Dag shrugged. “We have to tell ourselves some flattering stories to keep ourselves going. Day after year after decade. What else? Lie down and die for the endless despair of it all?”

She lay back and followed his stare up into the dim rafters. “Is there an end?”

“Perhaps. If we just keep on. We think there were not an infinite number of malices planted. They don’t come up under water or ice or above the tree line, or on old blight. Our maps of the lairs we’ve destroyed show them thicker toward the Dead Lake, but fewer and farther apart going out. And we say they are immortal, but in fact all that have hatched have been slain. So maybe they wouldn’t live forever, but what they destroy betimes is more than enough. Maybe they’ll stop hatching out someday just for sheer age, but that’d be a bad hope to count on or dwell on. Like to make a man impatient, and this is no war for the impatient. Yet if all things end, even despair must, too. Not in my lifetime. But sometime.” He blinked up into the shadows. “I don’t believe in much, but I’ll believe that.”

That despair must end? Or, not in his lifetime? Both, likely.

He sat up and stretched his back, wincing, and, after a desultory futile prod at his arm-harness buckles with his splinted hand, extended it to Fawn to free him for the night. She unbuckled it and set it aside as usual, decided they weren’t going to do better than to sleep in their clothes, and, after a brief hesitation, cuddled down in her accustomed spot under his left arm, where she could press her ear to his heart. She pulled the blanket up over them both. Dag did not, by word or gesture, suggest lovemaking here tonight, and, relieved, neither did she. The fire died to embers before either of them slept.

5

D ag left on a mumbled errand soon after it was light, leaving Fawn to pack up. She had the bags and bedrolls stacked tidily on the porch, the cabin swept out, and even the fireplace ashes hauled away and scattered in the wet woods, with no sign of his return. She collected from the abundant new deadfall to replace the pile they’d burned last night, and then some, and finally sat on the porch steps with her chin in her hand, waiting. The flock of wild turkeys—or another flock, as there seemed to be a lot more of them this morning, upwards of forty—stalked through the clearing, and Fawn and they eyed each other gloomily.

A figure appeared on the path, and the turkeys ambled off. Fawn sat up eagerly, only to slump in disappointment. It was Dar, not Dag.

He glowered at her without approval but without surprise; likely his groundsense had told him where she and Dag had gone to hole up last night.

“Morning,” she tried cautiously.

She received a grunt and a grudging nod in return. “Where’s Dag?” he asked.

“He went off.” She added warily, “He told me to wait here for him till he got back.”

Another grunt. Dar inspected his lathe, wet but undamaged by the storm, and went around the cabin fastening open the shutters. He trod up the steps, stared down at her, slipped off his muddy shoes, and went inside; he came back out in a few minutes looking faintly frustrated, perhaps because she’d left nothing to complain of.

He asked abruptly, “You didn’t couple in there last night, did you?”

Fawn stared up in offense. “No, but what business is that of yours?”

“I’d have to do a ground cleansing if you did.” He stared at the firewood stack. “Did you collect that, or Dag?”

“I did, of course.”

He looked as though he was reaching for a reason to reject it, but couldn’t come up with one. Fortunately, at that point Dag came striding up the path. He looked reasonably cheerful; perhaps his errand had prospered?

“Ah.” He paused when he saw his brother; they exchanged equally laconic nods.

Dar waited a moment as if for Dag to speak, then when nothing was forthcoming, said, “That was a clever retreat last night. You didn’t have to listen to the complaints.”

“You could’ve gone for a walk.”

“In the rain? Anyway, I thought that was your trick—patroller.”

Dag lowered his eyelids. “As you say.” He nodded to Fawn and hooked his saddlebags and hers up over his shoulder. “Come along, Spark. G’day, Dar.”

Fawn found herself trotting at his heels, casting a farewell nod over her shoulder at Dar, who by the opening and tight closing of his mouth clearly had wanted to say more.

“Were you all right?” Dag asked, as soon as they were out of earshot. “With Dar, I mean.”

“I guess. Except that he asked one really rude question.”

“Which was?”

Fawn flushed. “He asked if we’d made love in his cabin.”

“Ah. Well, he actually does have a legitimate reason for wanting to know that, but he should have asked me. If he really couldn’t trust me to know better.”

“I hadn’t worked round yet to asking him if your mama had softened any overnight. Didn’t you want to ask?”

“If she had,” Dag said distantly, “I’m sure Dar was able to stiffen her up again.”

Fawn asked more quietly, looking down at her feet pacing along the muddy, leaf-and-stick-strewn path, “Did this—marrying me—mess things up any between you and your brother?”

“No.”

“Because he seems pretty angry at you. At us.”

“He’s always annoyed at me for something. It’s a habit. Don’t worry about it, Spark.”

They reached the road and turned right. Dag barely glanced aside as they passed his family’s clearing. He made no move to turn in there. The road followed the shoreline around the island and curved south, running between the woods and more groups of cabins hugging the bank. The dripping trees sparkled in the morning light, and the sun, now well up above the farther shore, sent golden beams between the boles through the cool, moist air, which smelled of rain and moss.

Not a quarter mile along, Dag turned left into a clearing featuring three tent-cabins and a dock much like all the others. It was set a little apart from its neighbors by a stand of tall black walnut trees to its north and an orchard of stubbier fruit trees to its south; Fawn could see a few beehives tucked away among the latter. On a stump in front of one of the cabins sat an aging man dressed only in trousers cut off above the knees and held up by a rope belt, and leather sandals. His gray hair was knotted at his nape. He was carving away with long strokes on what looked to be some sort of oar or paddle in the making, but when he saw them he waved the knife in amiable greeting.

Dag dumped their saddlebags atop another stump and led Fawn over to the fellow. By his gnarly feet, she suspected he was an old patroller. He’d clearly been a big man once, now going a little stringy with age, except around his—for a Lakewalker—ample middle. He eyed Fawn as curiously as she eyed him.

Dag said, “Fawn, this is Cattagus Redwing, Mari’s husband.”

Making him Dag’s uncle, then. So, this marriage hadn’t estranged Dag from quite all his family. Fawn dipped her knees and smiled anxiously, looking around covertly for Mari. It would be wonderful to see a familiar face. She saw no one else, but heard cheery voices coming from down over the bank.

Cattagus tilted his head in dry greeting. “So, this is what all the fuss is about. Cute as a kitten, I’ll grant you that.” His voice was wheezy, with a sharp whistling running through it. He looked her up and down, a little smile playing around his lips, shook his head wryly, drew breath again, and added, “Absent gods, boy. I’d never have got away with something like this. Not even when I was thirty years younger.”

Dag snorted, sounding more amused than offended. “’Course not. Aunt Mari would’ve have had your hide for a tent flap.”

Cattagus chuckled and coughed. “That’s a fact.” He waved aside with his knife. “The girls from Stores brought your tent by.”