Dawn broke and the inhabitants emerged from the cluster of roundhouses that formed their village. They traipsed across the dew to reinvigorate the central fire. Elder Mildred clucked about from one home to the next demanding any treats they had tucked away.


    “Herbs, dried fruit, any eggs. Come on, winter’s over and we’ll make a feast to welcome them. Pieces of honeycomb? Don’t hide ‘em away.”


    Winilind passed Mildred a small wheel of cheese and kicked Oli’s ankle to forestall his protest. She had been saving it for Maralon’s Ascent in a fortnight’s time, but Mildred was an elder, after all. One of only three among three hundred people.


    Despite sympathising with her son’s chagrin, Winilind’s mouth watered when the pots over the fire began bubbling and Oslef’s nephew hauled out his uncle’s big clay oven. Oslef, another of the elders, rarely cooked these days but his gift for conjuring magic out of even the simplest ingredients had never been forgotten.


    Families gathered near the watchtower or around the fire, whispering encouragement to one another and watching the preparations for what was becoming an impromptu feast day. Winilind overheard snippets of anecdotes about similar frights in the past as she wended her way through the groups to join those waiting by the tower.


    “...When they pulled him down from the tree, he had enough honey for the supper of Descent! You remember don’t you, Aimar?”


    “...She never walked the same after they lifted the rocks off, but she learned her lesson about pilfering from hoarders!”


    “...They’re tough, Hallin children. They’ve survived worse than brushing up against a ghoul circle...”


    The village had worked itself into an optimism so determined it bordered on delusional when Lien, atop the watchtower, gave a shout. Those who had been cooking, or making suggestions to the cooks, ran to the picket wall and peered past one another into the woods, each vying for the honour of being first to greet the victorious return party.


    The party returned slowly, walking in single file down a narrow path. None of them spoke as they passed the boundary, and few lifted their eyes from the ground to look at those waiting in the crowd. The clansfolk watching blinked and shook their heads, as though waking themselves for a second time that morning. Could so many have failed? Had the hoarders really killed a child?


    The delightful smells wafting from the fire now taunted rather than tantalised. Winilind knew this celebration had been foolish. If Elder Joturn had not been with the search party, he would have stamped the idea out. She looked for her husband in the crowd and, from the back of the line, Luthold peeled off and came to where she waited. Only when he stepped passed her to first greet the children did she notice that Ada and Oli had followed her out of the house. He prised them away and looked her in the eye.


    Winilind picked something more than exhaustion out of her husband’s expression. A deep well of anger, rarely tapped, swelled close to the surface. And she read a warning in the lines of his forehead. She looked to Heridan, who had flung his sword beside the fire and seated himself, head in hands, on an upturned log. The blade was clean. None of the party were injured. As though sensing her gaze he raised his head and met it coldly, then stared at her son. Oli attempted what Winilind knew to be a sympathetic smile, but Heridan spat and turned sharply away. She ushered Oli quickly back to their roundhouse, coughing loudly when she heard someone mutter about his ‘smirking.’ She realised, as they crossed the threshold, how tightly she gripped his shoulder and relaxed her hand. She could hardly punish him when he had tried to be nice. What her son wanted to say, or show, always came out wrong.


    Once inside, Luthold sat with his back against the wall. His open, blistered hands rested by his side and the spear, prized heirloom of the family, lay discarded near the entrance. Adalina reached down for it, then hesitated and went to her father’s side instead. Winilind dragged over a pail of water and the two of them began cleaning Luthold’s cuts.


    “Bramble and rock cuts.” Said Oli flatly.


    “No fighting.” Despite his exhaustion, Luthold nodded appreciatively at his son’s observation. “Climbing. Lots of climbing. Futile, endless climbing, farther than was reasonable.” He closed his eyes and forcibly changed his tone. “But if it were my son, I wouldn’t have listened to reason either.”


    “You would have,” said Winilind quietly. “What happened? Did you find any tracks? Clothes? He cannot just have vanished.”


    “We found tracks, but not his. Something happened out there, at base of the mountain where they pile up their pickings. The ground was churned up. It looked like at least ten people were there, walking all over the place, coming and going without using the paths. The only tracks we could follow were the hoarders. We followed those into the mountains. High up, into the caves.”


    Winilind gasped, forgetting the wet cloth in her hands.


    “We didn’t find them.”


    Luthold pushed the cloth gently over the bucket and she looked down at the ring of dark earth where it had dripped onto the ground.


    “The hoarders, Win. We went into their home and didn’t see a trace of them.”


    She looked up and saw his confused expression. He was trying to make sense of this as much as she was.


    “You should not have gone inside the caves.” She chided in a low voice. “You’re lucky. Perhaps they were frightened – because there were so many of you.”


    Luthold shook his head slowly.


    “Maybe,” he mused, “but you know how jealously they guard their territory. We kept going, deeper and deeper. He insisted. Every step I thought we’d be ambushed. You wouldn’t have heard us, if they’d attacked us down there. The tunnels go on and on...”


    Luthold trailed off and shivered.


    “You all just let him lead you along?” Winilind demanded. Her sympathy faded and anger grew that one man had led almost fifty people’s loved ones on so foolish an expedition. How did Heridan always get his way? Did the other clansfolk think the size of his head made space for better thoughts?


    “He would have gone alone if we hadn’t kept him company. His son’s missing, Win. We couldn’t let him charge off by himself and start a war with them. Besides, I think some of them were glad of the excuse. I heard more whispers than I’d have expected about getting one over on them, showing the hoarders who the forest belongs to.”


    Winilind shook her head and muttered, “Hallin should know better. The forest belongs to no one.”


    Luthold coughed and attempted a smile. “Anyway, Joturn stopped us when the torches burned half. By then even Heridan had to admit defeat and we’re all back safely now.”


    For a moment they were silent. Winilind’s thoughts turned to Ingo. If only the boy would just turn up. She glanced at her daughter, staring at the wall. Did she miss him? Was she worried? Not so long ago, Ingo never went anywhere without Ada. She almost said something to that effect but checked herself. It wasn’t the time. Whatever happened next, their first thought had to be dislodging any idea that Oli was involved. They had to kill that notion before it grew into something ugly. The problem was, they had to know first that he truly wasn’t. As though following her thoughts, Oli spoke up.


    “You said there were people’s tracks going into the forest. Were there any going to the river? Isn’t that where Ingo said he was off to?”


    They all looked at Luthold, who breathed out slowly and stared into Oli’s eyes.


    “We need to talk about this stranger.” He said in a tone that warned each of them not to interrupt, “But you need to understand something first. Heridan thinks you’re lying. That’s serious, Oli, because right now he’s angry and scared. Do you understand?”


    Oli nodded. Winilind glanced at Adalina, who shifted and opened her mouth, then closed it with a frown.


    “He thinks I know where Ingo is.” Stated Oli.


    “He does.” Her husband loosened a bit, perhaps relieved to hear their son cooperating. “He thinks you’re hiding something to protect yourself, because you don’t realise what’s at stake.”


    “We’re not friends. He never comes to help me anymore. Why would he come today? And they all know I never go with him to spy on the hoarders.”


    “I know, Oli. But Ingo told Heridan he was going to meet you today. It sounds believable. He wanted to talk about...to ask you about...”


    Luthold glanced briefly at Adalina, who finished the sentence for him and then looked away.


    “He wanted to talk about me.”


    Luthold gave the slightest nod, and Oli turned his mouth up in mock disgust. Luthold continued. “It’d be different if you’d returned with a basket of fish and said you hadn’t seen him. But this story about a lone hunter attacking a child. Someone who can swim under the river... but somehow you got away?”


    “Well, he didn’t really attack me,” Admitted Oli sheepishly. “He just looked like he might. He looked crazy!”


    Luthold nodded and asked in his gentlest voice,


    “What else can you tell us?”


    “I was fishing. Earlier a barge passed. The men on it spoke to me.” Oli paused, looking from his father to his mother. Neither Winilind nor her husband reprimanded him. They needed to hear the whole story. Oli leaned forward and continued.


    “They asked to trade, but I made the sign of the Lost Daughter and they carried on. Then a bit later I pulled up a sturgeon and someone spoke to me. They spoke, but I couldn’t see them. I looked at where the voice came from and then I saw someone right in front of me. Someone who’d been there all along but looked different, like part of the bushes.”


    A short gasp escaped Winilind before she could master herself. She looked away from Oli and stared at the wall, hoping she had not put him off. He showed no sign of having noticed. She would rather have heard the story was made up and he knew where Ingo had gone after all than think about the shadow and memory she forced out of her mind.


    “He told me I was cruel for catching fish, but his own coat was made of hides. He wanted to know what we called the mountains. I didn’t understand. I told him we call them mountains too and he laughed at me. He had a spear, I think, but it looked wrong. I got scared then. I tried to get away. I tried to get to the bank, and he just walked right into the water and...”


    Oli began to cry.


    “He’s white as a cloud!” Winilind exclaimed and drew him inside her own cloak, caressing his soft brown hair and cupping his pointed chin in her hand. His body shivered beside hers.


    “I think he really saw something.” Whispered Adalina.


    “They’ll take me for a fool if I bring this to the elders,” said Luthold, shaking his head. “I must know more, Oli. What did he do in the water?”


    “He swam like a snake, through the current, right to the other side. When he took his robe off, he had a colourful shirt on, better than anything from town. It had purple and silver on it. He looked about as old as Algar. And he kept asking about the mountains... He asked if that’s where the... something-backs lived.”


    “Beyobacks?” Asked Luthold, looking up, his eyes glinting with interest.


    Oli nodded vigorously.


    “Beyobacks... purple shirt... young man.” Luthold repeated, as though chewing over words that tasted good. He looked at Winilind and announced with a smile of relief.


    “He’s a Westerner.”


    There was a hint of a question about his tone though. He needed her agreement to bury those thoughts, the same that had troubled her.


    “A Westerner.” She agreed, convincing herself of the theory. “Beyobacks is what the rich ones call the hoarders. They have a lot of silly notions about them, don’t they? He was probably a young adventurer from a wealthy family.”


    As she spoke, Luthold nodded along, his own conviction evidently growing. The shadow of fear flitted away, and Winilind felt foolish for having entertained it at all. This made sense.


    “Maybe there’s a few of them. That would explain all the mixed-up tracks. A gaggle of clumsy Westerners traipsing through the forest. Of course, you said they ignored the paths!”


    “Come to gawk at the savages of Saltleaf and their feral neighbours.” Added her husband. “Perhaps Ingo got mixed up with them. Perhaps he got talking to them? Yes, I’ll take this to the elders. Joturn will track them in no time.”


    Luthold squeezed Oli’s shoulder as he rose, and Winilind began disentangling her son’s gangly arms and legs from her body.


    “What about appearing from thin air and swimming under water?” Adalina chimed in, stony faced. “Do Westerners do that?”


    Winilind winced. Her daughter’s words punctured the relief, but she did not allow any room for doubt. The implications were too great for a possibility so small. If something about this did not fit their theory, if some details reminded her of forbidden stories and buried memories, she pushed them aside. After all, her son had a vivid imagination, and there was no place in those stories for Western words or colourful shirts, or for people who did not follow the paths.


    <hr>


    Winilind listened while Luthold relayed Oli’s story to Elder Oslef, and the embarrassed cooks shared out the extravagant meal. She could not read anything from Oslef’s expression, save that he did not feel the same relief as she and Luthold had. She waited until as late as possible before she roused Luthold and watched him prepare to leave with the next search party. She watched him approach Elder Joturn by the fire and turned to her children.


    “We need to clean and pack our winter clothes. There’s talk of moving the village this year.”


    “We’re not going to move.” Adalina replied with tired certainty.


    “If the gods invite us to, we will.”


    “Pasha says the gods don’t answer the oracle anymore,” quipped Oli, “She says the elders have forgotten how to ask them -”


    “Nonsense.” Winilind cut him off. “Elder Oslef is reading this year. He read the stones last time we moved, before the river flooded the old village site. He read them years ago and brought us South of the ridge, right before the Sullin started raiding again. Oslef knows how to read the stones – he knows how to get the gods’ attention.”


    Her voice softened and she looked up from the basket of summer clothes that she had brought out to sort.


    “It’s exciting, moving the village. A fresh start. We’ve lingered here too long. We need new paths to learn and new places to name.” Her voice turned wistful, and she spoke to herself as much as to her children. “It could be this year, with Oslef reading.”


    “Maybe it will be this year,” said Adalina, flashing her an emollient smile.This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.


    “Some of these need stitching,” Winilind threw a pile of clothes their way and Oli groaned as she produced needles and thread.


    “Get to it.”


    She disappeared inside the hut and busied herself cutting and sorting some parchment Aimar had made. She worked and kept an ear tuned to her children’s conversation. She hoped to catch Oli talking as he sometimes did with Ada, relaxed and unguarded. Perhaps they sensed her attention because they barely spoke at all as they worked the thread, fixing the lighter clothes for the months ahead.


    The time came for the next groups to depart, but Luthold returned to the house, entered and deposited the spear on the ground at the back. Winilind shot him a quizzical look. He ignored it and pulled the knife from inside his shirt, leaving that as well. She reached for his arm as he passed her, but he intercepted it, squeezed her hand gently and left without meeting her eyes. Joturn has always been cautious, she told herself, it is a good thing. But she remembered the elders’ impassive looks when Luthold had relayed Oli’s story. She prayed for her husband to make a swift return.


    “Look!” Winilind heard Oli exclaim as Luthold walked away, “Father is going with Elder Joturn and Torvald. Good job he’s not with Heridan.”


    “Heridan’s ok,” Adalina responded, a hint of hurt in her voice. “Elder Joturn should be getting some rest though.”


    “Why?”


    “He’s quite old you know, Oli. He should be looking after himself.” Her daughter’s attempt at a mature tone brought a smile to Winilind’s lips.


    “Joturn’s not old.” Oli replied


    “He’s older than grandfather was, when he died.”


    “Yes, but he’s not old old.”


    Winilind heard Adalina chuckle. She knew what Oli meant. Elder Joturn had the vitality of a cat.


    Before noon, Winlind found the summer clothes piled and folded by the doorway. She was about to step outside when she heard Oli whisper. She pressed herself against the wall beside the entrance and strained to hear.


    “What are you doing here?” Her son hissed at someone.


    “You’re in trouble, aren’t you?”


    Winilind recognised the high voice. Pasha, the daughter of Otmer and Beresa, was the closest thing Oli had to a friend. A couple of years his senior, she had never quite been herself after a summer of sickness left her housebound. The two of them had bonded, in their odd way, shortly after. Oli called her the most annoying girl in the clan, but she was the only child he played with.


    Oli replied hesitantly. “I’m not sure.”


    “I knew it! You saw what happened to Ingo, didn’t you?”


    Winlind’s body stiffened, and she shut her eyes. When Oli answered, though, relief flooded her.


    “I don’t know anything about Ingo.” He insisted, adding “And I’m not in trouble!”


    She stepped outside and feigned surprise at the sight of her friend’s daughter. Pasha was always a little wilder than you remembered her. The unkempt straw-coloured hair seemed to point in every direction and those black eyes darted around as she fidgeted and shuffled.


    “Oh, hello there, Pasha. Why don’t you play with Oli this afternoon? He’s just finished his jobs.”


    The girl inched out from the side of the house, eyeing him suspiciously.


    “You mean he’s not in trouble? Everyone says he’s in trouble.” She sounded disappointed.


    “You’d like to play with Pasha, wouldn’t you?” Winlind addressed her son, who nodded. “The two of you can play in the house.” Oli’s face screwed up into a scowl and Pasha’s erupted into a triumphant grin.


    “I knew it!” She declared to Oli, “You are in trouble.”


    “He’s not in trouble at all,” Adalina interjected, “Mother, they can play in the fields, can’t they?” In a lower voice she added, “People will only be suspicious if he’s cooped up in the house all day.”


    Winlind frowned. She wanted Oli where she could see him until Ingo was found but knew her daughter was right. Besides, it would leave her alone with Adalina. They needed a talk that was overdue. One they probably should have had before Ingo went missing.


    “Alright, but-” she started. Instantly, Pasha scampered away toward the sheep paddock, taunting Oli to catch up with her.


    “Stay out of the forest today!” She called after them as they both ran away.


    “I will.” Oli yelled back as he disappeared.


    Winilind watched them race out of view and sat outside beside her daughter. Adalina picked up a folded shirt that Oli had stitched, inspected it closely and re-folded it. Winilind watched as she picked up another.


    “Ada.” She said gently.


    “What?” Came the sharp retort. Then she looked up with an apologetic smile and added, “You could get some rest if you like, Mother. I’ll let you know when Father returns.”


    “Ada,” Winilind said, “If Ingo...when Ingo turns up... are you two still...?”


    “No.” Adalina returned her attention to the mended clothes. “I hope they find him soon and I hope he’s ok. But no, we’re not.”


    “What happened?”


    For years her daughter and Heridan’s prodigal son had been inseparable. She and Luthold had resigned themselves to becoming family with the thick-headed leader of the clan’s warriors, a man who differed in interests and temperament as much from them as he did from his son. Despite their differences, their rivalry even, the match did not displease them. Ingo would make a fine son-in-law.


    Yet, from the night the clan accepted her as an adult, Adalina had refused to see him. Neither she nor Luthold had been able to learn what happened. When Adalina did not answer, she persisted.


    “Was Ingo disappointing? Was he too shy? Was it embarrassing when you were alone? You know, it’s often awkward in the beginning. With your father and I -”


    “I know. You’ve already told me more than I want to know. We didn’t spend any time alone.”


    “Why not?” Winlind was nonplussed. “Didn’t you want to be married?”


    “I didn’t want. I don’t want...” Adalina mumbled and glanced in the direction Oli had run.


    “You didn’t want what?” Winilind leaned forward.


    Adalina put down the clothes and stared into the distance.


    “I didn’t want what comes after. It''s my earliest memory, you know. Listening to Oli coming. I never heard anything like it since. I didn’t think you would survive. Nobody thought you would survive. I only wanted to put it off, but he got upset and kept asking me why and what it meant. He thought I led him on for all those years. And now maybe I put it off forever.”


    Winlind shuddered at the memory her daughter had summoned. She recalled the sound of her own cries, heard as though being made by someone else, and the certainty she was losing both her own life and the child. She remembered holding Ada’s hands afterwards, as the blood congealed around her and her vision faded and telling her that she must look after the child if it had survived. But she could not let her daughter live in fear of so unusual a birth. She moved round to look in Adalina’s eyes.


    “Oli’s birth was not ordinary, Ada. Listen to me. You were there when Lien delivered. You helped Oslef to snip Beresa when Pasha’s little brother came. Even that wasn’t as bad, was it? Oli came out sideways and all tangled up. He got lost on the way out, the way he’s got lost ever since. That''s not what it’s like for every mother. I don’t remember any birth being as hard as that.”


    “What if it runs in the family?”


    “If it ran in the family, it would have been the same for you. But go and ask Elder Mildred how your birthday went. I was on my feet the very same evening.”


    “Is that true?”


    “Ask Mildred. You know she’ll turn anything into a horror story if she can.”


    They sat in silence for a while, and Winilind watched her daughter’s face change to relief, and then back to anxiousness.


    “He’ll turn up, won’t he?”


    Winilind smiled.


    “He’ll turn up. He’s a smart boy. Whatever pickle he’s got himself into, he’ll get himself out of it. And when he does, you put these fears out of your mind.”


    <hr>


    Luthold followed behind Joturn and his nephew, Torvald, as they tracked Oli’s footsteps under the grey morning sky, back from the village to the river. A little rain had fallen in the night, but the deep prints confirmed at least a part of his son’s story. He had fled hard and fast back to the village. No doubt flustered; he had even deviated from the familiar path on his journey South. Fortunately, he had stumbled across a new one which even Joturn looked surprised to see.


    Luthold peered into the gloom around them and shuddered. The colourful shirt and the Western words he had shared with everyone. They’d nodded to each other and tutted about outsiders and Heridan had looked hopeful.


    Fearful of leaving omissions, he had told the odder aspects of Oli’s story to Oslef. Luthold was close to Oslef, and he had relayed the extra details with a whisper and a chuckle, as though to make a joke out of the things a child could imagine, but Oslef had stared at him coldly until he fell into an embarrassed silence.


    Later that morning, Joturn had announced he would lead the search to the river and then he told Luthold and Torvald in private to leave all weapons at home. Out here, with trees so close it seemed like twilight, the idea of clumsy western adventurers abducting forest-born children felt less credible. The darkness lent itself to the notion of more sinister threats. It did not help his nerves that Oli’s story, the full version, had given the elders pause for thought. He did not know how much Joturn had told his nephew, and he did not ask him.


    Joturn broke Luthold’s reverie, speaking as he measured the gap between prints with his spread hand. “Someone scared your boy,” he muttered in his direction, “he’s rarely in such haste.”


    “Hmph.” Torvald grunted in agreement.


    Luthold did not answer. He’d heard worse taunts than that and something caught his eye on the edge of the path.


    “Here,” he called, “Are these boot prints? A man in pursuit?”


    Joturn closed the gap between them in a single leap and bent his face to the ground.


    “It’s a boot. Probably a man, running hard... and then it stops and then... it turns... off the path.” Joturn dissected the stranger’s movements of a day ago, gently pushing undergrowth aside as he danced lightly from one print in the earth to another.


    “Both come from the river,” added Torvald.


    “And only one child.” Luthold pointed out.


    “Only one child returning,” Joturn corrected. “Going out, we see neither Oli nor Ingo. Could have been one or both. Light tracks, gone by now. We may find answers at the river... or more questions.”


    Luthold and Torvald set off down the path.


    “Wait.” Called Joturn. They turned back and saw that he had not moved. The old hunter stood with his eyes closed, his face raised, and the wrinkles of his skin tightened in concentration. The only part of him that moved were the ends of his long hair that drifted in the breeze.


    “What is it?” Torvald asked.


    “Shh.” He held up a hand. They waited.


    “Perhaps my ears are not what they used to be, but I can’t hear the village from here.”


    The others closed their eyes and sought through the noises of the forest, the cracks and rustles and cawing of birds, for those strands of sound belonging to human beings; children shouting, pots banging, the sharp chop of axes.


    “I hear nothing.” Said Torvald.


    “Me neither,” added Luthold.


    Joturn shook his head slowly.


    “Why break off such hot pursuit just here? He could not see the village, nor could he hear it. How did he know that Oli would soon arrive there? That is, unless he knows the forest very well.”


    Luthold swallowed and looked again into the thick darkness around them. As much to break the silence, perhaps, as anything, Torvald ventured “He grew tired?”


    “Pfft,” scoffed Joturn. “To the river now.”


    <hr>


    Oli jogged around the perimeter fence to a gap at the far end of the fields. The Hallin didn’t keep a lot of livestock, but what sheep they tended for wool and milk ambled around inside an enclosure on the South side of the village. He clambered through the small gap in the picket fence, against which the enclosure was bounded, and circled outside the village to where Pasha would be waiting.


    The outer ‘fence’ resembled a sort of stretched-out porcupine tail encircling the roundhouses. It was formed of stakes of varying length driven into the ground and angled outwards. The larger ones were supported by poles arrayed in the opposite direction. Climbing over them would be difficult but not impossible. A determined force would have to be deterred by spears as well, but the picket fence was not really meant to defend the village from other humans. Root sleepers, despite their strength and speed, would struggle to drag their bulbous bodies over the sharp points. And if they tried, the wood could be set alight.


    As Oli ran, he jumped over the supporting poles, challenging himself each time to edge closer to the sharp points and leap higher.


    A shout broke his concentration, and his foot caught on something. The fence whirled upside down and his body, a moment earlier free, now spun around a new fixed point; his ankle.


    A moment later, he heard a ripping sound and his body fell free. His stomach would have sunk if it knew which way was down. His hands, moving on instinct, found the ground before the crown of his head hit it. Nothing could save his pride though as he heard the giggles.


    Lifting his head, still dizzy, he saw Kuno and Koen, the twins. He must have jumped right past them. They stood behind him, beside one of the poles he had cleared.


    “Oli’s chasing his sweet-heart,” drawled Koen. Oli’s face, already hot from running, could not redden anymore. Kuno took up the chant. “Oliiis chasing his sweeeaat heeeeaaart.”


    “Get lost,” hissed Oli, regretting his inability to compose a sharper insult. So much of childhood depended on that skill he lacked. He turned back and kept walking, his torn trouser leg flapping about his calf. The two younger boys followed, repeating the chant until a better idea struck Koen.


    “He’s leading her off into the woods,” he whispered to his brother, just loudly enough for Oli to overhear, “I bet he’s taking her where he took Ingo!”


    Oli kept walking, the heat rising into prickles on his skin. The twins repeated the accusation, louder and bolder. Oli could not run away from two boys three years his junior, nor did he dare turn to confront them. He could have insulted them, if he had the wits. Something whistled passed his ear and Kuno yelped, falling to the ground.


    “Haha! Kuno looks like a dirty hoarder!” Pasha’s voice rang from behind the fence.


    Kuno sat up and brushed the clump of earth off his head.


    “Not fair, Pasha,” protested Koen, arms folded.


    “Why, ‘cos he’s ugly?”


    Kuno’s bottom lip trembled, and Oli shifted uneasily.


    “It’s ok, Kuno,” he mumbled, “it’s not your fault your face is all wrinkled and weird.”


    Pasha roared with laughter. Kuno’s eyes opened wide, tears welling as he blew a long raspberry at them, and the two boys scuttled away. Pasha sat down, her back to the pole, and patted the ground beside her.


    “You shouldn’t make fun of how Kuno looks, Pasha. Mum says it’s not ok.”


    “Ha! Says you! That was so funny. ‘It’s not your fault your face is all wrinkled and weird,’” She imitated Oli, putting a cruel slant on the clumsy words he had meant to be conciliatory and fell about laughing again.


    “I wasn’t... oh, never mind. He can’t help that he got ill as a baby.”


    “Well, look at his twin brother. He wasn’t going to turn out handsome anyway. Not like Ingo... or you.” She winked and watched him with her inquisitorial eyes. Oli stared at a wisp of cloud, watching it dissipate and hoping her attention would do the same. For once, it did.


    “What’s going on, Oli?” She asked in a hushed tone, “Everyone’s saying you know what happened to Ingo.”


    “I don’t know why. He always makes up excuses. He never came to meet me. But...”


    “But you do know something, don’t you?”


    “Not about Ingo. Or maybe. It wasn’t the hoarders. My Dad says half the stories about them are made up.”


    “What about the other half?”


    Ignoring her, Oli continued. He was thinking out loud, articulating for the first time his thoughts about what happened without the pressure of grown-up ears straining to hear a version that appealed to their interests.


    “The hoarders have always been there, and they’ve never taken Ingo. But someone is in the forest who shouldn’t be.”


    He looked at Pasha and saw the eager curiosity on her face flicker momentarily into doubt. Her big, black eyes scoured their surroundings and the nearby tree line, and she edged back deeper into the fence.


    “Your monster. Mother says you made it up, but she won’t let me go into the forest today.”


    “It was a man, not a monster. But he appeared from nowhere. He crossed the bottom of the river. He had a cloak made of wolf hides and a twisted spear. My parents think it was a Western adventurer, but I know they’re wrong. Even they know they’re wrong.”


    She gulped and shivered. Oli knew he was scaring her, but it felt so good to talk that his words tumbled over each other. “I think that man got Ingo. My Mum’s gone to the river. What if he gets my Mum? He wanted to know about the mountains. I think he wanted to find the hoarders. I should have told him how to get there. Maybe he found Ingo and forced him to be a guide?”


    “You’re not lying.” Stated Pasha, regarding him intently and holding her cloak tight. “But you told the grown-ups, didn’t you?”


    Oli half nodded. “I told my parents.”


    Pasha smiled and patted his leg. “Well then, there’s nothing else you can do. My dad says there’s no one as clever as your dad, apart from Oslef, of course. Come on, let’s play.”


    Oli heard the rattle as Pasha pulled out a pouch and emptied it on the ground. The wood and stone disks clicked together as they fell into a pile. Oli beamed and reached for the nearest stone.


    “Ah, ah.” Pasha chided, “you always win when you play the gods. I’m trying your tricks today. Here, spirits.” She took the stones for herself and pushed the wooden disks across to him. Oli smirked. He had plenty of tricks for playing spirits, too. He arranged his pieces in order, stopping momentarily to admire the engravings. They were far better than those on his parents’ set.


    “A gift to my mother from Aimar,” said Pasha in a low voice. “They’re beautiful, aren’t they? She gave them to me and said not to let dad see.”


    Oli was always drawn to the sleek abstractions of the gods’ signs etched into stone pieces, but most people judged the maker’s skill by how they carved the spirits. The spirits in this set were particularly arresting. The aspect of the Bear seemed to capture its size, despite being contained in an oak disk a thumb’s width across. The Sleeper Queen stared malevolently at him, as though she would jump out and bite him if he looked too closely. The Sea Raven disk somehow contained the whole expanse of the sky and made Oli wonder what it must be like to soar so high above the world in any direction he pleased.


    “Come on, your turn.” Pasha’s voice drew him from the pictures. “I played Hurean on the North stack.”


    “Bear on the West.” Oli replied automatically as he placed the disk.


    “Terlos on the South.”


    “Too fast.” Oli commented under his breath as he claimed the East stack for the Sleeper Queen.


    “You know you sound about forty years old when you play,” teased Pasha. “Lost Daughter above Terlos.”


    “Sea Raven above her.” Oli didn’t care about her jibes when they were playing Sevenstones. He settled into the same calm that washed over him in the moment after he cast a line. Whenever he started playing, he just relaxed and knew he was going to win. He usually did.


    Pasha hesitated. She’s already wasted a good attacking piece, thought Oli. She bit her tongue between her lips and swapped the stone in her hand for another, reaching for the South stack. Before Oli could see what she had played a shout went up from the village and his head snapped round. In the next moment, the sound of dropped tools, flapping doors and hurrying feet came through the fence. Oli’s heart swelled in his chest. Fierce hope and a powerful dread whirled through his body, and he was grateful when he felt Pasha’s sticky palm against his, tugging him toward the gap. Abandoning the game, they pushed themselves through. Oli saw that a crowd had already formed around the watchtower and Lien atop it was shouting and waving her arms for quiet.


    They dashed to the edge of the crowd, weaving their way between houses and bodies until they could hear.


    “It’s coming from near the mountains.” Lien yelled to the crowd, which erupted with questions. The tall shepherd, near whose sheep Oli and Pasha had just been playing, was leaning at a nauseating angle from atop the watchtower, holding on with one hand and shielding her eyes with the other as she scoured the treetops. With her back to the crowd she added, “not the hoarders. Farther North. Much farther.”


    Oli looked round. “What’s near the mountains? What are they talking about” He asked Pasha, who shook her head and gestured at him to be quiet.


    “Where?” A loud voice demanded. “Where exactly?” Impatient men and women repeated the question.


    Suddenly, Pasha gasped and nudged him in the side, pointing up beyond the watchtower. Oli finally saw it. A great column of smoke rose in the distance, billowing into an unnatural cloud that hung in the clear sky above the forest. Had it come later in the year it could have been a clan leaving its old home in search of new paths. In early Spring, though, it could only be a sacking. He could not tell how near or far it was.


    Lien turned and even from a distance, Oli saw incredulity in her expression. She had stared long and hard without answering their questions, he realised, not because she could not see where it came from, but because she did not believe what her eyes showed her.


    “It’s coming from the Sullin Fort.” She announced. The onlookers fell silent. When a village was sacked, it was sacked by the Sullin for refusing payment. Sometimes villages managed to defend themselves, but nobody ever retaliated. Oli heard her ask in a trembling voice. “Who would attack the Sullin? Who could?”