As the door to the retiring room closed behind the three adults, we three had to wait and warm the seat cushions until Red Hawk came for us.

"Why didn't you tell me the King and the Truthsayer were your parents?" Andray asked, looking a bit wounded.

"Well, Prince Cat Rider, it just seemed like the thing to do," she looked a little smug. I started to wonder if a certain king's daughter had a difficult personality.

"I wonder why there's an envoy from Nordweg here?" Andray mused. "I wonder who it is. Last I knew, Nordweg and the Elven tribes were not exactly friendly."

"The first envoy showed up in the middle of the summer looking for you," Roaming Wren remarked.

"Huh, I wonder why they bothered," Andray frowned. "I would think they would be glad to be rid of me. It's an embarrassment for a cripple to be the Crown Prince. The court is split between those who think I should be king so long as I don't drool while I sign my name on documents and those who think my brother Willam should rule. If I vanish, the faction that wants me on the throne will collapse, the court will achieve some peace, at least until the next controversy, and no one has to look at the embarrassing cripple." Andray sounded rather bitter as he related all that.

"And what do you want, Cat Rider?" Roaming Wren asked, looking intrigued.

"Not to be murdered before I come of age," he shrugged, "though I'd settle for having enough time to discover who set the fire that maimed me and killed my sister." He looked up at her, "do you have a happy family, Roaming Wren?"

"Very much so," she looked confused by his question.

"Then love and cherish them and know that the Mother Goddess has blessed you with a family that loves you in return," he put conviction behind every word, sounding years older and wiser than his boyish face. It was the first time I had heard him talk like this.

There was a knock at the door followed by Red Hawk walking in. "Your parents need to host a feast this evening for the visitor from Nordweg. We will leave by the side door and retire to my home where Cat Rider and Fuzzy will stay for the evening. You are welcome to stay for supper, Wren."

"That would be most kind of you," Roaming Wren was the picture of good manners. "Thank you very much." She stood up from the sofa, "would you like a hand up, Cat Rider?" This elf girl kept surprising me with the way she was poised and polished one minute and a tactless brat the next.

"Well, as soon as I can get this furry lump off my lap, I would indeed welcome a hand. Come on, Fuzzy, get a move on."

It took a minute to get my boy off the couch and onto my back. Then we were out the door and walking on a wide grassy lane through the trees. When we were some distance from the longhouse, Red Hawk addressed Andray: "Well, Cat Rider, when we are done with supper, I'd like to take you to our local healer. She should have crutches you can use. I was wondering why you didn't have any?"

"When I was attacked this summer, my crutches disappeared along with my horse. Since then, I haven't needed any since Fuzzy was bringing me things to eat. Red Hawk, I was wondering, how does everyone know that Fuzzy is a spirit beast?"

"You don't know?" Red Hawk was surprised. "The most obvious thing is her eyes. Divine beasts, you call them spirit beasts, all have blue eyes that are the same as the color of the sky. She's also bigger than most of her kind, which is another divine beast trait. And then there's her intelligence and knowledge. Divine beasts are as smart as you and me and often know things no animal should know. I'm surprised you don't know this already, Cat Rider."

"Most people in Nordweg think spirits beasts are a peasant superstition," he briefly scratched between my ears. "I didn't know she was a spirit beast before today when Roaming Wren told me. I thought Fuzzy was a miracle, but it never occurred to me she was a living breathing peasant superstition."

"I'll be blunt, Cat Rider, about your divine beast," Red Hawk looked quite serious, "I am confident that you will gain asylum because you arrived here with Fuzzy. She has clearly adopted you. It means there is something about you that has earned the favor of the gods. No sane elf would ever turn you or Fuzzy away. Just your presence is considered good luck."

"Even if I'm a human?" my boy asked.

"Even if you were a goblin." She studied me and Andray, "how old are you, Cat Rider?"

"I'm 13. I'll be 14 five days after the winter solstice."

"You're small for your age," Red Hawk noted.

"I know," he sounded so disgusted that both elves laughed.

"Mother! Mother!" An elf youth in an elkskin tunic came running toward us. He stopped a few yards in front of us.

"By Erda, the rumors are true," he bent over to look at my eyes. "It's all over the settlement that a real divine beast arrived with the fourth princess. Oh my," he leaned down in front of me to look at my eyes," they really are blue."

"This sorry excuse of an offspring who doesn't remember how to introduce himself is my son, Cloud Eye," an exasperated Red Hawk stated. "It really should be Air Head, but it's too late now to change the name."

"I am not that bad," Cloud Eye humphed. "Hello, I'm Cloud Eye."

"I'm Cat Rider," my boy replied, "and this is Fuzzy."

"Meow," I felt I had to contribute something to acknowledge Cloud Eye's greeting.

"Son," Red Hawk interrupted, "do we have something suitable to give Fuzzy for dinner? It has to be meat. Mountain cats only eat meat."

"I have some cuts of pork loin and ham that I was getting ready to hang in the smokehouse," Cloud Eye frowned in thought. Other than that, I would need to butcher a sheep or a hog. Wish I had known earlier. I could have saved that wolf carcass. Do you eat wolf, Fuzzy?"

I nodded yes. Wolf wasn't my favorite meal, but it was better than resorting to fish or small game like rat or squirrel, which were meals of desperation.

We arrived at Red Hawk's home just a few minutes later. Her extended family included 14 different people whose names I have problems remembering since I only stayed there one night.

It was a noisy happy house. Elf houses are mostly underground with rows of windows between the roof eaves and the ground. "It keeps the place warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer," Red Hawk explained. Most of it was one large room, with the kitchen at one end. Workspaces, places to read or relax, or just waste time playing games were scattered about randomly. People slept in sleeping alcoves dug into the back wall and finished in wood. There were two privacy chambers at the end opposite the kitchen where family members could retire to do things that were better off without an audience, "like practicing flute playing," Red Hawk described with a perfect look of innocence.

It was an exercise in organized chaos.

My night at Red Hawk's home was one of the most arduous ordeals of my life so far. The family mouser recently gave birth to kittens. Mama cat took one look at me, poofed out, and hissed before grabbing one of the four kittens and hiding. The kittens had other ideas. To them, I was the world's most wonderful kitty toy. I spent the evening and night as the object of four savage predators who took great joy in stalking my tail and any other body part that might move, including my poor ears. The four kittens decided I was also a cat bed and I couldn't move all night for fear of rolling over on them. I did not get any sleep. I was exhausted when the sun came up the next morning.