“Aven,” Cullion said now without preamble, “when do we leave? Should I order a hunt or not?”

“Hold off for today,” the Aven said. “Cechtar did well yesterday. Come down to us if you need a few eltor.”

“I will. And what about—”

“An auberei should reach you soon. There’s a Council tonight in our camp. I’ve left it until late because I’m hoping Levon will be back with news from Paras Derval.”

“Good. Aven, I’ve been pushing my shaman since the snow started melting—”

“Don’t push him,” Ivor said automatically.

“—but he’s offered nothing at all. What about Gereint?”

“Nothing,” said Ivor and rode on.

He had not been young when they blinded him. He had been next in line, waiting at Celidon for years, before word had come with the auberei that Colynas, shaman to Banor and the third tribe, was dead.

He was old now, and the blinding had been a long time ago, but he remembered it with utter clarity. Nor was that surprising: the torches and the stars and the circling men of Banor’s tribe were the last things Gereint had ever seen.

It had been a rich life, he thought; more full than he could have dreamed. If it had ended before Rangat had gone up in fire, he would have said he’d lived and died a happy man.

From the time he’d been marked by the Oldest at Celidon, where the first tribe always stayed, Gereint’s destiny had been different from that of all the other young men just called to their fast.

For one thing, he’d left Celidon. Only the marked ones of the first tribe did that. He’d learned to be a hunter, for the shaman had to know of the hunt and the eltor. He had traveled from tribe to tribe, spending a season with each, for the shaman had to know of the ways of all the tribes, never knowing which tribe he was to join, which Chieftain to serve. He had lain with women, too, in all the nine tribes, to sprinkle his marked seed across the Plain. He had no idea how many children he’d fathered in those waiting years; he did remember certain nights very well. He’d had years of it, seasons of traveling and seasons at Celidon with the parchments of the Law, and the other fragments that were not Law but which the shamans had to know.

He’d thought he’d had enough time, more than most of the shamans had, and he had begun it all by seeing a keia for his totem which had marked him inwardly, even among the marked.

He’d thought he was ready when the blinding came. Ready for the change, though not the pain. You were never ready for the pain: you came to your power through that agony, and there was no preparing for it.