I smiled back, but then I took too large a bite of the bread and he frowned at me. I tried to chew it slowly, but I was so hungry now, and the food was here, and I did not understand why he would not just let me eat it now. It took a long time to eat. He had made the stew too hot on purpose, so that I would burn my mouth if I took too big a bite. I thought about that for a bit. Then I said, "You made the food too hot on purpose. So I will be burned if I eat too fast."

His smile came more slowly. He nodded at me.

I still finished eating before he did. I had to sit on the chair until he had finished eating, too.

"Well, Fitz," he said at last. "Not too bad a day today. Hey, boy?"

I looked at him.

"Say something back to me," he told me.

"What?" I asked.

"Anything."

"Anything."

He frowned at me and I wanted to snarl, because I had done what he told me. After a time, he got up and got a bottle. He poured something into his cup. He held the bottle out to me. "Do you want some?"

I pulled back from it. Even the smell of it stung in my nostrils.

"Answer," he reminded me.

"No. No, it's bad water."

"No. It's bad brandy. Blackberry brandy, very cheap. I used to hate it, you used to like it."

I snorted out the smell. "We have never liked it."

He set the bottle and the cup down on the table. He got up and went to the window. He opened it again. "Go hunting, I said!" I felt Nighteyes jump and then run away. Nighteyes is as afraid of Heart of the Pack as I am. Once I attacked Heart of the Pack. I had been sick for a long time, but then I was better. I wished to go out to hunt and he would not let me. He stood before the door and I sprang on him. He hit me with his fist, and then held me down. He is not bigger than I. But he is meaner, and more clever. He knows many ways to hold and most of them hurt. He held me on the floor, on my back, with my throat bared and waiting for his teeth, for a long, long time.