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Amira looked to Lendri. "And your father, he approves of this?"

"It is our way," said Lendri. "The omah nin will not helpus, but he will not interfere."

Amira stood. "Show me what to do."

* * * * *

The three of them swaddled the belkagen in the remains of his cloak, wrapped him in one of the spare deerhide blankets, and bound it all with tough leather thongs. When they finished, only the belkagen's head could be seen. Dried blood and dirt still smeared his face and caked his hair. Amira used a little water and the hem of her cloak to clean it off.

Amira looked down on the face and laughed sadly. "A ghost of fire."

"What?" said Gyaidun.

"The first time I saw him," she said, "I was wounded. Half dead, more likely. And delirious. I woke with him bending over me, chanting beside the fire. My first thought was, 'A ghost of fire.' Looking at him now, I see no ghost, no fire."

Both warriors exchanged a look and scowled, probably thinking it some subtlety of Common that they didn't understand.

"Our people believe the body is only a home for our ghost," said Lendri, "and our word for 'ghost' is uskeche."

"Uskeche?"

"It means fire," said Gyaidun.

Amira looked down at the belkagen's face. There was no fire there. Not anymore. Only a vague remembrance of it, like cold ashes.

"I…" said Amira, and found tears welling in her eyes. "I never thought… it would be him. Going after my son, chasing his captors, I thought I might die. I half-expected you two to get yourselves killed, but I never thought… not him."

They stood in silence over the body a moment before Lendri spoke. "I think he did."

"What?"

"I have thought long about this," said Lendri. "All belkagen are given wisdom in Hro'nyewachu. It is said it is the source of much of their power. But Belkagen Kwarun once told me that his blessing was just as much a curse. 'The one burden no warrior should ever bear,' he told me."

"What was it?" asked Amira.

"He never told me, but I think Hro'nyewachu showed him his own death. It is the one thing every warrior risks but the one thing he never knows. But I think the belkagen knew."

Gyaidun nodded, his eyes distant and a cold fire burning in them. "Yes," he said. "On Arzhan Island, when he heard Amira's tale… she awoke a great fear in him. I think it may have been why he balked at first." His face clouded, his nostrils flaring, and he looked away. "I shamed him. And myself. I… should have-"

"No," said Amira. "No, I think you made him proud. He was afraid, yes. Who wouldn't be? But you reminded him of courage and woke it in him. I only knew him a short time, but I think he was proud-very proud-of both of you."

* * * * *

The Vil Adanrath built dozens of pyres, arranging them in a wide ring on the hilltop. Finding enough wood for so many had been no easy task, but the survivors had roamed many leagues and brought every scrap they could find. When that was not enough, they dug through the snow, cut the grass beneath, and bundled it into tight sheaves. The heavy snowfall-already melting with the return of autumn weather-made everything damp, but the Vil Adanrath had lived in the Wastes for many generations, and building fires in the snowfields was the least of their skills.

The belkagen's pyre was the tallest of all, a waist-high bed of grass and sticks that stood in the middle of the great ring of dead Vil Adanrath. The belkagen lay upon it, his staff beside him.

The sun touched the rim of the world in the west, and a great howling filled the air. The surviving Vil Adanrath, elves and wolves, stood just outside the ring of pyres. Each stood over a fallen comrade, brother, sister, or lover. Some few of the older elves stood over the body of one of their adult children. All stood honor's distance away from the hrayeket, Lendri and Gyaidun, who stood witness over the belkagen. Amira had chosen to stay with them, as had Jalan and Erun.

"It is time, Lady Amira," said Lendri. "The sun sets, and the song of the people will sing their brothers home."

Amira raised her staff, the gift of Hro'nyewachu that the belkagen