Raisa followed his trail for a mile or so, wiping rain from her face and blinking ice from her lashes. The path followed a clear, half-frozen stream for a while, then veered sharply off to the west, climbing into an aspen forest, ending in an upland meadow. Raisa stopped amid the trees edging the meadow and peered out.

Amon stood centered in the meadow, stripped to breeches and undershirt. His sword belt and other gear were arranged in a neat pile at the periphery of the field.

He held a long staff in his two hands, and he was in constant motion, bending, twisting, circling around, the staff a whistling blur as he swung it over his head, swept it forward, lifted it high, and skimmed the ground. It was an elaborate dance, and he’d clearly been at it for some time. His dark hair lay in wet strands on his forehead, and his skin steamed in the chilly air.

Raisa stared at him—at the muscles rippling across his chest and his corded arms—and all her good intentions flew out of her head. He was beautiful and deadly, totally unself-conscious. He went at it as if determined to work himself to exhaustion. He didn’t look like he was enjoying himself. More like it was punishment. She could hear the rasp of his breathing from where she stood.

How in the name of the Lady could he be coatless? It was freezing out. Raisa shivered, the cold penetrating deeper now that she’d stopped moving.

She stood (almost literally) frozen for another long moment while her courage drained away. This was wrong, her spying on him. Whatever was going on, he meant it to be private. She’d find another time to speak her mind. She’d go back to camp, sneak into her tent, and stay there until he returned.

You’re just a coward, she thought.

But before she could move, Amon paused in the midst of a sequence, the staff horizontal in front of him, his head cocked. He flipped the quarterstaff to a vertical position, turned, and looked directly at where Raisa was hiding.

“Rai?” he whispered.

Bones. How did he know? Timidly, she stepped out of the woods. They stood staring at each other across an expanse of frozen grass and stumpy shrubs.

“I came looking for you,” she said finally. “I wondered what you were doing.”

“You came by yourself? Where’s Hallie?” he demanded, looking around as if the other cadet might be hiding in the brush, too.

Hallie’s supposed to be watching me, Raisa thought. So much for being just another soldier. “I slipped away. She thought I was in my tent.”

“You shouldn’t have come. It’s not safe for you to be out here on your own.”

“If it’s not safe for me, it’s not safe for you,” Raisa said. “Aren’t you cold?”