“Quibble, you can eat your medicine or you can eat me. Either way it’s going down your gullet.”

We heard the Tamer before we saw her. As we rounded another nest, this one with a storm bird more interested in the scene playing out nearby than us, the Tamer’s no-nonsense voice filled the air again.

“Well? I can always tell Brint ‘no berries’ until you’re smart about this.”

A mutinous, outraged squawk.

“No berries. Medicine first.”

A quieter squawk and then we were close enough to see what the spectator storm bird was seeing.

An old woman, tall and lean and dark skinned, was squaring off with what looked like a juvenile storm bird. She had a large brown thrust orb up near the creature’s face, but despite those antics, her hair was what immediately pulled at my attention. The sides were pulled tight and graying which contrasted strikingly to the soft black coils forming a mohawk down the center of her head. Everything else about her was practical: plain poncho and leathers, sturdy shoes, and a cane that she leaned on with her other hand. Though the cane’s presence was eye catching in itself. A straight piece of wood near the right length that wasn’t made into a spear? That was a rare thing, and it had clearly been better crafted and cared for than my own makeshift walking stick. She did wear a few bits of jewelry but they were more than understated after meeting Barra and seeing the rest of the tribe.

The Tamer ignored us as we stopped a healthy distance away. Wren looked like she had at least a dozen questions she wanted to ask the older woman, but even she knew better than to interrupt. Still, Wren looked cute when she got that excited gleam in her eye.

Quibble kept being difficult but, like Wren with Chirp, the Tamer eventually got her way. He snapped up the pill, squawked unhappily again, and then burrowed under the wing of an adult storm bird in the nest in front of the the Tamer that had watched the entire proceedings with a keen eye. Quibble’s parent preened the top of his head while giving the Tamer the stink eye.

She held her hands up in a placating gesture at the giant bird. “I’m done. All done, and you should be glad of it too or you might not have a hatchling come the Heartsong Festival.”

The bird ignored her in favor of comforting Quibble.

The Tamer turned to face us and I got the impression of bright yellow eyes and pinkish-brown lips. I blinked. She wasn’t one of the whisper women. After spending two-thirds of a year among their ranks it was odd to to see someone with obvious authority who didn’t have black lips. Even we had them now.

Wren’s question tripped out of her as the Tamer’s cane thumped into the ground. “You can—I thought—how do they understand you?”

The Tamer snorted and her demeanor softened. “A lifetime of practice and observation. The herders know their reindeer and sheep; I know my birds. Communication is more than words, girl. Remember that.”

Wren nodded, chastised, as Miyan stepped forward.

“I brought the remaining group, grandmother.”

I stiffened at the title before my mind caught up and recognized that Miyan had called her ‘grandmother’ with the wrong inflection for her to be the tribe’s spiritual leader. Nor did the Tamer have any of the symbols or signs that traditionally marked a Grandmother.

The Tamer flicked her gaze across the group. “Good girl. Bring their fire starter and healer to the village. They can get settled with the other two.”

Miyan looked a bit put out to be sent on another errand so soon, but she gestured for Colm and Sid to follow her and, after a quick word with Fern, they did.

The Tamer spread her free arm out. “Welcome to my Rookery. As you know I’m the Tamer, Tufani. What you likely don’t know is why you are here.” She raised an expectant eyebrow. “Would anyone like to guess?”

Wren took a chance. “To ride the birds?”

Tufani chuckled. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

Wren’s eyes gleamed with anticipation as she nodded. A miserable little twitter came from her hair.

Tufani stumped forward on her cane. She didn’t bend her right leg much as she walked. “Who’s this?”

Wren brushed her hair to the side, suddenly a bit shy. “Chirp. We’ve been friends since I found him as a hatchling.” She bit her lip and then pressed on in a rush. “He’s jealous that the other birds are big enough to carry me. They have a lot of requests. I can talk with them.”

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She traced the mark under her eye.

Tufani softened further as she took in Chirp’s tiny form. “A bird as handsome and smart as you has no reason to be jealous. I’m sure there are many things you can do that the storm birds can’t.”

Chirp puffed up at that and twittered something that sounded smug back. The Tamer reached out and unerringly found the spot he liked to be scratched just behind the bottom of his beak.

Tufani met Wren’s gaze. “He understands?”

Wren grinned at her. “Every word.”

Tufani grinned back before she seemed to remember herself. She drew back and took us all in again. Breck’s boredom, Ulo’s skepticism, Juniper’s misery, Nii and Wren’s excitement, Fern and me giving nothing away.

She planted her cane in front of her and stood tall. “You will get to fly on the storm birds. Eventually. If you listen and learn and reach an appropriate level of skill.”

I glanced up the birds soaring overhead. It felt a bit surreal to think that I could be there, on one, someday.

“You might be wondering why whisper women would need to fly when you have the shadow paths. But there are cloudy days, moonless nights, times when only the goddess’s pines still cast a shadow and the place you need to go is far from them.” Tufani’s gaze slipped in the direction of Azabel’s territory before snapping back to us. “That is when you will need my birds. That is when you will need to know how to care for them, to ride them, properly, how to communicate with them. You will get to know the birds while you are here and you will treat them with respect or I will deny you the privilege of learning those things.”

We stared back at her, shaken. After finally learning how to shadow walk between trees it had felt like we could go anywhere, do anything. We just had to focus and picture where we wanted to go in our minds.

But, now, with her speech the harsh reality of our abilities settled back into view. There were times when there wouldn’t be a shadow to step into or out of. On the shore that horrible day the mist had covered everything. The whisper women wouldn’t have been able to shadow walk if they hadn’t able to put together the makeshift system with the tents—and that wouldn’t have worked if the forest hadn’t been nearby or they didn’t have the tents or something else had gone wrong. Not even Hana, for all her skill at shadow walking, would have been able to anything without shadows to travel through.

The goddess’s boons weren’t limitless. They just gave us an edge in key areas so that we could focus more on doing our duties for her rather than logistics. After all, when I took moment to think about it they boiled down to quick travel, quick communication, and mitigating environmental factors that the goddess wasn’t inclined to change like the dark and harsh weather.

Tufani cut through my musing with her next announcement. “You can get started by helping your other group remove the feces from around the nests in the northwestern quarter and fertilize the surrounding trees. They will show you the process.”

She started to thump away and I wasted no time in following her with the rest of the group even as my mind buzzed at the thought of seeing Prevna—and the others—again. As we walked Tufani caught Wren’s attention and brought Wren up beside her by pulling her into a conversation about bird care. Wren seemed thrilled to be talking someone whose interest in birds matched her own. Fern’s face became pinched as she lost her chance to speak with the Rookery’s leader and report on our journey. I don’t think Tufani could have cared less about anything that happened outside the Rookery’s borders.

I tried to organize my thoughts as we wound around nests and gigantic birds and working tribes people. What should I tell her? How had Prevna’s own journey gone? Hopefully, it had less creepy creatures than mine. How would she react when she saw me? Maybe after spending weeks with Dera’s sweetness and Loclen’s smarts and Andhi’s cheer she would realize that the effort it took to spend time with me wasn’t worth it. At least I didn’t have to worry about Ento and Idra. I couldn’t picture them willing mixing with anyone but Juniper—everyone else was beneath them and wouldn’t get their private jokes.

It was easier being alone.

Maybe if I repeated it enough I would believe that again all the way to my bones.

But right now, after Prevna’s absence for weeks and her ‘you won’t be getting rid of me’ and ‘from one horror to another’ and that last terrible, wonderful, hug I don’t think much would hurt worse than her avoiding my gaze and leaving me alone.

Which, of course, was what I had done to Fellen.

Except worse. Much, much worse.

Luckily, everyone else slowed to a stop around me as my feet rooted in place. My fingers itched for the felt leaf in my pouch.

It had made so much sense at the time. But how? After everything, how had been so simple to do something so horrible to her? Was I really just that terrible of a person? Unable—

Someone flicked me on the nose.

I blinked and looked up from the ground, ready to tear into whoever had dared to touch me. The words died on my tongue as Prevna smiled wryly down at me. Right there. Braided buns and teasing eyes and unfairly tall.

“I thought I told you remember my hug if you went into tunnels?”

“I did,” I grumbled.

“And it didn’t help?” Pretend outrage masking a bit of real hurt.

My jaw worked before I managed to mutter, “It helped.”

She hugged me and whispered in ear, “Then don’t get lost right when we’re supposed to be reuniting.”

I batted her lightly away, an inexplicable blush rising up my neck and ears at her words. Everyone else had already moved away to begin intermixing and chatting, so at least no one else could see it.

Juniper slipped back into Ento and Idra’s fold while Andhi, Nii, and Ulo formed their bunch next to a nest. Loclen, Dera, Breck, and Wren formed the biggest new group as they swapped stories. Fern strode over to confer with the other Sapling leader whose name I had never learned and who seemed grateful for a distraction from the monotony of watching girls shovel poop.

Prevna gave me a knowing look. “Don’t want to join the others just yet?”

“Not yet.”

That got a raised eyebrow, but she led me over to another nest without comment. Then we spent the rest of the day shoveling poop onto a travois, dragging it into the woods to unload it, and doing it all over again while catching up. To my surprise, I didn’t try to keep much of anything a secret.