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PROLOGUE

He hated the forest Hated its eternal pockets of dale of trees and bushes Hated its s dying, even the living creatures incessantly pursuing their next meal, one failure away from the slow descent into death Soon his body would be onethe air, maybe buried,theirs for another day He would die He knew that, not with the single-minded intent of the suicidal or the hopeless despair of the doomed, but with the simple acceptance of aout of this world into the next Here in this stinking, dark, damp hell of a place, he would die

He didn't seek death If he could, he'd avoid it But he couldn't He'd tried, planning his breakout for days, conserving his energy, forcing hi himself really He'd never truly believed it would work Of course, it hadn't actually worked, just appeared to, like ain the desert, only the oasis hadn't turned to sand and sun, but damp and dark He'd escaped the compound to find hione nowhere They were co him

He could hear the hound baying, fast on his trail There must be ways to trick it, but he had no idea how Born and raised in the city, he kne to avoid detection there, how to becoht, how to effect an appearance so ht at hihbors in his apart, eyes lowered, a brief nod, no words, so if anyone asked about the occupants of 412, no one really kneho lived there: Was that the elderly couple? The young fah to attract attention, disappearing in a sea of people too intent on their own lives to notice his There he was a master of invisibility But here, in the forest? He hadn't set foot in one since he was ten, when his parents finally despaired of ever rand He was lost here Completely lost The hound would find him and the hunters would kill him

"You won't helpthe words in his mind

For a long mouided him, in the back corner of his mind, the farthest she ever went from him since she'd firstto speak

"Do you want me to?" she asked finally

"You won't Even if I want it This is what you want For me to join you You won't stop that"

The hound started to sing, joy infusing its voice with et Someone shouted

Qiona sighed, the sound fluttering like a breeze through his mind "What do you want me to do?"

"Which way is out?" he asked

More silence More shouts

"That way," she said

He knehich way she h he couldn't see her An ayami had presence and substance but no form, an idea impossible to explain to anyone asn't a shaman and as easy for a shaman to understand as the concept of water or sky

Turning left, he ran Branches whipped his face and bare chest and arellant And equally self-inflicted, he thought Part of him wanted to stop Give up Accept But he couldn't He wasn't ready to surrender his life yet Silish muffins with butter and strawberry jam at the Talbot Cafe, the second-story balcony, farthest table on the left, the sun on his forear in the other, people yelling, laughing on the busy street below Silly things, Qiona would sniff She was jealous, of course, as she was of anything she couldn't share, anything that kept him bound to his body He did want to join her, but not yet Not just yet So he ran

"Stop running," Qiona said

He ignored her

"Slon," she said "Pace yourself"

He ignored her

She withdrew, her anger a flash fire in his brain, bright and hot, then s the hound, but only because his blood pounded too loudly His lungs blazed Each breath scorched through hinored er to sex to pain His body was only a vehicle, a hter, and sunlight to his soul Now after a lifeti his body, he asked it to save him and it didn't kno From behind him came the bay of the hound Was it louder now? Closer?

"Climb a tree," Qiona said

"It's not the dog I'm afraid of It's the men"

"Slon then Turn Confuse theht trail Slon"