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asking questions and getting in the way. For the first time ever, he missed her.
    On the lower slopes of Mount Lykas, he made out a tiny red flicker. Was that Lapithos, and were they lightingthe beacons? Was Telamon safe in his father’s stronghold? Or were the Crows burning it to the ground?
    Suddenly Hylas had a terrible feeling that he would never see Issi or Telamon again.

    “
Stealing
my chariot!” roared Telamon’s father. “
Laming
my horses! Haven’t I got enough trouble without you making it worse?”
    Telamon leaned against the wall to keep from falling over. He was exhausted, and he knew he was in for a beating: His father was gripping his oxhide whip. Telamon only hoped he could take it without making a sound.
    But even worse was the fact that his father had discovered that he’d been friends with Hylas behind his back. One of his shepherds had glimpsed them in the chariot.
    “
Lying
to me,” growled his father, pacing like an angry lion. “Lying for
years
! Was this
honorable
?”
    “No,” muttered Telamon.
    “Then why?”
    Telamon took a breath. “He’s my friend.”
    “He’s an Outsider and a thief!”
    “But—
why
are they after Outsiders? It’s not right!”
    “Don’t you tell me what’s not right!” exploded his father. “Just tell me where he went!”
    Telamon raised his chin. “I—I can’t.”
    “Can’t or won’t?”
    “Won’t.”
    The Chieftain gave him a searching look. Then he threwup his hands. Telamon watched him prowl to the far wall and fling himself onto his green marble seat. On either side of it, painted lions greeted him with silent roars.
    Apart from Telamon and his father, the great hall of Lapithos was deserted. It smelled of stale incense and rage. Even the mice in the rafters had fallen silent. Now and then the slap of sandals echoed in the courtyard, but no one dared come any closer. Thestor was a kindly man who rarely raised his voice. When he did, it meant something.
    Telamon stood facing his father across the huge round central hearth: a throbbing sea of embers two paces wide, guarded by four massive pillars carved with black and yellow zigzags, like angry wasps.
    The fire had been burning for generations without ever being allowed to die. The hearth was ringed with a circle of painted flames, and when he was little, Telamon had loved to crawl around it while Thestor sat drinking with his men, and the women in the upper chamber chatted over their weaving, and the big dogs lazily thumped their tails.
    He’d loved the floor too, and he’d explored every one of its red and green patterns that warded off evil spirits. Those patterns now whirled sickeningly before his eyes.
    “Someone get the boy a stool before he passes out,” bellowed Thestor.
    A slave scuttled in, set one before Telamon, and fled.
    Proudly, he ignored it. “I did what I had to do,” he said.
    His father glared at him.
    But it was true. He
had
helped Hylas escape and he
had
decoyed the warriors away. He’d even recovered the chariot—what was left of it—along with poor Smoke, whom he’d found standing forlornly under a tamarisk tree with a stone in his hoof. Jinx was still missing. Telamon hoped this meant that Hylas was on his way to the Sea.
    “Why are they after Outsiders?” he said again.
    “Why is he your friend?” his father flung back. “Does he matter more than your own kin?”
    “Of course not!”
    “Then why?”
    Telamon bit his lip. Perhaps it was because he and Hylas were so different. He himself could brood for days over an insult, but Hylas simply didn’t care what anyone thought of him; why should he, when they looked down on him anyway? Hylas was ruthless and self-reliant, two qualities that Telamon secretly feared he lacked. And Hylas had no father to live up to.
    But it was impossible to explain any of this to Thestor.
    Telamon watched the Chieftain put his forearms on his knees and rub his hands over his face. His scarlet tunic was covered in dust, and