One tall figure stands motionless, back to the lake, gaze on the fire, the tines of his antlers rising high into the night air. Walker. The sadness coming off him has an almost physical presence.

Like I said, hard and deep.

This is a blessing ceremony for a dead cousin. The first night’s for family, the second for everyone whose life the departed had touched. What I’m looking at is the second night ceremony for Walker’s daughter and, judging by the turnout, she’d been well loved.

“There’s no body down there,” a voice says from behind me.

I don’t bother to turn. I’d already smelled the stranger’s coyote blood, heard his approach as he came soft-stepping out from under the pines, boots almost silent on the stone. I’ll admit my shoulders went a little tighter, but I didn’t allow myself to be concerned. Who would bring a new death at the edge of a ceremony such as this?

The stranger joins me on the outcrop and looks down on the proceedings below. I glance at him. Tall and lean, the dog-headed man is dressed in jeans and cowboy boots, buckskin jacket. His flat-brimmed black hat has a leather band that’s decorated with turquoise and silver. Two long braids frame his canine features.

“So there won’t be any feed,” the stranger adds.

“I know.”

He grins. “Makes me wonder, then, what a corbae’s doing at the goodbye do for some poor dead cerva girl.”

“Paying my respects,” I say. “Just like you. We’re not all about carrion.”

“I’m never about carrion,” he says. “I can’t hunt for myself, I don’t eat.”

“Whatever.”

He takes a tobacco pouch from the pocket of his buckskin jacket and rolls a cigarette, lights it with a shiny Zippo lighter. After a couple of drags, he offers it to me.

“I’m corbae, you’re canid,” I say, making no move to take the proffered cigarette.

“So?”

“So, what do you want from me?”

“Not that chip on your shoulder.” He gestures with the cigarette, offering it again. “I learned a long time ago to take people as they are, one at a time, not judge them by their tribe or clan or blood. You should try it—it’s very liberating not to be tied down to how people think you’re supposed to react to every damn thing.”

I give him a slow nod and take the cigarette, draw the smoke into my lungs.

“My name’s Whiskey Jack,” the stranger tells me.

“They call me Grey.”

His eyebrows rise. “Oh, you’re that blackbird.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”