Shadewood moss runner

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— daa’ka’s smirk is faint, but it shows—half-torn at one corner by scar, the other crooked like a wolf remembering how to smile.

i bleed for ice raven, he mutters. he looks now to the red feather now resting against his brother’s chest. i speak not just what i see. i speak what comes.

no more wives of mountain strangers. no more with no caribou hunter blood. no more pups raised by women who do not bleed lanzadoii. the line will be clean. strong. ice raven’s will. our hands.

the throes of religion creep through him. this is not his mind that speaks. he believes it to be ice raven's will. this is what must be. it is how they must live.

wed soon. all. ice raven watches. he will bless.

it was most imperative now, above all, to rebuild the sun clan. the children must be taught. the women must be mothers. the men must be husbands. meleys, he mutters of their sister, almost to himself first. then, louder, for kusax̱asaa. will she take lanzadoii man?

first is the matter of finding one.