A movement at the far end of the table caught her eye, Gundaron fidgeting with his pen case. If her Mark could not help them, and there was no Healer near enough to reach them quickly-would a different Mark be of more use?

It was past time this meeting was ended.

Gundaron hung back with Mar, letting the others leave the conference table before them. Karlyn-Tan hovered by the door, exchanging a soft murmur with Dhulyn Wolfshead and giving her a Mercenary’s salute, touching his lips instead of his forehead, before following Dal-eDal out of the room. Gun was pushing himself to his feet, hands braced on the edge of the table, when Dhulyn shut the door behind Karlyn-Tan and turned back into the room. Mar licked her lips and looked from one Mercenary Brother to the other and back again. Gun merely sat down and lowered his face into his hands.

Dhulyn Wolfshead sighed heavily, turned a chair around, and sat astride it, resting her cheek on her hands.

“Gundaron-Sun and Moon are my witness, if I were going to kill you, I should have done it long before. Will you look at me, and listen? Mar, can you help us?”

The touch of Mar’s hand on his shoulder was like a rope to a drowning man, firm, stong, life-giving. “Gun, I’ve told you Dhulyn Wolfshead wouldn’t hurt you, and now she’s told you. What more do you want than her own word?”

He looked from the Mercenary’s face to Mar’s and back again. Dhulyn Wolfshead raised one eyebrow and slowly blinked.

“What are you more afraid of,” she said. “That I will kill you, or that I won’t?”

Gundaron’s lips parted, but no protest came out.

“Wolfshead!” It was Mar who spoke, a wrinkle forming between her deep blue eyes.

“Would you rather he wasn’t bothered by what he’s done?” the Wolfshead said, her voice calm as still water.

“But he’s trying to help. The Tarkina and Bet-oTeb forgave him.” Mar spoke her next words to Dhulyn Wolfshead, but she looked at him when she spoke. “I forgive him.”

“He hasn’t forgiven himself.”

Heat burned through Gun’s face and he lowered his eyes. Not that Dhulyn Wolfshead wasn’t perfectly able to read him without looking into them. How did she do this? How did she know him so well?

“People are dead because of me,” he said. “No amount of ‘help’ can bring them back.”

“Many have died at our hands also,” Parno Lionsmane’s light voice fell softly into the air. “And many are also alive because of us. You still live; you have time to make the second true for yourself as well.”

“You’re not the first to do what he finds repulsive,” the Wolfshead said. “And you won’t be the last, blood knows, people being people. But you stopped the first chance you had, hold to that.” She shook her head, blood-red braids shivering. “Words won’t help you, at least not now. But I assure you, time will, if you let it.” She looked at Mar before turning her steel-gray gaze back to him. “In the meantime, since you’re sworn to help, I’d like to share a thought with you. I’m thinking that when something is lost, it’s a Finder we need, not a Healer.”

“You might have thought of this before the Racha bird was sent,” Parno Lionsmane said, with just enough sarcasm in his tone to ease the tension in the air. “We’ve no more a Finder than we have a Healer.”

“I think we do,” Dhulyn Wolfshead said. “What do you think, Gundaron of Valdomar?”

“How-” Gun’s throat closed. He would have said it was impossible, but he was sure he felt the blood drain from his face. He hadn’t… How could she know? Had she Seen? He shot a quick glance at Mar, but she was shaking her head.

“I didn’t-” Mar subsided when the Wolfshead raised her hand.

“No one told me,” she said. “Except you, yourself, when I thought about what you have done. Found documents left carelessly aside for centuries. Found the secrets of tribes and cities lost for generations. When Marked were wanted, you Found them.” Dhulyn Wolfshead paused, tapped herself on the breastbone, causing tiny bells tied into the laces of her vest to chime. “When a Seer was wanted, you Found her. You told Parno where to find the Green Shadow when it was in Lok-iKol-ah, you thought we’d forgotten that. Even now, you know where to Find the information that we need.”

“But that’s research…” Gun let his protest trail away. He could not use that lie again-not even to himself.

The Mercenary was shaking her head. “You forget, I’ve been trained as a Scholar myself, though it was not the life for me. I know how research is done, and the kinds of answers it produces. And how swiftly. And how many important answers in one person’s lifetime. What you do is not research. Your books may have told you what to look for, they couldn’t have told you where. You are Finding.” When Gun still hesitated, the Wolfshead went on, her voice rough but warm. “Come now. The time for secrets is past.”

“I’ve never…” Gun took a deep breath. He’d never convince anyone unless he could speak clearly. “I meant to tell you, after Lok-iKol, it’s just… I’ve always kept it secret. I’m a Scholar. It’s all I ever wanted. Even before the Jaldeans turned against the Marked, I never wanted to be…”

“Do you think I wanted it?” The Wolfshead was quiet but firm. “Untrained and half useless as it is? The world is not what we want, but what we make.” She paused, as if that word had some special significance for her, before continuing. “I wish your world was the Library carrels, the shelves of books, and the under-Scholars fetching ink and pens. Once I wished that for myself… I know how precious it is. But you are needed for more than that now. Wish for it or no, you will have to come out of your Library now and join the rest of us out here on the edge of the knife.

“You are a Finder, Scholar Gundaron. I am a Seer. Neither of us wants this. But we are what we are.”

Gundaron hung his head, aware as if from a distance that he was shaking it ever so slightly, wanting to deny her words. But Dhulyn Wolfshead was right. He lifted his head and found the Mercenary’s cool gray eyes ready to meet his. Next to her, leaning his hip against the table’s edge stood her Partner, Parno Lionsmane, the left corner of his mouth lifted. Beside them sat Mar, her blue eyes darker than usual with concern. When his eyes found hers, she smiled, her face lighting as if from within, and for an instant his heart stopped beating as the breath caught in his throat.

He would have to come out into the world. But he wouldn’t be alone.

“What do you want me to do?” he said. He’d thought his voice would shake, but it rang out firm and true.

“The Tarkin’s mind is lost. I would like you to Find it.”

Gun’s heart sank like a stone into a lake turning to ice. “The Tarkin? But how? I’m not trained. To Find something like that…”

“How did you Find the Green Shadow?”

Of course she would think of that. Library-trained, Dhulyn Wolfshead the Scholar. Her mind would work like his. Gun looked at them, Mar smiling, the two Mercenaries watching with guarded faces. He had to tell them, he realized. It would change everything, he would lose all the ground he’d gained, but he would have to tell. No more secrets. No more lies.

“I can Find the Green Shadow,” he began. “Because it… it touched me.” He looked up again into the silence. Mar, white-faced, lips trembling; Parno Lionsmane, the killing look back in his face, a knife in his hand. Dhulyn Wolfshead… Dhulyn Wolfshead calm and nodding?

“I’d lost some memory,” Gun said. “There was time I couldn’t account for, so I looked for it, and when I Found it…”

“You Found the Green Shadow. I Saw,” the Wolfshead said. “When One-eye was questioning me. The Green Shadow was there, looking through your eyes.” Parno Lionsmane made as if to move forward, but stilled at the Wolfshead’s raised hand.