Thunder shattered.
The lynx and Hederick screamed at the same instant.
"Begone!" A sword appeared above the boy, interposed between his crouching body and the giant predator. Red light played on the weapon's edge. A gauntleted hand grasped the hilt; an arm corded with muscular sinew held the blade steady. Hederick sat, powerless with fear.
The lynx screamed again, and the hand tightened on the hilt. "Leave us, cat!" came that same booming voice. The lynx tensed to spring, and the man swore fervently, invoking gods Hederick had never heard of. Just as the giant feline leaped, the man's other hand swept up, rais shy;ing a flaming torch.
Light exploded. Red and yellow sparks burned pin shy;pricks into the ferns. The lynx twisted away in midleap and crashed through a maple sapling and onto the ground off to one side. The man dropped the torch and whirled to meet the cat, sword ready, his body between the boy and the lynx.
Then Hederick was up. His left hand caught up the sputtering torch from the wet moss, and he ran to the man's side, bellowing a battle cry. Hederick threw any shy;thing and everything his right hand could grasp. Rocks, branches, leaves, mud, moss-all were hurtled toward the snarling lynx.
His tall rescuer remained poised with his sword. "By the New Gods, the boy's feisty!" the man said.
The only thing left was the torch; Hederick prepared to throw that as well. The man swore again, fumbled at his belt, and tossed something at the cat just as the boy released the fiery brand.
Another explosion of scarlet and topaz flashed through the trees. Bigger and louder than the last, it knocked Hed shy;erick flat on his back. When the smoke cleared, there was no sign of the lynx.
"Did we kill it?" Hederick could barely get the words out. His tongue seemed stuck to the roof of his mouth.
The man sheathed his sword and laughed uproari shy;ously, then shook his head. "By the New Gods, that pussycat must be halfway to the Garnet Mountains by now! If her feet touch the ground every six furlongs, if 11 be a miracle."
Hederick shook uncontrollably. Blood streamed into his eyes from a cut on his forehead. "It's still out there?" he wailed. "It's not dead?"
"Not dead, lad, but she won't be coming back here soon." The man extended a hand to help the boy up. Hed-erick's knees shook so that he could barely stand. "I can't imagine what the she-cat was doing so far from the Gar shy;nets," the man mused, "but who knows how great a dis shy;tance the creatures travel to hunt? Perhaps she sought food for kits."
"But it was hunting me!" Hederick shrieked. The man shrugged. "You escaped."
Wordless, Hederick studied his rescuer. The man couldn't have been much more than twenty. His face was long, with a dark beard neatly trimmed to a point and gray eyes that seemed both humorous and kind. A rough brown robe stretched to cover powerful shoulders.
The man submitted to Hederick's frank inspection without embarrassment. "By Ferae, you're a small one! How old are you? Eight? Nine?"
"Twelve," Hederick muttered.
"Your name, son?"
"Hederick."
"I'm Tarscenian," the man said. "Let me invite you to supper, young Hederick." Tarscenian placed a strong arm about the boy's still trembling shoulders and guided him deeper into the grove, where a small campfire blazed cheerily. The fire popped as they approached, the sound Hederick had heard as he entered the copse. Tarscenian urged the boy to sit against a fallen log and handed him a wooden trencher. Three pieces of meat swam in greasy juice.
"You can dine like a theocrat on fresh roast rabbit," Tarscenian said, "and then tell me how in the name of the Lesser Pantheon you ended up alone in the middle of nowhere."
Soon Hederick had all but licked the trencher clean. The hare's picked bones blackened in the fire. Tarscenian lounged on a blanket across from the boy, watching with amazement. "Whatever you take on, lad, whether it's lynxes or supper, you certainly do it wholeheartedly," he commented.
Hederick bristled. The man had offered him dinner. What was he supposed to do-admire it until it con shy;gealed? The man laughed and held up his hand. "Calm down, lad. I mean you no insult. You showed more spirit in facing that she-lynx than many full-grown men would have."
Mollified, Hederick leaned back against the log, regard shy;ing his rescuer with awe. Tarscenian was a far cry from the men of Hederick's isolated home village of Garlund. The young man's eyes glittered with life, his gaze was direct, and his movements vigorous. If the god Tiolanthe ever took human form, he would look like Tarscenian, Hederick decided.
"So, Hederick, what were you doing alone on the prairie in the dark of night?" the stranger asked. "Assum shy;ing that you weren't hunting lynxes, that is."
Tarscenian listened with growing astonishment to the boy's story. Hederick told him about his mother and father, Venessi and Con, who, after walking for weeks due east from their home city of Caergoth, had founded the village of Garlund just south of Ancilla's Copse. Their purpose was to provide a place where they and their fol shy;lowers could worship Tiolanthe, the god that regularly appeared to Venessi and Con, but only to them. Then Hederick had been born, the first baby delivered in the new village.
Two years later, when Con disagreed with Venessi over some matter of Tiolanthean doctrine, Hederick's mother had ordered the people of the village to kill her husband. Hederick's sister Ancilla, fifteen years his senior, had fled Garlund moments after Con's death.
"She promised to return for me, but she never did," Hederick said simply.
Tarscenian interrupted only once-when the storm broke and the pair took shelter under oiled canvas stretched from tree to tree. Each sat wrapped in a gray woolen blanket that smelled of incense and horsehair. Hederick talked until he could barely put words together, he was so sleepy. "And now I've been banished," Heder shy;ick said, "by Venessi."
"Your mother sent a twelve-year-old into the prairie alone at night?" Tarscenian demanded with a frown.
"I must learn humility, she said," Hederick explained, his words slurring. "And then the lynx came after me, and I ran to the only place I could think of-Ancilla's Copse. This is where Ancilla hid when she left Garlund, when I was two."
"You must not remember very much about this sister," Tarscenian said sympathetically.
"Oh, no!" Hederick exclaimed, shaking himself awake. "I remember her well. She had eyes as green as grass, and she was pretty-oh, so pretty, Tarscenian. She knew all about plants and herbs and things, and when Con beat me for sinning, she would give me things to take away the pain. Ancilla was wonderful."
"But then she left."
Hederick's face fell, and he nodded. "She was afraid the villagers would kill her as they had killed our father. So she left. And then she forgot all about me. I… I guess I was too sinful to come back for."
He remembered the night before Ancilla had left. For some minor infraction, Con had beaten young Hederick mercilessly. Ancilla, achingly beautiful at seventeen, defended him and treated his wounds. Hederick had begged her to stay with him. "You won't ever stop being my sister, will you?" he'd cried.
"Close your eyes, little brother," Ancilla had answered, rocking him by the fire. The little boy, safe in the comfort of his sister's arms, resisted sleep. She murmured words Hederick had never heard before, tenderly stroking his face and wispy reddish-brown hair. She fed him cold tea from a spoon, and when he tried to speak again, covered his mouth with a gentle hand and hushed him.
Once she rearranged the blanket to cover Hederick's feet, then she spoke fiercely. "I promise you this, little Hederick: I will always be your sister. / will never hurt you. I will protect you with every power I have. I will do all I can, even from afar, to keep Con and Venessi from turning you into … into what they are. You need never fear me.
That I vow."
That memory was too holy to share with this stranger, however. And besides, Hederick was so tired; he felt him shy;self sinking into sleep. Then Tarscenian's voice roused him.
"This village of yours, is it large?" the stranger asked.
"Large and wealthy?"
Hederick shook himself awake. "Sixty people, maybe."
"Prosperous?" the man asked.
"Venessi has plenty of food stored in the barns, but the people don't know that. They're restricted to two meals a day. No one in the village is well-fed except my mother, but she's in Tiolanthe's graces. Other than the food, there's nothing but a few candlesticks in the prayer house, and some icons."
"Steel icons?" Tarscenian asked quickly. Since the Cata shy;clysm, steel had been the most precious metal on Krynn.
Hederick nodded. Tarscenian didn't speak for a while, and Hederick thought he'd fallen asleep. The boy had nearly followed suit when the man's deep voice re shy;sounded again.
"Lad," he said, "I believe it's time for me to rest in my travels. And it's time the people of Garlund learn about some new gods."
Hederick jerked upright, bumping the oiled canvas and sending a splash of cold water down his left leg. "New