Chapter 7 – Broen

	The next morning, I woke to pain.  Burning, itching, intense pain.  I’d actually roused many times throughout the night as it got noticeably worse, but exhaustion had given way to deeper sleep eventually.  At least, until daylight broke into the lean-to, and the combination of pain and light overwhelmed all of that.  My body could no longer rest.
	I knew from the aching weariness in my limbs and the queasy feeling of full-body weakness washing over me as I attempted even the slightest movement, that I was not well.  And it was all radiating from the wound on my back.
	Finnegan was gone, but I could hear him outside, milling about.  With a heavy grunt, I willed myself to my knees and crawled out into the daylight, squinting against the sun.  I saw his silhouette and heard him approach before his figure came into focus, carrying something over his shoulder.
	“I figured to hell with even trying for a fire this morning,” he said as he trod through the snow into camp, clearly coming back from the river.  “If these fish are safe to eat frozen, let’s do it.  I’m tired of just carrots- hey,” he paused, putting down the small sack he’d brought with him, presumably with our breakfast in it.  “You look like death.”
	“What?”  I asked, hazily.
	“Sorry, it’s an expression,” He shook his head, crossing the distance between us and kneeling in the snow, reaching for me tentatively.  “You don’t look well.”
	“I don’t feel well,” I supplied unhelpfully, rolling my shoulder with a wince.  “My wound is acting up.”
	“The wound you weren’t particularly worried about?”  He chastised, sighing and tapping my arm lightly.  “Lean down, let me take a look.”
	I did as instructed and he scooched around to my side, peering at the injury on the back of my shoulder for a while in silence.  After a time, I began to worry.  “What does it look like?”  I asked, nervously.
	“Like an injury,” he said, sounding lost.  “I don’t know, Tulimak.  I’m not a Physician.  It looks redder than before?”  He sniffed.  “And it smells different.  Worse.  Not putrid, but not good.”
	“I’m not a healer either,” I said, wiping my paws over my eyes, trying to get the world to look less muddy.  I hardly felt like I was in serious danger, but I certainly did feel a little ill and the spot hurt a lot worse than yesterday.  I didn’t know what that meant.
	“Hell, you’re not going septic on me, are you?”  He asked, voice laced with concern.
	“I don’t know what that means.”
	“It means the wound’s not clean,” he said, then after a brief pause, “as far as I understand it, anyway.  Like I said, I don’t really know much about this, but sepsis is something we’d worry about in the Risers a lot, any time we had an open wound for too long.”
	“Is it dangerous?”  I asked.
	“You don’t come back from it,” he said quietly.
	Fear lanced through me.  Death had been hovering over us for the last few days, but I’d thought- I don’t know.  I’d thought I’d be shot maybe.  Which I suppose I was, but I hadn’t thought of this graze as being enough to kill me.  I thought if we were going to die, it would be quickly.  The idea of disease had never entered my mind, even though it really should have.  
	It’s how my mother had died.  My otter mother.
	“A few years ago,” I said quietly, feeling Finnegan perk up from beside me, his ears going up, “some kind of disease came through our village.  A few of our hunters came back with it after a trip and before long a dozen of us were sick.  My mother worked with our medicine woman, our healer, sometimes.  Mostly delivering pups, but she thought she could help.”  I looked down, stretching my shoulder and feeling a fresh wave of pain come over me.  “She caught it, too.  They all died.  Everyone who got the disease.  I wasn’t allowed to see her, even towards the end.”
	Finnegan was looking at me now, his gaze full of sympathy.  I wiped my nose, turning my muzzle towards him.  “A man from the nearby settlement came and told us what to do to avoid anyone else getting sick.  We had to leave food in a basket outside their door and water in a bucket.  My father couldn’t even be with her.  When it. . . was over. . . we had to burn the hut they were in.  We couldn’t even bury them.  Just the ashes.”  I drew in a shuddering breath.  “I hope this isn’t like that.  I’d hate to put my father through that.  Again.”
	The wolfdog said nothing for a while.  When he spoke again, he did so with a far-off look, although he was technically still facing my way.  “My mother also died of illness,” he said, then snuffed, “although I suppose that’s not much of a coincidence.  I think Mikhail once told me it’s how half of all people who die before their time meet their end.  He was very. . . aware of it, given his profession.”
	“Was he a healer?”  I asked.
	“Not exactly,” he said with a sigh.  “He and my mother, and. . . well, most everyone in Ambrose Park are Courtesans.  I know you don’t know the word,” he said before I could speak up.  “Just think of them as entertainers.  Personal entertainers.  They travel a lot for their job and spend time with a lot of different men.  Including a lot of military men and sailors, so it’s a risk.  Everyone picks something up eventually.  That’s why Mikhail got out of the work while he was still healthy enough to do so.  Sometimes you get lucky like that and find someone who can take care of you, so you can stop working.”  He wilted a little.  “That never happened for my mother.  She caught something that. . . lingered. . . a long time.  She stopped the work when it got bad, but the disease was untreatable.  Better medicine and coin for a real Physician would’ve made all the difference near the end, but the man who sired me refused to send aid, he’d long since disavowed us by then.  I started working, making as much coin as I could, but. . . .”
	He curled a lip at that, revealing clenched teeth.  “The thing about working to make life better for the people you love,” he said with some difficulty, “is that you’re not around to enjoy the time they have left.  I wasn’t home, when. . . .”
	I instinctively found myself reaching for him.  When had that become so second nature for me?  Why was it so easy to touch him, when I’d spent most of my life terrified of moving into most peoples’ space with my big body?
	I grasped at nothing for a moment and dropped my hand.  He noticed and went to reach for me, but I yanked my paw back.  “No,” I shook my head, suddenly feeling the need to put distance between us.  “M-maybe you should go.  I don’t want to make you sick.”
	He let out a breath and darted his hand forward, catching mine.  It clenched around my paw like iron.  I’d never known he possessed such strength in his arm.  “Tulimak,” he said intently, “I can’t catch blood poisoning from you, if that’s what this is.  I know that much, at least.  You need to have a wound.”
	“But you do,” I insisted.
	“My humors haven’t been exposed,” he insisted.  “I’ll be alright.”
	He said it with such certainty, I had to believe him.  I swallowed, and at length, nodded.  
	His expression softened and he released his grip on my paw some, turning it in his, then squeezing it again.  “And we don’t even know that’s what this is,” he pointed out.  “So it’s a little early to resign yourself to death.  Certainly not on my watch.”  He released my hand fully at that point and stood, with purpose.  “Now get up.  Help me pack camp.”
	I did so, albeit much more slowly than him.  He turned and grabbed up the bag he’d brought with him, doing an admirable job of covering the wince as he bent over.  “Are you hungry?”  He asked.  “You should try to eat.”
	“It’s hard to tell,” I said honestly.
	“You are,” he stated, pulling one of the frozen fish out of the bag.  “We didn’t eat last night, so you must be.  You need to eat to keep your strength up.  Do you think you can do that for me?”
	I nodded, taking the frozen salmon from him.  He pulled out the other, a far smaller one, and began to gnaw on the tail as he moved towards where his coat was lain out, the fish dangling from his mouth as he spoke through his teeth.  “I can pack us up.  Just eat and try to wake up some, alright?  We need to get back on the river and I need you at your best there.”
	I nodded, head still a bit muggy.  But something about his sudden determination caught me off-guard.  He was acting far more purposeful than we had any right to be, considering we still didn’t really have a firm destination in mind.
	I must have said that part out loud, because he replied, “Yes we do.  We’re going to Broen.”
	“But the hunters looking for you. . .” I trailed off.
	“You need a Physician,” he snapped.  “To hell with them.  I have a pistol and I’m pretty damn good with it.  We’ll manage.”
	“And the one following us?”  I said pointedly.
	He pulled free one of the oars holding up our makeshift lean-to, collapsing the pine boughs, the hide, and the layer of snow atop it all at once.  And then he fixed me with his sharp gaze.  “Didn’t you hear me?”  He began to lift a corner of the hide, shaking it out.  “Now eat.”
	I did so, finding the ill feeling in my body was subsiding somewhat.  Enough so that I could stomach eating, anyway.  Maybe it was because I was waking up.  Maybe it was Finnegan’s sudden command of the situation, making me feel more at ease.
	“I don’t know how well I’ll be able to row today,” I admitted.   “But I’ll try my hardest.  I hope I don’t slow us down.”
	“Tulimak, I don’t care if you do,” he said in a clipped tone.  “I don’t like living through my mistakes more than once.  We go together, at whatever pace we can manage.  I am not leaving your side until this passes or until we’ve gotten you help.”
	That was clearly the end of the conversation and I knew by the bark in his tone not to question him further.  I’d noticed it in the past, but at times like this it was even more evident.  Finnegan had a surprisingly deep voice for such a slender, small man.  Or well, smaller than me, which I guess wasn’t saying much.  I suppose amongst canines he would have been average.
	I found I rather liked his answering my uncertainty with certainty.  Even if I suspected some of it at least was false, there was a comfort in surrendering to his demands at a time like this.  I wanted someone to take charge, because I simply didn’t have the energy to.  And I wanted very badly for him to be right, as well.  It was harder to quiet the doubts that constantly plagued my mind when I was alone, but with someone with such a strong personality reassuring me, I found my anxiety receding.  Certainly not entirely, but enough that I felt better.
	That feeling improved further after the meal, just as he’d predicted.  It had been a safe prediction, to be fair.  We got back on the river and that day passed as well as could be expected, given the situation.  Rowing was difficult.  Painful.  But Finnegan was giving all he had and the gap between us was closing.  We found a pace eventually that I could slow to match that was easier on my body.  The wolfdog clearly struggled through mounting exhaustion to compensate, but he did so with quiet determination.  I had to admire his resolve.
	There was a lot I was beginning to admire about him.
	Spirits, how I wanted more time.  I wanted to know more of life, more of this feeling, this yearning growing inside of me.  
	I wanted to know Finnegan Ambrose better than I did now.
	I tried not to think about how the destination we were suddenly determinedly racing towards was also the place we were set to part ways.  Tried not to think about how or why I could justify knowing this man longer.  Survival was the goal right now.  Planning past that was pointless, until we knew there was a ‘past that’.
	I’d originally intended on us giving up on the raft after we passed the Twelve Sisters’ Rise, a break in the earth where twelve large rock formations split the land.  We passed them on that third day and kept moving up-river.  As painful as rowing was, the concept of carrying our possessions with my shoulder the way it was the remaining ten miles it would take by land to reach Broen was simply inconceivable.  Broen was along the river, it just wasn’t as direct a route to get there.  It would take another two days as opposed to the one it would have normally taken me in good health on foot, using the game trails.
	Thankfully, other than aching from the exertion, I didn’t feel any more ill by the close of the day.  Just very, very tired, and very sore.  I hardly made it to shore before I had to sit and despite my protestations, in the end, Finnegan pitched almost the entirety of our camp.  I had to help steady the oars and spread the hides, but he did all the labor aside from that.  He’d picked up on it fairly quickly for someone who’d only had a few days’ experience making camp.  He even managed to start a fire, although he once again used some of his papers to do so.
	“How much farther?”  He asked, voice thick with fatigue as we watched the salmon laid out on a stone in the fire crackle and sizzle.  
	“Tomorrow,” I said drowsily.  “We should. . . end of day. . . .”
	He leaned forward and spitted one of the fish on a sharpened stick, holding it out to me.  “Eat,” he insisted quietly. 

	The next morning, I felt much the same.  Which was to say awful.  But I suppose not more ill-feeling than the day before.  Just intensely tired.  All my body wanted to do was stay lying down in that lean-to, warm and still.  Sunlight was filtering in through the hide flap, and not meager morning light like had been many mornings prior.  It was stark daylight outside, which meant we’d slept for a long time.  And all I wanted to do was sleep even longer.
	As bad as I felt, the little world inside our lean-to was still so comforting.  Unlike the evening before, I’d slept soundly the whole night through.  Which might have accounted for why I was, at the very least, not getting any worse.
	The reason for our deep and restful sleep was abundantly obvious, at least as far as I was concerned.  Every night prior, Finnegan and I had slept with our backs against one another, or back to front, putting as much distance between us as we could in the small space.  I’d obviously closed the gap in my sleep the one night. . . but we’d tried to have some kind of propriety in the tight quarters.  As meager a bubble between us as we were able to, anyway.
	It was pointless, really.  We’d crossed every boundary that mattered already.  Finnegan had been hesitant since we’d talked to come anywhere near that kind of closeness again, and I suppose a part of me was glad for that.  But the nights were getting colder and last night when we’d pulled the worn sheepskin over the two of us, and the cold had persisted, the futility of the distance we were putting between us had been too obvious to ignore.
	This wasn’t about whatever I felt for Finnegan, it was about common sense and survival.  If I’d been well, the cold would have been something I’d have easily endured.  But it was one more pain we didn’t need right now.
	Without so much as a word to one another, we’d drawn in close and folded our bodies around each other.  It had so immediately made sense and felt right, I was tempted to believe a spirit was guiding us.  But it was probably something a lot more basic than that.  Instinct.
	I’d not slept this close with anyone since I was a cub.  Even now, in what I’m fairly certain was the early afternoon light, the canine was still pressed against my chest fur, arms tucked up against me, nose puffing warm air along my breast bone.  He was wrapped in one of my arms and the solid weight of him was quickly lulling me back to sleep.  I forgot about the throbbing pain in my shoulder, the nagging fear we were being followed, and allowed myself to bask in the moment.  
	This was the kind of comfort, I thought, that married people must feel.  Not that I wanted that with Finn, (obviously, it would be sheer insanity to think I could marry another man) it was just the only thing I could think to compare it to.  This total feeling of peace with someone who wasn’t related to you.  I was glad I got to know what it felt like this once, even if it wasn’t under the most ideal circumstances.  There were many comforts you could only have with a wife, and this was one of those things I thought I might never experience.  But here it was, unexpectedly.
	Of course, I’d experienced another ‘comfort’ reserved for marriage with Finn by now, as well.  And I hadn’t stopped thinking about it just because I was ill.
	In his sleep, alongside me as close as he was, I was able to study him in great detail with the advantage of not feeling awkward for staring.  Every moment, I found a new interesting thing about him.  Like how his eyelashes were longer than mine, or that some of his whiskers were bent.  And most intriguingly, that he had scars.  At least a dozen so far that I could see.  Three of them were on his face, one on his ear, the rest on various parts of his body I could see.  They were hard to spot on the previous occasions I’d seen him with his clothing off, both because it was dark and because of his dark pelt.  But on his face, joints and limbs in particular, where his fur was shorter, I was able to make them out.  Most of them looked older, pink lacerations or divots in the skin that were shinier and missing some fur.  In a way they almost reminded me of my markings, which had been burnt into my hide.  But these clearly had not been intentional.  They were old injuries.  
	A few might have made sense, given what he’d told me about his difficult childhood.  But so many?  It was unexpected.  I’d have to ask him about them some time.
	Some time.  In the next day.  Because after that. . . .
	I shook my head slowly, trying not to think about it for now.  I should get a little more sleep, if I could.  Even if it was getting late in the day, I clearly needed it.  And Finnegan wasn’t even up yet-
	He was, actually.  At some point I’d gotten lost in my thoughts and failed to realize his eyes had opened.  He yawned slowly, his tongue curling, body flexing against mine.
	“Mnnhhhh,” he groaned.  “It’s bright out.”
	I opened my muzzle to say something, but he was already shifting up onto his elbow, fur tousled and flattened against his cheek on one side.  He brushed at it sleepily with his claws, making a half-hearted effort to preen down the black tufts.
	“Finnegan,” I said suddenly, my words coming before my thoughts had caught up.  “Are you certain you can’t get this illness from me?”
	“We don’t even know for sure that you have it,” he said, voice deep and still thick with sleep.  “And you’ve been able to hold food down, so I’d say that’s definitive.  We just need to get the wound treated before it gets worse.”  He reached down and pressed a palm to his back, stretching his hip.  “Why?”
	I’d asked.  I had to answer now, or it would seem strange.
	My eyes darted away from his as I spoke.  “You. . . said you felt the same things for me that. . . I felt for you.”
	That got his attention.  I wasn’t looking at them, but I could feel his eyes become more intense, more awake.  “That’s vague,” he said, tone far too comfortable for something that was so hard for me to get out.  “You mean attraction?”
	“Yes,” I said simply.
	“Then yes.  Although we’re both in a poor state of affairs currently, physically speaking-”
	“Can I kiss you?”  I asked, forcing myself to look him in the eyes when I asked.
	To say he looked shocked would be an understatement.  It took him a full three blinks before he replied to me, and when he did it was with a bemused, “Why-ever are you asking n- I am a mess.”  He gestured down at both of us, really, but he was clearly mostly referring to himself.  And presumably the mud and grit in his fur, the scent of exhaustion and river water soaked into our bodies, and the stale odor of woodsmoke permeating the lean-to from last night’s fire.
	I smiled, though I’m not really sure why.  “You always look handsome, Finn.”
	“That’s true,” he said, without missing a beat.  “And I’m not saying no, exactly.  But why now?”
	“We’re going to reach Broen tonight,” I said with certainty.  “And once we make it to town, I may never have another chance.”
	My forthright answer had the desired effect.  He immediately seemed to realize the truth in the statement and leaned up on his hands, humming thoughtfully.  “Alright,” he said.  “You make a fine point.  But I’ve one caviat.”
	“A what?”
	“A demand,” he clucked, leaning over me. 
	“I-uh,” I stammered, “alright.”
	Maybe I shouldn’t have agreed to it so quickly, without knowing what it was.  But when he smiled at me, that long canine smile that went up into his cheek ruff, and leaned down over me, those forest green eyes boring into mine, I was certain I’d give this man whatever he wanted.  Which was probably a bad idea.
	Oh, I was done for.
	I reached up to cup my paw around his cheek, amazed by how perfect the contrast in our fur color looked against one another.  I wanted to see more of him. . . against me. . . .
	He was speaking.
	“I don’t actually, ah, kiss people often,” he said, his voice as uncertain as his got.  It was rather cute to see him awkward about something.  Anything.  “It feels like it’s something more reserved for people who are important to you, not dalliances.  And I’ve had more of the latter than the former.  So. . .” he cleared his throat, looking at me, his ears tipped back slightly,  “you have to swear to me that you’re not going to leave me with awful, tragic memories, alright?  Because I’ll remember this, I’m certain I will, and the bad memories I already have of people who’ve been important to me haunt me enough as it is.”
	He said it all so matter-of-factly, like he was making the simplest of requests.  He obviously knew the demand was a farce, what guarantees could I possibly give him that I wouldn’t let something unfortunate happen that would leave him with depressing memories?  But despite how nonsensical it sounded, I understood what he meant completely.  And it gave me some insight into him I hadn’t had before.
	“There’s only so much one man can take,” he said with a smile that didn’t fit how tired his eyes looked.  He laughed, dry and weak.  “I just. . . don’t prefer to have any more regrets than I already do.”
	“Finn,” I said with a huff, smiling as I realized I’d stumbled on at least one thing I could explain to the more worldly canine.  “Memories of people we’ve lost are like. . . stories.  Some parts make you sad, but it doesn’t make the rest of the tale worth any less.”
	“Sage wisdom,” he said in an unconvinced, dry tone.  “But I’d like to spend whatever time I have left on earth not being sad, if that’s alright.  I’ve had enough sadness in my life.”
	“I believe you,” I said quietly, my thumb brushing over his cheek.  “But I think you know I can’t promise you that.”
	He dropped his gaze, and after a time, spoke again.  His voice was very small.  “Just don’t die because of me, then.”
	“I’ll do my very best not to die at all,” I promised.  “At least not any time soon.  I have a lot left I want to do.”
	He nodded and closed his eyes for a moment, leaning in to my palm.  “Then I guess. . . it’s alright.”
	That was it.  He’d given me permission.  I’d been the one to ask, so I couldn’t back down now.  That would somehow be even more awkward than attempting it and failing.  Oh spirits, could you fail to kiss someone?  If anyone could, it would be me.
	He’d said he hadn’t done this much before, but then any experience he had was more than mine.  How miserably would I compare to his standards?  Why had I been certain enough to ask for this in the first place?  Where had all my confidence from a few moments ago gone?
	His eyes were boring into mine, the color of spruce boughs and mountains in spring flush.  I could not possibly invent enough metaphors in my mind to describe his eyes.  They were the first thing that had drawn me to him, and now they were inches away, looking into mine expectantly.  And for just this moment, I knew I was allowed to want something, to take something, and that he was willing to give it.  There was such a. . .calm. . . in that certainty.
	There it was.  
	Still holding his chin in my palm like a lifeline, I leaned in the few inches remaining to touch my muzzle to his.  It didn’t matter that I was twice his size, or that we were different species.  Or that we were both men.  His muzzle was soft and pliant against mine, and it only took a short span of brushing fur and whiskers together before we found an angle at which our barely open mouths met.  I felt him on the tip of my tongue, dragged his scent through my nostrils, tasted him.  I was overwhelmed by him, overcome by how his presence was dominating my senses, so much so that I barely noticed when his tongue slid over my own.  But I hardly needed a coherent thought to know what to do from there.  I wanted more of him, more of that.  So I reciprocated, opened my muzzle more for him.
	And so it went for. . . I’m not certain how long.  But when we pulled back, it was because we were both panting for air.  I felt dizzy, my limbs loose and heavy.  Finnegan looked more disheveled than before, and as the haze began to fade from his eyes. . . surprised.
	“Damn,” he said at length, words almost slurred.  “I was expecting something sweet and simple, from you.  Little peck on the muzzle.  There is a bear in there somewhere, isn’t there?”
	“I. . .”  I was momentarily considering an apology, but I dismissed it before I got it out, remembering every vivid detail of the kiss and how very mutual it had most certainly been.  Still, I wasn’t going to be held entirely accountable for it.  I gripped his paws, speaking to the baffled looking wolfdog.  “Finnegan. . .” my mouth was dry, but I persisted, “I-I’m really. . . fond of you.  And I’m worried about you.  I’m worried about what’s going to happen in Broen.  I still want to help you somehow, a-and I don’t know how, but I do know that I have. . . I feel. . .” I knitted my brow, frustrated.  “I have all of these feelings,” I settled on the simplest, bluntest way to impart how confused I really was, because there really was no better way to say it, “that I don’t understand,” I continued, helplessly.  “I know we have to go to Broen.  But I’m afraid we’ll part ways there, and then I’ll never understand. . . .”
	I let the thought run out intentionally, hoping he might explain in words what I simply didn’t have the means to.  But he said nothing, only looked down at our hands for a long time.
	“We have to get moving,” is what he eventually said, instead.  “You need treatment.  Broen isn’t far, right?”
	I swallowed back my disappointment.  What had I expected him to say, really?
	“Less than a day,” I said softly.  
	He nodded, standing and releasing my hands slowly.  “We row until we arrive,” he announced, quietly but firmly.  
	What then?  I wanted to ask.  
	But I didn’t.

	We arrived at Broen when the day was late and the whole world was purplish-blue, the snow catching the final colors of daylight as it faded over the mountains.  The lights of the large town were spread over the small valley on which it resided, the docks along the river ringed with lanterns.  I didn’t bother to hide my raft this time, we simply pulled straight up to the town and tied it off, alongside canoes and the sorts of larger boats the Otherwolves favored.  There was even a small barge.
	Our raft was, by far, the smallest and most ramshackle craft here, and a few stoats sitting near a crackling fire, cooking fish and a pot of potatoes, had a good laugh at our expense as we wearily stumbled onto the docks in near blackness.  I made sure to gather up everything we still had of value, because I wasn’t certain any of it would still be here if or when we returned.  I’d never had intentions of taking the raft all the way up-river to my tribe, anyway.  The water had become peppered with ice over the last day or so, as the temperatures dropped.  It would soon freeze.
	Despite it being dark, the dirt road alongside the docks was still bustling with activity, mostly men trying to make the most of the last waning hour to unload supplies, or gather water in bucket lines.  A cattle dog with a herd of mules was bringing them in for a drink before he presumably turned them in for the night.
	And there were a lot of women about, for some reason.  At least half a dozen, moving between firepit camps that had sprung up around the docks, some sitting with the groups of men, talking, laughing, and drinking.  We passed a wolverine amongst a group of Otherwolves, wearing a bright, if mud-stained, checkered dress.  She was smoking a pipe and gave me a long look when I stared, lifting her muzzle to me as if challenging me to say something.  I quickly looked away.
	“I’ve never seen so many women out at night, in an Otherwolf town,” I said quietly, leaning down to Finn as we walked.
	He glanced briefly up at me, arching an eyebrow.  Then sighed.  “They’re working, Tulimak.  Don’t stare.”
	I shut my mouth and dropped my gaze to the ground, mortified.  He was right.  I forgot sometimes how my curiosity about the world beyond our tribe might be inappropriate.  These were people going about their lives, not a spectacle for me to behold.
	We were passing rows of drying and salting racks for fish and I’d been keeping my gaze firmly on the dirt, so when someone approached us, I didn’t notice until she was right up on us.  Finn clearly had though, grabbing my arm and pulling me to a halt.
	It was a woman.  A coyote, by the look of it, lean and just a bit shorter than Finnegan.  She was wearing an Otherwolf dress with burgundy checkered patterns on it, over a dingy white petticoat and blouse, and a leather corset.  She was the most uncovered female I’d ever seen outside my own tribe, with her sleeves and most of her top pulled down to just below her shoulders, so that you could see the slope of her breasts.
	I was briefly worried I’d somehow offended her too, until I noticed she was smiling.  Although she was primarily focused on Finnegan.
	“Saw you sizin’ up Gina o’er there,” she remarked, gesturing in the direction of the wolverine.  “She’s spoken for t’night but I ain’t.”
	“We’re not interested in company,” Finnegan said politely.  “We have business in town.”
	“Ah’ve got a place in town if you prefer,” she said, tugging at one of her sleeves.  I wanted to tell her that doing so was just revealing more of her chest, which must have been accidental.  It was so cold out.  “Or a’least, I can.  For a few pence extra, I know a place I kin get us a room.”
	There was something in her tone. . . she was smiling, but also shivering a bit.  And her voice had a waver to it, a weakness in her throat.  It wasn’t desperation, but it was close.
	“That’s not-“ Finn began.
	“I kin handle two,” she insisted, wiping her nose.  “Even the big lad.  Ah’ll be good t’you both.”
	Finn had gone silent.  I wasn’t certain what it was the woman was offering, but I doubted very much that he was planning to take her up on her offer.  But that wasn’t it.  He was staring past her.  I followed his gaze and caught sight of two eyes in the dark, peering out from behind one of the drying racks.
	The coyote woman saw where we were both looking and snapped her head around, calling out.  “Ben, no.  I told y’to stay near th’fire-“  She frantically looked back at us and did a quick curtsy, hustling back towards what I now realized was a small child.  A little coyote boy, clearly only a few years old.  She bent down and picked him up, shockingly walking back towards us once she had him on her hip, her tone placating.  “Ah’m sorry, lads.  He won’t get’n the way, ah promise.  He’s quiet.  He won’t touch none’o your things.  He knows better.”
	I had hardly known what to say before, I was even more at a loss now.  I looked to Finnegan and found him equally silent.  Only he looked different, now.  Where he’d been polite and calm before, now he seemed. . . pained.  It was impossible to say what was going through his mind or why, but his eyes were unfocused, jaw tense.
	“Do you not have a place to stay tonight, otherwise?”  He asked of the woman, at length.
	“I don’t ‘ave fleas, if that’s your worry,” she insisted, far too quickly.  “I stay at the Church nights I can’t find board.  I’m clean.  M’boy’s clean, too.”
	Finnegan turned to regard me.  “You have coin, right?  To pay the Physician?  We’ll need at least a few silver.”
	“I have coin, yes,” I said, uncertainly.
	He turned at that and unbuttoned, then fished in his coat pocket and produced a few pence, the copper flashing in the firelight from the nearby camps.  I happened to know it was probably all he had left.  He held it out to the woman and after a brief pause, she took it.
	“Four’s all I can manage,” he said quietly.  “Not enough for your services, but you said you could find board for a few more, so. . . get somewhere warm.”
	“If I wanted charity I’d go to the Church,” she said, seeming quietly offended.  All the same, she pocketed the coin and readjusted her son on her hip.  “I don’t s’pose the tribesman there’s willin’ to part with some of that silver, then?”
	“Let’s go,” Finn said to me, walking around and past the woman.  I followed behind him, glancing back behind us as we left her.  She stared at us a further moment, then began to move back towards the camps.
	I thought about asking Finn what exactly had just transpired, but he seemed in a dark mood, all of a sudden.  I walked beside him in silence as we made our way into the lantern-lit town.  After some deliberation, I put a paw on his shoulder and squeezed it.  I didn’t know what to say, but he seemed sad, and it was all I could think to do.
	He reached up and gripped my paw back and held it for a brief time, before easing it down off of his shoulder.  
	We’d entered Broen’s main street.  It was far more intimidating, far more foreign to me than any place I’d been before.  There were people of all stripes (sometimes literally) milling about in the night market area, moving in and out of rooming houses and inns, sitting on the sprawling porches and leaning on paddock posts.  Broen wasn’t just some frontier town, it was a major trade post.  My father came here to trade for goods our tribe needed sometimes, but I’d intentionally avoided it to sell my fish, since everyone back home had agreed a place like this was too much for someone as young and inexperienced as I.
	I felt somewhat more comfortable being here with Finnegan, who seemed not at all flustered by the civilization around us, or the menagerie of different people.  And this was at dusk.  During the day it must have been. . . I couldn’t even imagine.
	I didn’t have long to take in the sights.  We bypassed most of the main street on our way to the trade district, which was not hard to find.  There were signposts up on the few street corners that comprised the square that was the town, (built around animal paddocks abutting most of the inns and rooming houses, as many towns were), and Finnegan seemed completely able to read them.  Unlike the sign on the Wayward Inn, these were only in Amurescan.  Which I could sound out if I took my time, but I was mostly good at picking out familiar words for inns, food, drink, words I already knew.  It would take me a good long while to make sense of all the signs in this place.  It was, after all, still a second language for me, even if my father has insisted all of his children become as fluent in it as possible.
	I’d never been more glad for that than I had been throughout this last week.
	“That has to be it,” Finnegan pointed ahead at a shop window with a complex word I couldn’t immediately make out, and a weathered, painted sign on a plank that looked like a jar of some sort.
	“Ahh. . . p-p-ah-“ I tried my hand at reading the word, squinting.
	“Apothecary,” he finished for me, looking mildly surprised.  “You can read Amurescan?”
	“Not quickly,” I said bashfully.  “My sisters are all better at it than me.”
	He readjusted the strap of his heavy satchel over his shoulder, glancing down at his bag and holding it closer to his body.  “I had no idea.  Come on.”
	The doorway into the small shop, built into the side of a larger building with two other shops in it, was clearly built for a smaller species.  We found the door open, thankfully, but the main area was a cluttered, V-shaped counter ringing a ten foot room, at most.  There was barely room for Finn and I to stand in the center with our bags and look around at the shelves of molasses-brown bottles and jars.  The counter was equally cluttered with various-sized glass containers of tinctures and spirits, dried herbs and many different sizes of gauze and linen.  The air inside smelled like nothing I had ever experienced before, sharp and bitter, stinging to the nostrils.  And beneath it all, the unmistakable coppery edge of blood, from somewhere nearby.
	A bell above the door had rung as we’d come in, and we heard the sound of someone making their way down the stairs from the second story.  The man that emerged through the doorway behind the counter was a striped Maine Coon cat, with a thick fur beard and sharp, triangular ears.
	I recognized him immediately.  
	“I’m sorry if you were closing down for the night-“ Finnegan began.
	“We never close here at Carlton’s Apothecary and Barber Surgeon,” the cat snuffled, pulling down a stained smock from a nearby peg and tying it across his belly.  He wiped some crumbs from his thick fur, flicking his whiskers.  “Although you did catch me in the midst of supper, so apologies for the wait.  Now.”  He placed his meaty paws on the counter.  “What ails you?  Here for a night tonic?”
	“I’m. . . not sure what that is,” Finn admitted with a slight chuckle.  “But no.  We had a. . .” he glanced up at me,”. . . bit of a hunting accident.”
	“Couldn’t be too bad if you’re still upright,” the cat guffawed, lifting a section of the counter and shimmying through it, just barely.  “But let’s have a look.”
	I put down our bags, looked once to Finn, who nodded at me, then kneeled down to be at the cat’s level and slowly pushed back my cloak to reveal the wound on my shoulder.  Even moving the cloth aside stung, and I let out an audible hiss.
	“Ahhh, I see,” the man moved around behind me, his hands prodding at and pulling taut my hide around the injury, which hurt like hell.  But I suppose he had to get a better look.  He took some time, even leaning in to sniff at the wound, before stepping back and nodding.  “Corruption of the humors, yes.  Hmmm.  We’ll need to purge the wound, sear it, and prescribe you a tonic.”
	I saw Finnegan wince out of the corner of my eye.  
	“I remember you,” I said quietly.  “You came to my village once.  Told us how to stop the illness our traders brought back from spreading.”
	The cat’s eyes widened marginally.  “Ah, yes.  That strange plague that afflicted so many tribes along the river.  I traveled to many villages. . . many towns. . . .”  He patted my arm, indicating for me to stand.  “Never seen its like before.  Hope I never do again.”
	I stood slowly and he continued, “Well, when we don’t know the nature of the beast, fire is always the best method.  Purges all impurity, all sin.  We’ll employ something similar for this affliction of your humors.  I’ll just have to get the brand ready. . . .”
	I blinked.  “Wh-what?”
	“C’mon upstairs, if’you can fit,” the cat chuckled, leaning down and grabbing up a leather bag from behind the counter.
	I watched him head upstairs, my shoulder still pounding with pain from his prodding at it, and fear now setting in fully.  
	“I’ve never been treated with Otherwolf medicine before,” I said quietly.  
	“We can’t let it get worse,” Finn put a paw out, taking mine.  “I’ll be with you.  You can endure this.”
 	Swallowing, I nodded.  And we made our way upstairs.

Chapter 8 – Standoff

	That acrid, astringent smell increased as we climbed the stairs to the second story.  And the unmistakable stench of old blood accompanied it, not overwhelming, but lingering, like it had sunken into the wood of this place.  The quarters upstairs was as limited in space as the downstairs area, essentially just a hallway with three doors off of it, the first of which we entered.  
	The treatment room looked as though it doubled as a spare bed room he let out to patients sometimes, with a worn straw mattress on an old frame in the corner, one small, uneven table, and a chest of drawers.  There was also, intimidatingly, a chair in the very center of the room with fraying leather straps built into the arms, and a lot of suspicious stains marring the headrest.  It had an odd array of metal pieces near the center, a few locking hinges that probably leaned it back, if I had to guess.  
	“Ughh,” Finnegan grumbled beneath his breath.  “Reminds me of the time I had a tooth pulled.”
	“I do that, too, if you’ve an irksome bugger that needs out,” the cat said chipperly.  He moved towards the potbelly stove near the far end of the room and opened it, reaching into a cone of what looked like small fire pokers nearby.  He extracted one, looked over the end of it, then repeated the process several more times before he apparently found the one he was looking for.  Then he inserted it into the stove and hustled back out down the hall, presumably to get something else.
	I had a feeling now that I understood what he’d meant by ‘sear’ the wound.
	Finn had put his paw on my shoulder again, the uninjured one, and I turned to regard him.  He looked worried for me.
	“You actually seem fairly calm,” he noted, dropping his voice.  “You know what this treatment will entail, right?  Do you need a translation?”
	I shook my head.  “No, I understand.  He is going to burn the wound closed.”
	Finnegan gave a soft huff, “So resolute.  I won’t lie, I’d be pissing myself.”
	“I’m just glad there’s a simple treatment for this,” I said.  “And anyway, it took weeks of hide-burning to finish my markings.  This will probably be much faster.”
	“Oh, right,” he rubbed a hand over his muzzle.  “Damn, how didn’t I think of that?  I’ve been staring at them for days.  Seems obvious now that you mention it- those are burned in?”
	I nodded, mostly paying attention to one part of what he’d said.  “You’ve been. . . staring at them?”  I asked, voice as low as his.
	He slowly smiled.
	We both heard the cat approaching us, and he removed his hand from my shoulder probably faster than he needed to.  When the apothecary came back into the room, he was carrying a brown glass bottle and removing the stopper with an audible plunk.  He gave it a sniff, then nodded, handing it up towards me.
	I looked at it uncertainly, then slowly took it from him.
	“Payment first, if’n you don’t mind,” the cat cleared his throat.  “Two silver for the medicine, two for the treatment.  You’ll want to drink at least a third o’that now.  Help keep you calm so I can work, help with the pain.”
	I reached down into my shoulder bag and dug for my coins, pulling out handful.  The silver were obvious, thankfully.  Some of the copper pieces were worth different amounts and I wasn’t good at telling them apart yet.  I sifted out four coins and handed them to him.
	While I did that, Finn leaned in and sniffed the bottle, arching his eyebrows.  “What exactly is in that?”  He asked.
	“Carlton’s Patented Pain Tonic,” the cat announced proudly.  “A proprietary tincture to treat the discomfort of all ails, and induce a calm and painless euphoria-“
	“It smells mostly like whiskey,” Finn muttered, in a dry tone.
	“Aye, that’s the base,” the man affirmed.  “Also Laudanum, castor, a bit of hashish-“
	“Bloody hell,” the wolfdog guffawed, glancing briefly at me.  “Tuli, maybe drink that slow, alright?  Have you ever even had whiskey before?”
	“We don’t trade for liquor, my father doesn’t believe in it,” I said, warily.  “He says it makes men crazy.”
	“Your father sounds like a wise man,” he agreed.
	“Do as you please,” the cat shrugged, setting down a bucket on top of the stove that I’d just realized he’d also brought in with him.  It was half-full of water, and had a rough-looking rag slung over the side.  “But you’ll be wanting my tonic to endure the treatment.  Believe me.”
	“I’ve sat through branding before,” I said, “I know what to expect.”
	“It’s not the brand you’ll be wanting it for,” the apothecary promised lowly.

	He was right.  The worst part of the treatment, by far, was having the wound scrubbed and cleaned.  The man used what I’m fairly certain was an intentionally coarse rag, (woven from horse hair or something like it) scathing hot water and lye soap, and scoured the wound raw, washing it in nearly boiling hot water in between each successive round.
	I was lying on my side on the chair, the wood creaking beneath my weight, praying to the spirits that it be over.  The whole while.  I’d had a few sips of his tonic before the cleaning began, but midway through, Finn sympathetically offered me more, and I took it.  The tincture was muddying my senses somewhat, but I can’t say it was euphoric.  It was mostly making me even more tired than I already was, but the pain saw to it that I stayed well and truly conscious.
	I’m not sure how long it all took.  It was thoroughly dark outside by the time he approached me with the brand.  At that point the pain was already blinding, but he gave me something to bite down on and I closed my eyes and pressed my muzzle into the headrest of the chair, thankful at least that this probably meant it would soon be over.  I vaguely felt Finn take my paw where it was slung over the edge of the armrest.  
	And honestly, though it can be hard to compare physical pain sometimes, especially when remembered through the haze of years. . . the searing brand on my raw wound was in fact far worse than receiving my markings had ever been.  Likely because the area was already so exposed.  But it was blissfully short.  I’m not sure if I cried out. . . I probably did.  I think I should be forgiven if I did.
	The apothecary said he’d give us an hour or so following the treatment for me to recover my senses.  He offered me the bed to rest in, but I didn’t want to move.  I just wanted to lean there on my side in that chair and pray to the spirits that the pain fade faster.
	Finn talked to me, quietly and calmly.  His voice kept me grounded, comforted me with its cadence.  It didn’t even matter what he was saying.  
	I could tell by his demeanor that unfortunately, this situation was not new to him.  He’d already told me how his mother had been sick, so. . . I could take a guess why he had experience comforting someone who was ailing.  As time passed, the minutes stretching as long as they could, as the burning fire on my shoulder blade oh-so-slowly began to lessen, I started to think about that a lot more.  My mother had died six days after catching the affliction she’d been trying to treat in someone else.  At the time those days had seemed long, but in retrospect, I’d essentially seen her healthy one day, been uncertain for a week, and then she’d been gone.  
	Finn said his mother had lingered.  For how long?  Long enough to request and be denied the coin to comfort her in her illness, apparently. . . by his own father.  
	Losing my mother had seemed the most tragic, unfair thing that could happen to someone, from my perspective.  I’d been outright angry about it for a long time, and I’d had many talks with my otterfa, trying to make sense of it.  What kind of purpose it could possibly have served, why the spirits hadn’t seen fit to save her, even though we’d prayed and prayed. . . .  It had me questioning so many things, wondering how I’d ever live on without her.  And I had a father, who still loved me very much and had tried so hard to fill in the gaps my mother had left when we’d lost her. 	
	I turned my head slowly to regard Finn.  In the low light of the room, the wolfdog’s eyes were intense and dark, lost in a sea of black fur peppered with those small scars I’d seen the other night.  His lean, elegant muzzle and strongly-defined, angular features had always been attractive to me, even when I hadn’t known that’s what I was feeling.  But seen in another light, they could be frightening.  There was a ferocity there, a fury, which I often interpreted as determination or focus.
	But I knew the anger that came from watching someone you loved. . . die.  Helpless to stop it.  And whatever it was he had endured with her, it had not only lasted far longer, he’d gone through it being denied the comfort and love of his remaining parent.  The man who should have loved her.  And him.
	What did something like that do to a person?
	 “I know it must feel enormous,” he said, soothingly stroking my good arm, “but the mark’s not that big.  Size of my palm, at most.  And it will probably shrink as it scars.”
	I shook my head slowly.  “It’s an honor,” I managed, through a dry mouth.  “To be wounded. . . protecting a friend.”
	Finnegan’s brows lifted and he smiled softly.  I swear I heard his tail brush the floor.
	“I’ll get a marking. . . for this,” I said hoarsely.  “An honorific I never thought. . . I’d earn.  A warrior’s emblem.”
	“Alright,” he chuckled, “but give it a little time before you go burning yourself again.  We all like to look good, but health comes first.”
	“I’ll have such stories thanks to you,” I said.  “My family will want to hear everything about this trip.”
	“Hopefully not everything,” he said with a knowing smirk.
	I went silent at that, realization setting in.  “Oh spirits,” I groaned, “I hadn’t even thought about how I might talk to my family about. . . .”
	“And you’re not going to start,” Finn affirmed.  “Remember what I said?  You don’t talk about it.  To anyone.”
	“But I tell my father everything, we don’t have secrets-“
	“Alright, this is probably not a good talk to have when you’re out of your mind with pain and. . . ‘tonic’,” Finn cleared his throat, stroking back one of my ears.  “Are you feeling up to moving yet?”
	“. . . I think so,” I said at length.  I attempted to sit up slowly and mostly managed, despite the world spinning and my body badly wanting to upend itself.  Finnegan stabilized me by the arm, and I took my time getting my bearings.
	The apothecary returned some time later with a tankard of fresh water from the well outside, and I gulped it down greedily.  I hadn’t realized how thirsty I’d become.  The water, and likely just being vertical, helped immensely with the dizziness.  
	More than just an hour must have passed, (at that point I was having trouble keeping track) because by the time I was really able to walk well again and was feeling capable of leaving and finding a place for us to actually spend the night, it. . . wasn’t really night any more.  At least, it looked as though it was beginning to grow more blue than black outside.  Dawn was probably an hour or so away, and we’d certainly taken up enough of the apothecary’s time.
	The Maine Coon seemed pleased with the transaction however, and more importantly, with his work.  He reminded me to keep the wound as clean as possible and to drink the tonic to help me sleep and improve my humors, but assured me that it would heal in time.  He suggested that I not overly exert myself for the next few days and showed us back down the stairs.
	By the time we made it down to the storefront area, I was dead on my feet.  Our bags were still there in the locked shop, although I recalled I’d left the oars on the raft.  We’d need them to set up our lean-to.  Probably down near the docks, alongside the other travelers who’d taken to using the area as a camp site.  I’d seen a few good spots near the wood-line where we could pitch.  We’d have to sleep through the day, but that hardly mattered.  Finn had to be as tired as I was.  Or well, maybe not as tired.  But tired. 
	Those were the only thoughts going through my addled, exhausted mind as we stepped out into the chill early morning air.  Fresh snow had fallen at some point last night, not very much, but enough to coat the town in a shallow dusting.  We’d have to stamp down an area for camp, I thought vaguely.  I wasn’t thinking about the troubles we’d had, or what the next day would bring, or what would become of Finn and I from this point forward.
	Everything, absolutely everything, came rushing back into my consciousness with a vengeance when a gunshot split the snow-muffled silence. 
	The door behind us clapped shut, the apothecary wisely bolting back into his residence.  The bleating of a small flock of sheep receded back into their pens in a nearby enclosure, and Finn and I both froze in our tracks, Finn reacting far faster than I did.  I nearly stumbled down the two shallow steps to the cobbled road.
	There was an upturned patch of blackened dirt and snow not ten feet in front of us, right in the middle of the road.  It was close enough that the intent was clear, but not so close that they might have missed.  Not unless, whoever they were, they were a terrible shot.
	“Should we run?”  I asked in a whispered, frantic tone, my breath puffing out into the air.  “Go for cover?”
	“No,” Finn said softly, holding a palm out.  “Stay completely still.”
	He was staring straight out across the road, very intently at something.  I followed his gaze slowly, and caught sight of the man.  
	There was a lone figure standing on a porch across the street, staring back at us.  He was wearing simple mountaineer’s clothing, a cotton shirt with leather breeches, suspenders and a brimmed hat drawn down over his features.  He was feline at least, that I could make out, and had a rifle held in his hands, but it wasn’t pointed at us.
	“Why aren’t we running now?”  I asked Finnegan, again in a whisper.  “He already fired.”
	“No, he hasn’t,” he said with dead certainty, his eyes scanning the street.  “Do you see any smoke?  Look for smoke from their powder.  He isn’t alone.  Whoever else is with him, they’re re-loading right now.  And he still has a shot, if he chooses to take it.”
	Finnegan shifted his paws a bit further apart, turning his body slowly to the side and gingerly brushing back the edge of his coat.  But at that point, the man on the porch spoke up, and began descending the short staircase down to the road.
	“That’s enough, Ambrose,” he called out, padding slowly across the street towards us.  He lifted his chin, revealing a very young face.  A mountain lion.  He was barely grown, skinny and fawn-colored.  I felt like I’d seen him before, but it was hard to place.  Maybe when he’d been even younger.
	He stopped a short distance away from us, tail curling and flicking from side to side.  He pushed up one edge of his hat, looking Finn over.  “You are Ambrose.  Aren’t you?”
	“I haven’t a clue who you think I am or what you want,” Finnegan said, and I noticed with some shock that he’d shifted his voice, or rather his accent.  The one that set him apart from the Otherwolves I knew.  He was doing an admirable job of it, too.  If I hadn’t met him before, I’d never have picked his voice out as being foreign.  “But my friend and I have done you no ill.  Please don’t hurt us.”
	“C’mon now,” the young lion spit on the ground, cracking half a smile.  “A man as defenseless as you play at would’ve a’least put his hands up.  Show me now.  Show me ‘ow innocent’n helpless you are.”
	I saw Finnegan’s jaw tighten, but he didn’t move.  Didn’t raise his hands.  I looked between him and the lion, wondering what could be going through his mind.  Shouldn’t we do as the man with the gun said?!
	“Aye, thought not,” the lion snuffed.  “Mmhh.  You look juuust like yer picture.  That artist did you right.  N’the bounty papers didn’t miss no details.  Down to the eyes. . . and the ivory grip on that pistol o’yours.”
	“Did they tell you who you were hunting?”  Finnegan asked, voice deadly low.  And he’d given up the charade of masking his accent.
	“That they did,” the young man nodded slowly, before glancing briefly back behind him. . . somewhere.  “That’s why m’ma got set up well and proper this time.  She’s got a clear shot at you, half-blood.  No tossin’ river to foul things up.”
	“Your mother is Odina,” I said suddenly, before I realized the words had left my mouth.  That got the man’s attention, although his gaze kept flicking back to Finn.
	“How d’you know my mother?”  He asked curiously.	
	“She comes to trade with my father,” I said.  “Chieftain Takoda.”
	He seemed to digest that, his hands shifting on his rifle, showing the first sign of nerves any young man his age should rightfully be feeling in a situation like this.  “You’re Takoda’s son?”  He asked, nose twitching.  “The bearchild?”
	I nodded.  “My name is Tulimak.  What’s yours?”
	The mountain lion looked again briefly to Finnegan, his gaze darting back and forth, hands gripping his rifle tighter.  “Sawyer,” he said, distractedly.  “We didn’t know who you was, when we fired on you.  Thought you was just some gun for hire.”
	“I barely know a thing about firearms,” I said, trying to sound less tired and drunk than I felt.  The pain was still there too, my shoulder throbbing with each pound of my heart.
	“Why the hell are you travelin’ with this’un?”  He asked, denoting Finn with a flick of his rifle.
	I opened my mouth before I really knew how to answer the question.  What could I say that would help us, here?  The reason we were traveling together, after all, was because he was being hunted.  Apparently by one of the local hunters my father’s tribe knew.  Which wasn’t that strange when you thought about it long enough, but still.
	Should I tell him why there was a bounty out on Finn?  That would take a long time to explain.  Probably more time than we had.
	“Look,” Sawyer said, addressing me and taking a step in my direction.  “Ain’t no reason this has to go down bloody.  Why don’t y’just-“
	I heard, and saw, next to nothing.  Only felt the barest hint of motion beside me and a flash of movement.  And I do mean a flash.  In an outright stunningly fast gesture, Finnegan had somehow drawn his pistol and pointed it directly at the mountain lion’s head.  
	The boy was as caught off-guard as I was, having been talking to me, he’d looked away from Finn.  For a few seconds, at most.  That’s all it had taken.
	I was on Finnegan’s side, and it frightened even me.
	Sawyer didn’t have his own gun raised, only held in his hands, so he was caught dead.  He went stock still, flinching back as one might if they expected they’d be shot any second.  But thankfully, Finnegan didn’t pull the trigger.  Not immediately, anyway.
	“Finn-“ I started to say, my voice probably far too loud, but my blood was rushing through my ears.
	“Tulimak, stand back,” the wolfdog cautioned.  “Last thing we need is for you to get fresh viscera in your wound.”
	“You wouldn’t,” the young mountain lion said, obviously trying to keep his voice calm, but only partially succeeding.  Plenty of the fear was coming through.  “She’s got her sights on you boy, let me tell you, an-“
	“Try me,” Finnegan rumbled from somewhere deep in his chest.  “You think I won’t shoot a kid?  You think I won’t take you out with me?  You carry a firearm, you become fair game, as far as I’m concerned.  And I haven’t got much left to lose, lad. . . so by all means. . .” he advanced a step, closing more of the distance between them.  “I’ll take my chances on a rifle at, what. . . ten yards?  Twenty?  Versus a pistol three paces away?  God knows I’ve had worse odds in the past.”
	“Finn, no, please,” I begged quietly, splaying my palms out, although I did not know what I planned to do with them.  I just wanted to stop this from happening.
	“Tulimak, look away,” he commanded quietly.
	“She’ll kill you!”  The boy shouted.
	“If she hits, maybe,” he replied, voice dead calm.  “Did you really think a standoff would make me flinch?  You said you knew me.”  He took another step forward, and the mountain lion another step back.  I heard someone else move, somewhere down the road.  Quiet footsteps in the snow.  
	“Finn-“ I tried to warn.
	“I hear her,” he murmured, then louder, “Last chance.  Leave.  Both of you.”  He fully cocked the hammer on the pistol.  “Or your son dies.”
	I could see her now, silhouetted against the pale, muted blue mist of snow lifting in the wind on the empty street.  She had a rifle raised, and wasn’t far.  But she was still much farther from us than Finn was from Sawyer.
	My heart was hammering.  I wasn’t even certain who I was more afraid of any more.  I didn’t want to be here, watching this.  Being a part of this.  
	I didn’t want to watch Finn shoot this young lion.  No matter the threat to our lives.
	And I believed that he’d do it.  I wasn’t even sure why.  There was just something in his tone that prickled my instincts, made me feel the intent in his words.
	Like he’d done this before.
	“What if I were to shoot the bear?”  A rough, female voice called out.
	Finnegan had been still as a statue until that point, his gun arm unwavering.  But he shuddered at that and one of his feet shifted.  Unlike Sawyer, he didn’t move his gaze from his target.  But he inclined his head ever so-slightly and raised his voice to her.
	“Why would I care?”  He asked coolly.
	The words stung, but I knew he was trying to bluff her.  I wondered if I should move. . . but he’d told me not to.  Still, things had changed.  There had to be something I could do.
	“Odina,” I called out.  “My name is Tulimak.  You’ve traded with my father-“
	“I know who you are,” she asserted, slowly approaching us, becoming more visible through the morning haze.  She was a tall, stocky woman, much as I remembered her.  She was dressed similarly to her son, practically, in men’s clothing, and had two heavy straps supporting a large pack she carried on her back.  She wore a heavy, worn duster that had clearly seen many years of weather.  Her tail rigidly twitched from side to side as she walked, keeping her balance as she held her rifle aloft.
	I swallowed.  “You’ve always had good relations with our tribe.  I know my father likes trading with you-“
	“You threw your lot in with that one,” she stated matter-of-factly.  “I don’t know why and I don’t care.  If you want to rectify that mistake, now’s the time.”
	“Give me a chance and I’ll explain why,” I said, holding up my paws and trying to put myself between her and Finnegan.
	“Tulimak. . . .”  Finnegan growled out a warning.
	“Weak pretense there, Ambrose,” she called past me.  “You two use each other’s given names, and we’ve been stakin’ out the apothecary since my son saw you go in last night.  You bothered seeing to the bear’s injuries. . . and now he’s standin’ in the line of fire for you. You really want his death on your conscience?  Got a lot of others weighin’ on you by now, I’m sure.  So maybe what’s one more?”
	“I-what?”  I glanced back at Finn.  And this time, his eyes had moved.  Only momentarily, but not at me.  He’d just closed them for a moment.  He opened them a few seconds later, and slowly. . . slowly. . . waved the pistol at the young mountain lion, in the direction of his mother.
	The teenage boy skittered the few feet to his mother’s side and moved partially behind her, pulling his own rifle up, finally.  Finn had followed his movement with his firearm, and now the two groups were just staring down their barrels at one another.
	I looked back to Odina, who had relaxed some now that her son was at her side again.  She kept her rifle up, but tipped her chin towards me.  “Relax, bearchild,” she said in a far less gruff voice than before.  It sounded almost motherly.  “I wouldn’t’ve shot Takoda’s boy.  I have far too much respect for your father.”
	I breathed out a sigh, but Finn cursed behind me.  
	“Fuck you,” he hissed out.  “You already shot him!”  
	“And who’s fault was that?”  She retorted back, like she’d been ready for it.  “How was I to know you’d suckered a local boy in somehow?  What manner of spell did you cast on this sweet’un to string him along?  Takoda’s told me about him, he’s a good boy.  No reason he should be involved in any of this.  I’m sorry I fired on you, child.  We didn’t know.”
	“Are you alright?”  I asked her, prompting an outraged look from Finnegan.  “I-it’s just that, we were pretty sure Finn hit you-“
	“I did,” he said with angry certainty.
	“Aye, he did,” she agreed.  “The wardens warned us you were a crack shot, but I thought for sure, on a river-tossin’ raft. . . well, it was a graze, anyway.  Got me on my right.”  She glanced down at her duster, which I now realized had a stain and a sizable hole in it just along the right side of her ribcage.
	“This time I’ll be a lot more careful,” Finnegan said, his tone icy.
	“Alright enough of that,” the mountain lioness said dismissively.  “Seems t’me at this point we’re at an impasse, and I’d rather we settle things one way or t’other before the law in these parts starts to take an interest in our activities.”
	“That won’t exactly shake out well for you,” Finn said.  “The law in Broen is my people. Who do you think they’ll side with in a dust-up like this?  Some feline woman, or the canine she’s menacing?”
	“I’d be happy t’let them take us all in,” she replied evenly, apparently not at all flustered by his words.  “Then I can show them the bounty papers I’ve got on you.”
	Finn went dead silent at that, gritting his teeth.
	“Your friend there’s the solution we’re both seeking,” she continued.  “A means to work this out without spillin’ blood.”
	It took me a moment to realize she was talking about me.  “I-I am?”  I said when it was obvious everyone was looking at me.
	“You’re taking him up-river, aren’t you?”  She asked knowingly.  “To your tribe.  Which means he’ll be in Chieftain Takoda’s care.”
	I realized where she was going with her questioning before Finn did.  He mostly looked confused, and was beginning to say something when I spoke up, “Yes,” I said quickly.  “Yes.  That’s where we were headed.  How did you know?”
	“Ain’t much else up-river,” Sawyer finally spoke again, sounding a little less scared now.  A little.  
	“Just the settlement they’ve been building on Takoda’s land, and Broen here,” Odina added.  “If we hadn’t found you here we would’ve gone up that way even not knowin’ who you were.  Not many other places you could’ve been headed.”
	“How did you beat us here?”  I asked, realizing they must have been here for quite some time to have been able to follow us, wait outside the shop and lay an ambush for us.
	“We took the deer trails,” she said, as though the answer were obvious.  “The river winds, takes a day longer at least.  I didn’t know I’d hit you, but figured chances were good you’d stop here regardless.”
	I’d known that, of course.  I felt foolish for even asking.  But it had been a long few days.
	“I’m guessin’ it’s not the bounty you’re interested in,” she said, nodding her rifle at Finn.  “But whatever your interest in this half-breed is, we can negotiate it with your father.”
	My eyes widened.  “You’d be willing to do that?”
	“I know once I explain things to him, he’ll see it my way,” she said evenly.  “Takoda’s a sensible man.  We can talk business and mediate how t’handle this in your village.  In a way that don’t get no one killed.”
	“We’re not-“ Finn began.
	“Fine, yes,” I raised my voice over his, and the wolfdog blinked at me in shock.  “That’s good by me.  My father will know what to do here.”
	“Can we talk?”  Finn snapped quietly, from behind me.  
	“Later,” I promised him.
	“Later might be too late,” he insisted.
	“I am not going to stand here and watch either of you shoot each other!”  I exclaimed, summoning what I could muster of my bear voice.  My throat was dry and I was still hoarse with pain and addled by whatever drug I’d been given.  But it still worked.
	The nice thing about rarely raising your voice is that when you do, people tend to listen.
	“Enough people have been hurt by this already,” I said, quieter.  I looked into Finn’s eyes and his expression slowly gave way.  “My father will know how to handle this.  I know he will.  We are not just going to hand you over, Finn.”
	The canine haltingly lowered his pistol, and his gaze from mine.  “Alright. . . .” he said at length.  “Sure.”
	There was something non-committal in his tone, like he didn’t believe me.  I wanted to say something to assure him, but it was at that point that Odina spoke up again.
	“We’ll be keeping an eye on you for the duration of the trip, if’n you don’t mind,” she hoisted her rifle up over her shoulder.  “But you can keep your own camp. . . and that piece o’yours.”
	“Just try to take it from me,” Finnegan growled softly.
	“Oh, I will,” she promised.  “In time.”

	We made camp just as we’d planned down by the river, while most of the rest of the town was just starting to wake up.  Pitching our lean-to was a blur for me, I was beyond exhausted and had needed to drink more of the tonic just to muscle my way through the agony of lifting some of our things and making it back down to the river.
	Finnegan once again did most of the work to set up our campsite, and I leaned against a nearby tree on my good side and drifted in and out.  He went about the task in complete silence, the air surrounding him dark and agitated.  I couldn’t imagine what was on his mind after all that had happened, but considering I was having enough trouble staying conscious and he didn’t seem to want to talk, it felt like a good time to give him some space.
	At some point he woke me and I crawled into the lean-to and barely made it onto the sheepskins before sleep took me.  I vaguely felt him settle down beside me, but not as close as we had been the previous nights.  I didn’t need the added comfort to sleep, though.
	I don’t know how long I was out, before an overpowering physical urge woke me.  My eyes opened to bright yellow light streaming in through the hides, my eyelids nearly sealed together, mouth dry, nose dry, everything parched.  My body ached, but it seemed mostly residual, my shoulder actually did feel a little better.  Not good, certainly, but not like it had before.  When I flexed it, the pain didn’t radiate all the way down my back.  It felt more contained to the burn now.
	What had woken me, though, was the overwhelming need to relieve myself.  I realized groggily that I hadn’t last night, I’d just gone straight to sleep.  And I’d had a lot to drink after the treatment.  The tonic seemed to parch me, for some reason, and I should probably drink some more water now, while I was up.
	That thought just made me need to relieve myself even more, so I stiffly got up and crawled out of the lean-to, making my way for the woods.  It wasn’t far, we’d camped right on the edge of the tree-line to afford ourselves some privacy from the other campsites.  Also because we needed trees to set up the lean-to.
	Once I was done, I made my way down to the river, which also wasn’t far.  I could hear the distant sounds of the other other campsites and beyond that, the bustle of Broen.  But here, things were quieter.  And we should have been alone.
	Except we weren’t.
	The young mountain lion saw me approaching and didn’t bother to hide himself.  He was sitting on a boulder near the edge of the river, whittling something with a pocket knife.  It was hard to tell if he was making any progress, or what it would be.  Currently it just looked round.
	I gave him a long look before I leaned down over the edge of another of the boulders along the bank and just stuck my face in the water, letting it wash away some of the stale, dry feeling around my eyes and my nose.  It was freezing, of course, so I lifted my head back out immediately and shook, before lowering my muzzle back to the current and drinking for a time.
	Sawyer began speaking while I was still drinking.
	“I don’t know under what falsehoods that’un imposed himself on you, young’n,” he sniffed.  “But you ought get out from under his sway before this thing’s done.”
	I lifted my head and shook again, before glaring in his direction.  “I’m pretty certain I’m older than you.”
	“Ah’m fourteen, and ah’m nearly full grown,” he said stubbornly.  “Been a man longer’n you have.  Ma says you only just left your tribe, that you ain’t been out in the world more’n a year.”
	He had me there.  Something was bothering me, though.
	“Why are you still speaking to me in Amurescan?”  I asked in Nontawlik, the northern tribal language that almost every tribesman I knew in the area spoke.  
	He balked a bit at that and when he answered me back, did so imperfectly and slowly.  “Don’t speak tribe speak well.  Mother said it’s less important now.  It’s their world.”
	His answer made me sad, but I couldn’t argue the logic in it.  The mountain lion tribes, much like the bear tribes, were all but dissolved.  At least everywhere I knew.  They’d been small to begin with and fiercely territorial, so they’d been some of the first to meet with the Otherwolves’ aggression.
	“Is that also why you have an Otherwolf name?”  I asked, switching back to Amurescan since it seemed to make him more comfortable.
	He nodded.  “Ma says I fit in better like this.  Anyway, you’re the one travelin’ with one of ‘em.  And a criminal at that.”
	“Just because there’s a price out on his head him doesn’t make him a criminal,” I said with a sigh, reaching back down into the water to wash my paws.
	“No,” he said in a clarifying tone, “killin’ people is what makes him a criminal.”
	I lifted my head slowly to stare at him.
	“He didn’t tell you why there’s such an enormous bounty out on ‘im?”  The young lion asked me point-blank.
	“He. . .” I tried to find the words to explain what I knew.  What Finnegan had told me.
	What Finnegan had told me.
	“He’s a murderer,” Sawyer said.  
	My field of vision shrunk.  The sound of the river seemed to intensify, or maybe it was the blood in my veins, growing to a roar that filled my skull.  But it was still not loud enough to drown out the mountain lion’s next words.
	“He killed some rich man across the ocean, in their home country.  And two more since he made landfall here.  Shot ‘em all dead in the street.”  His eyes softened with some sympathy.  The pity I saw there made me feel sick.  “You didn’know, did you?”