Assassin's Quest

He frowned at me and I wanted to snarl, because I had done what he told me. After a time, he got up and got a bottle. He poured something into his cup. He held the bottle out to me. "Do you want some?"

I pulled back from it. Even the smell of it stung in my nostrils.

"Answer," he reminded me.

"No. No, it's bad water."

"No. It's bad brandy. Blackberry brandy, very cheap. I used to hate it, you used to like it."

I snorted out the smell. "We have never liked it."

He set the bottle and the cup down on the table. He got up and went to the window. He opened it again. "Go hunting, I said!" I felt Nighteyes jump and then run away. Nighteyes is as afraid of Heart of the Pack as I am. Once I attacked Heart of the Pack. I had been sick for a long time, but then I was better. I wished to go out to hunt and he would not let me. He stood before the door and I sprang on him. He hit me with his fist, and then held me down. He is not bigger than I. But he is meaner, and more clever. He knows many ways to hold and most of them hurt. He held me on the floor, on my back, with my throat bared and waiting for his teeth, for a long, long time. Every time I moved, he cuffed me. Nighteyes had snarled outside the house, but not very close to the door, and he had not tried to come in. When I whined for mercy, he struck me again. "Be quiet!" he said. When I was quiet, he told me, "You are younger. I am older and I know more. I fight better than you do, I hunt better than you do. I am always above you. You will do everything I want you to do. You will do everything I tell you to do. Do you understand that?"

Yes, I had told him. Yes, yes, that is pack, I understand, I understand. But he had only struck me again and held me there, throat wide, until I told him with my mouth, "Yes, I understand."

When Heart of the Pack came back to the table, he put brandy in my cup. He set it in front of me, where I would have to smell it. I snorted.

"Try it," he urged me. "Just a little. You used to like it. You used to drink it in town, when you were younger and not supposed to go into taverns without me. And then you would chew mint, and think I would not know what you had done."

I shook my head at him. "I would not do what you told me not to do. I understood."

He made his sound that is like choking and sneezing. "Oh, you used to very often do what I had told you not to do. Very often. "

I shook my head again. "I do not remember it."

"Not yet. But you will." He pointed at the brandy again. "Go on. Taste it. Just a little bit. It might do you good."

And because he had told me I must, I tasted it. It stung my mouth and nose, and I could not snort the taste away. I spilled what was left in the cup.

"Well. Wouldn't Patience be pleased" was all he said. And then he made me get a cloth and clean what I had spilled. And clean the dishes in water and wipe them dry, too.

Sometimes I would shake and fall down. There was no reason. Heart of the Pack would try to hold me still. Sometimes the shaking made me fall asleep. When I awakened later, I ached. My chest hurt, my back hurt. Sometimes I bit my tongue. I did not like those times. They frightened Nighteyes.

And sometimes there was another with Nighteyes and me, another who thought with us. He was very small, but he was there. I did not want him there. I did not want anyone there, ever again, except Nighteyes and me. He knew that, and made himself so small that most of the time he was not there.

Later, a man came.

"A man is coming," I told Heart of the Pack. It was dark and the fire was burning low. The good hunting time was past. Full dark was here. Soon he would make us sleep.

He did not answer me. He got up quickly and quietly and took up the big knife that was always on the table. He pointed at me to go to the corner, out of his way. He went softly to the door and waited. Outside, I heard the man stepping through the snow. Then I smelled him. "It is the gray one," I told him. "Chade."

He opened the door very quickly then, and the gray one came in. I sneezed with the scents he brought on him. Powders of dry leaves are what he always smelled like, and smokes of different kinds. He was thin and old, but Heart of the Pack always behaved as if he were pack higher. Heart of the Pack put more wood on the fire. The room got brighter, and hotter. The gray one pushed back his hood. He looked at me for a time with his light-colored eyes, as if he were waiting. Then he spoke to Heart of the Pack.

"How is he? Any better?"

Heart of the Pack moved his shoulders. "When he smelled you, he said your name. Hasn't had a seizure in a week. Three days ago, he mended a bit of harness for me. And did a good job, too."

"He doesn't try to chew on the leather anymore?"

"No. At least, not while I'm watching him. Besides, it's work he knows very well. It may touch something in him." Heart of the Pack gave a short laugh. "If nothing else, mended harness is a thing that can be sold."