Grinning foolishly, Sunbright waggled his blade at Blinddrum. "We may begin," he said.

But the swordmaster stood still. "Your travels addled your brain, Sunbright," he said. "You grin before a death duel."

"I'm just glad to be home."

The fighter's grin had become a death's head rictus. White teeth gleamed in the torchlight.

"To come home to die is foolish."

"I could have died a thousand times in battles past, Blinddrum, but my sword prevailed because I had fine instructors. Probably the best in the world. You and Thornwing."

The straight sword drooped. Almost petulant, Blinddrum rumbled, "You make it hard to kill you. And I don't think you came home to fight."

Children scuffled bare feet around the ring, eager for battle. Adults stilled them to hear.

"I came home to talk to my people, to make them listen and think. They will not listen, only let me fight. So I fight. Prepare!"

Sunbright Steelshanks leaped into battle. Illuminated by torchlight, Harvester of Blood glittered like a crescent moon as it swung across the night sky. The shaman's howled war cry, "Ra-vens!" sent a shiver and thrill through the audience.

When his blade crashed on Blinddrum's upraised sword with an awesome clang!, sparks scattered. The crowd roared.

Instantly, Sunbright dropped back for the parry, as he'd learned long ago. And it came, for Blinddrum scythed his sword sideways to shear Sunbright's leg or knee. The young man was not there, having hopped free, and Blinddrum had to snap his blade up to protect his shoulder from a hissing sideswipe. When their blades clashed and rebounded, Sunbright feinted a head blow, then aimed for the same spot again. His quadruple blows came so fast that Blinddrum was slashed across the shoulder. The big man grunted and stepped back.

"You learned much in the southlands."

"I learned everything from you," Sunbright panted. "And practiced it every day. Have at you!"

Blinddrum stepped back, almost into the crowd, as Sunbright grabbed Harvester's pommel in two hands and slashed sideways. The giant tilted his blade, and banked Sunbright's off. Normally a fighter using two hands couldn't poise his blade quick enough, and Blinddrum swung at exposed ribs. But Sunbright surprised everyone by whirling a complete circle and slashing again. Blinddrum whipped his blade too slowly, and was pinked across the wrists.

The giant, much older than Sunbright, waggled his blade as a shield. He puffed, "You make me recall tricks I'd forgotten!"

"Recall them then! That's why I'm here!" Sunbright shouted. "Hyaah!"

Two-handed, Sunbright aimed a down-angling slash, but feinted once, then twice. His blade spanked Blinddrum's both times, lightly, then he knocked it high. Leaping, he tipped Blinddrum's tunic at the breast, shearing the old hide and drawing a trickle of blood.

But the wily instructor took the nick and snapped his steel up to wound Sunbright's right elbow. Blood dripped from the barbarian's forearm as he stamped backward.

"The lion is not toothless!" Sunbright shouted over the yelling of the tribe.

"The cub is," Blinddrum gasped. "You won't kill me! You pulled that blow!"

"Prove it!" Sunbright yelled. "Huzzah!" Stamping forward and driving hard, Sunbright aimed a two-handed lunge at Blinddrum's belly. The instructor batted it aside heavily and swung wild, just clipping Sunbright's chin. The younger man flicked his head aside, reached too far, but snagged Harvester's barbed hook behind Blinddrum's bicep. Whipping it back, he dug a furrow in the man's bronze skin. So sharp was the cut, it bled little at first, but soon ran a river.

Blinddrum hollered, stamped and slashed, feinted and double-thrusted, but only pinked Sunbright once in the thigh. By then the instructor's left arm was spider-webbed with blood and hanging limp. Finally he cried, "Hold!" and dropped his point to the rocky ground. "I cannot continue. I concede."

"No!" cried many. "No! To the death! Finish him! Kill the outsider!" Yet others yelled, "No death! Honor is satisfied!"

Blinddrum shook his head, handed the long steel blade to Thornwing waiting in the ring. The tall, thin woman used her hem to wipe blood from the pommel and blade, then entered the ring and saluted.

Sunbright blew like a bellows, wiped sweat off his brow and blood off his chin. Salt stung and he winced, for he was pinked in four places. He kept his swordpoint down.

"You'd make me fight another duel right away?"

"Yes," Blinddrum wheezed. "We counseled, and decided it was best to get it over-"

"You cannot council," the shaman interrupted, "for you have no council fire."

The giant demurred, corrected, "We talked then, and decided it was just. You must abide by the decision."

"Talk is fine," the shaman said, shaking his head, "but only the council can change the rules of a duel. True?"

Confused, Blinddrum turned to Thornwing, who nodded and dropped her swordpoint. "He is right," she said. "Tradition gives him a day to rest before the next duel."

"Saved by tradition!" Sunbright gulped. "I choose to rest." He limped to the circle, where he joined Monkberry and Knucklebones to return to the hut.

Behind, noise swelled as the crowd argued. Why didn't Blinddrum strike to kill? Why grant Sunbright a day of rest? Was the duel even necessary when Sunbright was under a sentence of death to begin with? Why not just execute him? Who would wear the wolf masks? Did they even have a wolf mask now?

Monkberry smiled in a small way, resembling her grinning son. "You're not back one day, child," she said, "yet the tribe buzzes and talks as they haven't in months. Would your father could see this."

"See people squabble endlessly?" Knucklebones demanded. "They gabble like ducks in a pond and say nothing!"

"At least they're not crying, lamenting their fate," Sunbright offered. "They discuss how their lives should run, not be run."

The thief shook her head. "It must be the water here," she mumbled. "Or the thin air. It drives people insane."

Sunbright chuckled in the dark as he crawled into his mother's hut. Knucklebones striped cold light on rocks and angrily prodded his wounds. Lying on dirt, his head pillowed on stone, Sunbright hissed at her touch, then sighed, "Ah, it's good to be home."

"Completely," growled the part-elf, "insane."

Sunbright and Knucklebones used the next day to scout the camp, identify old faces and learn new ones, climb a low hill and scan the wasteland, and walk to the mountainside to check the local resources. In a narrow cleft, fresh water spilled into a shallow, pebbled pool where they swam and made love. They spotted a few small deer and rabbits, so set wire snares, but found little else. Rocks ruled this corner of the world. Sunbright concluded, "This land can't sustain us. We must move out."

"Where? And why do you keep saying 'we?' I'm not a member of your tribe, and never will be. A part-elven thief is as different from your yellow-haired northerners as a fox from a fish."

"True." The two sat on a rock and watched mountain shadows overtake the wasteland. He put his brawny arm around her small shoulders and said, "But it's tradition in our tribe to steal wives and husbands, for we're forbidden to marry within the tribe. My own mother was stolen from the Angardt in a raid. Father said he picked the female who fought back the wildest, then just hung on. He showed me scars she gave him, bite marks that never went away. He lacked an earlobe that my mother spat out. Mostly we marry other barbarians, but some have dark hair. Note you Archloft has brown hair? He was kidnapped off a trail by a raiding party and married to Jambow."

Knucklebones snuggled under his arm, waggled her bare feet in the air, but was not comforted. "There are none of elven blood," she said, "and I am more of the old folk than human, I think. I wish I could talk to my mother for an hour…"