llia has left this room since we put you here."
	"And she made me sit here when I wasn't in my own bed," Miranda said with a caustic little look at the princess.
	"I was not about to leave him alone, Dolanna," Allia said.  "He always knows when we are near, and it makes him rest better."
	"It's that nose of his," Miranda said with a cheeky grin.  At that moment, there was nothing more beautiful in the world to him than that quirky little cheeky grin Miranda had.
	"Come on, children," Dolanna ordered.  "Let us let him rest."
	"And you're going to bed too," Faalken told the Sorceress.  "You've been up almost as long as them.  You won't be any good to anyone if I have to drag your unconscous body around by the hair."
	"Right now, my friend, I am too tired to put up much of a fight."
	"That's good, because I wasn't looking forward to knocking you over the head with a belaying pin," he said adamantly.  "You push yourself to hard, Dolanna.  Now then, I'm going to take you to your room and put you to bed.  And if I see you out of that room until tomorrow, I'm going to borrow a nice heavy blunt object from Renoit and bash it over your head."
	Miranda grinned, but she had the sense not to laugh.  Faalken escorted Dolanna out of the room, forcefully.  Only after the door closed did she laugh.
	"I heard that," Dolanna's voice came through the door.
	Keritanima giggled, and Allia smiled.  "Bed sounds like a good thing, but I want--"
	"Go to bed, Kerri," he told her.  "I'll be alright by myself for a while.  You too, sister."
	"Alright, my brother," Allia said in a gentle voice, "but if you should need anything, just call for us, and we will be here."
	"Go on, I'll catch up in a minute," Miranda told them as they kissed Tarrin goodbye.  She stood and wrapped the blanket around her shoulders, ignoring Keritanima's heated look and dismissing her with a wave of her hand.  Tarrin's sisters filed out of his room, and Miranda sat down on the edge of the bed.  She stroked his unbraided hair back from his face tenderly, looking down at him with serious, sober eyes and a gentle smile.  "You saved my life, Tarrin," she told him calmly.  "You did more than that, actually.  I could feel Death coming for me, but you fought her off.  You brought me back from the edge of death.  I don't even know where to begin thanking you."
	"We are friends, Miranda," he told her weakly, exerting what little strength he had to reach out with a paw and take her small hand.  "If you haven't noticed, I'm very protective over my friends.  You're all I have, and there's nothing I wouldn't do for you, or any of the others either."
	She chuckled in her throat, smiling as she leaned down and gave him a kiss on the cheek.  "Be that as it may, I owe you a big one, Tarrin," she told him.
	"I'm not keeping score, Miranda," he replied in a voice barely more than a whisper.  Her form was becoming fuzzy, and he found it a sudden chore to keep his eyes open.  "I'd do...anything...for a friend...."
	And he surrendered to sleep, leaving whatever reply she had for him unheard.

	Miranda stared down at his inert form for a long time, stroking back his tangled blond hair, pulling it out of his ear gently.  The door opened, and Keritanima stood there.  "Regrets?" she asked simply.
	"No," Miranda replied.  "I don't love him that way, Kerri.  I'm just thinking about what friendship can really mean, that's all."  She stroked his hair again.  "I could feel it, Kerri.  When he healed us, he touched us.  I could look right into his soul.  He healed me and Sisska, knowing that it was going to kill him.  It would have killed him, if you hadn't stepped in and saved him.  I feel unworthy."
	"I think you're more than worthy, Miranda," Keritanima told her gently.  "And so did he.  If anything, you've been a good friend to both of us, and if he's taught me anything over these months, it's how important friends really are."  She was quiet a moment.  "What else did you see when you looked into him, Miranda?"
	Miranda's eyes were a mystery.  "A friend," she replied with a gentle smile.

	Her name was Ariana, and everything about her was exotic.
	Her wings absolutely dominated her entire appearance.  They were very large, bird-like wings with white feathers, some of which were over two spans long.  They folded nearly three spans over her head, and their tips brushed the wooden deck.  Fully spread, those wings had to have a breadth of nearly twenty spans.  She was very tall, seven spans in height, about Allia's height, thin, willowy, and maybe just a little bony.  Or she would seem that way, if not for the fact that she was generously buxom and had the wide hips of a heartstopper.  She was very sleek, athletic, and her visible corded muscles rippled whenever she moved.  The most surprising of her musculature had to be her rock-hard, ripped abdominal muscles, but then again, powerful abdominals would be necessary for a flying being whose wings were attached so far forward.  She would literally have to hold the rest of her body straight while flying, and that had developed exceptionally powerful muscles in her body.
	Her body was impressive enough, but aside from her wings, it wasn't the next thing that got one's attention.  It was her hair.  Tarrin had never seen such a deep shade of blue before, and had never dreamed to see it in a human-like being.  But her hair was undeniably blue.  A deep blue, like the skies over the sea, or maybe the water on a sunny day.  In a curious reversal of normal coloring, her eyes were an amber-like yellow not too far from Keritanima's eyes.
	If her appearance was striking, her clothing was not.  She was garbed in a ragged wrap that went around her neck and over her breasts, tying behind her, and a pair of loose-fitting cotton breeches given to her by one of the performers.  A piece of rope served to keep the garment from sliding off her hips.  She had been kept naked, Tarrin had learned from Dolanna after waking up, naked and chained to the magical device that drained her of life to make the Zakkite vessel fly.  She seemed unconcerned with the amount of skin she was showing, skin that was deeply tanned.  Exposure to the sea's uninhibited sun had left its mark on her.
	Tarrin thought he could understand how that would feel.  He had never felt so drained before.  He felt almost feeble, even after spending the entire day sleeping, but he couldn't tolerate laying in that bed any longer.  After having a nasty fight with Keritanima over going for a walk, he did so.  But it only took climbing the stairs to the deck to convince him that it may have been better to let Kerri win the fight.  But coming up had brought her into view, and then curiosity got the better of him.  He'd forgotten that she was still here, even after Dolanna had told him about her.
	Memories of the attack had started unravelling in his mind, and it scared him.  Not that he had lost control, but at the raw power which he had displayed.  It even frightened him.  Never had he performed such Sorcery before, and he doubted he could ever match that feat again.  It had taken losing a dear friend to bring that out in him, and he desperately hoped that it wouldn't ever show again.  He had no doubt that the carnival performers had to be absolutely terrified of him now.  He couldn't blame them.  He was a little frightened of himself.  That she had survived the onslaught was a miracle.  She had been on the first ship he'd attacked, the one he'd sheared in half.  Blind luck had separated the chains, and she had flown free of the wreck before it sank.
	She was one of six.  Five men and women, wearing wraps and borrowed robes, rested below under Dolanna's care.  They were traumatized and horribly scarred by their enslavement, both physically and emotionally.  Tarrin remembered the wicked, horrible scars Azakar had on his back, the visible reminders of life under an Arakite's whip, and he wondered if the other survivors were similarly marked.  That people could be so cruel to each other completely mystified him, but if there was one thing that life in the world had taught him, it was that human beings had no limit to the evil and cruelty they could inflict on others of their own kind.  They were the only race Tarrin could think of outside of goblinoids that were so self-destructive.
	The Aeradalla regarded him for a long moment. standing at the rail, then she beckoned to him with a long-fingered hand.  He approached her quietly, coming close enough to thoroughly analyze and memorize her scent.  It was light, metallic, curiously similar to Allia's.  But where Allia's scent was coppery, hers was more like bronze, but not unpleasant at all.  His tail swished back and forth rhythmically as he looked at her, waiting for her to say or do something.
	"You are the one?" she asked in a richly timbred voice, a contralto that would sound heavenly when put to song.
	"In what way?" he asked calmly.
	"You saved us," she said after a second.  "Your powers of magic are unparalleled, furry one.  Seeing it from the receiving end was very eye-catching."
	"Well, it's not something I do on purpose," he told her after a slight pause.
	"Yes, the Sorceress told me," she agreed.  "I am Ariana Ak'Kalani.  I am in your debt."
	"I think we can forget about debts," he told her immediately.  "To be honest, I had no idea you were on that ship.  Saving you was purely accidental."
	"I know, but credit goes where it is due," she said adamantly.  "I'd never have gotten away if not for your intervention.  That places a debt of life to repay to you."
	"Don't worry about it," he told her with a dismissive wave of his paw.
	"I'll not worry about it, but it will always be there," she told him.  "I'll leave it up to you when and how you wish it repaid."
	"Thanks," he said in a grunt.  That was as good as forgiven, as far as he was concerned.  "Dolanna said she thought your race was extinct."
	"It's a belief we encourage, because of the Zakkites," she replied calmly.  "They have hunted us for thousands of years to power their ships.  Those of us who remain live as far from their reach as possible."
	"How did they catch you?"
	"We can't survive without contact with the other races forever," she said.  "We usually trade with the Selani for what we need, but sometimes we have to go further.  I was caught in a Pelan border town by Arakite merchants, who sold me to the Zakkites."
	Tarrin thought about that.  Pelan was the small kingdom created after the Selani war with Yar Arak, placed between them as a buffer between the two bitter enemies.  The Aeradalla certainly didn't live in either Pelan or Arak, because of Arakite custom of enslaving non-humans.  That meant that they had to be coming from the other direction, from the desert.  "Pelan?  It would be safer going to Arkis."
	"True, but we don't trust Arkisians.  And Pelan is closer, and distance is serious when you have to fly back with what you've bought," she pointed out.
	"That would put your home somewhere in the Desert of Swirling Sands," he realized.
	"Where else is it safer from sea-going enemies than in a desert?" she pointed out with a smile and a wink.
	"Do the Selani know about you?"
	"Of course they do," she replied.  "We trade with them, remember?"
	"Allia's never mentioned the Aeradalla."
	"The Selani?  I think she's from a clan very far removed from our home.  We don't go that far to trade, and as you may have noticed, Selani clans don't communicate with each other very often."
	"I guess so," he agreed finally.  "Her clan territory borders Arkis."  The fact that Selani don't talk is relatively well known in the world.  Those who knew the Selani knew that the thirteen clans were generally  rivals with one another.  Though their Goddess forbade warfare between clans, there nevertheless existed real aggression and hostility between rival clans.  Raiding and abductions were a common occurance along borders between clans, and though there is no killing, there was nevertheless a state of bloodless war that raged between Selani clans.  It tended to be a war of prestige and honor, where the objective was to gain honor over other clans.  It was the one aspect of Selani culture that Tarrin could never quite understand.  Selani clans would battle each other in wars of intrigue and one-upsmanship, steal each other's food, water, and livestock, even occasionally battle each other in the Dance in a form of non-lethal combat, yet turn around and give food, water, or aid freely to the very same clan who had suffered a crisis or emergency.  That the Selani seemed to hate each other, yet maintained an exceptionally powerful racial unity, seemed illogical.  Allia explained that it was one way that the Selani kept in shape and fighting trim.  The Holy Mother, Allia told him once, put her children against one another to make them stronger against those from the outside.  Selani were clannish and very territorial, but would quickly dissolve those boundaries when an event occurred that threatened Selani lives.  Even the lives of the most bitterly rival clan.  "My brother the enemy," Allia had called it one time.  Odd.
	"There you are," she said with a chuckle.  "We never go that way, because we don't trust the exiled Arakites.  I doubt her clan has ever seen us."
	"Probably not."
	"You are unusual.  Dolanna called you Were-cat.  Is this so?"  Tarrin nodded.  "We have long debated whether to return to Fae-da'Nar.  I doubt that they remember us anymore."
	"I wouldn't know," he told her in a quiet voice.  "I'm not Fae-da'Nar."
	She gave him a startled look.  "A Rogue?  You are very brave, Tarrin of the Were-cats.  Few challenge Fae-da'Nar and live.  Their power is formidable."
	"I've never seen that power," he told her, leaning against the rail.  "They've tried to kill me, but they haven't been able to do it yet."
	"You are lucky, then.  A single Druid is usually all it takes."
	"I can deal with Druids," he told her.  "Not that I want to, but they don't really leave me much choice."
	She leaned against the rail with him.  "It's not my place to speak for you, but if you have any way to reach an agreement with Fae-da'Nar, I suggest you find it," she advised.
	"It's gone too far for that, Ariana," he sighed.  "I wanted to at one time, but it's too late now.  My bond-mother put her own needs over mine when mine were much more important, and it made me Rogue.  Then I damned myself in Fae-da'Nar's eyes when I killed innocents protecting myself from another one of them.  I didn't ask for them to be an enemy.  I've tried to resolve it without killing any of them.  But it's too late for that.  The next time Fae-da'Nar crosses my path, one of us is going to die."
	"Sad words," Ariana consoled.  "Sounds like a twist of fate."
	"There's nothing but twists in my fate anymore," he grunted.  "I think about it sometimes, standing up on a deck and looking into the stars.  I've lost my way, Ariana.  I don't really know what I'm supposed to be anymore, or where I'm supposed to be, or what people expect out of me.  I feel like a stranger.  And I have no idea why I'm talking about this to a complete stranger.  I shouldn't really be talking to you."
	"Why not?"
	"Dolanna calls me feral," he told her.
	"Ah, say no more," she said lightly.  "I guess I should feel honored that you'd deem me worthy enough to confide in."
	"I guess you're just a non-human face," he sighed.  "I guess I just don't trust humans anymore.  Not after everything they've done to me.  And to think that I used to be one."  He shivered slightly.  "I've never met one of you before, so I guess I haven't decided yet if you're a friend or foe."
	"Well, that's a gentle way to put it," she said with a slight smile.
	"Now that I've bared my soul to you, when are you planning to leave?"
	"Well, I was waiting to talk with you," she replied.  "To thank you and to tell you of my debt.  I guess that since that's done, I can return home.  It will be a long flight, but I'll enjoy every minute of it."
	"It must be something else to fly," he said, looking up at the sky.
	"There's nothing like it in the world," she said dreamily.  "I should get some rest.  I'll be flying out with the dawn.
	"I think I'd better go back down to my room pretty soon too," he said ruefully.  "It's starting to become work standing here."
	"I didn't realize you were ill," she said in concern.
	"Not ill, just weak," he replied.  "Doing what I did really drains me."
	"Do you want help?"
	"No, I'll be alright.  Besides, it looks like you wouldn't fit in the companionway with those wings."
	"Alright.  If I'm not here when you wake up, I just want to say thank you, and may your gods speed you on your journey."
	"Thanks.  Have a good flight home, Ariana."
	She took his paw, smiling at him warmly.  "If you ever need me, just call, and I'll come," she told him seriously.  "It's the least I can do for someone who saved my life."
	"I don't see when I'll need you that bad, but I'll remember it, Ariana,"he told her.  "I hope we meet again."
	"We will," she said with a smile.  "Trust me.  We will."
	Tarrin gave her a curious look, watching her move towards the large lean-to style shelter that was made for her on the deck.  For some reason, he had to agree with her.
	Absently swatting some insect that landed on his back with his tail, he turned and looked out over the calm seas, both paws on the rail.  The memories of what had happened had started unveiling themselves, and they worried him.  He understood why Dolanna wanted to talk to him so badly.  He remembered weaving together strands.  He knew how he did it, and he could do it again.  The amount of energy it required had been staggering, but it was something that he could accomplish.
	He had no idea how he knew how to do it.  In his rage, he was completely subjugated by his animal instincts.  Perhaps they had some sort of mystical connection to the Weave that he didn't understand.  Perhaps they could sense things that he couldn't when in control of himself.  Maybe it had just been blind luck.  Whatever it had been, it had worked, and worked too well.  He had wanted more power, faster, and that was exactly what he had gotten.  The fact that he used that power to destroy meant nothing to him; they had nearly killed Miranda and Sisska, so there was no mercy.  Not that he was ever overly merciful in the first place.  Regardless of why he had wanted it, the fact that he had managed to call it forth wouldn't leave his mind.
	The power had been incredible.  Now that he could remember what had happened, he could remember things that his animal instincts hadn't noticed in their rage.  About how beautiful it felt, to hold onto that much power.  Even when it was burning him, there was a nearly euphoric sensation involved in wielding that much power, a feeling that was odd, and a little frightening.  He was starting to fear that he was beginning to like using High Sorcery, and that would be a deadly attraction.  He had been lucky so far, either using Sorcery so quickly that he didn't have the chance to build enough power to cross the threshold, or managing to break away from the power when he did.  This time would have been it, if Keritanima hadn't been there to cut him off.
	It was sobering.  It was more power than any single Sorcerer could manage.  It was power that even a Circle had to work to contain.  Yet he could use it, alone.  That scared him, deeply.  He didn't understand what set him apart from all the others, and he was starting to worry that having that kind of power was going to become comfortable to him.  It would change him, if he allowed it to.  He would become used to it, and used to the pedestal on which it placed him over others.  That could lead to arrogance, conceit, maybe even belief that he was better than anyone else.  So much power was an allure, almost like a drug, and he realized now that he had to be careful, or he would be seduced by its dark promises.
	It's very good for you to understand that now, my kitten, the voice of the Goddess echoed within his mind.  Power is a sword with two edges.  It must be respected.
	"Goddess," he said in surprise, looking around.  "I thought you were gone."
	I may not speak to you, but I'm always watching you, kitten, she said whimsically.  It's good to see you up.  Are you feeling alright?
	"I'm still a little weak," he replied, looking down into the sea, at the wavering reflection of the greatest moon, Domammon.  Soon the twin moons, Duva and Kava, would rise, and just behind them, the red moon Vala would rise.  Behind the large white disc shimmered the colored pools of light on the water which reflected the Skybands.  They were much narrower now than he remembered them in Aldreth.  Keritanima told him that when someone was on the equator, they were nothing but a knife-edge in the sky, and only visible at night.  In the frozen expanses of the north, they took up the entire southern section of the sky, brilliant and scillinting in the night, and dulling the light of the sun a little during the day as it shined through them.  They seemed to be in front of the sun and moons, yet behind the clouds.  "But you already knew that."
	Of course I did, she said with a choral giggle.  But it seems to make you feel better if I pretend to ask about things I already know, rather than bowl you over with them.
	"Thanks," he said dryly.  "Goddess--that sounds so impersonal," he grunted.  "But maybe I should be more formal.   You are a goddess, after all."
	Let's not start that again, she warned in a dangerous voice.  You know how I feel about frivilous platitudes.  It's how you feel in your heart that concerns me, not how silly you can make yourself look for my benefit.
	He looked into the sea, quiet and brooding.
	I know, she said gently.  You should have expected it, my kitten.  You're a being of the wild, trapped on a seagoing ship.  It's only natural that you'd start wondering why you're here, and doubting what you're doing.  I don't blame you for it, because I know your heart.  You won't abandon me.  I count on that.
	"It's more than that," he sighed.  "I'm just not the same person anymore.  I've turned into everything I feared I become.  Even more."
	It's necessary, she said gently.  It's a process of discovery.  You've only been Were for about six months, kitten.  You haven't discovered what that means to yourself yet, and being on these ships isn't helping you.  But there's nothing I can do about that.  All I can tell you is that no matter how much you feel that you've lost yourself, you will always have the power to decide what you want to be.  It may not be an easy road to travel, but there's nothing stopping you from trying.
	"I know.  It's just so hard sometimes.  Sometimes, I feel like I should go back to Suld and gut the Keeper for doing this to me.  I should have killed her."
	No, she said sternly.  The Keeper had no choice.  She was acting on my orders.
	"Your orders?  You made them do this to me?" he asked in shock, his entire moral and religious foundations beginning to buckle dangerously.
	Yes, I did, she replied calmly, almost challengingly.  And the reason you are so weak is the very reason why.
	"What do you mean?"
	Kitten, you are a Weavespinner.  Maybe now you appreciate more fully what that title means.
	Tarrin blinked.  She was right.  The title wasn't some archaic, ambiguous term, it was a literal description.
	That's right.  You have the power to create and destroy strands of the Weave.  It's a very rare gift, something that even the Ancients didn't see very often.  My children may remember the title, but they had no inkling of what to do with you.  They trained you like a normal Sorcerer, because they didn't know any better.  They didn't realize that when they did that, they would have signed your death warrant.
	"What do you mean?" he asked in confusion.
	Weavespinners are so strong in the Weave that they can't survive being in direct contact with it, the way that Sorcerers contact it to draw power.  Had you remained mortal, were you still human, the instant that Jegojah pushed you into the Heart, it would have incinerated you.  Your Were body, with its inhuman endurance and ability to regenerate, was the only reason you survived.  And if it wouldn't have been him, it would have been something else.  The first time you would have touched High Sorcery, it would have Consumed you.  Being what you are is the only reason you can survive it.
	So, my kitten, I had you changed.   It was a simple matter of keeping you alive.  You may hate it, and you'll probably hate me for it, but there are some things that we all must do that we don't like.
	Tarrin turned that over in his mind several times.  That the being he looked upon as his patron deity had been at the center of his life's greatest turmoil shocked him to the core, but the logical part of his mind couldn't refute her explanation.  Pragmatism seemed to be a universal compulsion.  To save his life, she had ordered him turned Were.  And he had survived.  He was still struggling with those consequences, but as his mother would say, life was an opponent, to be challenged and battled.  There was a little sense of betrayal, but it came from the childish part of him that still believed in happily ever after.
	"You're right, I hate it.  But I can understand it," he said after a long moment, in an emotionless tone.  "But couldn't you have found something a little less...traumatizing?  I may not feel so alienated if I was a Were-wolf instead."
	There was nothing else, she replied.  Were-cats are the only breed of Were-kin that would have suited.
	"Why?"
	It goes back to the Breaking, kitten.  Were-cats are much different than other Were-kin, and it's much more than skin deep.  It happened to them in the Breaking.  The next time you see Triana, ask her about it.  She was born just after it happened, and she can explain some of it to you.  Anyway, after the Were-cats were changed, they were like you are now.  But what most outside of Fae-da'Nar don't know is that it gave the Were-cats some enhanced abilities compared to other Were-kin.  Were-cats retain their inhuman strength, speed, agility, senses, and their power of regeneration in any form, where in other Were-kin they only receive those gifts in their hybrid form.  It's the gift they receive in exchange for losing the ability to hold the human shape without pain.  It's also one of the reasons the other Were-kin resent Were-cats.  Only a Were-cat's body is suited to resist High Sorcery.  Using any other Were body would have still killed you.
	Tarrin considered that.  It was a bit surprising.  Jesmind had said that Were-cats were different, but it seemed that even she didn't understand the truth about their condition.  He wondered why that would make the other Were-kin resentful.
	Because they're a little jealous, the Goddess answered.
	"But they can take the human shape."
	So can you, if you're willing to endure the discomfort.  The only thing the Were-cats really lost was the ability to stay human for extended periods of time.
	"What caused them to change?" he asked curiously.
	The Breaking did more than kill mages and Sorcerers, and make magical objects explode, she replied.  It also affected some species with ties to magic, like Were-cats.  The Were-cat condition is something of a side-effect of the Breaking, an alteration brought about by the shift in magical power.  A mutation, in a word.
	"What does that word mean?" he asked.
	It's a rather technical term for when a child born of parents doesn't look like the parents, she explained.  I'm not talking about just facial features or hair color either.  Imagine if all human babies born after this moment had four arms instead of two.  That's a mutation.  That's what happened with the Were-cats.  All children born after the Breaking were like you and Jesmind and Triana.
	"If they were born changed, what happened to the parents?"
	They're all dead, she replied, a bit sadly.  They tried to raise their children, but they were very different from their parents.  The original Were-cats were very benign and domestic, where their changeling offspring were wild and grounded very much in their instincts.  That made the parents afraid of them, so they branded the Were-cat offspring to be Mal-de'Kii, or Children of Darkness.  The same title given to vampires, lamias, and other exotic creatures that prey on humans.  The parent Were-cats then tried to kill their children, deciding to reproduce by biting humans, to infect them with the same type of lycanthropy that they had.  Humans bitten by these elder Were-cats became the same type of non-mutated Were-cat.  By then, these changeling children were old enough to defend themselves, and there was a merciless war between the changelings and the original Were-cats.  It ended when the changelings wiped out their elders, replacing them in Fae-da'Nar as the new Were-cat society.
	"That's horrible!" Tarrin gasped.
	Yes, but it was a matter of survival, she replied gently.  As a Were-cat, I think you understand how savagely a Were-cat will fight to protect its life.  Tarrin was forced to nod in agreement there.  There was no other way.  I don't think that the changelings wanted to take it that far, but even one elder Were-cat had the power to bite humans to increase their numbers, then come after them again.  So they decided to exterminate them all.  It may be sad, but not everything in life or history is all light and sunshine.
	"I guess not," he sighed.  "Triana was involved in that?"
	She's the oldest of your kind, kitten, born just after the Breaking.  She was part of it.
	"It must have been awful, knowing you had to kill your own parents," he said compassionately.
	Hold on to that feeling, she told him.  There will come a time when what you say to Triana will decide whether you live or die.  Look at her before you answer.
	"What does that mean?"
	What you want it to mean, she answered cryptically.  Just remember what I told you, kitten, about Triana, and about the path you decide to take.  It's time for me to go.  Be well, and know always that I love you.
	And then the sense of her presence was gone, leaving him feeling like there was an emptiness inside.  And leaving him with more questions than answers.
	A path to take.  Maybe she was right.  Maybe, if he worked very hard, he could reclaim some part of himself that he'd lost to the Cat.

	Two days in bed had done wonders for Tarrin's health, but little for his i