The Named: The Complete Series

Chapter Thirteen

As Ratha padded through the salt grass with Mishanti in her jaws, she eyed the floating bridge with mixed feelings. She was glad she would not have to make the trip around the inlet. Her jaws already ached from carrying the cub by the scruff, and her conscience hurt her almost as badly. The bridge would save her some travel, but she didn’t like the way it shifted and strained against the cords that anchored it to stumps on the bank. Currents riffled water against the upstream side as the retreating tide drew water from the inlet.

The Named had crossed the floating bridge enough times to prove its worthiness. It was her own bad luck that she had to cross on an outgoing tide, but the bridge would bear her.

Lifting her chin to hold Mishanti high, she took several steps down the bank. Was that a splash in the water upstream, she wondered, and what was that eddy? She cocked her head to one side so she could see past the cub in her jaws. A shadow seemed to cross the bottom, but it went swiftly and was chopped up by the small whitecaps. She stared hard but could see nothing.

Clouds scudded by overhead, casting fleeting shadows along the ground and over the water. The cub sagged in Ratha’s jaws. With a toss of her head, she heaved him up again and strode onto the floating bridge.

With the first step, the raft-bridge rocked, as she had expected it to. The next few steps were staggers; the mass of bound driftwood and rushes heaved as if it had been struck from beneath. Ratha nearly lost her hold on the cub in her mad scramble to keep on her feet on the plunging raft. But she lost her balance, flopping on her side and clawing wildly to keep atop the mass of thatch and sticks. Mishanti squealed in pain from the pressure of her teeth in his scruff, and her neck muscles strained with the effort of keeping him from tumbling off.

Angrily she vowed never again to use this flimsy crossing during an outgoing tide. Her anger turned to alarm as she felt one end of the raft-bridge swing downstream. She snapped her head around, causing a squall from her small charge. Surely the other tether would hold. But she saw to her horror that the cord lay loose on the surface of the water. The raft surged beneath her and floated away free, carrying her with it.

She crouched, digging her claws into the thatch and holding the cub in her mouth. Her muscles tensed for a jump to the bank, but the shore retreated. She faced the green-gray water, ready to plunge in and stroke for shore. But she knew she could not keep her head above water with Mishanti in her jaws. All she could do was cling to the raft as it headed seaward, bucking and bounding as if it were alive and rejoicing in its escape.

Seeing the tether from the front end streaming alongside her, Ratha extended a claw and snagged the twisted bark-cord. It looked stout, but it must have frayed. Then she looked more closely at the soggy end draped across her paw. Yes, the fiber looked worn, but the final cut was clean, as if someone had chewed on the rope to weaken it and then, at the final moment, bitten through.

She guessed that the other tether would look the same. Crouching, she ground her back teeth while her fangs held Mishanti’s scruff. He was a mute, wet little ball of fur by now, hanging limp in her jaws, too terrified to struggle or mewl.

The raft gave an odd lurch that wasn’t part of the rhythm of the water bearing it. Ratha loosed her mouth-grip on Mishanti, pressing him down with her chest and hoping he would have enough sense to dig in his claws. She risked a glance over her shoulder at the back of the raft.

Two paws stuck up out of the frothing water, with claws driven deep into sodden thatch and driftwood. One paw was smaller than the other, the leg shrunken. Soaked fur revealed the bony outlines of the leg and the corded tendons in each foot.

From the instant she had recognized that the raft’s tethers had been bitten through, Ratha had known her opponent was Newt. Now the knowledge hit her again, this time with such bitter force that it threatened to jolt her off the raft. To Newt, she was a nightmare, a tormentor. And Newt was Thistle-chaser, the daughter she had bitten, then deserted. She could no longer deny to herself that this vengeful enemy was her own flesh and Bonechewer’s legacy. How could there be anything between them except hate?

Ratha felt ice freeze in her belly. She was no stranger to hate. Many had opposed her and tried to thwart her rise to clan leader or topple her from leadership. She had faced Meoran, the old clan leader, and then Shongshar, but neither could claw as deeply to her heart as this water-soaked, green-eyed revenge that fought to hang on to the raft.

She will give her own life if she thinks she can take mine, Ratha thought, and knowing that sent the ice creeping out along her limbs. Thakur and Fessran, why did you meddle? You did her no favor by finding a mother who should have stayed lost.

The raft slid with the tidewater toward the sea. Ratha stared numbly at the white surf line ahead and flattened her ears against the increasing rumble and crash of the waves. A roller crested ahead of the raft then broke, drenching her. The sea’s churning whitecaps took the raft and spun it around so rapidly that Ratha closed her eyes from dizziness. One whirl took the craft so close to shore that she tensed to jump, but before she could get her feet beneath her, a strong seaward current swept the raft away again.

Though Newt might be smaller and lame, she had maneuvered Ratha into alien and treacherous surroundings, where she held the advantage. Ratha, the proud bearer of fire on land, was but a ragged wretch clinging to a few sticks in the sea.

The current weakened, giving the raft less forward motion, but the chop and roll tossed it about more than ever. Ratha clung to the slithering mass of thatch and driftwood. Drenched and cold to the point of numbness, she nestled Mishanti between her forelegs, holding his nape in her jaws and trying to shield him from the spray. Even now she was wondering if she could manage to swim ashore without drowning him.

The fierceness of the attack told Ratha that Newt was ruthless and remorseless enough to kill her. Was her daughter mad, like one taken with the foaming sickness? No, Newt’s illness was not the foaming sickness, for that killed rapidly. It was something slower, more subtle, and even more destructive. Newt’s attack was more than purposeless madness. It had been planned with a cold cunning that had outdone the best of the Named.

Knowing that there was a deep and painful reason for Newt’s hatred drew Ratha’s strength from her. She closed her eyes again, not from dizziness but from despair. I sought the light in Thistle-chaser’s eyes. I have found it now, but it is a light that sears me more than the touch of the Red Tongue.

Her fear hardened despair into harsh resolution. This ex-cub might have good reason to vent revenge on her. That didn’t matter anymore. If Newt attacked, she must fight back, not only for her sake but for the sake of the Named, who would be left without a leader. Perhaps, she thought, she might be able to somehow talk to Newt, and if the chance came, she would take it. But if it came down to teeth and claws, the fact that Newt was Thistle-chaser, her own daughter, would no longer matter.

It was that decision that made her sidle backward, trying to gauge whether she could lash out with her rear claws and break Newt’s grip on the raft. If she could do it without wounding her, then Newt could swim to shore. That might make managing the runaway raft and Fessran’s adopted cub a little easier.

Ratha’s impulse was to strike quickly and get Newt off the raft. Her hind paws trembled but didn’t move. She was certain that Newt meant to seek her life, yet something in Ratha still held to the hope that it was only a threat.

She couldn’t attack. Not without knowing.

She secured Mishanti once again and craned her head back over her shoulder. The raft had slowed now. Newt was still in the water, hanging on with her claws, but the surging current no longer buried her. As Ratha peered back at her, Newt lifted her chin above the water, her ears flat, her gaze the color of serpentine.

She may understand words. I have to try.

“Thistle-chaser,” Ratha said. The ears twitched and flattened more against the brine-slicked head. The chill in the eyes went beyond the cold of the sea. They looked like marble or green-frosted ice.

“Dreambiter,” Newt answered, never taking her gaze from Ratha’s. Ratha could not control her flinch.

“We can tear each other apart well enough with words. Let it stop there.”

“You tear me with teeth, Dreambiter. I answer.”

“Leave the raft and swim to shore. I promise none of the Named will hunt you or seek you out,” Ratha said.

Newt slitted her eyes. “I hunt you, cub-slayer.”

“You have given me to this angry water. I will never reach shore. Isn’t that enough? Or will you force me to stain myself with your blood... ?”

“Again,” Newt hissed, ending the sentence with the word Ratha could not say.

Newt loosed her grip and slid back into the sea. For one hopeful instant Ratha thought she had persuaded her to go. Then she saw a shape glide alongside the raft. Newt lifted her head, bared her teeth, then ducked under. Again Ratha hoped she had gone. She felt the raft lurch once more and sag beneath her. Newt surfaced, her jaws tangled in bark-cord lashing from the bottom of the raft. Ratha watched, feeling numb. Newt was tearing her floating refuge apart.

With slow, deliberate malice, Newt continued to destroy the raft-bridge. She slashed reed bundles, chewed off bindings, and pried driftwood sticks apart. Now Ratha fought back, striking out with bared claws from the narrow and increasingly cramped area that remained to her. But Newt could easily duck into the sea to escape and rise on the raft’s far side to plague her again.

Ratha knew that Newt could mount a sharp, quick attack, tearing her throat or pulling her into the sea and dragging her under. Newt wanted more than just her death: She had discovered the savage pleasure of tormenting an enemy.

The sea behind the raft was soon littered with shreds of driftwood, rushes, and bark-cord. Gray water welled up through the floor, soaking Ratha’s feet and half covering Mishanti. She tried to hold the fraying mass together with her claws, but Newt relentlessly pulled away one piece after another.

Ratha found herself clinging to the last fragment of the raft, holding the cub in her mouth and staring at the foam-streaked back of a wave. As the swell lifted her, she caught sight of white surf in the distance. Waves breaking meant land of some sort, even if it was no more than a few rocks. She held to the raft as long as she could, then launched herself over Newt’s head into the sea.

The shock of cold water punched the breath from her. The weight of the struggling cub dragged at her jaws as she fought to get her nose above water. For one panicky instant, she almost let him go in order to get a precious breath.

She suddenly wondered why she was fighting so hard to save the youngster. Hadn’t she taken him from Fessran’s den to exile him from the clan? To abandon him, not kill him, a hurt part of her cried. The irony of that claim made Ratha cringe with shame as she shivered and struggled in the ocean. Had she really fooled herself into thinking that young cubs taken from their mothers and abandoned far beyond clan ground would survive? Quit fooling yourself. You were going to kill him. And now you probably will whether you intend to or not.

With an angry sideways toss of her head, Ratha flung the youngster back over her shoulder, still holding on to his scruff. He slid off, dangling in her jaws and threatening to drown both of them. Once more she tried, giving a fierce kick and a wrench of her neck. He fell across the back of her shoulders and she felt cub-claws drive in deeply, making her snarl with pain.

She wallowed in a trough between waves, searching for some sign of the breakers she had seen from the raft. Disoriented by the swells, she picked one direction and struck out with Mishanti clinging to her neck. A roller lifted her, showing her the distant surf line once again, and she changed her course.

It was slow, hard paddling, with bouts of exhaustion, disorientation, and panic. Several times she lost sight of the breakers and ended up swimming aimlessly. Her breath seared her lungs and the back of her throat. Her limbs felt heavy and the cub on her back even heavier.

And then she saw a shape circling her, and she thought about all the creatures of the sea, especially those who ate meat. Her heart sank further when she recognized the sleek form gliding around her. The thought came to her that without Mishanti, she would have a better chance against Newt and the ocean.

His eyes are empty. I should let the sea take him.

Ratha growled deep in her throat, angered by the suggestion and at the part of her that made it. She knew that if she sacrificed the youngster, she would be much closer to Newt’s image of her. But why did it matter, a part of her cried out, despairing. The cub would die out here anyway.

The stinging pain of claws in her nape told her he wasn’t dead yet. She forced herself to stroke with limbs that throbbed with weariness and lungs that burned with ashy dryness, despite all the water around her. And all the time, Newt circled her like a shark, coming in to rake her flank.

Newt’s attack was strangely languid, as if she were only sporting. Perhaps she was playing with her quarry as a hunter would toy with prey. Or perhaps she was surprised to see that Ratha had come this far and wondered how much farther she would go before the sea overwhelmed her.

Ratha only fixed her eyes on the tossing surf and struggled toward it.

It seemed to Ratha that she had been swimming forever in a gray, heaving landscape of waves, foam, and sky. Her limbs slowed of their own accord, and she hung in the water, utterly bewildered as to where she was or how she had gotten out here. She was tempted to just lie in the trough between swells and let the waves roll her around until she sank.

Then she felt the soggy weight of the cub on her neck, remembered, and paddled onward. The sting from his claws faded. Either she was growing too numb to feel anything, or he was weakening. That thought stabbed her with alarm, and she redoubled her efforts.

The sight of Newt cruising around helped to wake her cold-muddled wits with a surge of anger and sent her thrashing through the whitecaps.

She panted and gasped, her throat raw from salt and hard breathing, her chest seared with pain. A spume of spray fountained into the air ahead of her, raining down onto her head. The boom of waves breaking against rocks penetrated her dulled hearing.

A little surge of triumph fought its way through the layers of exhaustion and fear, but before she could really feel it, Mishanti started to slide from her neck, too weak to keep his claws fastened in her nape any longer. Again she grabbed him, slung him back into place, hoping the jolt would revive him long enough for her feet to find some purchase on the rocky bottom.

But the rocks where the waves broke seemed to plunge right down into deep water, with no way to scale their sheer faces. With leaden paws and a growing fear weighting her down, Ratha swam behind the surf line, searching for some shoal or shallows where she could drag her weary self ashore.

At last she came to a place where sea-battered stones had split and tumbled, forming a field of islets. Here she might have a chance of getting through before the breakers dashed her against the rocks. She splashed and scrabbled, tearing her pads on mussel shells that encrusted the islets. She floundered on her belly, nearly lost the cub again. Dragging him by his scruff, for she was too weary to lift her head, she clambered up through tidepools, slipping and falling on slick strands of seaweed, while backwash from the surf dragged at her legs.

Her vision, already blurred from exhaustion, threatened to fade completely. Desperately she sought a shelf or slab of rock far enough above the spray to offer some refuge. Just when she thought she would have to collapse atop the jagged crest of the wave-beaten rock, she caught sight of a low, sloping band of sandstone. It was steep and tilted down toward the surf, but it was better than lying on sharp-edged coral and shells. She struggled across the mussel beds, her pads bleeding and throbbing.

At last she found herself crouching on a tiny, worn table of rock that barely rose above the sea. At least her refuge was flat enough so that she wouldn’t slip off, but it offered no protection against wind or wave. With no room to stretch out on her side, she huddled up with Mishanti against her chest and fell into an uneasy drowse.

The flapping of wet fur woke Ratha from a sleep that had been too short and often interrupted by spray blown in her face by the wind. Groggily coming awake, she had to blink and stare before her eyes would focus. She felt her skin prickle, but her fur was too wet to bristle and her limbs too weary to respond, even to a surge of anger. Ratha could only watch Newt clamber onto a boulder that stood next to her own refuge.

Newt stopped to shake more brine out of her coat. Ratha endured a long silence with only the sound of the sea and her daughter’s harsh breathing. The gray-green eyes stared at her, never wavering. Their color shifted like the hues on an incoming breaker.

Then Newt came slowly down off her rock and onto Ratha’s. Though Ratha’s limbs screamed in protest, she gathered up the cub and scuttled away as far as she could go. Head low, eyes fixed, Newt limped after her.

Ratha let Mishanti down long enough to speak. “I can’t fight you with him in my jaws.”

Newt ignored her words. When Ratha held her ground with the cub between her forelegs, Newt stalked up and stood facing her. Uncertainly, Ratha watched as Newt balanced on her good foreleg, her other one drawn up against her chest. She readied herself to fend off a biting attack, thinking the cripple could not attack with her foreclaws.

Newt’s raised paw shot out. A claw dug into Ratha’s cheek fur, dragged across her face. Angrily she lashed out with both forepaws, but Newt was too quick. The two faced each other, tails flicking with rage. Quickly Ratha grabbed Mishanti and shoved him to one side. Newt took advantage of the distraction to attack. Again the two met in a brief flurry, scattering fur and droplets of blood before breaking apart.

“Can use this paw now,” Newt snarled.

“Thakur told me that he worked with you... healed you... ,” Ratha panted.

“He understood, Dreambiter. He knew.”

“But he did stop. After you wrecked the pen... ”

“Too late. This leg better. Soon Newt will run on all legs, Dreambiter.”

Again she launched herself at Ratha, striking in whirl-wind slashes of claws and teeth. Enraged, Ratha fought back. She hated the instinct that made her want to seize Newt’s throat and twist until her enemy’s neck broke, yet she knew that was the instinct that would save her own life. The battle raging inside her was more savage than the frenzied bursts of combat as the two fought back and forth across the islet.

“Dreambiter,” Newt hissed, closing her teeth around the word as she stalked Ratha. “Soon I will be free of you.”

Ratha jumped sideways, letting Newt slice empty air. She hadn’t missed by much, and Ratha knew exhaustion was slowing her. “Your nightmares,” she panted.

“No, yours. You run in them. You tear me. Not once, but again and again and each time the pain comes.”

“You think you’ll end the nightmares by killing me?” Ratha spat back. “This thing that strikes at you out of your dreams is not me. It is something you have made. Killing me won’t put an end to it.” Her words were lost in the rising yowl of Newt’s battle cry and the wailing of the sea wind.

The wind’s moan grew shriller, and the waves rolled higher around the islet, warning Ratha that a squall was nearing. To spring and dodge as she did on land earned her only hard, bruising falls on spray-slicked rocks, with Newt gouging at her belly.

A big wave broke across the islet, drenching them both and slithering away in a foaming cascade of gray-green water. A trembling cry struck through the tumult of the noise and fighting. Ratha saw Mishanti, engulfed by the retreating water, being dragged away. She leaped, landed badly on the craggy rocks. One forepaw slipped into a crevice, throwing her hard on her shoulder.

Ignoring the bruising, she tried to pull free but found her foot wedged into the crack. Irritated, she wiggled and jerked fruitlessly. She was stuck, her paw jammed and the cub sliding away beyond her reach.

She lunged, straining the caught leg with her frantic swipes to reach Mishanti with her free paw. As a last, wild effort, she threw herself over, stretching and scrabbling with her rear paws to catch the cub. Her trapped foreleg twisted, sending shooting pain into her breast. For a terrible moment she felt only water against her hind toes, then a wet, sliding body. She caught the cub between her two rear pads and tried to claw him up to where she could grab him. His teeth fastened in her hock in angry protest. Then she could only hang onto him while another wave spilled across the islet.

Even before the water rushed away, she felt him hitching himself up her leg as she lay on the rocks. She looked down and saw his eyes open and burning like amber flames while his needlesharp talons dug into her leg. Something had jolted him out of his numbed terror. Now he was angry, with a fierce rage to live.

Hate me, hate the world, hate everything, but stay alive, Ratha thought at him as he struggled up her wet flank, over her belly, and up her ribs. With a surge of relief, she grabbed him.

A sharp blow bashed her head against jagged rock and nearly stole her consciousness. Against her will, her jaws slackened. The cub slid from her mouth. She cursed herself for having forgotten Newt.

“You can’t use your leg, Dreambiter,” came the bitter voice. “How does it feel?”

Ratha ignored Newt, lunged groggily to reach the cub, who had tumbled into a tidepool. Her trapped leg sent fiery pains in protest. Again she had almost reached him when Newt caught the flailing paw.

Ratha stared at her daughter as Newt’s teeth came down on her leg. Though Newt could not speak now, Ratha read her eyes and seemed to hear words spoken in that flat, cold voice.

You crippled me, Dreambiter. Now you will know how it feels.

“I am not your Dreambiter,” Ratha said hoarsely. “I was once, but not now. Listen to me, Thistle-chaser. My death won’t kill the creature that torments you. It will make it even stronger.”

She curled herself up, kicking out at Newt with rear claws bared, but Newt swung herself aside, yanking Ratha into an even more painful position. Ratha yowled as Newt’s teeth sawed against her foreleg. She saw Newt grimace in frustration. A new look, closer to despair than madness, came into Newt’s eyes, but the blow to Ratha’s head, combined with the grinding pain in her trapped foreleg, had driven her close to oblivion. Newt’s face became a blur, along with everything else.

The pain abruptly grew muted. Ratha felt her paw flop free from Newt’s jaws. Through the waves of dizziness that washed over her, she heard an angry squall. Struggling to focus her vision, she saw a double image of Newt spinning around to face Mishanti.

“Yow! You bit my tail!” Newt snarled and dealt the bristling cub a slap that sent him tumbling. Shivering and snarling, he launched himself to the attack once again, leaping between Ratha and Newt. He stood astride Ratha’s extended foreleg, his head lowered, short tail lashing. With a growl, he leaped at Newt, making her draw back.

“Get him out of the way,” she hissed at Ratha. “Get rid of him, or I’ll kill him.”

Ratha could only lie still, fighting waves of gray nausea and weariness. Hopelessly she jerked at her trapped foreleg. “Do you think I can?”

Her words only enraged Newt. The sea-green eyes shrank to slits, and the ears flattened against the spray-slicked head. She bared her claws and aimed another blow at Ratha, but again Mishanti flung himself between the two. Ratha struggled to raise her head enough to grab the little warrior in her jaws and yank him aside, but she was too cold and weak. She could only croak out, “No, Thistle-chaser... ” as Newt struck the youngster.

The cub spun away with two red gashes along his flank, but he rebounded, hurling himself between Ratha and Newt. Again Newt tried to wound Ratha, tore the cub instead. He rolled aside, shuddering, his mouth wide. For one horrible instant, Ratha thought Newt had gutted him; then another gray-green surge of seawater spilled through the rocks. Ratha could feel the wave tug at her, but it wasn’t as powerful as the last few.

The cub clung to the jagged rock with his claws as the water streamed around him. It washed the blood away, letting Ratha see the new wound, a long diagonal slash across the lower ribs. When the water retreated, he fought his way back to Ratha, his soaked fur making him look almost skeletal. The welling blood and the too-bright eyes made her feel that he had become something more dangerous than just a litterling.

Again he put himself in front of Ratha, facing Newt. Ratha saw Newt’s lips writhe back, baring her teeth. She struggled to make some part of her body move, but she could get only uncoordinated jerks. Newt snapped at the cub, who wobbled aside at the last moment. Again Ratha tried to reach him and failed. Newt was preparing to lunge for the killing bite.

Ratha had only her voice and her wits.

“Dreambiter. Cub-slayer,” she snarled, throwing Newt’s words back at her.

Slowly Newt’s ice-green stare moved from the cub to Ratha. “You are... ” she began.

“His blood is on your claws now, daughter.”

Newt froze, one paw still raised. A tremor crept over her, turning into shivering.

Ratha hitched herself up, trying to hold her daughter’s gaze. “You may hate me now, and you may hate me more after I’ve said this. You will never slay the Dreambiter, because you have become the Dreambiter.”

“No.”

“You would kill or cripple that cub if it meant you could take out your hate on me. It is the same thing. It was the same thing then.”

“No. He in the way,” Newt spluttered.

“You got in the way when I attacked Bonechewer,” Ratha said, her voice hard. “We are both Dreambiters and cub-maulers. We are both fighting for ourselves so hard that it is easy for us to wound others who get in the way.” She paused. “That is the truth, Thistle-chaser.”

Now Newt was taking hard, deep breaths. Ratha could see her daughter’s rib cage heave. Was it realization or rage that lit the depths of her eyes? Ratha couldn’t tell and braced herself for another blow.

With a despairing howl, Newt flung herself around. She seemed to go into a wild fit, slashing at empty air, raking her claws across rocks and opening her jaws in a raw-edged scream. Then she turned her wrath on herself, ripping her own fur with her claws and trying to stab herself with her teeth.

“Thistle-chaser!” Ratha howled, then shut her eyes, unable to bear the sight.

A deep roar drowned out Newt’s cries and then there was a booming crash as a storm-lashed breaker surged over the islet. Ratha was caught in a river of icy water that pulled her painfully against her trapped paw. Newt was a mass of soggy fur tumbling between wave crests. And Mishanti was nowhere in sight. Ratha strained as high as she could, trying to spot him. She saw Newt recover, fight her way to a boulder that rose above the water, and cling there, looking dazed.

There was a growing tightness in Ratha’s throat. Mishanti, the little warrior who had fought to protect her, had been swept away by the sea. Anxiously she scanned as much of the islet as she could see and then the heaving ocean. Rain began pelting down. Lightning jumped and flickered overhead, and thunder mixed with the roar of beating surf.

And then Ratha saw a tiny, dark shape on the outlying rocks at the far end of the islet. It moved.

“Thistle-chaser!” she called. Newt only stared back at her dumbly.

“The cub—he’s down on those rocks. I’m stuck. Please... ”

Newt seemed lost in a trance. Ratha turned her gaze back to the small form nearly lost against the foaming surf, wondering if he was really still there or whether her hope had deceived her. A movement at the edge of her vision startled her. It was Newt, leaving her refuge and half swimming, half sloshing through the water. She moved slowly, as if still dazed, but she was going in the right direction. Toward Mishanti.

She halted, stared at Ratha, her eyes smoky, unreadable.

“Get him,” Ratha said. “Not for my sake. For yours.”

Newt seemed to wake up. She took several splashing bounds across the nearly swamped islet, scrambling across the rocks. She had nearly reached Mishanti when another wave broke, sending torrents of water over the rocks. This time the cascade almost drowned Ratha. She fought to keep her nose above the water, pulling as hard as she could on her trapped forepaw. Fear stabbed when she saw foam covering the place where Newt and the cub had been. Neither one was visible.

Now Ratha was alone. Numbly she hoped the next wave would engulf her, filling her lungs with water and giving her a quick choking death. Otherwise she would hang here on the rocks, battered and soaked, until the cold killed her. Or grief.

To lose both her daughter and Fessran’s foster son to a single furious sweep of the sea, yet to be left living and conscious enough to know and feel the loss was cruelty beyond bearing. Ratha felt herself starting to retreat, to close down, turning inward to find shelter from the world around her. Her body was numbed past feeling. She hoped her mind would soon be the same.

A thin wail threaded itself through her dulled hearing. Not until it came again did she even think about lifting her head. It seemed too heavy, not worth the bother. Why the interruption now, when she was starting to feel comfortable? She no longer felt the wind. It was as if she were lying, warm and lazy, in a pool of sun near the entrance to her den.

And then more noises came. Splashes. Panting. Ragged grunts. Ratha forced her eyes open.

Newt struggled in the surf at the islet’s edge, holding the cub in her jaws. He looked like a limp fur mat, and when Newt hauled him out, brine streamed from him. Ratha could see that Newt too was nearly at the end of her strength. She shuddered and staggered. Her weak foreleg had taken more of a battering than it could stand and she was limping again.

She had to set the cub down to get her breath. He sprawled on his front, his rapid breathing the only indication to Ratha that he still lived.

“Bring him here,” she said to Newt, who gave one final deep breath and took the cub once again in her jaws. She made a quick feint toward Ratha, dropped Mishanti near her, and backed off, as if fearing retaliation. With her free paw, Ratha gathered the bedraggled little bundle to her chest, trying to press some of the seawater out of his coat. She curled around him to warm him with her body and her breath, but she knew she had barely enough warmth to stay alive.

Convulsive shudders went through him, and his eyes began to dull. Ratha knew he was dying of cold. However close she held him, he shuddered harder, and her own clammy coat wasn’t helping. She licked the top of his head, full of despair.

Then someone was standing over her. It was Newt. Newt’s gaze was uncertain, but there was something new flickering in her eyes that had never been there before.

“My coat thicker,” she said. With a clumsiness generated by self-consciousness, she took the shivering youngster from Ratha, shook herself as dry as she could, then curled around him. Ratha watched as Newt ruffed her fur and nestled him into it. After a while he stopped shivering.

“If we can wait out the storm and I can free my paw, we might be able to get to the next islet. I think there is a string of these islets that connects with the jetty where your seamares are.” Ratha lifted her head and peered at the sky. Thunder still rumbled overhead, but the rain had lightened to a drizzle, and waves no longer broke so high over their refuge.

She still felt cold outside, but the stabbing despair that was worse than ice around her heart had gone. She dared to hope that they might all get out of this alive and, even more, that things might change between herself and Thistle-chaser.

Waiting for the storm to abate and the seas to calm grew wearying, and Ratha felt the cold creep deeper into her. She had ceased to feel the pain in her trapped paw or the wound on her leg made by Thistle-chaser’s teeth. Gradually she slipped into a daze and thought she was again lying in a pool of sun by her den, the sun’s rays warm on her coat, sliding through drowsiness into deep sleep.