Adalina watched as her father surveyed the night-time defences. They were spread out amongst the trees again, like after the sleeper attack two days earlier. The circumference of spears and torches burned and glittered between the trunks and swaying branches. A pregnant silence filled the air. Inside the circle, families huddled close.

  “We were two days from their nearest nest when they attacked,” said Luthold. "The sleepers are so aggressive this year. They have woken too soon. It's like they smelled weakness in the air and leaped upon it.”

  He shook his head. When they set out, they had not prepared for such a battle. The sleepers usually took a couple of months to make serious inroads into the paths. Early in the year, they picked off smaller groups of travellers. Adalina had heard complaints that Luthold should have anticipated it. When that happened she pointed out that they would have been far slower in formation with lit torches. Some, like Thilo, laughed and asked what she knew, being barely an adult. When they did, she discovered that a fixed, silent stare often quietened them.

  “How far are we now from the Levonin village? Do you think they know we are coming?” she asked.

  “We're half a day away, at our pace. A small group could have gone and returned already. I wouldn't be surprised if their scouts have seen us. I wouldn't be surprised if they are watching us now.”

  “What if Elder Mildred has gone back to the old village by another path?”

  Her father shook his head.

  “There isn't another path as quick as this one. The only other way is up the river or as the Westerner travels. Even the river is slower than the path though. It snakes and bends like a sleeper’s leg in these parts.”

  “You know the journey well from only one visit. Or did you go south on other occasions?”

  She tried to ask the question casually, but her father shot her a knowing glance.

  “You know the rest of the story, then?”

  “Mother told me. Just before...” Adalina trailed off and looked to where the wounded lay, waiting to heal or die. Otmer and Beresa helped tend to them this evening and the huge builder's frame stood out as a silhouette in the darkness, hovering over her mother.

  “I'm glad she told you," said Luthold. "I wish we hadn’t argued. I spoke to her this morning and I don’t know if she heard me or not. She drifts in and out of sleep. The healers say her ribs will mend though, and blood is not pooling inside her."

  “She'll come around, Father. And we'll reach the Levonin soon. Elder Mildred will see to her.”

  She wanted to reassure her father with conviction but the sight of her mother wrapped tightly in bandages with lolling eyes frightened her, too.

  “She would have told everyone," Luthold said. "She didn’t want us to carry the weight of the secret. She was angry with me because I didn't tell Elder Oslef, that last night when we spoke alone."

  "I know."

  "I promised her I'd tell him in the morning. Who knows if he could have helped us? I never got a chance to keep that promise.”

  Her father breathed in deeply and turned to face her.

  “What do you think? Should we tell them all the story? None of them know the things he did.”

  Adalina looked around the camp. No children laughed or played. Pasha lay curled beneath a low branch, as though she were trying to hide from everything that was happening. Men and women sat silently together, staring into the diminishing light. Aimar stood alone, some distance from her and Luthold, perhaps waiting for their conversation to end. The Sullin had dispersed more loosely among the clan. Here and there one of their warriors whispered words of persuasion to the dejected Hallin. Adalina was struck again at how few children of their own they had amongst them. She lowered her voice as she replied to her father.

  “Mother was right. You should have confided in Elder Oslef. But that was then and this is now. It’s no time to throw them all into doubt. Their trust in you is holding us together."

  Luthold nodded.

  “I know we broke the Elders’ command, Ada, but–”

  “Father,” Adalina interrupted. “You saved my life, but if Oli was the price...” She felt the words catch in her throat. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  Luthold’s face fell and he shut his eyes. She reached out and squeezed his arm.

  “I’m not angry with you,” she whispered. “But I feel so guilty. Like we brought him into the world so it could be taken away from him.”

  “We?” Luthold opened his eyes and gripped her shoulder. “Never say ‘we.’ I made that decision with your mother. Do you understand? You don't share the guilt.”

  Adalina kept her doubts to herself. Her mother had said something similar. But if she had benefited from their crime, how could she not share a part of the guilt?

  From between two thick yew trees, Heridan and Erlends emerged. They were not deep in conversation or sharing jokes like before. Heridan frowned and walked as Erlends talked. The two of them glanced over as they drew closer. Adalina looked away before the Sullin chief could catch her eyes. Though she knew they needed to keep Erlends friendly, she did not want the friendliness he offered in the looks that he gave her. Erlends walked away and Heridan stood for a while alone. He began to turn as though he would approach them, then waved and left in the same direction.

  Something about the interaction troubled the edge of Adalina's mind. It drew her to the tightening of Heridan's shoulders and the confident steps of the other man. It was not a suspicion or concern, exactly, but a call to attention from some sense that functioned deep in her heart.

  “I think Aimar is waiting for you, Father. You should see what he needs.”

  “Yes, he is, Ada. Do something for me while I’m organising the watches. Stay with your mother. She should have family beside her.”

  “Of course.”

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Adalina did not go to her mother. Her guts turned and she knew they would not settle until she had spoken with Heriden. His broad, tense frame was nearly out of sight.

  She had to take this chance. Her father was neglecting the clan's greatest warrior – the forest's greatest warrior, if people were right. Luthold had tried once or twice to approach him and given up. Adalina was determined to make him speak. After all, he was talking to the Sullin. Why shouldn't he talk to his own people? She needed to know what he and Erlends discussed on their walks around the camp.

  She closed the distance between them and saw that Heridan walked with his head down, as though following someone’s tracks. He ignored the small groups he passed and kept walking, watching the ground. As Adalina passed the same groups she greeted them silently and moved on. Soon they had passed the outer perimeter of the camp. She looked around nervously, but Heridan did not slow his pace and neither did she.

  The watch fires dimmed and disappeared in the dusk behind her. This was no patrol. She had to move closer to avoid losing sight of him and when he stopped for a moment and looked around, she found herself pressing her body behind a trunk. Why am I hiding? I came here to speak with him. And yet, she did not reveal herself. Before resuming her pursuit, she examined the ground. Beside Heridan’s boot prints there was another pair.

  She saw him stop and quickly ducked. He stood beside a tall ash and scoured the earth beneath it with his eyes. Then he turned and paced back and forth, one hand hovering on the hilt of his sword. Adalina sidled towards some cover and peered out from behind it. The spines of a bramble punctured her clothes but she held her breath. When Heridan turned to pace the other way she saw his face and almost dashed out to comfort him. His features were drawn into a look of such anguish that she felt guilty for watching him in secret. Surely, he has come here to grieve in private. When he turned again, she edged away, intending to double back and go to her mother. A thorny branch sprang back and Heridan paused. Before he could look in her direction, someone coughed in the darkness. A figure appeared. Erlends. Adalina retreated deeper into her painful concealment, this time barely registering the points of the barbs.

  “Here I am.” Heridan spoke first.

  “Here you are,” echoed Erlends. He extended a hand and grasped Heridan by the arm, but Heridan remained rigid. Adalina tried to swallow and felt her mouth go dry. She almost coughed and her eyes watered with the effort to stifle it.

  “Well? Whatever business you have away from the camp, out with it!”

  "Such rudeness toward me does not become you, Heridan. It makes me worry for our friendship." Erlends' voice dripped with a false sincerity that nauseated Adalina.

  "After what you've revealed to me, you are lucky I don't consider you an enemy. You really thought I'd agree with such a strategy?"

  "I thought you might. I'm disappointed. But I see you have not run to the other Hallin. You've kept our words between us warriors. Doesn't that show you're considering their merit?"

  "You know full well why I'm here before I've spoken to them," Heridan growled. "You told me that you have news about my son. Well? What of it?"

  News about Ingo! What could that mean? Adalina leaned forward, forgetting her fear. The oracle said he was lost. Yet, she recalled her own words to her mother regarding Oli: lost is not dead. Whatever Erlends knew, he had used it to lure Heridan here against his will.

  “Out here I’ll speak to you as one man to another," said Erlends. "Not as a Sullin to a Hallin – although I doubt you really are one of them in your heart.”

  “Speak then!”

  “Your son is alive.”

  Heridan staggered back. Adalina could not see his face but strained to read Erlends’ expression. He looked like a sevenstones player about to place a winning move.

  “Alive and well.But if you leave the forest, you’ll never see him again. If you stay, you’ll need friends here to find him.”

  "Friends like you, I assume? Or do you already call them your friends, too?"

  "They are not friends, Heridan, but we'd be fools to let them become our enemies. They’ll leave us alone if we give them what they want! Listen to reason. I know their leader. If we go to him with the clans behind us, he will give us the whole forest to rule over! We Sullin will protect the Seveners’ ways. We’ll be the shield of Saltleaf and no other clan will have to speak with apostates. They’ll have the same peace they ever had, and they’ll keep their home with it too.”

  Heridan took another step back and replied in a dull, shocked voice:

  "You've already completed these negotiations, haven't you? That's why you're so incensed that we Hallin plan to leave. Your only value to them is if you can control the rest of us."

  Erlends' smug expression fell and the corner of his eye twitched.

  "You touch it with a needle, Heridan. But remember, there is more at stake for you than whether you follow that scholar's reading of a foolish oracle."

  Heridan was silent. Hate burst into Adalina’s chest like a vent of sulphur that had ruptured from her stomach. She did know that she could feel such anger. Whether the man spoke the truth or not, he knew his words were like a narrow cord wrapped around Heridan’s heart. How could he fight against the promise of seeing his son again? What threat could he make to someone who offered such a possibility? Erlends’ promise was like Oli’s bait for the fish on the end of a hook and its silken thread.

  Finally, Heridan spoke again.

  “Will you tell them any of this? Or will you pretend to unite them to fight a battle you have already surrendered?"

  “Don’t make a fool’s protest, Heridan. You know Seveners as well as I do. What reception would the Levonin give us if we came as messengers of the Republic? If we go to the Dombarrow on everyone's behalf and appear to negotiate a peace, it’s more palatable for everyone. The wise will know the truth and will be wise to keep silent. And who knows? In time we may learn a few of their secrets. Why shouldn't we use them as they think they are using us? We won't keep the peace forever. We'll break away again."

  “With you as our king, no doubt,” scoffed Heridan. Erlends fixed him with a level gaze.

  “You scorn what you should consider in earnest.”

  Adalina was astounded by the extent of his ambition. Erlends stepped forward and leaned in close. He spoke lower and she strained to hear his words, leaning precariously forward as she stretched out her neck.

  “You should hear what they say about your boy – that their leader has him wrapped around his finger. That they talk for whole afternoons in his tent. They think he knows where to find Terlos' Soap. They like him. You should let me help you to pry him loose.”

  Heridan turned to face away from Erlends and Adalina froze dangerously close to the edge of her cover. He looked up into the leaves, through which narrow beams of grey light shone. He took a deep breath and turned.

  “If this is a lie, if it is some other poor boy they caught–”

  “Then you will hunt me down and decorate the limbs of the forest with my remains. I’d expect nothing less from one raised by the Sullin. And if it is not a lie?”

  “You ask me to choose between my clan and my son. Between the gods and my son.”

  “Typical stubborn Hallin morality. I ask you only to think for yourself, instead of trailing after that coward Luthold. What would Maralon ask of you now? Courage and audacity for your people and your son! Lend us your voice when the time comes. It's coming soon, Heridan. Very soon.”

  “Luthold is no coward,” said Heridan quietly. "You want me to help you pull him down and turn the clan to follow you?"

  “Don’t pretend you have any love for him," Erlends spat, then added with a smirk: "Though I think we both admire his daughter.”

  Adalina saw Heridan’s head draw back, just as her own body tightened. What plans did Erlends have for her father? What plans did he have for her?

  Heridan replied: “The man is arrogant and cold as ice from the mountain’s summit, but I do not hate him. And I do not admire his daughter as you do. She was betrothed to my son. She still is, if he lives. She carries my homehold. I am a second father to her, and if you think that I will allow you to–”

  “Peace, Heridan.” Erlends held up his hands in mock surrender, laughing gently at Heridan’s anger. “She is taken. I accept it with regret. Then think of her interest as well as your son’s. Think of them together in the home they know. It’s surely better than the alternative.”

  Heridan pushed his shoulders back and adjusted his cloak. He shut his eyes, then looked around in quick glances, as though the trees and bushes might judge his actions. His lips moved wordlessly, and Adalina wondered which deity he was invoking and how he had the courage to do so. He was considering betraying them. She did not want to believe it, but it was happening before her eyes. His face contorted in pain and tears ran down the sides of his cheeks. The Sullin chief spoke again.

  “I can bring Ingo to you before they turn him into one of them. What do you choose, Heridan?” asked Erlends. Were other Sullin waiting in the shadows in case he rejected Erlends’ offer? How many warriors would it take to bring him down? The question was not put to the test.

  “I choose my son,” said Heridan, as his shoulders sagged. “What other choice is there?”