When Mihn had finished, he sat her up to slip on her boots and lace them up.

At last she looked Mihn directly in the eye. 'What is he like?' she asked softly.

'Lord Isak?' Mihn was surprised by the question. 'Don't you know?'

'I know what he looks like in his dreams,' she whispered, 'but sadly, dreams are only that. They tell me nothing of who he is.'

Mihn helped her upright and let her take her weight. After a little unsteadiness, she looked able to walk. 'Lord Isak is a young man trying to be a good lord,' he said after a moment. 'He's trying to understand what's been done to his life.'

'He fights it, though.'

'That's only natural, isn't it? As a white-eye?'

'It is in his blood to do so, but it is not always the answer. He may need others to show him that.'

Mihn hesitated, disturbed by the direction of her thoughts. 'Let's get you out of here so you can tell him yourself.' He guided her to¬wards the window, opened the shutter a little and peered out. The area around looked empty of armed men. 'Can you climb?'

'I'll manage.'

'Are you sure?' Mihn looked at her sceptically until Xeliath took his hand with her good one. Her fingers, shaking a little as he had helped her out of bed, now clamped around his wrist and began to crush it. After a few moments, Mihn gave a gasp of pain and she released him.

'I get the point,' he said dryly. 'You're still a white-eye.'

'Good boy.'

'But without meaning to offend you, my Lady, you are going to find it hard to climb with only one arm. Your left is completely useless, isn't it?'

She grimaced as her shoulder spasmed, as though responding to Mihn's question of its own volition. With her teeth gritted against the pain, Xeliath brought her left arm up to chest height, visibly shaking. With what looked like great difficulty, she turned her wrist so Mihn could see what she held.

'I think we should bring it with us nonetheless,' she whispered.

Mihn hadn't been able to identify it as he'd struggled to fit Xeliath's ruined arm into the shirt sleeve, though it felt smooth, and as warm as her own skin, for all its solidity. Now, in the dull moonlight, he saw a glassy surface and his heart went cold. The last time he had seen something like that, it had been fused to Eolis, Lord Isak's sword…

The Crystal Skull given to Xeliath had done the same thing, only this one had fused itself to the hand with which she'd first gripped it. It had probably attached itself to the bones within as well. To take the Skull of Dreams from Xeliath would require more than theft: it would need mutilation.

Mihn suddenly realised Lord Isak had been right to send him here. Sooner or later someone would try to take the Skull from her, and Xeliath would most likely die in the process.

'May I be allowed to tie a rope around you, in case you slip? I prom-ised my Lord I would bring you safely to him.'

The young woman shook her head. 'I have been imprisoned here for the best part of a year; I will escape it by my own strength or die trying. The wishes of the man whose fault this is do not concern me.' With no small amount of difficulty, she fought her way down the wall, clinging fast to the creeper as she searched for secure footholds. Her gritted determination paid off and she half-fell into Morghien's waiting arms.

They set off by fits and starts as rainclouds began to gather above. With Seliasei's ghostly assistance, they got to the edge of the forest as the first fat drops began to clatter through the leaves. Morghien led the way, a throwing axe ready in his hand, while Xeliath allowed Mihn to walk at her side, a secure arm around her waist in case her underused leg muscles failed her.

'Thieves, are they?' said a woman's voice behind them.

Mihn stumbled in shock, almost knocking Xeliath to the floor, while Morghien whirled around with his axe raised. Mihn could do little to help his companion beyond turning Xeliath so she could see who had spoken, but Morghien did nothing once he'd raised his weapon.

Standing a few yards behind them were three young women in long dresses. They had hair curling to their waists. The middle one had skin the same shade as Xeliath's. The girl on the left was a rich ebony, and the one on the right had a silvery sheen to her patterned coffee skin that caught the moonlight.

'Thieves they must be, sisters,' answered the right, smiling like a cat at Morghien as he put himself between Xeliath and the strange women. 'Thieves stealing the jewel of our household, I think.'

'And on our father's day as well,' continued the ebony-skinned woman. Her flesh was so dark Mihn could see little of her face beyond sharp little teeth and eyes that flashed green. 'Shall we permit it?'

'How could we permit it?' purred the middle sister. 'Stolen from our domain, when we are bound to protect her family? No, they must be punished.'

'We've stolen nothing,' Morghien said, prompting all three women to turn their hungry attentions solely on him.

'Strangers come and creep in through windows, hurrying away before the alarm is sounded, with a noble child under their cloaks. Thieves, we think,' she spat, with undisguised venom. 'Avoiding the guards is easy, but us? Not so; we can sense all that goes on in these parts, and how could we not notice a foreign spirit walking our fields?'

Out of the corner of his eye, Mihn saw a brief white flicker around Morghien's head. Seliasei, he thought. If she's worried, perhaps we should be too.

'They steal nothing, wolf-cubs,' Xeliath replied firmly. 'Leave and let us pass.'

The middle sister spared her a pitying look, all the time flexing her long fingers impatiently. 'You do not order us, we grant that boon only to your father.'

'Wolf-cubs,' Mihn blurted out. 'You must be the Daughters of Meqao, the Aspects of Amavoq bound to this place.'

'We are,' said the sister with ash-bark skin, 'and we do not care who you are, so be careful of how you speak to us.'

'He'll speak to you however he wishes,' Xeliath snapped, 'and you will run back to your trees and hide there until we are far away. In the morning, when you eventually appear before my father, you will say I have run off to be married to a soldier I met when he presented me at court, and he should not follow. He will hear from me soon enough.'

The sisters took a step forwards, hungry expressions showing long teeth and hanging tongues. 'And why should we do that, little one?'

'Because otherwise you are my enemies.'

As Xeliath spoke, Mihn felt a sudden warmth in the arm held close to him. He could feel a fire building inside her, one that sent a surge of prickling energy rushing through his body as well. He could see the sisters felt it too, and suddenly they were nervous.

'What do you have in your hand, little one?' the middle sister asked, rather more uncertain now. A burst of white light came from Xeliath's side, shining from the Skull through the ruined hand. The sisters howled and staggered back, shielding their eyes from the light. The lightest-skinned of the three dropped to her knees with a wail that stopped only when Xeliath halted the surge of magic. Thinking quickly, Mihn was ready to take her weight when the effects of the coursing energy hit Xeliath and she sagged onto his shoulder.

'I am blessed by your mistress, Lady Amavoq herself. Be content you are doing her will in helping me.'

The three sisters stared at her fearfully, then turned and ran as one. They had gone just a few paces when their bodies became insubstan¬tial and vanished to nothing.

Xeliath panted furiously and forced herself fully upright again.

Morghien gave her a curious look and laughed. 'Lady Amavoq, that great romantic,' he said and laughed again.

Xeliath gave him an angry glare and he kept his mouth shut as he sauntered past her and back into the forest. An obscure little smile played across his face for the first time in weeks.