"It's staying away," Ratha told him quietly. "Whatever it is, it's too cautious to approach."

  "Can you hear it?"

  Ratha shook his head. "I can smell it."

  "It wants something we have."

  "Nothing ordinary, I warrant." Ratha shook his head and drew another deep breath.

  "It knows we wait and watch."

  "That would trouble me less if there were more of us."

  Archer touched his shoulder. "We three are enough. It fears us."

  "So far. I wish I knew what it is."

  "Mayhap we'll never need to know. I'll keep on the move."

  Ratha nodded, keeping his attention on the night and the fog that hovered just above the ground. The night itself might betray nothing, but movement in the fog could tell much of a story.

  Archer was gone again. A caw, like that of the crow, carried on the night air. Giri, saying all was still well at his post. Ratha answered in kind.

  So far, it was well enough.

  Tess's sleep was disturbed. A nightmare kept returning to her, a dream of dark oily fingers slipping into her mind. Finally, able to bear it no longer, she shook herself awake and sat bolt upright. The fire still burned, lower now, and she was surrounded by sleeping bodies.

  Shivering as the night air hit her back, she drew the carriage blanket around herself and tried to shake off the ill-effects of the nightmare.

  Though she had no memory older than three days, she was still able to judge the scene around her as safe and normal. The fire burned, the people slept, people that she was coming to know. Even Young Tom was lost in the sleep of innocence.

  But the dream would not quite go away, and uneasiness danced along her spine. Shuddering, she scooted closer to the fire, then wondered why she thought the light would make her any safer.

  Or any warmer, for the chill she was feeling now came from within her. From some place so deep inside her she didn't know how to name it. Didn't know what it was.

  "Is something wrong?"

  The whisper startled her, and she jumped with a small cry, twisting to discover that Archer had come to squat beside her.

  "My apologies," he murmured. "I didn't mean to startle you. Are you all right?"

  "I had a nightmare. I can't seem to shake it off."

  He nodded, his gaze darting around as if he were trying to watch the entire world at once. "Ratha, Giri and I are standing guard. You need not fear."

  She shuddered again.

  Hesitantly he reached out and touched her hand, where it clutched the blanket around her. "Tell me," he suggested quietly.

  "It was as if something evil were trying to get inside me. Something evil and cold. And the feeling is still here."

  He nodded but said nothing. On the other hand, he didn't tell her that she was being foolish.

  Finally he looked at her again. "You're feeling it, too. There's something out there, but it dares not approach. You can rest safely."

  "I don't think I'll sleep again tonight."

  "Perhaps not. How quietly can you walk?"

  She didn't know how to answer that. "I'm not sure."

  He cocked his head. "Then it's best you stay here. Trust me, we're watching over the campsite."

  "How can I help?" It was a stupid question, she thought, even as she asked it. She had no idea whether she knew how to use a weapon of any kind. No idea whether she had ever fought anyone or anything.

  "Keep your back to the fire and watch," he said. "We need eyes."

  She nodded, then watched him rise and melt away once again.

  It was only then that she noticed the fog that surrounded the campsite, as if held at bay only by the fire. It clung low to the ground and was so thick that nothing could be seen through it. But while it surrounded the campers, it approached none of them.

  Another shiver passed through her, and she wondered how long it would be before the sun rose.

  Dawn came without further incident, much to everyone's relief. The party struggled through a quick breakfast, then set out on the last brief leg of the journey to the caravan.

  The scene, when they came upon it in the clear morning light, was almost exactly as Tess recalled. The bodies were strewn about, untouched by carrion eaters. The river ran clear now, free of blood. The men of Whitewater at once began to burden their packhorses with as much undamaged food as they could carry. Then they began the bitter task of burying the dead.

  Tess sat astride her horse, disappointed that there was nothing here that might wake her memory.

  Archer drew his mount up beside her. "Do you remember anything?" he asked quietly, so that no one else would overhear.

  She shook her head, feeling her heart squeeze with both disappointment and the horror of her earliest memory: the carnage she had seen here.

  "Give it time, Lady," he said. "For now, come with me. I want to find some sign of who wrought this destruction."

  Nodding, having nothing else to do with herself, having no personhood or even personality to guide her, she followed him.

  "We'll ride downstream," he told her. "That would be the best place for the attackers to start from--the rear of the caravan."

  "That makes sense."

  "If anything about this makes sense."

  "This doesn't happen often?"

  "This never happens," he said flatly. "Few caravans are attacked, and those that are rarely suffer more than a few casualties and the loss of their goods. This is surpassing strange."

  She gave a little laugh of unhappy amusement. "Like me, the woman from nowhere."

  "Be at ease, Lady. You remembered how to speak. The rest will come."

  "I'd be at ease if anything seemed familiar."

  He raised a brow at her. "Are you saying riding that horse doesn't feel familiar?"

  At that she gaped, and finally a trill of laughter escaped her. "You'll cheer me up in spite of myself."

  "It's the small things that matter," he reminded her.

  Then his attention began to focus more on their surroundings. They crossed the portage bridge, and he drew rein, staring up at something.

  "What?" she asked.

  "See those rocks?" He pointed at a bunch of high crags.

  "Yes."

  "The caravan would have passed beneath them. If one could gather his group up there, he'd be in the best possible position to know when to attack."

  Tess looked around them. "I don't see any way to get up there."

  "Not from the road. That would be too obvious. I'm going into the woods. If you'd like to stay here, that's fine."

  "No, I want to come." She had to start carving something out of her new life, and staying behind every time someone did something would only make her exceptionally useless in the long run.

  The old forest was deep and dark, with only little shards of sunlight dappling the ground here and there. It was easy enough to pass through, but still not the sort of place one would choose to ride.

  "It would be easy to get lost in here," Tess said.

  "Aye. But don't fear. My sense of direction is excellent."

  Indeed it was, because in only a short time he had brought them round the tor and found a narrow, rocky path up its side, sufficient for them to ride single file.

  But instead of leading them up it, he dismounted. "Wait here. I want to see the tracks."

  She took the reins of his horse from him, although she suspected that was totally unnecessary. There was something about Archer and his horse that felt like a single entity.

  She watched as he climbed the rock alongside the trail with booted feet as naturally as if he were a fly climbing a wall. Every so often he paused to look down on the dirt of the trail, to lean toward it as if studying something. Then he disappeared into the treetrops.

  She waited, growing increasingly aware of the silence of the woods around her. She might have no memory, but she knew woods were never this quiet. There was always the rustle of something moving about, and occasionally the sound of birdsong or the screech of some small animal protecting its territory. From time to time trees cracked and groaned like old men who had been still for too long.

  But these woods were as silent as death. Not even a breeze seemed to stir the distant tops of the trees. She looked straight up, longing for even a small glimpse of the sky.

  But it was as if the branches crowded in over her, jailing her.

  Enough was enough, she decided abruptly. Sitting here like someone's handmaiden, holding the reins of a horse, was not the way she intended to continue this new life of hers.

  Dismounting with ease--something else she knew!--she tethered both horses to a nearby pine trunk. Then, tucking the front of her slit skirt out of the way by threading it through her belt, she began to climb the tor, following the path Archer had used.

  A thrill filled her when she realized that her hands felt comfortable grasping small crannies, when her toes seemed to know on their own how to wedge against the smallest protuberance. She had done this before. Often. Of that she was now certain.

  Glancing at the narrow path beside her, she could see the imprint of many horses' hooves, most chewed up, but one or two clear as a bell. These horses had been shod. For some reason that surprised her.

  The climb was strenuous but exhilarating. For the first time since her fateful awakening, she felt truly confident and alive, as if somehow she had made a connection with a deep part of herself. The brooding silence of the forest was forgotten as she mounted the tor.

  Something clattered, and she realized it was a pebble falling down from above. She hoped it was Archer returning and not the thing that had terrified these woods into silence.

  She was warm and breathing hard by the time she mounted the sun-drenched top of the tor. There she found a wide circle, surrounded by higher tongues of stone. Archer was squatting in the middle, looking at the black remains of a campfire. From it he picked up something small and white, and tucked it in his tunic.

  He turned when he heard her.

  "I thought I told you to remain below."

  She clambered over the last rock. "I don't take orders well. I tethered the horses. What have you found?"

  He put his hands on his hips, throwing back his cloak and revealing the long sword at his side. She could tell, somehow, that he was at once displeased and amused by her. In response, she tossed her head back and met him stare for stare. "Well?"

  "The coals at the bottom of the firepit are still warm. Nothing unusual in that. They buried the fire before leaving."

  "Or to hide themselves."

  "Aye, or to hide themselves."

  She looked around the dirt and the few hummocks of grass that dotted the area. "There were quite a few horses here, were there not?"

  "So it appears. And quite a few men, as well." He walked over to her and guided her a few feet to the left. "However," he said, squatting down and pointing, "they left quite a bit of information."

  "That the horses were shod?"

  "That they were all shod by the same smith in Derden. See this crescent? I know who made these horseshoes."

  "That will aid in finding them."

  "Most certainly." He straightened. "Now come over here."

  She followed him to the opposite side of the tor and at his direction peered between two tongues of rock.

  "Lean just a little farther," he said, "and look down."

  "I can see the road quite clearly."

  "Exactly." He drew her back and pointed to the ground. "Archers lay here. As I see it, before they even went below to attack, they lined up here and began to shoot at the caravan from above."

  She nodded, picturing it.

  "It would have caused a great deal of confusion in the caravan. They would have rushed for the portage bridge, which is a bottleneck."

  "Yes." Leaning forward to look through the rocks again, she picked out the bridge a short way upstream.

  "Great disarray," Archer continued thoughtfully. "Perhaps before they had even crossed the portage, the archers had taken out most of the caravan's guards. By then everyone would have been screaming and struggling to get as far away as possible."

  She straightened. "And other thieves were already waiting for them on the other side."

  "Perhaps." He eyed her sharply. "Do you remember this?"

  She shook her head. "It just makes sense. Terrify them with the archers, cause disarray in the caravan, and drive them headlong into the ambush."

  His gaze was now definitely hard. "You think like a general."

  She stood before him, arms hanging helplessly at her sides, no memories to guide her. When she spoke, the words sounded choked. "Maybe I was."

  His face tightened with suspicion. "Maybe you were part of this."

  "I don't know. Oh, God, I don't know."

  She averted her face as memory of the slaughter she's awakened to overtook her, as nausea rose within her, and wrapped her arms around herself as if trying to hold something in. "Those poor people," she whispered brokenly. "Those poor, poor people!"

  Then a single large tear rolled down her cheek.

  * * *

  Chapter 7

  Archer insisted on descending the tor first, so that he could catch Tess if she fell. There was, however, little danger of that. Clinging to the rocks felt as natural to her as riding a horse. Clearly it was something she had done many times in the past, although she couldn't begin to imagine why.

  The forest still felt dark and haunted, the air thick with threat as they descended below the canopy to the ground. Somehow she was sure woods weren't supposed to feel this way, that at some past time she had enjoyed walks among trees such as these. But she couldn't summon a visual memory to support the feeling. It was just a feeling arising out of her unreachable past.

  "How long have the woods been like this?" she asked as they rode back to rejoin the others.

  "You mean the absence of tile animals?"

  "That and the sense of threat."

  He turned in his saddle, looking at her with renewed interest. "You feel it?"

  "How could anyone not?"

  He studied her a moment, then returned his attention forward. "Many don't. Most don't. Oh, they've noticed that the animals seem to have fled. Everyone remarks on that, and it makes them uneasy. But I've heard no one else speak of the sense of threat."

  "Maybe I'm crazy."

  Gray eyes settled on her once again. "Or perhaps you're more sensitive than most. I feel it, too. It began recently, with the early snows. It was as if something dark began to move over the land."

  She nodded and reached back to pull up the cowl on her wool cape. The wind was snaking down her neck, chilling her. The wind.

  Suddenly she lifted her head. "There was no wind here before. Do you feel it?"

  He lifted his head, looking upward toward the treetops, and she followed his gaze. In woods this thick, the wind rarely built any real strength below the trees, but she felt a definite push against her back.

  "It's like it's trying to drive us out," she said. Then, for just an instant, the trees bent as if before a gale.

  "Hurry," Archer said, and spurred his horse.

  Her own mount followed immediately, barely needing the pressure of her heels. It was as if the mare wanted to escape this forest, too.

  It was a relief to emerge from the woods back onto the road, at least from an emotional standpoint. Tess felt as if she had just left a heavy, oppressive mood behind. But the instant they hit the clearing of the river gorge, the wind became even stronger, blowing from the north as if seeking to lift them and carry them away.

  Upriver they could see the men of Whitewater struggling against it to lift the last few sacks of grain onto the final packhorse.

  Then Archer did something so strange that Tess would wonder about it for a long time. He stood in his stirrups, stared into the teeth of the wind and said, "Too late. I already found what I wanted."

  Then he settled back into his saddle, and the two of them galloped across the portage bridge to their companions.

  The wind battled them every step of the way. It blew straight into their faces as they headed north toward Whitewater, until they all hunched forward against their horses' necks. The animals themselves pushed into the wind with heads down and nickered sullenly from time to time.

  And with each passing league, the wind grew icier. By early afternoon, snow began to fly, a promise of greater treachery ahead as it melted and dampened the road. On the tree limbs it stayed frozen, gradually whitening them into ghostly shapes.

  Young Tom drew abreast of Tess, shivering within the deep wool of his gray cloak, and said, "The men are muttering that this is no natural storm."

  "Why would they think that?"

  "Because it came up so sudden. Because 'tis far too early in the year."

  "What do you think?"

  He shrugged. "Winter came early. Why shouldn't a blizzard come, as well?"

  She nodded as if she accepted what he said, but she couldn't forget the way the wind had seemed to be pushing her out of the woods, a wind that she shouldn't have been feeling. Or the way Archer had felt moved to speak into the teeth of it, as if it were some icy beast with a mind.

  The youth spoke again. "The wind makes it feel as if we're traveling up a steep hill."

  "Yes. I hope the horses will make it."

  "These are good horses, Lady. Sturdy and strong, Whitewater bred. They pull plows and heavy carts when they're not being ridden."

  She took hope from that, although these mounts were a long way from being Clydesdales. And where in the world had that comparison come from? What was a Clydesdale?

  For long minutes, despair settled over her like a crushing cloak. How could she ever hope to get on if she remembered nothing? Her life had become like rattling around in a darkened, empty room, occasionally getting a glimpse through a window at people and events that didn't always seem fully real. As if a pane of glass separated her from everything else.

  But that pane of glass had protected her from none of the horror she had felt amidst the caravan's carnage, nor had it protected her from the sting of fear and doubt when Archer had suspected her of being party to the raid and she hadn't even been able to defend herself.