Alfonse and I kept to the path that wound through the forest. Any hope we might have had of pursuing Orvald’s tracks had been dashed by his well-meaning friends in Shakerton whose boot-prints had utterly obscured any trail Orvald himself might have made.

  “What if instead of trying to track Orvald, we try to track the sheep?” I said an hour into our ride. In that, our task was similar to hunting ibex. They were difficult to find when one was thinking like a predator, but when thinking like an ibex, they were much easier to locate. “That’s what Orvald was doing as he passed through the woods. It might make it easier for us to track him in turn.”

  The older Hume inclined his head. “A fine strategy, Draeza. Lead the way.”

  A mile or so later, a strange pattern of tracks and a disturbance in the undergrowth caught my attention. I swung off Gwinny, who began to stamp nervously, so I told her to wait for me on the path. With a slight grunt, Alfonse swung down after me and hovered just behind me at the edge of the trail.

  Sorting out the tracks from the bootprints, the clearest set of prints belonged to a wolf rather than a sheep, and a large one at that. “If you were a shepherd,” I began.

  “I’d at least follow and see if the wolf had taken the sheep,” Alfonse said.

  Ibex were smart enough not to wander through the woods by themselves. I wanted to ask Alfonse if it was an edict by the Order that prevented them from raising ibex instead of sheep, but I didn’t want to seem as though I was being critical of Hume culture at a stressful time. The sheep herds had brought a multitude of difficulties upon Shakerton, of which Alfonse was aware already. And it was too late now to undo the herds’ introduction.

  I led Alfonse off the path into the woods. “We’ll only go far enough that we can still see the horses,” I assured him. “Lose sight of the path, and the forest will be sure to lose you.” This last I added quietly to myself, something I’d learned from Bansaerin when he was teaching me to hunt and track, back before I’d met the spirit in the isla.

  I moved carefully, sniffing the air every few steps to check for the scent of decay. I had no desire to add an encounter with mournlings to our search for the Hume. It was just as important to check behind, making sure I could still see the path, as it was to check the path ahead.

  Just before I would have lost sight of Gwinny and had to turn around, a gray shape stood out amid the shadows at the base of a large oak. I froze upon seeing it, causing Alfonse to raise his staff overhead with a sharp cry.

  “Wait,” I urged, raising my fist beside me, a signal among our hunters I hoped Alfonse would understand.

  The shape was unmoving. Blood coated the base of the tree around it. “It’s not Orvald,” I whispered back to Alfonse, creeping toward the shape. There was a great deal more fur than even the best-clad Hume hunter would have worn, and though my experience with Hume was limited, I had heard enough stories of frost-bitten shepherds to know fur was beyond the reach of their limited coin.

  The scent of blood had faded from the corpse, though a slight bloom of decay hung in the air—Was it the natural decay of the forest or the first stage of a mournling’s corruption?

  The pelt lay in tatters around the body. I winced as I stepped upon a stick hidden in the underbrush. Of my two pair of boots, I’d chosen the ones better suited for riding than foraging, which was only proving to be a problem now. Such destruction wasn’t the work of any living creature—the decay became stronger as I drew closer to the corpse.

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  Two of the paws were still intact, the other two had been crushed beyond recognition. I crept the remaining few feet toward the corpse. A mournling would have already reacted to my presence. “It’s a wolf,” I murmured to Alfonse. The body had been badly bruised as the creature fought its attacker. I bowed my head over its body and murmured the prayer of passing to allow the wolf’s spirit to return to Illios and keep it safe from the ravages of the mournlings.

  That’s what had killed the wolf, why the scent of decay lingered about the body. I explained as much to Alfonse who nodded gravely. Such a development did not bode well for Orvald and his sheep, but neither of us wanted to voice such a conclusion and call a darker cloud over the boy’s fate.

  “Be at peace,” I said, pressing my palm down toward the wolf to ease its spirit’s passing and conclude my prayer. I had a few herbs in the pouch at my waist that would help to protect the body as the spirit faded away. We didn’t have time to bury the wolf, which grieved me. They were essential to our forest and our safety—they took what they needed and nothing more, and in balancing the Cycle, they prevented an overabundance of mournlings.

  Bansaerin believed the Hume’s fear of the wolves was part of what had led to the swell of mournlings in Scaoden, the continent northeast of Breoland and across the channel. He’d taught me too that the wolves’ necessity and skill as predators were why they had been adopted as the symbol of the Lifkin freedom fighters, the Umbral Wolves. They had taken up my parents’ rebellion after it had failed and remade it for a world that was more hostile toward our people than it had been even before. The Hume feared them. My uncle remained suspicious of their methods and cause, but it was one of Bansaerin’s deepest-held ambitions to one day join their ranks.

  “We should return to the path. It’s getting late.”

  I pressed my hands into the dirt and rose, following Alfonse back to Gwinny and his mare. To mine and Gwinny’s relief, whatever creature had plagued us on our way to Shakerton remained unwilling to show itself again to a pair of two.

  As we neared the halfway point, where I had bid farewell to Bansaerin that morning, a flicker of pale blue light beckoned to me from a few feet into the forest. “Alfonse, there’s something there.” I kept my voice low so as not to disturb whatever it was.

  As before, I pulled Gwinny to a halt and swung off the saddle. The blue, glowing form hovered a few dozen paces within the forest.

  I approached carefully. Drawing near, my breath grew short in my chest. The spirit of a young Hume paced back and forth in front of a tree. At its base, the body of the same Hume lay slumped against the trunk. Blood coated his neck and ran down his shoulder and chest. His belly was swelling but wasn’t yet distended.

  “Orvald?” I ventured softly. Was I supposed to be able to see Hume spirits? Aveela had never mentioned helping the Hume to pass on or being visited by a Hume, though I don’t know that one would have come to our clan.

  “You . . . you can see me?”

  “I can.” I bit my lower lip. Aveela had warned me about this part of spirits’ experience, their struggle to reconcile their former and present states, but at least Lifkin spirits knew about being spirits. How would a Hume take their passing when they weren’t familiar with spiritspeakers?

  “I’m dead, aren’t I?”

  “Yes.” I inhaled slowly and waited for the news to settle over the spirit.

  Orvald threw his arms into the air and began cursing while muttering a Hume’s name under his breath. He resumed his pacing. Aveela had taught me not to interrupt them, but he was working himself into a state.

  “Orvald’s spirit is here by his body,” I explained to Alfonse who was looking between me and the corpse. “He’s quite distressed. Does the name Gerry mean anything to you?”

  Alfonse frowned. “Yes, the lad worked for him.”

  “He sent me into the light-cursed forest, didn’t he?” Orvald yelled, whirling about to face Alfonse. “All for this blasted, murderous sheep.”

  “Murderous sheep? What do you mean?”

  “There!” The boy’s spirit cried, pointing over my shoulder.