"Tell me the rest of the story, bird."

The raven cocked his head. "Story?"

"About the god Kupilas-about Crooked, as you call him. Tell the tale, bird. It's pissing down rain and I'm cold and I'm hungry and I'm lost in the worst place in the world."

"Us is wet and hungry, too," Skurn reminded him. "Us has et scarce but a mashed cocoon or two lately."

That idea didn't make Barrick feel any better. "Just… tell me some more of the tale. Please."

The raven smoothed his blotched feathers, mollified. "S'pose us could. What did us tell last?"

"About how he met his great-grandmother. And she was going to teach him…"

"Oh, aye. Us recalls it. 'I will teach you how to travel in the lands of Emptiness, ' his great-grandmother did tell Crooked, 'which stand beside everything and are in every place, as close as a thought, as invisible as a prayer.' Be that what us were telling?"

"That's it."

"Could p'raps find you somewhat to eat, first?" Skurn was in a good mood again. "This part of the wood be full of Whistling Moths…" He saw the look on Barrick's face. "Well, then, Sir Too-Good-For-Everything-but don't blame Skurn when you comes over all rumblystummicked in the night…"

"Crooked did spend long days at the side of Emptiness, his great-grandmother, learning the secrets of her land and its roads and growing wiser even than he had been. He learned many tricks traveling in his great-grandmother's land, and saw many things when no one thought he watched 'em. And though his body was crippled and he had one leg shorter than the other, walking rickety-raw, rickety-raw like a wagon with a broken wheel, Crooked could travel faster than anyone-even his cousin Tricker, who men do call Zosim.

"Tricker was swiftest of all the clan of the Three Brothers, sly master of roads and poetry and madmen. In truth, clever Tricker had figured out some of Grandmother Emptiness' secrets all on his ownsome, but he also called her 'Old Wind in a Well' when he didn't know she were listening. After that she made sure Tricker never learned anything more about her lands and their weirdling ways.