“It was a foolish waste,” Soldier’s Boy growled. He leaned back on the moss and looked up at the fragments of sky that showed through the dense canopy overhead. “All that magic consumed by futility. What I did may delay their cutting of the trees, but it will not stop it. And while it may frighten them or puzzle them, I fear that it will only set their minds to working on how they can overcome it rather than make them give up their plan. I know the task of ridding our land of the intruders is mine; but I do not know how I am to accomplish it. That still eludes me.”

“The magic does not give a man a task unless there is a way to do it,” Jodoli said comfortingly. The words had the rhythm of an old saw.

“Perhaps. But always I have been told that when you are on the right path, the magic lights the way and makes all clear. That has not happened with me, Jodoli. I am blind in the darkness, feeling my way through a task that does not seem to have a solution.” It was strange to hear my voice without consciously deciding to speak. Very strange, and a tingle of dread ran along my nerves.

Jodoli looked acutely uncomfortable that Soldier’s Boy had confided his deficiency to him. I knew that Great Men seldom became close friends; they might be allies or more likely rivals. Power was to be shepherded for one’s own use, for the good of one’s kin-clan. To admit to him that all my vast magic had been spent to no avail embarrassed Jodoli on my behalf. Soldier’s Boy knew there was no point in withholding that information from him. Perhaps he had some inkling of a solution to our woes.

But if he had or did, he did not share it then. “In time, the magic will reveal your task, I am sure,” he said. He gave a sideways glance at Firada, and for the first time I noticed how shocked she was. The Great Ones did not admit ignorance, I suddenly knew. That Soldier’s Boy had done so frightened her; the Specks looked to their Great Ones for leadership and guidance. Was not the magic of the forest in them, showing them what they must do? For me to admit that I felt no such inspiration from the magic frightened her. What if not even the magic could halt the flow of the intruders? What if even the Great Ones of the Specks could not save them? I regretted my words.

“I am sure it will. I am only tired and discouraged, and thus spoke as I did.”

“Of course. Eat and restore yourself and all will be well.”

Soldier’s Boy shook my head ruefully. “It will be days before I have restored even a third of my bulk, and months before I can amass that much magic again. It was a terrible waste.”

“Why did you do it?” Jodoli asked.

Soldier’s Boy shook his head mutely. It was already a mistake to have confided in Jodoli as much as he had. If he told Firada and Jodoli that the ignorant Gernian part of him had done it, it would only confuse them. Possibly it would turn them against him. He could not let that happen. I was beginning to suspect that if he were to accomplish his task, it would require all the support he could muster. And all the strength.

A wave of hunger washed through him again, and he was suddenly aware of a terrible thirst. “Is there more water?” he asked.

“In that skin there, perhaps,” Jodoli said stiffly. He gestured at it, but did not move to pass it to me. I sensed another misstep on Soldier’s Boy’s part. Jodoli was not his feeder, to see to his basic needs. Firada stood motionless at his side, well aware that it was not her place to offer him anything. He heaved our body to a sitting position and managed to reach the water skin. It was not full but there was some in it. He drank it down and then asked plaintively, “Where is that boy? What is his name again?”

“Likari,” Firada said. “My nephew’s name is Likari.”

The water had helped but it was still difficult to keep his thoughts fixed on anything but his hunger. “Your nephew. I thought perhaps he was a younger brother.”

“No. He is my nephew. Olikea’s son.”

I tried to keep the dismay from my face. “I did not know she was married.” I had to slip into Gernian to find the word I needed.

Firada looked puzzled. There was no such concept in Speck society. Nevare’s guilt for sharing sex with a married woman had briefly spilled over into my Speck self. “What is this ‘married’?” Firada asked. She spoke the word as if it might indicate a disease.

“A word from another place and time,” Soldier’s Boy said airily. I sensed his discomfort that I’d been able to influence his thoughts and words. “It means that she is devoted to a man. Dedicated enough to bear his child.”

Firada wrinkled her brow. “I do not remember who fathered Likari. Olikea probably knows. She was barely a woman when she decided to have him, and quickly wearied of caring for him. She only pays attention to him when he can be useful to her.”

Nevare’s outrage at such a thing collided with Soldier’s Boy’s sense that it did not matter that much. The child belonged to his kin-clan. He would be cared for even if his own mother did not assume a major role in his life. It took a few moments for my inner turmoil to subside. Had Soldier’s Boy felt the same frustration that I now felt when Nevare had been in charge of my life? I suspected it was so. The Gernian part of me was suspended now, able to think and judge but not to take action. I now knew I could influence Soldier’s Boy’s thoughts, but not control his actions. The best I could do was make that other self thoughtful and force him to compare the two different worlds that had created this duality.

He had been silent too long. Both Firada and Jodoli were looking at him oddly. “I suppose that I acted hastily in sending Olikea away. Perhaps the boy will tend me now until I can select someone who is better qualified.”

Jodoli glanced aside from me and puffed out his lips in the Speck gesture for “no.” Still not looking at me, he suggested, “Perhaps you are braver than I would be, taking on such a young feeder who is untrained. He will know some of the foods you must have, and Likari is clever enough to quickly learn his duties. But there will be some ways in which your comforts will be lacking. Unless you seek comfort of a different sort.”

His words were oblique but I took his meaning. Nevare was affronted. Soldier’s Boy answered bluntly. “I have sent Olikea away. If she does not care for this child, why would I give her another one? And depleted as I am, I think it will be some time before I desire a woman. Chiefly what I need now is food, drink, and rest. The first two the boy can provide for me, and the last I will take on my own.”

“But you cannot rest. Not yet.” Jodoli was emphatic.

“Why not?”

“Because it is time to journey. Our kin-clan was well on our way up into the mountains when the summons reached me that we must return to save you. It is the time of the traveling. You cannot linger here. The snows will catch you long before you reach the Wintering Place if you do.”

Firada spoke up, stating plainly what Jodoli had skirted. “It is only by Jodoli’s magic that you are alive. He used much of his reserves to bring us here to you swiftly. But for his intervention, you would still be baking in the sun while Olikea and Likari journeyed back to the Vale of the Ancestor Trees.”

“I owe a debt of food and thanks to Jodoli.” Soldier’s Boy acknowledged the obligation.

Firada pursed her lips in disapproval. “And with such a young and inexperienced feeder, I do not see how you are going to pay it. Likari will be strained to provide enough for you. He is a good boy, but young. How will he gather enough to pay back to Jodoli what was spent on your behalf?”

Jodoli looked aside. It was beneath a Great Man to fuss over such trifles. If he had demanded to be paid back, it might seem that he was not powerful enough to shrug off such an expenditure of magic. But it was the duty of his feeder to keep track of such things and be sure that other folk not only recognized their debts to the Great One in their midst but paid back such debts with appropriate foods. Firada stood her ground squarely, even though it was awkward for her to confront a Great One in such a way. The foolish expenditure of my magic had cost me much in status as well as power. My size had been sufficient reason for folk to respect me. Diminishing and stupidly endangering myself had undermined my standing with Olikea’s kin-clan. My position, I suddenly saw, was precarious. The kin-clan already had a Great One. Supporting him and gathering the foods requisite to keep his power fed was already their burden. Having seen my poor judgment, they might think supporting a second Great One a poor bargain.