"It ain't none of my business," Liam said.

"Ah, but it is," Nathaniel said. "If you're one of us, it's your business. This--" He looked at the chest, and then out through the falling wall of water, his gaze taking it all in: Lake in the Clouds, Hidden Wolf. "This is Hannah's birthright, and Many-Doves, and their children's. It's my business to keep it safe for them, and it's your business, too. If you're one of us."

The boy flushed, color moving up his throat. He stared at Nathaniel, and then at the silver.

"I'm one of you," he said hoarsely.

"Then let's get to work," Nathaniel said, handing him a pack. "It's too damn cold to talk."

Not quite sunrise, and Elizabeth was wide awake. The babies had nursed just an hour earlier and were resting easily, but she lay unwilling to sleep. She had lit a candle, willfully putting away the small voice that chided her for this extravagance, and she lay on her side watching the first colors of the dawn through the ice-crusted panes of the single small window. The window was another luxury, and at the moment it was one she regretted. Soon the sun would come over the crest and Nathaniel would wake, and then he would get up and be gone.

She had encouraged him to go; she had insisted on it. And still the idea of his going was suddenly overwhelming. Elizabeth was filled with dread, with vague worries about Montréal and the troubles there, with more detailed imaginings of the things that might come to pass--that often came to pass--in the endless forests, and with irritation at herself. She would not make this leave-taking harder on him.

But she must study his face now. This face she knew so well. He would be thirty-six years old in the spring and already there was a single strand of white at his hairline. Straight brows, a scar beneath his left eye. The strong lines of nose and jaw. His mouth, the curve of it. The groove in his chin where the shadow of his beard was darkest.

The sun had not yet risen, but she sensed a change in the rhythm of his breathing. There was a small tremor in the muscle of his cheek. She held her breath, hoping that he would settle again, hoping he would sleep until noon if it would keep him here one more day.

His arm came up and around her, and pulled her down to him.

"You're so edgy, Boots," he said softly. "Come, rest with me."

Elizabeth put her face against his neck and said what she had been determined not to say. "I wish you did not need to go."

His arm tightened around her shoulders.

They were quiet together for a moment like that, the only movement between them his fingers on her temple, gently stroking. Under her hands his chest was as hard as oak. She drew in his smells and felt her pores opening, her nerves waking.

"I wish--" she said finally. And stopped. She felt him waiting. When she turned up her face to his, Elizabeth found his eyes open and calm with knowing. He knew, he always knew. Nathaniel kissed her, and then she did cry. Just a little, enough to flavor the kiss with salt and regret and longing. He made a comforting sound against her mouth, his hands cradling her face.

She held him to her, and kissed him back. It was all they could have now, in this little bit of time left, and with her body still so raw. But it was good to hold him, to feel that he wanted her, and to know that she could still want him back. In spite of the astonishing range of aches her body presented to her, still Nathaniel's kiss made her breasts pulse and tingle, and in the pit of her belly there was the blossoming of nerves she had discovered on that winter morning when she had first learned the feel of him.

There was a tightening and then a trickle of milk. She broke away with a sob of surprise.

"Shhh." He caught her up again, pulled her back to him. "Never mind, never mind. That happens. Never mind." With one hand he raised her chin. He was smiling, a small smile. "I'm just sorry I can't take you up on the offer."

She pushed against his shoulder with the palm of her hand, but he wouldn't let go. With his mouth against her temple, he whispered to her.

"I'll come back to you, Boots, and you'll be healed and we'll be together. It'll be warm enough then in the cave. We'll get to know each other again where we started, you and me. How does that sound?"

Elizabeth brushed the hair away from his face. "It sounds as if you should be up and away, so that you can come home again. "Journeys end in lovers meeting," after all."

"That's one quote I'll remember." Nathaniel laughed. "It'll serve me well on the long road home."

3

The March winds came off the St. Lawrence in a rush, nosing up Montréal's narrow lanes to seek out Nathaniel where he stood in the shadows of the Auberge St. Gabriel. Most of the city's residents had retreated over slick cobblestones to their dinners by the time the seminary clock chimed four, but Nathaniel stood motionless and attentive, oblivious to the icy snow that rattled on roofs of tin and slate.

The door of the tavern opened and a servant clattered out, bent to one side by the weight of her basket. Behind her followed two redcoats, shoulders hunched. Nathaniel pressed himself harder against the wall, relaxing even as they went past. Their eyes were fixed on their boots, and their minds on the duty that had drawn them away from hearth and ale. He was invisible to them.

Nathaniel continued scanning the darkening street. Between the houses opposite there was a small flash of movement. A child, underdressed, searching the gutter as he slipped along in the shadows. For a moment Nathaniel watched, and then he stepped into the lantern light and held up a coin. The boy's gaze snapped toward the faint shimmer and he angled across the lane in three bounds, to follow Nathaniel into the shadows.