Book One – Chapter 17

Even if there was no wizard who would oppose the raiders, the tairan authorities could send messages if they only learned of the planned attack. Tria would know whom to contact. And once the settlements were secured, saved by Yu, she would take him back. She had to. If he begged her right. He would. Yu would beg and do whatever she wanted if it meant that he would never again have to set a talon outside of the estate, for the rest of his life until he died.

Yu’s stomach twisted hard as the thought of the alternative, which was to continue the Snowtrail in the other direction. To turn westward into the unending white. A path of snow and ice, of no warmth and endless ridges with no safe descent, with no markers except the occasional cairn half-swallowed by all the rockslides and avalanches. It took months to reach the winding slopes down into the western Moors. Months. And that was only if you survived. If the witches or the orks or the avian beasts did not get you first.

Yu would not survive, even if it was just the cold. The last four weeks had been bad enough. The memories alone made his stomach clench again and the sickness climb up his throat.

He swallowed it down.

He could not do it. He could not go back there. He could not even think of that now.

But maybe he did not have to.

No matter the direction, Yu could not get away on his own. Not right now. Not yet. As things stood, he did not have the strength, or the skills, or the supplies to survive even a day out there alone, and he knew it. He would need someone capable to attach himself to, someone with a plan that led to safety. And for that to happen, Yu needed a reason, a good and non-suspicious one, to join them. Whoever that person was, they would decide where to go and how to get there.

Until then, Yu needed to be normal and harmless and compliant and likeable.

Oh god.

His life depended on his people skills.

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