"Fine," Kip said. He turned as if to go, but instead grabbed her glass jug. "I'd like to have a drink with dinner. You keep the rest. For the great service." He smelled the jug. As he thought, it was grain alcohol. He took a swig to look tough and had to school his face to stillness when it set his mouth on fire. Then his throat. Then his stomach.

The men who'd been shifting to get up settled back down.

"Mind if I sleep here tonight?" Kip asked.

"It'll cost you," the man who was balding up front and had hair halfway down his back said.

"Sure," Kip said. He wasn't nearly as hungry as he'd been a few minutes ago, but he forced himself to eat the greasy javelina leg. As the rest of the javelina cooked, the other men and women came and took slices.

As Kip finished, he sucked his fingers and walked toward his horse. He got far enough that he began to hope that they would simply let him leave.

"What are you doing?" the balding man demanded.

"I need to rub down my horse," Kip said. "It's been a long day."

"You don't need to go anywhere, and I don't want you near my horse."

"Your horse," Kip said.

"That's right." The man bared blackened teeth at Kip-not quite a smile, not quite like he was going to bite him-and drew a knife.

"We'll be needing that coin belt, too," another man said.

The women around the fire simply watched, impassive. No one moved to help. Several other men joined the two already facing Kip. Kip looked into the darkness, his vision spoiled by the fire, but still he could see several dark shapes waiting for him.

Give them what you have, and maybe you'll escape with a beating, Kip. You know you're not getting out of here with everything. Stall for time, maybe there's some kind of camp guards here who might save you.

"Evernight take you," Kip said. He smashed the top off the jug of grain alcohol on the edge of a wagon wheel.

"Fool boy," the balding man said. "Most people keep the handle if they do that, not smash it off."

Kip lunged, splashing grain alcohol over the man. The balding man grimaced, rubbing stinging eyes, switching his knife to his left hand. "You know what? I'm going to kill you for that," he said.

With a yell, Kip charged.

It was the last thing the man expected. He was still rubbing his eyes. He raised an arm to fend off a blow, but Kip dove at his stomach, past the knife, spearing the top of his head into the man's gut. With a whoof! the man staggered backward and tripped right at the edge of the fire.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then the grain alcohol on his hands ignited. He lifted his hand with a yell, and his hair ignited. His beard ignited. His face. His yells pitched to tortured screams.

Kip bolted, straight past the flaming man.

No one moved for a blessed moment. Then someone dove for him, missing his body but clipping his heel. Kip went down heavily.

He hadn't even gotten three paces from the fire.

Some run, Porky.

He rolled over in time to see the flaming man, still screaming, run straight into the fat woman. She shrieked, an oddly shrill sound to come from such a big woman, and started whacking at him with her big knife.

Then three men were on Kip, the fire behind them making them huge grotesque shadows. A kick caught Kip in the shoulder, then one from the other side hit his kidney. Pain lanced through him, taking his breath away. He curled into a ball.

Kicks rained on his back and legs. One of the men was leaning over him, punching his hip, his leg, trying to hit him in the crotch. Someone stomped on his head. It was a glancing blow, but it caught his nose. Hot blood exploded over his face and his head caromed off the dirt.

Only a single thought won through the fog suddenly wreathing Kip's brain. They're going to kill me. This wasn't going to be punishment. It was murder.

So be it. They'll have to kill me on my feet. He struggled to all fours.

That opened his ribs to attack and a kick hammered his side. He absorbed it with a groan.

Three grown men, attacking a boy who'd done nothing to them. Something about the injustice of it tapped an iron reserve of will. No, not only three now. More had joined. But the additional numbers only infuriated Kip further. He hunched into his own bulk, gathering his strength, tucking his head between his shoulders. Burn in hell, I can take it.

With an inhuman roar, a sound like Kip had never heard, a sound he didn't even know he was capable of, he shot to his feet, taking a wide stance. The suddenness of his movement seemed amplified by his previous slowness.

Bellowing, bleeding, with his yell he sprayed blood into the face of a man who'd been running forward to kick him. Kip was like a cave bear, suddenly standing on its hind legs. The man's eyes went wide.

Kip grabbed the man's shirt and pulled, spinning, screaming, and hurling him the only direction that wasn't blocked by bodies.

Into the fire.

The man saw where he was headed. He grabbed for the spit arcing over the fire to catch himself, missed, caught it with his elbow instead. It spun him sideways into the fire, his head dropping right into the heart of the flames, the spit collapsing.

Kip didn't watch, didn't listen to the new screams. Someone hit him in the stomach. Ordinarily the blow would have folded him in half. But now the pain didn't matter. He found his attacker-a big, bearded man easily a foot taller than him, looking at him like he was stunned the boy hadn't fallen. Kip grabbed the man's beard and yanked it down toward him as hard as he could. At the same time, he lunged forward, head like a ram. The big man's face crunched as they collided. He went down in a spray of blood and flying teeth.

Something like hope glimmered through Kip's rage. He turned again, looking for another victim just as something cracked across his head.

Kip went down. He wasn't even aware of falling. He was just on the ground, staring up at another grinning ghoul of a man carrying a piece of firewood in his hand. Behind that man were four others. Four? Still? Between the tears and the dizziness, Kip wasn't even sure he was counting right.

He clambered to all fours again, and promptly fell over, spots exploding in front of his eyes. He had no balance.

"Throw him in the fire!" someone yelled.

There were other words, but Kip couldn't sort them out. The next thing he knew, he was being lifted, one man taking each limb. He was facedown. The heat of the fire beat at the top of his head, his face.

The men stopped. "Don't push us in, you assholes!" one of the men at the front said.

"On three!"

"Orholam, he's big."

"Don't have to throw him far."

"Gonna sizzle like bacon in the pan, ain't he?"

"One!"

Kip swung a little over the fire, close enough that he swore his eyebrows curled from the heat. Fear strangled him. The dizziness disappeared.

He swung back away from the fire.

"Two!"

Enough. The odds were just too bad. I tried. What do I have to fear when I have nothing to lose? I despise myself. So what if I die? A little pain, so what? Then the pain's gone forever. Then oblivion.

Kip swung farther over the fire, closing his eyes, welcoming the heat. His eyebrows and eyelashes melted. The fire licked his face like a cat.

A Guile wouldn't give up. They accepted you, Kip. Expected you to pull your weight. Gavin, Ironfist, Liv, they let you belong for the first time in your life. And you're going to disappoint them?

And like that, the fear was gone. No.

They swung him back away from the fire; one last time. Four men. Four Ramirs. Four of his mother, treating him like shit and expecting him to take it.

Hell no. The sudden, implacable heat of Kip's hatred matched the heat of the fire.

"Three!"

The men swung him forward.