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“Thass.”

“She doesn’t belong here,” he said, and it made me wonder.

He’d been one of the ones who’d brought me stories about her. He’d spoken well of her, laughed as he’d told me all the trouble she was causing, never said an ill word of her. Not once.

Now he stood before an assembly, passionate about sending her away.

What would cause such a change of heart? So Fenli was a troublemaker. None of the other young hunters cared. It was the old men who held so fast to the old ways you’d think tradition was the only thing getting them hard at night. Why had Thaas taken up this cause? What had happened between him and Fen?

Fenli had said he didn’t like her. I was starting to suspect that wasn’t the truth.

“She’s never belonged here,” he went on. “If you had some space, brother, I think you’d see it. Let her go back with her clan. In time, she will see that it’s what she needs.”

“What she needs,brother, is for her own people to support her.”

He shrugged. “They will.”

“Wewill.”

He had the nerve to laugh and shake his head. “You’re as stubborn as her. It’s probably why the two of you are forever at each other’s throats. Can’t you see she’s wrong for you?”

I tried to cross the space between us, but others stepped in my path, their hands on my shoulders. “You wish,” I said. “Rejection’s a bitch, isn’t it Thaas? Tell us why you really want her gone so badly.”

His jaw tightened and every muscle in him seemed to go still. I’d guessed right, I realized. He’d tried something. He must have. And Fenli had rejected him.

“She’s a nuisance,” he said.

“She’s too good for you, and it eats you up inside.”

He glared at me, biting back whatever he thought in favor of his icy silence. Then he turned to the elders. “She’s in the west hut,” he told them. “Let’s put this decision to rest while we have her and before she bolts again.”

“She’s where?” but he ignored me.

“Toke’s clan has tried and fallen short where she is concerned. She’s unhappy, she sneaks off, tampers with our maps, and disregards authority at every opportunity. Why? Because she was never meant to be here in the first place. She isn’t a child of Toke’s, and this clan could never be an adequate home for her. I say we vote, and we put her back with the clan she was meant for. Once she’s settled among her own people, I think she’ll find that she’s happier as well. She’s Runehall’s. We’ve tried. But it’s time to give her back.”

“Bastard,” I said, pushing past the others. “You think a speech like that gives you the right to hurt her? You’re sore because she never felt the same way for you that you did for her, and now you want to make her pay.”

I shoved him in the chest, and he stumbled.

With his feet back under him, he said, “No one in their right mind would want that stupid bitch.”

I swung, but he was ready for me. He blocked my punch and drove his fist up into my stomach. I blinked in surprise and coughed the air back into my lungs. I had attacked in a rage and without thinking. Now I saw this for what it was. We were going to finish the fight we started back in the old village. Only this time, there was something at stake.

I caught my breath and straightened. I needed a level head. I needed to focus.

“You don’t want to do this, Faasval,” Thaas said. “Remember last time? It didn’t work out for you so well. And your emotions are running high.”

I widened my stance.

“Shut up and fight me.”

I swung and he ducked under my fist. This time my head was in it, and I blocked the next punch he tried to land. I advanced on him as he took steps back, unwilling to let him get away from me.

We traded blows. Thaas was quick on his feet with a damning cross, and I couldn’t let my guard down for a moment without him taking advantage of it. This was not a half-hearted spar, and I felt myself rising to the challenge. Everything I had, I threw at him. Finally, I caught him in the jaw, his teeth cracking together and head snapping back.

There was a murmur that moved through the room. After he blinked a few times, Thaas looked at me, and it was with hell in his eyes. He rushed me. I blocked the first two punches he threw, but the third bashed me in the ear, making my head spin. The next thing I knew, he had his shoulder in my hips, tackling me to theground.

We were brawling. He had the higher ground, and he was quick to take his advantage. He pummeled me in the face like we were a pair of boys. With my forearms taking the battering, I shook off the hit he’d gotten on me and pulled my thoughts back together. Then I bucked him off and spun, launching my foot at his wrist and sending him crashing to his elbows.