“They are much stronger,” she said finally. “I could tell coming back to Glensk Wood. Are they strong enough to warn me consistently and accurately? I can’t be sure yet. I have to wait and see. I have to trust in what he told me. And I do trust him, Pan. I still think the exchange was a fair bargain.”

She had noticed something else, too, although she didn’t choose to talk about it just yet. As they walked, traveling through the gloom and shadows of the woods, alone amid the trees save for those things that lived there, she found she was able to detect, identify, and isolate almost everything that drew breath. She couldn’t always tell exactly what she was sensing, but she could tell if it was big or little, safe or dangerous, lying in wait or sleeping, hunting or simply moving about. It was a subtle thing, filled with nuances she had not recognized before, and it gave her insights that filled her with unexpected confidence.

“How far do you want to travel today?” he asked.

She shook her head dismissively. “As far as you want.”

“But you’ve already traveled several days just to reach me. You haven’t had time to rest. You haven’t slept in how long?”

“Not so long, Pan. I can keep going. I feel all right.” She saw the way he was looking at her, and she could see the doubt in his eyes. Apparently doubt wasn’t a color. “Really, I do.”

They walked through the remainder of the morning, climbing out of the valley floor and onto the higher, more open expanses of the lower slopes while staying below the snow line. They passed isolated homes and farms, and once or twice they saw people and exchanged waves. The sun rose and the day brightened, and the heavy mists receded far enough up into the mountains that the air warmed and dampness of the dawn’s dew faded. Hunting birds circled in the skies overhead, and patches of paintbrush and avalanche lilies appeared amid the rocks.

“It could almost be like it used to, couldn’t it?” she asked him at one point, gesturing at the countryside. It could, she added to herself, but not so long as I can’t tell the colors of the flowers.

“This is like it used to be,” he said after a moment. “You and me, doing what we’ve always done.”

You and me, she repeated to herself, and the words were comforting.