Kжdmon's eyes were as colorless as his pallid skin.

"I can't stop myself… they won't let me stop."

Kжdmon shook with clenched muscles as his crystal eyes scrunched closed for an instant. He took a jerking step. All tense resistance vanished, and he charged with open hands.

Sorhkafare set himself but did not raise his knife.

Kжdmon had seen too much in these long years of battle. They all had. The man's mind finally broke under the strain. No matter their differences, he was an ally who had fought hard beside Sorhkafare's own people. Kжdmon had lost his own father when their settlement was overrun before alliance forces arrived to defend it. But still the man fought on, and his loyalty had never wavered.

Sorhkafare sidestepped, ready to slap away Kжdmon's grasp. He barely drew back his hand before Kжdmon's grip latched around his throat.Too sudden and too quick for a wounded man.

Kжdmon closed his fingers.

Sorhkafare could not breathe. He tried to break the man's grip. Kжdmon's features twisted in agony as his mouth opened.

"Don't fight," he whispered. "Please don't make me… make you suffer."

Sorhkafare almost stopped fighting for air.

Within Kжdmon's mouth he saw malformed teeth stained with blood.A human mouth with sharpened fangs like a dog or short-snouted goblin. He slashed the knife across the back of Kжdmon's forearm, but the man did not even flinch.

Sorhkafare's chest convulsed, trying to get air, and his sight began to dim. He rammed the blade into the side of Kжdmon's neck.

Kжdmon's head snapped sideways under the blow. He gagged once before his face turned back, now little more than a blurred oval of white in Sorhkafare's waning sight.

"It won't help," Kжdmon sobbed. "I'm sorry… it never does."

Air seeped in through Sorhkafare's nose.

He heaved, filling up his lungs, then gagged and coughed as he tried to suck more air. He lay on his side upon the ground, not even knowing he had fallen. A blurred form appeared above him and reached down. Sorhkafare twisted away in panic.

"Get up, sir!" it said, and the words were in his ownElvish tongue. "The horses have been slaughtered… we must run!"

Vision cleared, and Sorhkafare saw one of his commanders. Snahacroe reached down for him, but Sorhkafare only looked about for Kжdmon.

The man lay crumpled on his side, off to the left. The shaft of an elven spear rose from his torso. Its silvery tip protruded from Kжdmon's rib cage, and black fluids ran from the bright metal to the ground.

Sorhkafare stared at the gaping wound, not truly aware of Snahacroe until his kinsman pulled at him, trying to make him follow.

Kжdmon rolled onto his face and braced his hands upon the ground. He pushed up and lifted his head. Snahacroe halted in shock to look at the human.

Ksedmon began to shake. Once more his whole body seemed to clench. His fingers bit into the earth as if he sought to hold on to it and keep from rising.

"Run," he whimpered.

Sorhkafare still hesitated. The man could not be alive. The spear point dripped more black fluid from his body and the same ran from the knife wound in his neck. The broken stream of fluid vanished as it struck the earth, but Sorhkafare heard the slow patter continue.

"Run… while you can!" Kжdmon shouted.

Snahacroe wrenched Sorhkafare around and they fled.

Grim silhouettes closed in behind them with pounding feet. The more that came, the more Sorhkafare saw one here and there from the ranks of both sides that day in battle. Their faces seemed too pallid in the dark.

All around were figures with glittering eyes.

Sorhkafare…

The name clung to Magiere's thoughts like her own, as she came slowly back to consciousness.

"Sgailsheilleache, hold off!"

It was Brot'an's voice, but Magiere only saw moving blurs around her. She felt and smelled moss against her face.

She began panting hard.

"She is unnatural," Sgaile snapped."Undead… in our forest!"

"No," Brot'an barked. "She is something else. Now do as I say!"

Magiere took three rapid breaths before her thoughts cleared in realization.

Brot'an had never told the others about what he had seen of her in Dar-mouth's crypt. He had kept her secret.

It didn't matter anymore. She'd lost all control, and they'd all seen her.

Magiere's sight cleared slowly. She lay on her side, one hand limp upon the moss before her face. There was blood on her fingernails.

But her hand was not long-boned and tan as it had been in the dream… the vision… whatever she should call the sights and sounds that had taken her. She saw only her own pale hand, not that of the elven man she had become… Sorhkafare.

Why? She hadn't touched the remains of any victim, trying to see through the eyes of its undead killer at the moment of death.

Magiere flopped onto her back, trying to find the faces of those around her. She looked at the birch that she'd backed into and touched before the world turned black. She began to tremble.

The tree's trunk bore the mark of her hands. Where she'd touched it, the bark had darkened and dried dead. Brittle pieces had already fallen away.

"Leesil!" she cried out.

"Here… I'm here!" he answered; and then, "Get out of my way!"

A wet nose grazed her neck, and Chap's head pressed into her face.

She dug her fingers in his fur and hung on. Leesil dropped to his knees beside her.

Magiere latched on to him, thrashing around to bury her face in the chest of his hauberk and hide from all eyes.

"It's all right," he whispered.

She still felt the lingering shock in her body and saw in her mind the marks of her hands upon the birch. Nothing was all right anymore.

Magiere closed her fingers on Leesil's hauberk until its leather creaked in her hands and its rings bit into her palms. The name she'd been called still echoed in her head. Her… his allies came in the dark with colorless eyes and teeth stained with the blood of their own.

Sorhkafare.

"I said keep back!" Leesil growled, and pulled Magiere closer. "It's over."

He knew better than to touch Magiere until she recognized him. But when she fell and cried out for him, he knew her dhampir nature had already retreated.

Brot'an stepped around to wave Sgaile off. Osha finally released Wynn.

En’nish was on her feet but still hunkered from Brot'an's strike. Her one remaining companion aided the other that Magiere had thrown into the trees. They both emerged, but the latter man was limping badly and the front of his tunic was shredded.

Nein'a glared at Leesil in shock. Any hint of fearful and angry denials she'd cast at him were gone. There was only wary revulsion as her gaze drifted from him down to Magiere hiding in his arms.

"It is not over," Freth said coldly, and the white majay-hi shifted silently in her way. "You have brought an undead into our midst. I do not understand how this is possible, but this thing you coddle will not remain."

Leesil's anger rose again, but he couldn't leave Magiere.

"Chap," he said quietly, "kill anyone who takes a step."

Chap didn't answer in any fashion. He simply paced around Leesil to stand before Magiere and glanced once at the white majay-hi blocking Freth.

"Enough," Brot'an insisted. "If she were undead, the forest never would have allowed her to enter. There is nothing Leshil could have done to change that."

Leesil wasn't certain about the shift in authority taking place. Both Sgaile and Freth were reluctant, but it seemed Brot'an took charge. For the moment, it served to protect Magiere from the others-but still, Leesil didn't like it.

Brot'an's pale scars stood out like white slashes on his lined face. "We are all fatigued from a night of running with no food. We will rest part of the day in the outer forest."