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scape: she needed to be able to see.
"Stay here quietly," Hernou told the eldest child. "Your mother will be back soon."
Hernou wondered about Groden. He was fighting the bear, she supposed. There was nothing she could do to help him.
She moved aside the flap of leather into the middle chamber, and crawled through it to the kitchen. Here the lamps were still flickering, casting an unsteady light, smoking and giving off the smell of burning fat; but with this smell was the smell of wet leather and mud, and before Hernou could turn and get into the bedchamber there was a rustling in the porch and she was looking into the eyes of a wild-haired and mud-streaked man, a man she had never seen before, not of the village, but dressed in skins like a savage. His high cheekbones and the hard line of his chin gave him under the matted tangle of his hair and beard the semblance of a demon, and Hernou knew she was looking upon the spirit of the nomads in human form: she was looking upon Tsoaul. She was looking upon the Forest God, who had brought down a plague of bears on Burh and would destroy every man and woman and every thing in the village, who was coming for her now because it was she who had incited Groden and it was Groden who had planned and led the raid on the nomads' camp.
"Make a noise and I'll kill you."
She could utter no sound, feebly submitting as he grasped her arm and pulled her towards the entrance. She preceded him, crawling through the porch and into the open air.
In a daze she stood up. The Forest God came behind her, and he too stood up, much taller than she, taller than any mortal. Across the village the screaming was undiminished. Hernou could see lights dancing, the rush of people as the bear changed direction, dark and formless in the night.
The stars were overhead. She felt only the wind from his fist as Tsoaul struck her. She heard a thin, high keening, and then blackness overtook her and she knew nothing more.
* * *
Tagart ca