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Hope battered her chest like a bird beating at the bars of its cage

"Can you really do such a thing, Holy One?"

"We shall see" It was painful to hope In a way, it was a relief when the Holy One changed the subject "Have you seen any child a the White Deer people who can follow after you, Adica?"

"I have not," she murut "Nor would I have ti she would need to know"

"Do not despair, Child I will not abandon your people" A sharp hiss of surprise sounded, followed by the distant hoot of an owl "I a surprised That quickly, her presence vanished

Had the Holy One actually traveled through the gateway of the stones? Had she stood behind Adica in her own self? Or had she merely walked the path of visions and visited Adica in her spirit form? The Holy One was so powerful that Adica could never tell Nor dared she ask

Truly, humans had the smallest share of power on this earth Yet if that were so, why did the Cursed Ones ly? Why did the Cursed Ones hate humankind so?

Wind clacked the bronze leaves of the cauldron She thought, for an instant, that she could actually hear flowers unfurling as the sun rose

A horn call blared: the alare

With more haste than care, she hurried back to her tent, took off her holy garate of the village just as a slender girl with strong legs and a wiry guard dog in faithful attendance loped up The girl threw e beads at the feet of Mother Orla, who had coate in response to the sunarled that she could barely count off theShe reat age, Orla did not fear evil spirits or death; they teased her already

"A skirmish," she said to those who assees "The Cursed Ones have raided Froe did you coly flavored with meadoeet flowers that the smell of it made Adica’s ht her breath "I came from Two Streams, and from Pine Top, Muddy Walk, and Old Fort before that The Cursed Ones attacked a settlement just beyond Four Houses There were three people killed and two children carried away by the raiders"

"Did any of Four Houses’ people go after the up to the front He’d been up early, hunting He carried his sling in one hand Two grouse, a partridge, and three ducks dangled fro nosed the dead birds, but the Swift batted it away until another child ran up with a nice

"Nay," said the Swift, "none of the Four Houses people pursued the Cursed Ones, for those killed were Red Deer people There were two fao They come out of west country"

"What does it matter to the Cursed Ones whether they kill Red Deer folk or White Deer folk?" Beor had a good anger about him now, the kind that stirred others to action "We’re all the same to the Cursed Ones, and once they’ve killed and captured Red Deer folk, who’s to say they won’t coether, or we’ll all fall to their arrows one by one"

People er by turns

"What does the Hallowed One say?" asked Orla with deceptive softness

Everyone fell silent as Adica considered The Swift finished the ht to her by one of the boys she’d beaten at the races the sus and the loose breechclout that gave her room to run He looked as if he wanted to touch the anify her status At the Festival of the Sun last year, when all the villages of the tribe rievances, this girl had won the races and with that victory the right to the naes between the villages of the White Deer people

"Already the Hallowed Ones of the human tribes work in concert, and we count as our allies the Horse people Yet the Horse people are less huladly" Adica paused, hearing their restlessness