“Slowly. Go slowly.” Those words were to me. Then, “Refill the cup. Quickly!” That command was given to someone else, probably Likari. He’d opened my eyes, but shapes and colors seemed to whirl and blend rather than resolve themselves into sensible images. He closed them again. The cup came back, and with it my sense of smell. It was a thick apple juice, spiced and warmed, and this time he drank it more slowly. It helped but my whole body was still in distress. Things simply felt wrong inside me, far beyond the horrible hunger that chewed at me. I’d come as close to dying as a man could and still step back from the brink, I decided.

“Can he speak yet?” The voice that demanded an answer to that question belonged to Dasie.

“You nearly killed him. Can you expect him to speak so soon after such damage? Look at him! The skin hangs from the bones of his face. It will take me weeks to rebuild him to where he can eat with pleasure, let alone wield any power.”

Soldier’s Boy coughed and then cleared his throat. It took all his will to drag in his breath, and something more than mere willpower to send it out as words. “I can speak.” He opened his eyes again. Light and darkness swam and mingled, shadows formed and suddenly Dasie’s face was looming over his. He shut his eyes and turned away from her, sickened by the memory of iron.

“You said the magic made you for a reason. That because you have been one of the intruders, you know how to drive the intruders out. You said it was not by Kinrove’s dance, nor by my fighting a war as they fight them. But what else is there? Tell me, now, unless it was all just a trick to keep me from killing you.”

The liquid Soldier’s Boy had swallowed seemed to have fled my mouth. Likari hastened back with another cup. I could smell it and Soldier’s Boy could not keep my eyes from being drawn to it. But Dasie’s outstretched palm denied the boy access to me. Soldier’s Boy could not think of anything at that moment except the cup of lifesaving moisture, just out of reach.

“Speak!” she commanded Soldier’s Boy and I felt a feeble spark of his temper.

He tried to clear his throat and could not. He rasped out the words “If…a trick…stupid to…abandon now.”

Anger flared in her eyes. She had pushed him too far. “Then I’ll just kill you now.”

He coughed. His throat was thick, as if he’d been ill for weeks. “That’s your…answer for everything. Kill it. Better kill me then. You don’t have patience. For strategy.”

“What strategy?”

He shook his head. He could barely lift his hand but he pointed a trembling finger at the cup Likari held. His lips remained closed.

Dasie gave a snort of disdain. “Very well. Your ‘strategy’ seems to be that you will keep silent until I allow you food and drink. I shall. Because I know that at any time I need to do so I can kill you. You will keep. Right now, I have other things to attend to.”

She straightened up and looked around. In that moment, she looked to me more like an officer assessing a situation than a Speck mage. She spoke to her feeders. “Bring me fresh food and drink. I have need of it. Necessary as the iron is, it still leaches strength from me to be around it. Have all of the swords put safely away, except for two. I wish a man with a sword to remain here, at an appropriate distance from Kinrove. He should be aware of the iron while taking no harm from it. The same for Intruder Mage here. He”—and she gestured toward Jodoli—“may leave as soon as his feeders have him ready to travel. I go now to speak to all the dancers. Those of our kin-clan will travel to our winter grounds with us. Others who have saviors among our warriors may go with them. But I want everyone enslaved by the magic and forced to dance to know that they are now free, and that if they require help to return to their own kin-clans, we will give it.”

Olikea held a piece of soft bread to my mouth. It had been dipped in oil and honey. As Soldier’s Boy chewed, my body rejoiced at the sweetness. Strength from it came into me.

A young warrior had been standing by one of her feeders as Dasie spoke, obviously waiting to report to her. The moment her words paused, he made an obeisance to her and then said, “Great One, we have already given that news to every dancer. We have told them they are free to go, and that if they need help, we will give it. But some of them—”

“Some of them will stay with me. And dance again. Because they have felt what they are doing and know what they are doing is within the design of the magic.”

The interrupted warrior made another brief obeisance. “Even so, Great One,” he said in confirmation of Kinrove’s words.