a storm.

  Though such a thing would have been unheard of a generation ago, sentries on horseback, armed with bows and hunting knives, now stood guard around the little valley. The nearest hastened toward Alirah and Berun at their approach, and then rode down to the encampment to spread word of their arrival. Alirah could see ripples of alarm spread through the camp as she and Berun made their way toward it. Any stranger who appeared in their isolated community was cause for excitement, but now with tensions already running high, a man obviously wounded in combat brought outright fear. Parents ran to collect children, while spouses and lovers ran to collect each other. A handful of people strode out to meet Alirah and Berun, calling out questions as they did so.

  “Who is that?”

  “What happened?”

  “Were you attacked?”

  As people closed in about them a grim expression stole onto Berun’s face. He seemed to hunker down as he walked, as if fortifying himself against attack. In contrast Alirah st
ood up excitedly and tried to answer everyone at once.

  “We weren’t attacked,” she said quickly. “We’re fine. I don’t know who this is. He came over a ridge near us and then just fell off his horse. He’s hurt and he’s sick and he needs a healer. Where’s my mom?”

  Nobody knew immediately, but there weren’t many places to look. A couple of kids took off at a run to search. At the same time Alirah saw her little sister, Kaya, rushing up along with a few of her friends. Kaya was a small, skinny girl of thirteen, only just now starting to grow into herself. Like Alirah she was fair-skinned for one of the Kwi’Kiri. As always she wore her hair in a neat, careful braid, into which she’d tied a faded ribbon of blue silk. Now her bright eyes were wide as saucers. She looked from Alirah to the fallen rider and back with an almost comical expression of alarm.

  “What’d you do?”

  “I stabbed him and knocked him out,” said Alirah.

  “Re… Really?”

  Alirah rolled her eyes. “Of course not! He rode up to us and fell over. So we brought him back here. Where’s Mom?”

  “She’s here.”

  Their mother, Nuara, now made her way through the crowd. She was a slim woman of middle years with a Kwi’Kiri’s vibrant, copper complexion. Her eyes were very dark: so deep a brown as to be almost black, though they shone with intensity and wit. She wore a white muslin shirt and a dark green skirt. A scarf covered all but a few stray locks of her dark hair, which only recently had begun to fleck with gray. She drew up next to Kaya and lay a slim hand on the girl’s shoulder as if to reassure herself that she was safe. Nuara’s gaze swept over Berun and the unconscious stranger in a flash, then settled back upon Alirah. The other folks who’d come running out of the camp formed a loose circle about them.

  “Are you okay? What happened? Where were you?” Nuara’s words came out in a rush, her voice wavering between anger and fright. Alirah blushed.

  “I’m fine, Mom.”

  “What happened to your wrist?”

  I guess he left bruises, Alirah thought, but she shook her head dismissively. “It’s nothing. He grabbed it when he was delirious. He wasn’t trying to hurt me. He’s hurt, though. I’m sure he’s got a fever. Can you help him?”

  Nuara glared suspiciously at the young man. “Who is he?”

  “How in the world should I know? Does it matter?”

  “It does if he’s a Taragi scout, looking for a nice little camp for his people to pillage.”

  “He’s not.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I…” For a second Alirah hesitated. There were no secrets in the little pana, but she didn’t want to blurt out what she’d Seen in front of a crowd. Also, she suddenly recalled the last rider of her vision, the one who had seemed to lead the Taragi and yet not be one of them. Could that last, briefly glimpsed figure and this stranger be the same person? But gazing again at the young man, seeing his youthful face drawn in slumbering pain, she felt certain it was not so.

  “I just know,” she said at last.

  Nuara leveled a glower at her. “You just know?”

  “He was looking for Dad.”

  Whatever Nuara had expected her daughter to say, that wasn’t it. Her darkling eyes flew as wide as Kaya’s, then narrowed as she turned a shade paler.

  “He was what?”

  “We found him a few miles east of here,” said Alirah, stammering. “He just rode up over a ridge, and then he fell over. He… he said he was looking for Prince Ethyrin. He said it in the common tongue rather than our language, of course, and he had a strange accent. I told him Ethyrin was my dad. Then he passed out.”

  Nuara glanced at Berun as if for confirmation. The boy nodded silently, and Nuara turned her gaze upon the stricken rider himself. As she stared at him her expression darkened, until Alirah began to fear that she would reach up and throttle the unconscious man. But then suddenly Nuara shook her head and shut her eyes. When she opened them her murderous gaze had vanished. Her hands had clenched into fists, but now they relaxed at her sides. She heaved a sigh.

  “Run and find your father,” she said to Kaya, her voice heavy. “He’s over in the other pana with the council.”

  The young girl took off at a run. Her friends deputized themselves as escorts and followed her. Nuara turned back to Alirah and Berun.

  “We need to get him out of the sun, and I’m sure he needs water. We’ll take him into our tent for now. Come on Berun, we’ll need your help to get him down. Follow me. The rest of you… go find something else to do.”

  She turned and strode imperiously through the crowd, which parted for her in silence. Alirah and Berun followed in her wake, still leading the stricken man’s horse with him on top of it. Luckily the mare seemed to be used to crowds, and it regarded everyone with the same calm, intelligent stare. Only after they had all passed did a hubbub of murmurs and whispered questions arise among the onlookers. Alirah did her best to ignore them.

  Nuara led the way through the encampment to the tent that she and Ethyrin shared. Once a bright blue, it was now thoroughly faded by more than twenty years of wind and sun. A hodgepodge of weathered boxes and bundles ringed the tent, while a small fire ring stood before it. A handful of sawn logs draped with woven mats served as porch furniture.

  Berun carried the fallen rider into the tent and laid him down on a thick rug which covered the ground. Nuara knelt down beside him and began to examine his wounds.

  “These don’t look too bad,” she said after a few minutes. “I don’t see any sign of infection either. I’m guessing there’s some poison at work. I’ll need to get his clothes off to get him cleaned him up. Alirah, you wait outside.”

  “But I can help!” she protested. “I brought back some kaisa leaves, which I know you said is good against fevers. I…” She stopped. Groping in her pocket she felt nothing, and she realized she’d left the little bundle of herbs behind when she’d climbed out of the scrub oak. “… Well, I guess I forgot them. But I can still…”

  “Just get outside, will you!”

  “Fine!”

  “I’ll go too,” said Berun.

  “No, you stay. I could use some help and I don’t want to be alone with him if he wakes up all of a sudden.”

  Grumbling under her breath, Alirah stepped back out of the tent and let the canvas flap which served as its door close behind her. She found a good sized crowd waiting for her outside. Most of the pana’s kids were grouped there, along with some grown-ups too nosy to go about their own business when something unusual was happening. She glared at them angrily.

  “What? Are you just going to stare at the outside of the tent? You heard my Mom! Go away!”

  The kids laughed at her, and the adults clucked their tongue in irritation, but one by one they all departed. Of course, they did not have far to go. Real privacy was a rare commodity in the encampments of the Kwi’Kiri, but Alirah soon had as much of it as she ever did. She found herself staring at nothing. Her mind raced in circles but only formed one coherent thought, over and over again.

  What does he want with Dad?