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mind, how could she?
    â€œThank you, no,” she replied. “But when Darkwind gets in, he’ll want food and drink, please.”
    The hertasi hissed, “Of course!” and vanished again. Iceshadow gave her a farewell smile, and wandered off to his own ekele barefoot. She turned to Firesong, who was leaning back against the stone of the pool’s edge and enjoying the massage Silverfox was giving to his long and graceful hands.
    It was hard to get her mind on business, but in the next couple of days it would be time to leave, and she had better get her mind set about doing so. “Have Treyvan and Hydona made up their minds what they want to do first?” she asked. “I’d be perfectly happy to have them come to Haven as ambassadors, but if there are more Kaled’a’in out there wanting to come back, they really ought to go to k’Treva first, as you suggested.”
    Firesong made a small sigh of utter contentment, and answered without opening his eyes. “I believe that I have talked them into my scheme, cousin,” he replied. “K’Treva will not be long in moving on to a new Vale; there have been no troublesome outbreaks of any kind for better than a year now. Indeed, we would have moved on this winter, had it not been for your request for help. And if I may boast—k’Treva Vale is second to none. I think that our Kaled’a’in brethren would be most happy there, taking it after we have gone.”
    â€œIs that fulsome description for my benefit, shaya?” laughed Silverfox. “I promise you, there are not many who would require convincing. We had not expected to find ourselves offered safe-havens and homes, ready to our hands—yet another miracle of Treyvan and Hydona’s doing. And I think that none among you will find fault with our stewardship of what you will leave behind.”
    The Kestra’chern tossed his dark hair over his shoulder, and moved his graceful fingers along the tendons of Firesong’s wrists. Firesong sighed with content.
    It was still very hard to think of Firesong as a relative, however distant. She had not even known that Herald-Mage Vanyel had left any offspring—much less that she and a Hawkbrother Healing Adept were descendants of two of them! Really, she had learned more about herself in the time she had been here than she had learned about magic. . . .
    â€œOn the whole, I think it’s a better idea,” Elspeth told him. “I’m glad you talked them into it. My people are going to have enough trouble with Darkwind and a Changechild appearing on their doorstep. I’m not sure I want to subject them to gryphons and gryphlets as well.”
    â€œAh,” Silverfox said shrewdly, “But with gryphons and gryphlets, a Changechild and a Hawkbrother Adept might well look less strange. Hmm?”
    â€œThe thought had occurred to me,” she admitted. “But—well, let’s just leave things the way they are. The gryphons can always change their minds when Darkwind and I are ready to Gate out of k’Treva.”
    â€œAnd gryphons are wont to do just that,” Darkwind said from behind her, where he had already begun undressing.
    She turned quickly with a welcoming smile, and he slipped out of the last of his scout gear and into the warm water of the pool. “Gods of my fathers!” he groaned. “That is wonderful! I thought I had become naught but a man of ice! I have never found anything colder than a spring rain.”
    Elspeth could think of several—such as the snowdrifts that she and Darkwind had collapsed into in the aftermath of Falconsbane’s banishment—but then, she hadn’t been out on the border all day, either. Temperature seemed to depend on context.
    â€œJust be glad that we’re going to k’Treva by Gate, then,” she replied. “Skif and I got here the hard way. It’s a lot colder outside the Vales up