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road and straight toward her. Corporal Emo. She froze, trusting the night to keep her hidden, eyes narrowed to slits so that the whites would not betray her. He continued to come directly at her. They'd served together five, nearly six years. Did he know something?
     
    Then, less than a body-length away, he stopped. And there was a dagger in Vree's hand.
     
    "Kill him!"
     
    "I know what I have to do." But as she hesitated, Emo hiked up his kilt, reached into his sling, and directed a stream of urine practically at her feet. "He doesn't see me, Bannon."
     
    "He's probably too soaked to see anything." Vree could feel relief under the derision. "What if he'd aimed six inches higher?"
     
    "Then I'd have killed him on principle." She felt almost giddy. "How can he piss for so long?"
     
    "How can he drink so much?" Bannon asked in turn, a shrug implied.
     
    Emo finally tucked himself away, belched, and turned to go. Then he stopped, frowned, and stared into the shadows. Vree felt his eyes meet hers, saw recognition dawn, and she slowly stood. His gaze dropped to the dagger in her hand, then went back to her face.
     
    He knew her speed, he knew her skill, and he wasn't so drunk that he didn't know, at that moment, how close he stood to death.
     
    No one in the squad would be surprised if Emo died in the bushes, too drunk to have seen the enemy. Vree could feel the weight of the dagger she held, feel the familiar grip under her fingers. This close, she couldn't miss; could close her eyes and with a flick of her wrist still bury it in Emo's throat.
     
    You don 't see me , she mouthed. I wasn't here .
     
    "Vree! What are you doing?"
     
    Emo stared at her, startled. She wondered what he saw. Who he saw. Finally, after several lifetimes, he nodded. I don't see you .
     
     
     
    "You've brought the hunt down on us," Bannon snarled when the watchfire had faded to a glow in the distance.
     
    Vree remembered a younger man with large callused hands and a ready laugh; Emo before the wineskin became his constant companion. "He won't say anything."
     
    "How do you know?"
     
    "He was a friend."
     
    "He was my friend, too, but I'd have killed him."
     
    That was not an argument she wanted to get into. Bannon hadn't been the one with the dagger in his hand and those kinds of choices were easier to criticize than to make. "There was no need to kill him."
     
    Bannon gave a mental snort. "You think he'll keep his mouth shut just because you used to fuck him? Think again. They'll know you didn't die in the city. They'll come hunting for you, Vree, and when you die, I die, too."
     
    All at once she was very, very tired. "So we'll try to get your body back before that happens."
     
     
     
    They hadn't caught up to Aralt when dawn began to elongate the shadows and brush the cloaking night away. But neither had there been any indication that they themselves were being followed.
     
    "Keep going! He can't have gone that much farther!"
     
    As Bannon's thoughts bounced around her head, brittle and beginning to shatter, Vree realized how tightly his sanity had been tied to finding Aralt quickly. What if he lost it? Would he drag her down with him, or would madness dissolve their unnatural union and send him screaming off as a disembodied spirit?
     
    "Vree!" Her name echoed in her skull as she moved farther away from the road. "What are you doing?"
     
    Locking her fear away, she chose her words carefully because her calm appeared to be the only thing holding her brother together. "I'm taking advantage of this water hole," she murmured, as her approach sent a trio of wild goats bounding away. "I'm going to take a long drink, and then I'm going to make myself a little less obvious for day travel."
     
    "But we have to catch Aralt!" His protest was shrill enough to be almost painful.
     
    "We will." Her tone suggested she spoke to a small and frightened child, not a young man only a year her junior. "But it's going to be hot, and I don't know