Rowan's look turned stormy as she balled the parchment up into her fist and raced into the forest. Daniel climbed down from the tree and watched her receding back until it was lost among the trees. He turned to the remaining members of the band. "Aren't you going to go after her?" he questioned mildly.

"Nope," replied Anna Kate shortly.

"She needs to go burn off some anger," elaborated Hannah. "She'll be back soon enough. And with a load of firewood, to boot."

The dull thud of a blade on wood rang out across the forest as the group turned towards their home camp.

"So what do we do now?" inquired Daniel.

"Whatever you like," replied Megan glumly. "I would suggest you practice weapons - you sorely need it - but neither Nay nor Lari are here to supervise, and you sorely need that, too."

Daniel grimaced, prepared to refute the statement, realized it was true and subsided. When they reached the clearing Rowan's so-called "high court" resided in, Daniel searched out the glade Rowan called home and where he had slept the previous night. He picked up the sleeping furs he had scattered that morning and neatly folded them against the tree in the center of the glade, resolving to find somewhere else to sleep that night. It wasn't right for him to steal the sleeping place of the leader of the camp. She hadn't even given him permission to use her nickname.

He decided to go help Rowan chop wood when he realized he was utterly bored. He hunted up an ax and followed the ringing sounds to where Rowan was furiously hacking at pieces of what once was the trunk of a massive oak. After pausing uncomfortably at an almost palpable barrier between Rowan and the world, he stepped into the vicinity of the flying wood chips. Rowan glanced up for a moment, then turned back to her task.

The pair worked in silence until all the wood was split.

"Feel better?" Daniel asked delicately.

"A little," grumbled Rowan. She shook her head a little, as if to clear it. "So what brings you out here?"

"Looking for you," Daniel replied.

Rowan looked up at him. Silence reigned for a moment. "Coming to make sure I didn't kill myself, no doubt. I bet Hannah sent you. She's always worried when I come out here."

"No. Everybody told me just to hang out until you came back. I got bored, so I came to help you."

"I don't need your help!" Rowan exploded. For the second time that day, she stormed away. Daniel wandered back towards the base camp. Upon seeing the dazed expression on his face, Hannah rolled her eyes skyward and voiced the question Daniel himself was thinking. "What did you do?"

"Honestly? I don't know."

"Tell me about it."

"We were just finishing up with the stack of wood, and she says, 'Why did you come out here?' and I say, 'Looking for you,' and she says, 'Yeah, right,' so I say, 'I got bored, so I came out here to help you' and -"

Hannah groaned and put her head in her hands. "Steph, darling, you dolt," she murmured to herself. She looked up. "I'm going to tell her that. You wait right here," she said turning to Daniel; she got up and left.

Several minutes later, Rowan came reluctantly out of the woods, propelled from behind by a glowering Hannah.

"Now, what do you say?" growled Hannah.

"Sorry," muttered Rowan.

"And?"

Rowan heaved a grumpy sigh. "I'm sorry that I snapped at you for wanting to help me. Is that good enough?" she whined, turning to Hannah.

"More or less. Now?"

Silence. "Now.what?"

Glare. "Now, to make up for it."

"Oh! Right. Would you like to see something? Of course you would. Come on." Rowan seized Daniel's hand and dragged him off into the forest.

Hannah dusted her hands of and walked into the camp. She batted a tent flap aside and sank into a cross-legged position.

"Now that we've gotten rid of the two lovebirds, what are we going to do to get Annie and Laria back?" Megan questioned her friends.

"How are we supposed to know? They were always the ones that master-minded this type of thing," Eva retorted.

"They were not. Everyone always had input on the plans. Besides, they've done it often enough in front of us, we ought to be able to copy the method and make it work," Anna Kate offered.

"Well, why don't you start, then," retorted Eva again.

"Okay, let's see. Here's us.and here's Robin's camp," Anna Kate said carefully as she scratched some squares in the dust. "We want to get at Lari and Annie without endangering Rowan."

"One would think the easiest way to do that would be to leave her here," continued Megan, getting into the swing of things.

"As if we could get her to agree to that," snorted Eva.

"And what if Robin realizes we would do that and sends some of his men over here to get at her while we're fighting over there?" queried Hannah, gesturing at the dust-map.

"Hmm." the four subsided into silent thought.

A slow smile spread across Eva's face. "What she doesn't know.won't hurt her."

Megan looked up, puzzled. "But you know she'll find out. She's psychic like that!"

Hannah caught Eva's train of thought and piped up, a wide grin on her face, "She won't if she's distracted. Like she is now?"

Realization dawned on Megan and Anna Kate's faces. They both grinned wide, mischievous grins. "Yes," murmured Anna Kate. "She'll be distracted."

The four bent to their task of planning a deception and escape.