Gradually, the dancers allowed their music to slow to a less frenzied tempo. The drummers changed their rhythm as well. White Face’s dagger was withdrawn.

Given leave by the forester, Egrin looked up. Makaralonga stood in the ravine below, donning a deerskin robe. Pale wisps of fog drifted around him.

The flaming ring of wood was no more than glowing embers, and the scene was washed in the ruddy light of the setting sun. Egrin was puzzled. He was certain only one mark had passed since his capture, yet if sunset had come, half a day must have elapsed.

White Face guided him away from the Place of Birthing. They followed a wide, well-marked path eastward, deeper into the Great Green. Scores of masked Dom-shu trod silently on either side. It wasn’t until they reached the foresters’ village that the masks were removed and the foresters began to speak among themselves.

Egrin was taken to a sod hut of considerable size, with a steeply pitched thatched roof. The top of a boulder by the door had been hollowed out to serve as a lamp, the hollow filled with burning animal fat.

A boy came out of the hut. About seven years old, he had curly dark hair, a high forehead, and skin paler than most Dom-shu.

Nodding toward Egrin, the boy asked, “Who’s the old grasslander?”

“Mind your tongue, Eli!” White Face snapped. “He is an Ergothian warrior of great renown.”

The boy’s face showed skepticism, but before he could say more, White Face removed his fearsome headgear and Egrin’s mouth fell open in shock.

“Kiya!”

Eldest daughter of Makaralonga and a warrior of the Dom-shu, Kiya had been given to Tol years ago as hostage and wife, along with her younger sister Miya. The formidable pair had never been wives in the usual sense, but looked after Tol, his household, and his affairs. When Ackal V drove Tol into exile, Kiya and Miya were the only ones who dared go with him.

Egrin’s head was reeling. “By all the gods, Kiya!” he exclaimed. “I never suspected it was you in that getup!”