I look at him now. He’s walking alongside the wagon, mouth set in a crooked grimace, and his fingers curled around an Old World rifle modified to shoot black powder. Every few paces he glances over his shoulder to make sure the goat is still following with my gear.

I can’t believe he’s alive. All those years we assumed him dead, and here he is, walking beside the wagon, whole and well. I should be elated, relieved—and a part of me is—but a larger part is furious. He’s trafficking servants! Which I fear is what I’m about to become. Powder Town might be where people go for security, but word among the smaller, more paranoid packs is that the security comes at a price, that people there aren’t quite free, and that a working class keeps the place running while the folks who founded it live comfortably.

It’s part of why Ma never wanted to make the trip, why she clung to Dead River with an iron fist.

Guess I’m about to find out the truth.

“This what you’ve been up to all those years, Asher?” Baby doesn’t even flinch when I break the silence. The wagon’s rocking like a cradle and she’s sleeping the best she ever has against my chest.

Asher gives me a narrow sideways glance and plods on.

“You escaped that raid at Alkali Lake to trap people like game? Silla would be disgusted.”

“My mother is dead,” he snaps, turning on me. Those blue eyes don’t look calm anymore, but rimmed with fire. “And you don’t know anything about me.”

“I knew—”

“You knew a kid. That Asher’s been gone since your half of the pack left.”

“The kid I knew was at least kind,” I point out. “He set animals free when our traps brought in more than we needed. He didn’t like gutting game, so I did it for him. He picked wildflowers off the scrub for his mother, and he never would have resorted to something like this.”

“He also grew up the moment he watched his pack die for him, and he went on growing up alone and abused and imprisoned. He didn’t have anybody, so he became what he needed to survive. I’m sorry you don’t like that, but I don’t give a rusted damn how you judge me. You always thought you knew best, Delta, and sometimes you did, but not about this. You know nothing about what I went through.”

I bite the inside of my cheek because he’s right about that last bit. The traders talked about Alkali pack-members shot in the heart, floating bloated in the lake, burned alive in their huts. I assumed Asher was among them. I never imagined he got away. Or rather, that the raid got him.