“He is young,” Thom agreed. “And not half so bad as he would like to think himself. Sometimes he is not.”

Mat glowered at both of them and lowered his hand.

Lifting the shafts of her cart, Aludra got it turned around and started for the door, giving Tammuz a kick in the ribs as she passed. He groaned groggily.

“I would like to know something, Aludra,” Thom said. “How did you light that lantern so quickly in the dark?”

Stopping short of the door, she smiled over her shoulder at him. “You wish me to tell you all of my secrets? I am grateful, but I am not in love. That secret, not even the Guild knows, for it is my discovery alone. I will tell you this much. When I know how to make it work properly, and work only when I want it to, sticks will make my fortune for me.” Throwing her weight against the shafts, she pulled the cart into the rain, and the night swallowed her.

“Sticks?” Mat said. He wondered if she might not be a little strange in the head.

Tammuz groaned again.

“Best we do the same as she, boy,” Thom said. “Else it’s a choice between slitting four throats and maybe spending the next few days explaining ourselves to the Queen’s Guards. These look the sort who’d set them on us out of spite. And they have enough to be spiteful for, I suppose.” One of Tammuz’s companions twitched as if coming to, and muttered something incomprehensible.

By the time they had gathered everything and saddled the horses, Tammuz was up on his hands and knees with his head hanging, and the others were stirring and groaning, too.

Swinging into his saddle, Mat stared at the rain outside the open door, falling harder than ever. “A bloody hero,” he said. “Thom, if I ever look like acting the hero again, you kick me.”

“And what would you have done differently?”

Mat scowled at him, then pulled up his hood and spread the tail of his cloak over the fat roll tied behind the high cantle of his saddle. Even with oiled cloth, a little more protection from the rain could not hurt. “Just kick me!” He booted his horse in the ribs and galloped into the rainy night.

CHAPTER
41

A Hunter’s Oath