I reeled with the things I did not want to know. The cold of Kettricken alone in her bed. Verity, drawn to Skill at night. I did not know what was worse. My voice shook as I said, “You must not tell me these things, my queen. To speak of this to me is not right-”
“Then let me go and speak to him. He is the one who needs to hear this, I know. And I am going to speak it! If he will not come to me for his heart’s sake, then he must come for his duty.”
This makes sense. She is the one who must bear if the pack is to increase.
Stay out of this. Go home.
Home! A derisive bark of laughter in my mind. Home is a pack, not a cold empty place. Listen to the female. She speaks well. We should all go, to be with him who leads. You fear foolishly for this bitch. She hunts well, with a keen tooth, and her kills are clean. I watched her yesterday. She is worthy of he who leads.
We are not pack. Be silent.
I am.
At the corner of my eye, I caught a flash of movement. I turned quickly, but there was nothing there. I turned back to find Kettricken standing silent before me still. But I sensed the spark of anger that had spirited her was now damped in pain. It bled her resolve from her.
I spoke quietly through the wind. “Please, lady, let me take you back to Buckkeep.”
She did not reply, but pulled her hood up around her face and tightened it to hide most of her face. Then she walked to the mule and mounted and suffered me to lead the beast back to Buckkeep. It seemed a longer, colder walk in her subdued silence. I was not proud of the change I had wrought in her. To take my mind from it, I quested out about me carefully. It did not take me long to find Cub. He stalked and shadowed us, drifting like smoke through the tree cover, using the windblown drifts and falling snow to hide himself. I could never once actually swear that I saw him. I caught motion from the corner of my eye, of a tiny bit of his scent on the wind. His instincts served him well.