The last thing that Ashamin or his companions needed on that hot Tallsun night was fire. Unfortunately, it was what they got. The Clovenheart had been reading over the words on the antlers given to him by the Moon Goddess and found no power in them. Over and over again he had tried variations, attempted to tease out a meaning from the runes, and been met with dull silence. But just when the sun grew so hot that its effects stretched into the evening, just when Ashamin would have begged for cool silence, the incantation screamed out in his mind and he understood. Maybe it was something he had always known, had always seen etched in small corners of the world.

In reality, it was his mother's lost tongue carved in bone. And when he spoke it he spoke a whisper, something that flared up as if the tongue of his dam were the tongue of fire itself. The flame came from war.

Lochan and Rakt jumped back in fear, their eyes wide and stances instantaneously defensive. They were seconds from running into the woods when the fire shot up from the antler tips, first as high as a foot before settling into cool wisps of gold. Ashamin himself, who had been lying beside the artifact, scrabbled back and tried to stand. Fire was not an element he knew, and fire was not an element he could control. At least it hadn't been, not up until now.

He watched the flame die as it reflected in his eyes, and for a moment it seemed as if their coal pits were alive for the first time. When the flames burned they revealed, too, more runes, but ash still clogged their carvings and the Clovenheart suspected they would not be clear to him for some time.

When the fire was gone he looked around as if he had lost something, even though he had learned so much. His companions stood with their sides pressed together and their own antlers cast down, shaking, as if to ward away some evil that had been summoned. Ashamin turned swiftly, circling the antlers on the ground and wondering if he'd been spotted. The flame would have served as a beacon cutting through these heavy red woods, and would attract attention in the dark and hot night. But when the painted buck looked he saw there was nothing, and there was no one, and for the moment the spell the Clovenheart had murmured beneath his breath was a secret one. Scared and unsure he stopped, standing alert, and let his breath fall in the wind.

""

Ashamin