Bearclaw Valley You must be, or you wouldn't have come here

In the yawning blackness of his mind, there was a lynx.

Strange, thought Aventus as he floated in nothingness, untethered, suspended, that it was a lynx and not a bear. It didn't occur to him to question why he would see any animal in the dark of unconsciousness. That felt normal here. He had always expected it would be a bear, the great spirit his father believed in, the great spirit Merrick carried within his breast. Wasn't it only natural for the son to inherit the father's will? He had lived his life in service to Merrick and his ursine god, the devoted son of Ursus.

After all that, there was no bear waiting for him. It was a lynx. An ugly thing, really, with its hind end lifted higher than its shoulders, its hideously large paws and small head. The leggy creature was no taller than he and lacked the bulky strength of a bear. He thought he could dispatch it with little effort if he wished to. Yet when it turned illuminant white eyes on him and disappeared without a sound behind a wall of fog, he was stricken more than he ever had been by any bear.

Merrick was gone. The wrenching grief of that knowledge skimmed by him in this quiet abyss, leaving only the objective truth of it. Merrick was gone, and that meant Aventus was, for the first time ever, free to live his own life and not the one fashioned by his father's manic worship. In his heart of hearts he had always known the bear was a thankless and unforgiving spirit. He had always feared fulfilling its desires would only lead to more pain. What had it ever given Ursus to offset all that it had taken? Even if it had delivered revenge into Aventus' hands, what price would it exact?

Perhaps living as a bear was not the answer Merrick had always hoped to find.

Perhaps living as lynx — cunning, elusive, silent, but no less deadly — was the way.

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Aventus groggily came to, and when he did, it was with a flash of panic. The last thing he recalled was emerging from Mosskeep and knowing he must deliver news of his father's death to the pack. Where was he, and how had he got here? The vast walls climbing skyward around him weren't familiar, but brought to mind the canyon formerly held by the Saints. That thought, fractured in his aching head, made his panic grow.

There was a dead body here. The smell of blood was so strong he could taste it. He could see its fur, eerily still in the stifling air of the canyon. It was no one he recognized, for which he was immensely glad. Suppose it had been Arielle or Val, wolves for whom he cared? It didn't mean for sure that they were not here with him, but it gave him some small comfort that perhaps he was the only Saints captive.

Again came the blooming panic, so strong now that Aventus kicked out his legs and struggled to regain his feet. His head swam and blackened at the edges with each abrupt movement. Pain erupted behind his eyes and hit his stomach with such sudden nausea that he gagged. The blood didn't help. That was when his frantic eyes lifted and found... No.

No, no, it couldn't be. They couldn't have her! Arielle, he said in a voice that slurred thick and soupy like marsh water. How had they come to be here? How had the Saints captured them both?! The Saints... His thoughts were slipping away from him faster than he could conjure them. His head hurt like hell. They must have knocked him over it with something. Had they been responsible for killing Merrick and Laurel and laying the scene as a trap? No... No, that was days ago. Wasn't it?

Where... What...