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it into its belt and set out running.
    Running was not a skill the tree-raised children of the Rain Wilds practised much. She’d become a better runner since coming to this place, but it still felt almost dangerous. How did one run and remain aware of one’s surroundings? How could she listen when her heart was pounding in her ears, or scent anything when panting through her mouth?
    The game trail wound along the ridge, avoiding the densest brush and threading its way through the groves of trees. Tats, she discovered, was a strong and swift runner. She did not even see him for a time, but followed the trampled trail the immense deer had left.
    When the game trail left the ridge and plunged across a steeper slope toward the river, she caught her first glimpse of Tats. He was running, bow gripped in one hand, head down, free hand pumping. She lifted her eyes and saw, not the hunt, but swaying brush that told of the fleeing animals. The whining excitement of the wolves carried back to her and infected her with something of their frenzy. She tucked her chin to her chest, tightened her wings to her back and ran, bounding in leaps as the slope of the trail became steeper. ‘Tats!’ she called again, but breathlessly and without carrying power. The trail suddenly twisted, heading up the slope again. She gritted her teeth and pounded on.
    Lifting her head, she saw Tats ahead of her. He had paused at the crest of the hill. ‘Tats!’ she yelled, and this time she saw him turn his head. He stood still, and much as she would have liked to slow down, or even to drop to a walk and catch her breath, she pushed herself to run up the hill.
    As she reached his side, she found herself both breathless and speechless. Tats, too, stood staring down and across the hillside before them.
    The hunt had gone on without them. The deer and their pursuers must have leapt across the extremely steep slope before them. The whole hillside was pocked with hoof-prints and flung earth. Below them, the remains of an Elderling road paralleled the game trail for a short distance before turning toward the river. From their vantage point, Thymara could see that the road ventured out onto the ruins of a bridge, where it ended abruptly in jagged timbers and tumbled stone. Once that bridge must have spanned the river, a feat that seemed impossible now: she could glimpse the other end of the bridge on the far side of the river, similarly truncated.
    Far below the ragged end of the bridge’s arc, the river foamed and boiled. On the near shore, the road that once must have joined to the bridge approach was a succession of broken surfaces. Trees had encroached and parts of it had broken and slid down as the river gnawed at the shores. Of the roadway that should have led to their current village, there was no sign. Long ago the river had shifted in its bed to devour it, and then shifted back, ceding its place to tussocky meadow.
    â€˜They’ve got them cornered,’ Tats announced. ‘The wolves must know this place. They’re driving the deer right out to the end.’
    He was right. Her eyes found first the fleeing animals and then, through a screen of trees, the wolves behind them. She glanced back at Tats, only to discover that he was sliding down the steep slope. He’d started out in a crouch, but soon sat down abruptly and slid. He vanished from sight in the rough brush that cloaked the lower slope.
    â€˜Are you STUPID?!’ she yelled angrily after him. Then, cursing herself for a bigger fool than he was, she followed him. His passage had loosened the scree and rain had made the earth slippery. She kept her feet longer than he had, but eventually fell over on one hip and slid the rest of the way, earth and brambly brush bunching up against her as she went down. He was waiting for her at the bottom.
    â€˜Be quiet!’ he cautioned her, and then held out a hand. Grudgingly she took it and let him pull her to her feet.