“Little prince,” she told him, “I became a warrior as young as I could so that I might be out from under my elders’ eyes and run where I willed and do as I pleased. But even before that, whenever my father caught me stepping outside the Ring, he never scolded, but only told me, ‘You’ll make a warrior soon enough, filly, if you stay at this clip.’ “

And she laughed then suddenly, almost lightheartedly. It sounded strange in the stillness to Jan’s ears. And she was laughing at him a little, it seemed, baiting him, daring him with her green, green eyes. His limbs felt weak. Abruptly, Jan felt his bravado vanishing.

“Pledge me you won’t tell Korr,” he whispered, for all at once hope sparked in him again. Perhaps he was not lost, after all. Perhaps in time he could win back his father’s grace, if only the prince never learned of this.

The healer’s daughter laughed again, more gently. “No fear. I hadn’t planned to.”

Jan studied her dubiously. She looked at him. “Will you have my word on it? Here: I, Telkélla, swear.”

Jan felt a sudden rush of gratitude then, and just a trace of shame. Among the unicorns of the Vale, one’s truename was a secret, given at birth and known only to oneself and one’s dam. Not even Korr knew Jan’s truename. Yet Tek had trusted him with hers as readily as the Renegades had spoken the name of the Mother. He felt he must repay her somehow.

But Tek was already speaking. “Unless you speak of it, no one will ever know. But by the Beard, little prince, you were in such a froth during the storm, I thought you might babble the whole thing afterward.”

She snorted, picking at the soft chalk underfoot with one hoof. Jan felt his ears burning, abashed, not quite sure whether Tek was right in thinking he had almost confessed, or because she had mistaken his desperation for terror. She gave another snort, half a laugh.

“You’ve been keeping yourself so docile of late—save getting yourself lost in the Pan Woods—until you spoke your father back upon the Plain, I was half afraid you’d lost your fire.”

And two emotions roiled up in Jan suddenly, like wellsprings rising, overwhelming and obliterating the tranquility that had filled him since he had entered the grove. The first was fury, fury at Korr for all the helpless frustration he, Jan, had felt during the storm—and before that, beside the fallen Renegade when his father had simply loped away, ignoring him, as though he were nothing.

And the second emotion, which was for Tek, he could not even name.

“Aljan,” he told her. “My truename’s Aljan.”

“Dark moon?” the healer’s daughter said. “It suits.”

He found himself gazing at her—he had been gazing at her for some time now, he realized, and could not stop—caught unexpectedly by the way the patches of black and rose in her coat mingled and interlocked. Not odd, beautiful. The suddenness of his seeing it surprised him. Why had he never noticed it before?

The color of the sky above had grown warmer, redder, and the cast of the wyvern shelves below almost coppery. Tek stood eyeing him with her green, green eyes that caught the light like gryphons’ eyes, and all at once Jan felt himself flushing scarlet beneath the skin.

She tossed her head, shaking herself. “Come,” the healer’s daughter said. “We should go back. It’s dusk.”

Jan followed Tek back through the milkwood grove. The shadows of the trees slanted long around them, and their shadows trailed dark over the fallen leaves. Then the soil changed from grayish brown at the wood’s edge to the white lime sand surrounding the pool. Dagg, already standing before the water, was glancing about anxiously. They slipped up beside him.

Jan saw other pilgrims stepping into the place about the Mere, all facing inward, ringing it round—no outward-facing sentries this night. Alma must keep them while they kept their vigil (might the wyverns not wake). The sky above, fire-streaked with gold, was mirrored in the pool.

Across the water, Korr began to speak. He told of Halla, how she had formed the Circle of Warriors in the first years after the unicorns’ defeat at the teeth of the wyverns. She had made the Ring that the herd might not scatter, each running his or her own way across the Plain. It was Halla’s wish that the unicorns remain a single people, whole and strong, so that one day—at the coming of the Firebringer—they might return and cast the wyverns from these hills.

But Jan found he could hardly listen. His thoughts wandered along their own path. Tek’s words in the grove troubled him. Was she not, as a warrior of the Ring, bound to report him? Yet she had pledged not to. Was her breach then not as great as his?

Only the worthy, the prince was saying, only those who had kept themselves true, did Alma permit to join the Ring. As for the rest, the Ring-breakers, they were lost. As Renegades, they perished on the Plain. Am I worthy? Jan asked himself. I have not been true. Once he became a warrior, he would no longer have a colt’s excuse.

He watched the sunset in the water, the gold in the sky turning to amber, then deepening to red. Streaks of shadow shaded from mauve into purple, then dusky taupe. The dusk wind lifted, stirring the grove, then soughing, died. Jan began to be able to see stars though the dim glow of sky reflected in the pool.

Teki chanted them the lay of Wenfedh, a young warrior newly returned from Pilgrimage, who had died at the talons of gryphon captors rather than forswear the Ring and betray the unicorns. The twilight turned into evening, the sky becoming deep blue and then at last true black between the stars. Silence settled; the unicorns grew still. Strange constellations lay like bright dust upon the surface of the Mere, and Jan watched them.

No moon arose. It was the night of the nothing-moon, when the moon ran mated with the sun under and around the other side of the world. On the morrow’s eve, a new moon would arise, newborn, a thin crescent slip. Jan gazed intently at the still, dark water, and his tangled thoughts quieted. The night rolled by, the sky overhead wheeling slowly, ever so slowly, like a lazily circling kite.

The hour swung past midnight. Jan felt no uneasiness, no urge to sleep. His legs held firm, without stiffness, and he measured the dark, surrounding space by the little noises: a restless murmur, the scuff of hooves as someone shifted, a soft snort, a swishing of tail. Each sound fanned out, thinning, filling the night until it rebounded on the dark.

Night waned. The young hours after midnight loomed and passed. Jan found his gaze on the pool had grown deeper. Perfectly steady, he no longer needed to glance away to keep his balance or his bearings. His hooves seemed rooted to the soil, growing downward like the boles of the milkwood trees. Their savor hung on him, pervading the air.

His gaze was fixed upon the Mere, moving steadily farther into that clear deepness. He felt the woods, the others around him all falling away, and knew that he had been searching for a thing that lay hidden just beyond his gaze for a very long time. He came aware of a light, a dim glow slowly brightening that dark infinity of night. And he had existed for an age, an endless universe of time, in darkness, with only the glimmer of stars for a guide.

But now the light was coming. He felt his heart lifting, his breath quickening. The others around him—he could neither see nor hear them anymore, but he felt their kindred anticipation, scented it, tasted it almost, like the dying of the dark. The stars faded. Dawn sky blended from black to indigo, from wine to rose and apricot, then gold.

He saw something, a dark figure, but could not quite make it out. The grove around him still lay in smoky shadow, the reflected sky casting only the subtlest of light. He moved forward without thinking, nearer the water—and the vision moved. He hung over it, staring at it, holding his breath as the dawn grew gradually brighter. Then in the next moment, the vision crystallized, clarified, became—only himself, his own image reflected back at him from the surface of the Mere.