"Ho, Longshanks!"

He blinked and looked up just in time to see the tight roll of his own sleeping sack fly at him. His hands shot up in pure reflex, catching it just before it would have hit him in the chest, and he glowered at Brandark.

"I'm thinking it's a mite risky to be coming all over frisky so early in the morning, little man," he rumbled. "I'm not full awake yet, y'see, and I might be doing something you'd regret."

"Promises, promises!" Brandark said airily. "Besides, I'm not worried. Kerry will protect me."

"Oh no Kerry won't," Kaeritha said primly.

"You won't?" Brandark stared at her hurt-eyed, voice plaintive, and she laughed.

"No, I won't," she told him. "In fact—"

Her hand flicked, and the snowball neither Bahzell nor Brandark had seen caught the Bloody Sword squarely on the tip of his prominent nose. He squawked in surprise and stepped back, arms windmilling for balance, and then landed flat on the seat of his breeches in the snow while Kaeritha crowed with laughter.

"I see boys will be boys!" she chortled. "And let that be a lesson to you, Brandark Brandarkso—awwk! "

Her laughter broke off as Vaijon hit her with a snowball of his own, and then, suddenly, the air was thick with flying white spheres. Bahzell never figured out who hit him with the first one, and it didn't really matter. Under the circumstances, anyone made a perfectly acceptable target, and he hurled himself into the fray with a deep, rumbling laugh.

They were quite late getting back on the trail that morning.