His kiss, his tender touches…that crying! I cannot ignore it any longer. I ask Sean about it, he breaches my defenses and all I want is to stay right were we are at. Pushing him off I finally see that look in his eyes. Of all the nights he could have had me! This one was the one he had chosen. Growling under my breath this lass best be bleeding. Sean grunts curses behind me.

My eyes widen at all that opens before us after Sean calls the stranger her name just as Keu and Baine join in the scene. Well, I thought he was a neuter, this is a strange twist. Lasair tells us her story. He is not a druid! A perversion! No sacrifices unwilling! A fire burns deep and my eyes betray the anger. My fists are clenched at my sides. Worthless murderer didn’t even make sure his prey was dead! I make a choice at that moment. I will help Lasair kill this man somehow. This I know will go against part of my new family.

Nion’s voice breaks us from the story-spell. We are to take to the shadows and wait for the Niafers. An enemy I assume, but were kine the real reason for this feud? I’d have to ask later, if there would be a later. Thoughts start rushing pass my vision. I don’t have my bow. How am I going to help Lasair? Who is this enemy? Do we take ears afterwards for a kill count? Sean takes me by the arm to find a suitable place for this ambush. I pull away, he looks surprised. Baine runs off as silently as a feather on the wind. Keu looks grim and goes off his own way.

”I need a bow,” I say as start my way towards were the majority of the renegades were at. He follows after me calling that I can use one of his. “I can’t! My arms aren’t long enough to get a decent shot off!” I’ve lost him in the shadows and he dare not call out my name now. Some jingling of riders are heard as I snatch up a random man’s short bow and full quiver. His remarks are caught in his throat as I fling my hood back and give him a full flash of my battle embittered eyes. The few men there make signs against me, but no weapons are drawn against me.

I’m gone, running through the shadows as new thoughts assault my mind. What if this battle goes badly? What if Sean gets cut down? What if this was our last night? The blood pounding in my head reminds of his heart against my heart that day past, when he left me in the cave. A slight panic over takes my good sense. I want to cry out. I stop in a full shadow, looking frantically lost. My head swings this way and that. I don’t know what I’m looking for. I don’t even know which way I have gone. The jingling has gotten closer. How did they find us so late in the night? Dogs, they have to have dogs, but whose scent do they follow? No one would give a lick about a nightly bonfire…

A step betrays someone close by. I level an arrow at the sound. Nion looks a little confused. Were I not a thinking mess at the moment, I’d have heard him, but the jingling and Sean have taken my attentions. My mouth drops open to ask where Sean is, but nothing comes out. Nion hisses something at me. Dogs! They have to have dogs! Within a blink a small fluted pipe is between my lips and fingers poised. Nion makes a grab for it, but I’ve already started sending a lungful of air through it. No sound comes from the little flute. But the dogs heard it and they just betrayed their handler’s position with howls…

I am torn about who to find first, but I know I have to find my love first. Lasair will wait for the opportune moment. Her tears washed away the fear she had about this Morann. He would die.

Where is my Sean? My young love, where are you!…