Rawley led me along a strip of mud and stone between the bluffs and the lake until we reached an outcropping of stone large enough to fit both of us comfortably. I was doing a poor job of hiding my legs' shaky weakness at that point. I felt the sweep of her eyes as she glanced back and evaluated me before she took two swift steps and sat on the outcropping's top ledge. She gestured for me to sit on the lower ledge between her feet. I hesitated, and I saw her notice that too, but she didn't say anything. Just waited, easy and patient. Her non-reaction to my hesitation and my aching legs were enough for me to get over it and sit between her feet. I felt her pick up my messy braid of tangled and knotted warm brown hair.

She asked, "May I?"

I hesitated again, not sure what she was asking or why she was asking it, but then I remembered that she was my one and only chance at learning what I needed, so I nodded. She untied the thong of leather holding the braid together and began to gently and deftly pick the braid apart. I hadn't run a comb through it since before I fell ill and the hair that had escaped the braid had clumped and tangled together into large snarls. Rawley worked quietly for a few minutes before she asked another question.

"What do you think is the most important skill for a huntress to have?"

It felt like one of Levain's trick questions, the ones that sounded straight forward and easy, but that actually hid the correct answer away. And like her questions I didn't know enough to find that answer out.

"Hunting, killing animals to feed the tribe." An answer was always better than silence.

Rawley clicked her tongue. "There's more to being a huntress than killing creatures. That's the least important thing you will learn. Patience. Listening. Preparation. Flexibility. Master them and you'll never be bested at hunting by any huntress who could only see the virtue of speed and sling. Those four skills will take you farther than all the rest combined."

I didn't like how easily she had caught me in her trap, so I tried to catch her in my own by throwing her off center as she had done to me with her request to fix my hair. "Then why aren't you the leader of the Pack? I doubt Fenris exemplifies those qualities."

She flicked the back of my head in a light rebuke. "Who says I have mastered them? Besides, being a face of power isn't always the most advantageous position, nor something that everyone aims for."

I twisted around to look at her. Her words had the ring of truth in them, but my gut twisted uneasily as they contradicted the mantra I had heard for as long as I could remember. Levain had never wavered on the point that more advantages always came with the power from climbing the social and political hierarchies of the tribe and whisper women.

Rawley held up the strands of hair tangled around her fingers and slightly raised her eyebrows. The look was both gently chiding and inquiring. I pressed my lips together and turned back around. Now wasn't the time to push for answers about every little thing. I could learn what Rawley meant by her statement in time. Levain had always hated it when I questioned her—and I was already getting the sense that Rawley could out wait me on any question she didn't feel like answering. Even if Rawley hadn't mastered all four of her tenets, it didn't take much time to realize she had at least mastered the first.

She resumed picking apart the knots in my hair but I could still feel the weight of her silent inquiry pressing in around me. Rawley wanted to know why I had suddenly turned the conversation to tribe politics and her position in it. I didn't want to reveal my intentions. It quickly became clear that while Rawley could out wait a question, she could also wait for an answer—no matter how the minutes dragged or awkward it got.

So I went with a different truth and hoped it was enough to distract her. "I thought all huntresses wanted to become Pack Leader."

She chuckled. "It seems that every child has that misconception, but no. It might be hard to imagine but some Pack huntress prefer to follow, and many lone huntresses took on the role because they prefer neither to lead nor follow, but be independent—rather than the popular belief that they became such because they were too power-hungry and disruptive for the Pack."

Those that only followed were weak, without initiative. It made me glad that Rawley was my mentor, rather one of the Pack. I would need to know how to survive on my own without depending on a group to make up the slack. "Were you always a lone huntress?"

"Not in the beginning, no, but I find it suits me best." She paused and then seemed to decide it was time for another lesson. "Tell me what you see, what you hear."

I concentrated on the scene in front of me, wanting to impress her. "There's a group of three huntresses diving on the opposite shore from us. Their helpers are preparing the fish and lakeweed they've already collected. Others are drying out fire moss for the cook fires and keeping an eye on the children. There's two hawks circling the lake. The sky is grey and cloudy. I can hear a few echoes from the Skinning Cave and the camp, but I can't make out what they're saying. The breeze is making a few small waves lap against the shore."

"What else do you notice?"

I focused on the senses she hadn't asked about. "The air smells like fish and a bit of smoke and decay. You...smell like old leather and sweat. I can feel you untangling my hair."

"And?"

I struggled for other details. "It's cold for the warm season and the rock is hard. It looks like the old man who spins wool is spinning stories as well again to the fisher folk. Grandmother just came and scolded him. One of the huntresses is swimming back to shore. It looks like she speared a couple of fish. And the camp is quieter since the herders took the sheep and reindeer out to graze."

"Good." She paused untangling my hair long enough to lightly squeeze my shoulder. "Why do you think I asked you what you noticed?"

It was another one of those deceptively easy questions. I held in my frustration and answered, "To test my perception."

Rawley made a short hum of disapproval. "Not entirely—being the most prominent inks a target on your back. You noticed the huntresses and camp first as any potential attacker would. The more details you can take in quickly, the better you can understand a situation and the best course of action to take. In a hunt that might mean you can better use your surroundings to more efficiently take down your prey or, in this case, it means you can identify what strengths or weaknesses might stand out to an attacker so that you can develop a better defense."

I twitched at her unexpected answer, barely keeping myself from turning to look at her again. I could feel the difference in power between us and I didn't like it. Levain had held a similar power from her superior knowledge of the things I needed to learn, though she had been more scathing in her use of it. And more direct in her lessons. Everything had been pure memorization, but with Rawley she turning things in a new direction, pressing me to think through an answer on my own. I couldn't get the measure of her and it kept throwing me off, making me uncertain. I hated being uncertain—it made me hesitate and Levain had never approved of an answer that wasn't immediate—so I tried to push Rawley off-balance again in order to gain more ground. "All the huntresses pay attention to you—even if they pretend like they don't."

The tactic failed utterly. She didn't even pause in fixing my hair. "Yes, they do, and for that there is a not inconsequential target on my back. The Pack doesn't like that I'm not afraid to question their Leader's decisions, but nor can they completely ignore my skill and abilities, and the benefits they bring to the tribe. So, they do what they can to minimize my influence." Rawley pointed at where the water lapped at the shore a few feet in front of me. "Now, tell me how you would retrieve that speckled rock over there without being able to move from this spot and the resources currently at your disposal."

I scowled. "I don't have any resources."

"Everything is a resource. Begin."

I tried to reach the rock with my foot, but Rawley made her hum of disapproval before I even stretched more than a few inches. Next I tried to drag it toward me using my waist pouch, but the pouch's ties weren't long enough for it to reach the stone. I spied a stick near the outcropping and managed to use my feet to lever it up into my hands. After a quick, silent apology to the goddess I tried to use it to push the stone toward me, but the stick barely reached and I only managed to accidentally rolled the stone closer to the water. I glared at the rock and contemplated throwing the stick at it, but refrained from being childish in front of Rawley. I did try to will the rock towards me, and that proved as useless as everything else I tried, as I knew it would be.

Eventually I gave up and Rawley asked me another simple, leading question.

"What have you learned?"

I spat, "That I'm not tall enough for this task."

She chuckled but when she spoke her voice was chiding, "Don't waste your energy on trying to complete an impossible task." She stood, stepped around me, retrieved the rock, and placed it onto my lap. "Everything is a resource. Don't narrow your focus so much that you turn an easy task into an impossible one."

The morning continued like that. Lessons embedded in lessons. Rawley never even touched on the things I assumed I would be learning. There was no overview on how to use a fishing spear or skin a rabbit or how to track. Instead she gave me scenario after scenario as we sat next to the lake and had me try to solve them. I felt stupid by the end of it.

Rawley just smiled at me and ran her fingers through my snarl free hair. "I'll see you after the midday meal. Meet me back here."

I nodded and vowed to myself to show her that I was worth her time by the end of the day. That I would solve whatever frustrating mind games she threw at me after the midday meal. I refused to stay with this tribe any longer than I had to.

--

I wasn't gone from the outcropping by the lake long. Stares and mutters and the possibility of seeing the twins or Levain weren't conducive to an enjoyable meal. Normally, I would have grabbed my food and disappeared into Grandmother's tent but after being interrogated all morning I didn't relish the possibility of Grandmother needling me with questions of her own. And my stamina still wasn't built up enough to look for another secluded spot.

Rawley wasn't there when I sat back down on the outcropping, plate of fish and pluckings in hand. The slightly sour and salty flavors of the meal mixed well with the solitude. In camp there was never space for being alone, not unless Levain had to go out to treat her patients while I stayed behind and studied. Even then there still had been the sounds of people walking by and chatter. Grandmother's tent might be preferable to eating out in the cooking yard with the rest of the tribe, but it was never completely empty either. At least at the outcropping there was no claustrophobic reminders of people unless I chose to look across the water—only the whispering breeze and the lap of the lake—even if I did have to walk around a third of the lake to get there.

Setting my plate aside I stood and stretched. After weeks of being mostly immobile I was tired of resting. As I shifted through different stretching positions, I looked around the outcropping, but I couldn't see anything that Rawley might ask me about next. She had questioned me about everything from the history of our tribe—which I had barely known—to which rocks I found most appealing.

"So eager for your next lesson?"

I snapped around to face away from the path that led back to the Skinning Cave. Rawley stood there, resting her weight on one hip, and a sling dangling from her fingers. She winked at me and tucked it back into her belt next to her stone pouch.

"I wasn't expecting you back so soon." Her eyes caught on my discarded plate. "Balance that plate on your head while you stretch until I get back."

She stepped close to me to pick up the plate and I didn't move to accommodate her. I refused to show weakness, especially after a morning of being made to feel like an idiot. A knowing look crossed her eyes and the corner of her mouth curled up, but she reached around me, picked up the plate, and put it in my hands without a word. Then she was past me and I turned to watch her, but the bluffs hid her from view as she strode easily across the shore. It was annoying to realize that I hadn't seen her slip or hesitate once despite the slippery rocks and mud. If I waited I would be able to see her in a few minutes. But by then it would be too late to follow her with any kind of stealth.

The plate was back on the outcropping in less than a dozen heartbeats and I slipped after her within the four after that. My body immediately protested. I had already walked far more that morning than I had in the past several weeks and a bit stretching and rest didn't do much for my soreness. I ignored it. My legs could deal the pain and recover, or break and recover. Either way I was going to learn more about my mentor and see what she was up to.

I wasn't nearly as steady and smooth as her as I made my way along the shore. Speed and then stealth became the priority. I caught sight of Rawley again when she was about halfway between the outcropping and where the bluffs rounded off and continued away from the lake. I moved as quietly and low to shore as I could as I followed her. The more I did to mitigate the chance she would catch movement out of the corner of her eye and spot me the better. She only glanced back once though, when I planted one foot firmly on a loose pebble and it went skittering into a larger stone when I nearly lost my balance. Luckily, I managed to stay tucked in the little hollow in the bluff that had draw me to where the pebble was in the first place and she continued on after several breathless moments.

Rawley kept along the bluffs when they stopped running parallel to the lake. She was going to the Skinning Cave then. Except she didn't stay there long—she ignored the few women still doing various tasks there and was inside the cave for less than a minute before she continued on past it. I tried to skirt around the Skinning Cave, but there wasn't much cover around it by design, except for a few trees. One huntress glanced over at me, glanced in Rawley's direction, and then gave an annoyed shake of her head before going back to scraping a bear skin. It left little hope left that Rawley hadn't noticed me, but I continued away. If she wasn't going to stop me then I wasn't going to go back to the outcropping like some scared rabbit back to its burrow.

She led me along the bluffs for a while longer before turning left into the sparse forest. The sunlight broke through the pine trees' canopy easily, but I kept nearly loosing track of her. Every time I had to glance down to check my footing or strayed to far back she would be gone and I would only have my gut to rely on. But then there would be some small rustle or quick movement and I would find her again. She was leading me on, helping me follow her, when she wasn't even supposed to realize I was there. When I vowed to prove myself to her less than three hours ago. The realization sent an angry spike of indignation crackling through my chest and I felt my jaw lock mulishly in place. I made a new vow. I wasn't going to stop until she did.

That vow drowned out the needles of pain in my side, the bands of stone tightening with each step around my ribs, the graying, out of focus edges around my vision. I continued. I followed her past the point of stealth or speed. She didn't give up the pretense that she didn't know I was following her though until I stumbled over my own feet at the top of a small rise. I fell hard, the impact jarring its way though my palms and forearms, and tumbled to the bottom of the incline. I struggled to get up and keep going, but it felt like all my limbs had been replaced with wet lakeweed. Rawley stepped out of the cover of a tree and made her way down the rise to sit on my legs. I took that to mean she had stopped the game of chase and let myself lie back on the ground.

After a moment I asked, "What are you doing?"

She snorted. "Keeping you from doing anything else reckless and stupid."

"You could have stopped. Made me go back."

"I needed to see how far you were willing to go."

I stared up at the bits of gray sky I could see through the pine needles. "When did you know?"

She smiled, quietly amused. "Since before you sent that rock rioting off the bluffs."

"Did you know I was going to follow you?"

"No, but I guessed as soon as you got that defiant look in your eye when I told you to stretch with the plate. So," she rested her chin in one hand, "what did you learn?"

I refused to meet her gaze. "Not to make a fool of myself trying to track an experienced huntress when I have no skill."

She chuckled. "Everyone has to start somewhere. Do you know where you are?"

"In the forest."

"Yes, but where in the forest?"

I stayed silent. Unwilling to waste my energy on voicing ignorance.

Rawley gave a hum of disapproval. "Never get so lost in the hunt that you lose sight of your position and condition. There's little point in capturing your prey only to be so lost that you can't find your way back to camp or are too tired to make shelter and die of cold or hunger."

Her lesson hit a little too close to home, so I changed the topic. "What were you doing?"

She gave me a knowing look, but let the conversation shift. "Before you insisted on a game of chase?" She opened one of the bags at her belt and pulled out inking tools. "Getting things for your apprentice mark."

"My apprentice mark?" As soon as I spoke I hated how slow and dull witted I sounded. Of course, I needed the huntress's apprentice mark. Rawley couldn't officially be my mentor until I received it. But I had been closed to the possibility of becoming a huntress for so long that the reality of what was happening felt surreal.

Rawley moved and settled next to my legs, and I scrambled up to sit in front of her, unable to stomach the resemblance to Levain's interrogation. Simply sitting up took more effort than I liked, but Rawley let me do it on my own. She pulled out the stopper on a jar of ink and set it next to the two rags draped across her knee before picking up a sharpened bone shard.

Rawley held out her free hand. "May I have your wrist?"

I held out my right wrist, knowing that was proper side for professional commitments, despite not having the dot on my inner wrist for her to make the apprentice mark around. She took my wrist in hand and studied it for a moment. Not hesitating, but planning. Then she pressed the bone shard into my skin and deftly rubbed the ink into it before I could even hiss at the bite of pain. I kept my focus on watching her and remaining quiet as she continued. It was odd to see the tiny cuts and blood that Rawley would occasionally dab away and know that the hands that were making the incisions weren't Levain's. If it wasn't for prayer, cuts and blood had always sat squarely in the healer's domain.

Rawley finished making the mark when the sun started setting. It was a simple, single spear head, dark gray rather than the absolute darkness of the goddess's markings. If my mentor had been part of the Pack it also would have been encircled, and if I passed my apprenticeship I would be allowed to adorn the spearhead with a more intricate design. Rawley would need to add a smaller spear head to her forearm as a sign that she had taken on an apprentice.

She smiled at me as she packed away the inking tools. "I've never heard of a healer huntress apprentice before."

I gave her a small quirk of a smile in return. "Neither have I."

She pulled a clean bandage out of another pouch and handed it to me. As I wrapped it around my wrist and tie it off she said, "I'll do my own mark tomorrow morning and get a soothing tincture from your mother. I—"

"I don't have a mother," I cut in, barely keeping my voice from warping into a snarl.

She considered me for a moment before nodding, "No, of course not." Rawley stood. "Your final lesson for the day then: see if you can keep up with me on the way back to camp."

She bolted off and I scrambled after her, biting back a curse when I put weight on my newly marked wrist as I got up. My legs quickly became heavy and clumsy with fatigue again and it took all my focus to keep her in sight. I was too inexperienced and tired to notice it then, but she kept her pace just punishing enough that I could only think of the next step and staying on my feet. Looking back on it, I would thank her for that gift rather than having to experience the brooding cesspit that journey back to camp could have been.