Wynn focused on only two things. She pushed panic aside and folded her left leg up high. She kicked sharply downward.

Her boot heel ground down the soldier's thigh and hit sharply on his kneecap. His leg buckled, and he barked out a curse. When her feet touched down, she thrashed free of his grip, but he grabbed the pack before she could get clear.

Wynn slipped her arms from its straps and reached up her left sleeve. As her hand closed on the dagger's hilt, a booted foot struck her hard between the shoulder blades.

She toppled forward and slid. Her right cheek grated across the street's cold stones. Panic took hold as she scrambled to her knees, swinging blindly back with the dagger.

Its tip grated along a leather hauberk instead of a breastplate. The second soldier half crouched above her. His eyes widened at the blade's passing, and he lashed out with his hand.

His palm cracked against the side of Wynn's face, and her head whipped sideways. Wynn's vision turned white, and she vaguely heard a metallic clatter.

She lay facedown in the street, but the white still blurred her vision like a blizzard enveloping the world. What little she made out looked as flat as a picture-her left eye would not focus at all.

Something thin and biting circled her wrists. A sharp pain in both

Wynn's shoulders cut through the dull ache in her head and eye, as her arms were pinned back and tied.

"Lucky day, girlie," came a voice she barely heard. "We're supposed to bring you in one piece."

Wynn's arms jerked upward, her shoulders twisting back as she came off the ground. She exhaled sharply. Her feet dragged on the stones as she was carried away.

"You half-wits!" someone shouted. "You were to stay out of sight until they were on the bridge."

It took all Wynn's strength to turn her head. She looked up with only her right eye.

Lieutenant Omasta glared down Favor's Row and slowly shook his head. Wynn tried to focus.

Bodies lay in the street. Soldiers were Wynn's best guess. Magiere and Chap were gone. They had escaped-and she was alone.

Wynn could not feel afraid. She was too tired. She wished the soldier would just drop her so she could sleep on the cold stone. She remembered Leesil holding her as she told him that everything would be fine.

Omasta turned about and looked down at Wynn. "Take her in and wait for me. The rest of your contingent had better bring that hunter back."

Wynn's head sagged. A salty taste filled her slack mouth, and every few paces a dark red droplet spattered on the snow-dusted stones of the keep's bridge.

Magiere heard Wynn cry out. She faltered in her flight and stopped to look back. Chap whirled about as well.

Three soldiers closed behind them. Three more were coming out ahead. Magiere couldn't see Wynn, and anguish only made her furious that she'd led the young sage into this trap.

Chap lunged back down the road toward the trailing soldiers.

"No!" Magiere shouted.

The dog skidded to a halt with an angry snarl.

"We can't help her if we're caught," Magiere said.

Chap barked twice in denial, but he turned back, lunging ahead of her toward the soldiers in their path. Magiere rushed after him.

The soldiers were fully focused on her, and the first was caught by surprise when Chap grazed his leg in passing. The man stumbled sideways, and Magiere slashed into his side with the falchion as she passed She didn't look back to see if he went down. The next two slowed.

Chap swerved right, snapping and snarling as he passed one soldier's flank. The man spun about at the dog's circling attack, and Magiere charged straight for his companion.

Every fast breath Magiere took fanned her hunger. She no longer felt the cold. Her opponent cocked back his shortsword, and Magiere swung downward while still running. For that instant the soldier seemed to slow in her vision, yet her own movements retained speed.

The shortsword had barely finished half its swing when Magiere's falchion collided with it. His force seemed weak, and Magiere's strike broke through his guard. The falchion's curved end bit through his hauberk's shoulder, and he crumpled. She turned away before he hit the ground.

Chap's jaws were clamped on the third soldier's ankle. He set all fours and jerked backward. The soldier slipped and fell, his boot tearing between Chap's teeth.

The soldier's skullcap helmet clanked on the stone. Magiere kicked his head as she passed, and his body spun a quarter turn on the cobblestones. He went still, arms splayed out like a rag doll's. Chap pulled in beside Magiere as she ran on, with the trailing soldiers closing from behind.

Chap rushed ahead and swerved down the first side street, and Magiere followed. The dog turned again into an alley. He wove his way between the crates and barrels, and Magiere toppled as many as she could in her passing to slow their pursuers. A few steps ahead she spotted a half-open door in a building of weather-bleached planks.

"Here!" she shouted at Chap.

The dog spun around, running back. He leaped through the opening, and she followed, slamming the door behind. She quickly heaved a pivoting wood bar into its braces, sealing the door.

"Help! Murder!" someone screamed.

Magiere flattened her back against the door.

A portly woman holding a dripping ladle stood gasping in wide-eyed panic near a small stone hearth. Brown stew bubbled within a cast-iron pot hanging over the weak flames, and spatters of" the same color stained the woman's greasy apron. There were stacks of tin and wood plates and mugs on a squat side table, and crates of potatoes were piled in the corner under plucked chickens dangling from wall hooks. Magiere was in a back scullery and kitchen.

"No," she said, lowering the falchion. "Ma'am, be quiet.'

She must look horrifying to a commoner, rushing in armed with a large dog at her side. Magiere put one finger to her lips. The squat woman stared at her with wide round eyes.

The door bucked against Magiere's back as something struck it from outside. The woman screamed again.

Magiere shoved past her, kicking open the far plank door. She ran out and startled a skinny girl with a haggard face carrying a wooden tray of brimming tankards. Magiere stood in the common room of a small tavern. Clusters of townsfolk stared at her in surprise as another squealing scream came from the kitchen.

"Murder!"

The skinny girl stumbled, and the tray of tankards toppled to the floor with a splashing clatter. A stocky man in a floppy leather cap stood up in alarm.

Chap lunged out before Magiere, letting out a deep snarl. His muzzle and teeth were stained with blood.

"Wolf!" cried the stocky man.

Patrons toppled drink and food, chairs and tables, as they scrambled in any direction away from the dog. This left a clear path to the front door, and Chap raced for it as Magiere realized what he'd done. She slammed her palm into the chest of the man in the cap, knocking him aside as she followed the dog.

She stopped briefly in the street to look both ways. Another soldier rounded the far right corner, coming straight for her with his shortsword out. He was young, probably less than twenty years.

He came at her too fast, and she sidestepped him neatly. As he passed, she slammed the butt of her sword into the back of his head. He went down face-first in a crumpled heap and didn't move. Hunger worked its way throughout Magiere's body, building to an ache in her jaws.

Chap barked, and she spotted him across the street before a set of wide doors. She joined him, jerking one door open, and they both hur-ried inside. She hadn't seen any other soldiers in the street, but some townsfolk across the way had surely watched out the windows. They would point out where a "wolf" and a fleeing woman had gone. She looked about her new surroundings.