"There was no time to pick and choose. I gave him what I had to hand. I didn't know he'd go mad on carris seed."

"You could have refused him," Burrich said quietly.

"It wouldn't have stopped him. He'd have gone as he was, exhausted, and been killed right there."

I went and sat down on the hearth. Burrich was not watching me. I lay down, then rolled over on my back and stretched. It felt good. I closed my eyes and felt the warmth of the fire on my flank.

"Get up and sit on the stool, Fitz," Burrich said.

I sighed, but I obeyed. Chade did not look at me. Burrich resumed talking.

"I'd like to keep him on an even keel. I think he just needs time, to do it on his own. He remembers. Sometimes. And then he fights it off. I don't think he wants to remember, Chade. I don't think he really wants to go back to being FitzChivalry. Maybe he liked being a wolf. Maybe he liked it so much he's never coming back."

"He has to come back," Chade said quietly. "We need him."

Burrich sat up. He'd had his feet up on the woodpile, but now he set them on the floor. He leaned toward Chade. "You've had word?"

"Not I. But Patience has, I think. It's very frustrating, sometimes, to be the rat behind the wall."

"So what did you hear?"

"Only Patience and Lacey, talking about wool."

"Why is that important?"

"They wanted wool to weave a very soft cloth. For a baby, or a small child. `It will be born at the end of our harvest, but that's the beginning of winter in the Mountains. So let us make it thick,' Patience said. Perhaps for Kettricken's child."

Burrich looked startled. "Patience knows about Kettricken?"

Chade laughed. "I don't know. Who knows what that woman knows? She has changed much of late. She gathers the Buckkeep Guard into the palm of her hand, and Lord Bright does not even see it happening. I think now that we should have let her know our plan, included her from the beginning. But perhaps not"