Leesil burst from the shelter but tripped on the tarp's corner. He stumbled to one knee outside. Flakes pelted him at a slant in the hard wind, and snow began collecting on his coat and hair. A blizzard had built while he slept.

Sgaile flew out behind him, looking about with his face twisted in wary fright. Wynn and Osha came last, gripping Magiere's coat. Leesil turned even colder inside at the sight of it.

Magiere was out in the storm wearing nothing but her hauberk and wool pullover.

Sgaile dashed farther out and peered toward the peaks.

"Can you see her?" Leesil shouted.

"No!"

Leesil turned to Wynn. "What did you see? Why would she run off?"

"Chap noticed first," she answered, looking toward the dog. Her expression went blank as if she were listening. "He says he lost her trail across a rocky slope above and came back to get us."

Leesil fastened his coat and took Magiere's from Osha. He ran upslope along the rock face of their cave, following Chap's tracks. He stopped where these faded to mere depressions in the deepening snow and looked down to the camp.

Leesil snarled under his breath. He should've had a grip on Magiere before he fell asleep. Her dreams had been worsening, coming more often the higher they climbed. He should've heard her or noticed when she stirred.

Sgaile came across the lower slope, back toward camp, and Leesil scrambled down as well. Wynn hastily relashed the blanket around Chap's torso.

"Did you see anything?" Sgaile demanded.

"The tracks fade," Leesil answered, knowing Sgaile would count this as another failure of his guardianship. "I don't know if she has a path in mind or if she's wandering half-asleep, but either way, it's not the easiest path."

"We must find her quickly," Sgaile said and spun around, looking in every direction.

Leesil didn't see many choices. Trudging blindly about in the dark was dangerous enough, but doing so in a blizzard was madness.

"Upward," Wynn said, fastening her hood. "I know that is not much, but it is the way she would head."

Leesil stepped farther out, surveying all upward paths, as Chap bounded upslope around stone outcrops rising through the snow. The dog came in and out of sight several times, and Leesil felt a small hand close on his arm.

Wynn clutched him, watching for Chap, and then pointed high above their camp.

"The path above our shelter leads to a rocky passage farther on," she said, "where Chap lost her trail. But the way beyond it splits in several directions. He cannot tell which way she went."

Osha peered curiously at Wynn and then at Chap.

Leesil had no time to explain how the sage knew what the dog had found. He studied the rock-face slope above, still uncertain if Magiere would take such a difficult route. He scanned the open slope for an easier way to scale to the same heights. Too many choices, and no sign of Magiere's passage.

The terrain broke and twisted everywhere in white paths between jagged stone crags and ridges rising in the dark. Chap came hopping back downslope, chunks of snow tumbling along in his path. He whined once, as if he, too, had no answer.

Leesil turned to Sgaile. "Take Osha up above our camp. Chap and I will try the open slope. Hopefully he can track her. We can cover more ground if we split up."

"I am coming with you," Wynn said.

"No!" Leesil snapped too harshly, and then calmed himself. "Someone has to stay in camp… in case Magiere comes to her senses and makes it back on her own."

This mountainside's maze of small ravines and gullies would slow him enough, and he had to move fast. Without waiting for Wynn's agreement, Leesil clambered upslope through shin-deep snow. Chap passed him, lunging up the white hillside.

"Chap!" Wynn called. "Leesil!"

She stood where they left her, watching them fade in the thickening snowfall. When she looked back toward the cave, Osha and Sgaile had already headed up along the rock face above it.

"Go back inside the shelter," Sgaile called.

His voice barely reached her above the blizzard, but she squinted into the storm after Leesil and Chap.

"No!" she shouted back, and headed upslope. "I am going with Leesil."

"Wynn!" Osha called out.

She ignored him, pushing on, though she sank knee-deep with each step. She finally glanced over her shoulder.

Osha was bounding toward her. Sgaile passed him with a growl.

"Valhachkasej'a!"

Wynn stepped away. "Go on-both of you-and stop wasting time! I am more use helping Leesil than sitting about."

She turned, trying to run as Osha shouted after her.

Wynn knew she could not outdistance them, but Sgaile's anger at her would be quickly outweighed by his fear of losing Magiere. Soon their angry voices fell behind, and Wynn knew she was right. Leesil and Chap needed her, and she followed the muted depressions of their tracks.

The slope sharpened, and the pain in Wynn's right foot forced her to slow. She looked up, trying to spot where they had gone. But she had to turn away as snow peppered her face and caught in her eyelashes. Digging into her coat pocket, she pulled out the cold lamp crystal and tried to warm it with her hands.

"Chap!" she shouted. "Wait!"

The crystal glowed dully in her cold fingers, so she put it in her mouth as she trudged on. The incline decreased over a knoll's crest, and she parted her lips. A glimmer of light leaked out through her teeth. Wynn spit the crystal into her gloved hand and held it up.

It glowed at half-strength, and its light turned the falling snow into a white gauze curtain shifting all around her. But it was enough to navigate by, and she thought she glimpsed movement higher up to her right.

"Leesil?"

No answer, and the ache in Wynn's right foot seemed to spread to her left calf as well. She took a step, but when she looked down at the snow, Leesil and Chap's tracks had faded altogether.

Wynn turned about, looking down the long slope for the way back to camp.

Between black crags and snow turned pale gray in the dark, she saw at least three separate ways. But which one was correct? Even her own tracks were quickly filling with snowfall. Anger crept in, pushing back Wynn's fear.

She was always the one to fall behind. But it was safer to go on than get lost on the way back to camp. Leesil and Chap could not be far ahead, and she was more likely to meet someone if she pressed on.

"Leesil!" she called out, but the wind drowned his name.

Wynn stumbled on over another crest, into the next chute between high stone, and then around three bends as the broken mountainside forced her to weave in the dark. But still she found no tracks for Leesil or Chap.

She clambered through a saddle between two massive outcrops, jutting high like miniature peaks. When she looked back, only her last six steps showed clearly through the blizzard.

"Chap!" she shouted,

Only the moans and half-whistles of wind over stone answered her. Fear crept back in, eating away resolute anger.

She was alone-as lost as Magiere.

But if Magiere indeed wandered in some half-conscious state, she would travel upward, as she had done for so long. Leesil would continue his climb until he found her. And everyone else would be searching the heights.

The ache in Wynn's legs and feet dwindled. This was no relief-it was a bad sign. Cold seeped deeper through her clothing, and she pulled the coat closer, tugging the hood forward. At least she had her gloves, but she had forgotten her face wrap. If only she had eyes like Leesil or Osha, or even Magiere-some way to see clearly in the dark.

Or did she?

One night in the elven forest, Chap had bolted off after a pack of majay-hi. Wynn had tried to follow, but the forest toyed with her mind and left her lost. In desperation, she had willfully raised her sickening mantic sight, left from the taint of wild magic in her flesh. Chap became her beacon, glowing more brightly than any other life in the forest.