His sister had wandered off, as usual, but the explosions had brought her scurrying back from the depths of the forest.

Greensleeves was built the opposite of her brother- small, so scrawny you could count the bones in her hands and arms. Yet she was obviously related, for her eyes were green, her chestnut hair wavy and untidy, her cheekbones wide and mouth narrow, her skin walnut-dark from a lifetime outdoors though she was just sixteen and not full-grown. She wore a faded linen smock dyed green with lichens, and a tattered shawl peppered with sticks and leaves. She wore no hat, and never anything on her feet, even in winter snows. As always, her hands were dirty, her wrists stained green from rooting in the soil and plucking at grasses. Her mother had named her Greensleeves for those stains.

Not that it mattered what her name was, for the girl barely knew it or anything else.

Frightened as a squirrel by the noise, she ran to her brother and grasped his brown hand. She gabbled in her animal tongue, chattering like a squirrel, chitter-ing like a badger, spilling incomprehensible questions as she wrung his fingers.

Gull spoke to her the same as to his mules. "Stay here, Greenie. I'm going"-he couldn't say "home" lest she feel deserted-"to see about something. To see a man. Stay here. I'll be back soon." She still looked worried, and he wondered how much she understood. He pried her fingers off his hand.

His mind aswim with questions-What was happening to the village?-Gull slung his quiver and bow-case over his shoulder. He carried them for hunting, but now he might have to drive off those little… creatures in the sky. He looped his mulewhip around his belt, then hefted his big double-bitted woodcutting axe. "Best be prepared, though I don't know what for."

He turned to find Greensleeves close behind him. Maybe packing his weapons scared her. "Stay, I tell you!"

He wanted to run but forced himself to walk, stretching his legs for the mile and a half trek to the forest's edge. He couldn't run more than a hundred feet anyway. Three years ago an elm tree had jumped off the stump: elm was a man-hating tree that let go without a warning crack. It had crushed his right knee. All winter had passed before he could walk again, with a permanent limp. His knee ached in damp weather, too, so he could predict storms.