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sobs. At her heels, the switch descended again, striking
splinters just below her heels.
And she was at the wall’s summit, crouching there and staring down at him, and for a moment she had no idea what shape
she was in, or where her Stepping might have taken her.
But those eyes with which she now glared down at Kalameshli, they saw the world in human colours, and what held her
to the wall were her human fingers and toes, crooked into every
little crevice and crack she could find, bleeding from the rough
wood, her nails ragged and broken.
And Kalameshli looked up at her, and where she expected to
find bitterness was instead a kind of triumph, for she had mastered the personal Testing he had set her, and somehow the tiger
remained caged. He had made her his creature, a thing of the
Wolf only.
She slipped down over the far side of the wall, feeling numb.
The rest of the course, she walked. Nobody threw anything at
her. Kalameshli did not follow any further. His point was made,
and he was satisfied.
At the course’s end, nobody was there to greet her and exult
with her, but she had expected that. By then her shoulder was
agony, and she went to make a poultice to bind over it that
would dull the pain. It would be grim work, one-handed, but
nobody would do it for her, nor would she trust them to.
Later, when the tribe had begun the raucous celebrations that
came after the Testing, Smiles Without Teeth came for her, and
told her that her father demanded her presence.
5
Asmander was awakened by the sounds of fighting.
    He and the Horse delegation had been gifted one of the
smaller huts to curl up in, presumably leaving some of the more
wretched Laughing Men to shiver outside in the dark. With so
many sleepers laid out close together around the circle of floor,
like interlocking pieces of a puzzle, the cold of nightfall did not
touch them; and besides, Asmander had a gift for sleeping well,
yet waking when he needed to.
    He was on his feet in an instant – some of the Horse were
already about, judging from the vacant spaces on the floor, and
there was no sign of Venater at all. No surprise there: from the
sound of it, Venater was one of those doing the fighting. The
pirate had been awake still when Asmander retired, conversing
in guarded, hostile tones with the Malikah of the Laughing Men.
Asmander was only surprised it had taken the man so long to
get into trouble.
    In nothing but a loincloth, his stone-toothed maccan sword in
hand, Asmander hurried up into the morning light.
There were three of them pitched against Venater. Three
men, though, and it was plain that amongst this tribe the men
were given no place of honour or respect. Nonetheless, they
were game fighters, from what Asmander could now see, teaming up to try and bring the big southerner down.
It was all in friendly contest, that much was plain. When they
were in human form, their hands were empty of weapons. Still,
the Laughing Men possesed jaws that could grind bones and
fights like these were seldom won or lost without blood being
drawn.
Seeing that there was no real danger to Venater, and that the
Laughing Men had not decided to butcher their guests,
Asmander just stood back and watched his companion fight.
He moved like strong waters, this old pirate: deceptive when
he was still, unstoppable once he struck. Sometimes he wore his
human shape, with sallow skin gleaming in the bright sunlight.
More often he was Stepped into the true form of his soul, the
savage creature he called the dragon. Long and black, he was, as
heavy and powerful as when he walked on two legs, and his
scales were like black pebbles. His blunt head gaped wide in
threat, showing a horrific array of curving fangs, and he could
rush with a terrible swiftness even on those sprawling, ungainly-looking legs.
The three Laughing Men tried to surround him, to nip at
him from behind while he chased whoever was before him, but
Venater was an old warrior, wise to