They woke up with the sun the next morning, chilly and damp with dew. Lo'ak got up first, and went to go forage for something to eat, leaving Neteyam and Prisha to do their own morning preparations.

Prisha's eyes were shadowed, and she kept yawning and shaking her head to try to bring herself around. In his old life, Neteyam might have thought less of her – but now he knew she was used to the warm, silent interiors of human habitats, and had some idea how loud and cold it would seem to her to sleep outside. She was determined to pretend she was all right, and got to work changing their oxygen bottles. Since he had to hold his breath for this anyway, Neteyam took the opportunity to shave his face.

Lo'ak returned with a couple of tetrapter eggs to fry and a cloth full of dark purple berries. "Here we go," he said, offering the latter to Neteyam. " We'aykalin . Spider eats these, but they're not my favourite, so you guys can have them."

"Thanks," said Neteyam. He did like the berries – they were just a little sour, which he preferred to sickly sweet. He thought of them as tiny, but from down here they were as big as his thumbnail. "Have you tried them?" he asked Prisha.

"No." She shook her head. "Mom and Dad always say don't eat anything from outside, but if Spider eats them they must be okay." She took a couple of berries and lifted her mask to pop them in her mouth. "Hmm... they're like raspberries, but they're firm like grapes, not mushy."

Neteyam couldn't remember the names of any of the Earth fruits he'd tried. He would have to seek out the ones she'd mentioned, and see if she were right.

Prisha ate a few more berries, then took a brown package out of her backpack. "Neteyam, you want some M&M's? They're chocolate. You might as well try it."

He frowned, not sure what she meant by that. Reet had mentioned something about chocolate...

"It's a little poisonous to Na'vi," Prisha explained. "It's also toxic to a lot of animals on Earth, but humans can eat it. Here."

She poured the objects into his hand – half a dozen little lens-shaped things, like river-tossed pebbles, in blue and yellow and orange. Neteyam put one in his mouth and bit down on it. There was a crunchy shell, and then a soft inside that was a little bitter, but also very sweet. He tried another one.

"You have to get used to it," he decided, "but it's all right."

Lo'ak whistled for Tìtstew. The banshee had flown off to find his own breakfast, and must have succeeded because there was still blood on his muzzle when he returned. Lo'ak climbed into the saddle, and helped Neteyam up behind him and Prisha in front. Prisha reached forward to pat Tìtstew's neck, then changed her mind before touching him.

"Right here," said Lo'ak, and reached up to scratch the corner of Tìtstew's jaw. "That's where he likes it."

They were far enough from the river here that there wasn't much fog as they set off. Heading west meant the sun was behind them, shining brilliantly on the sea of green foliage that stretched off to the horizon in all directions. Neteyam looked back for any signs of what had happened yesterday, squinting into the sunrise and wishing he'd brought Rob's sunglasses after all. There was nothing to see, though, only the mountains bobbing in the early morning light. What were the Sky People doing, if their flying machines had been wrecked by the hailstorm? They couldn't just walk home. They would have to wait for rescue while the wild banshees, angry about the destruction of their roosts, hunted them and picked them off. Serve them right.

Neteyam had never been bothered by any of the wildlife on his trek to High Camp. The titanotheres hadn't even seemed to notice him, and the tapirus had only been hoping for food. Only Pawk, who was confused by the sound of his voice, had tried to harm him, and he wasn't sure she'd actually intended to. The Great Mother knew who Neteyam was. That was probably the most important thing.

"There's smoke over there," Lo'ak said.

Neteyam turned to look ahead. His eyes had to re-adjust to the light, but then he made it out – a distant dark curl on the horizon. He tried to place it on his mental map of the territory, but was hampered by the featurelessness of the treetops and the fact that wasn't the one connected with the banshee. The animals had an extra sense that helped them navigate. Dr. Spellman said it had something to do with the same force that kept the mountains floating, the one Prisha had described as making noise in the planet's atmosphere.

That meant Tìtstew knew where they were, and therefore, so did Lo'ak. "That's on the Noro," he said.

"The caves," Neteyam said. "The Sky People were in there looking for stolen explosives, but there was also something else they liked the look of. You know that shiny yellow metal the Sloatxayo people make beads out of?"

"I thought Eywa didn't approve of you using metal," said Prisha.

"Different clans interpret it differently," Lo'ak told her.

"The Sloatxayo say it's okay as long as you don't make weapons or work with it in fire," Neteyam agreed, "although Grandmother says it'll catch up with them someday." He thought of something. "Pa'ay went to check on the garrison there, and she didn't come back yet that I know of."

For a moment nobody spoke, and Neteyam was pretty sure Lo'ak was thinking the same thing he was: in their old live, this would have been where Lo'ak wanted to investigate while Neteyam insisted that they follow orders, call Dad, and stay safe. Dad wasn't here, though, and they had no way to get in touch with him. The People would come to investigate eventually, surely, but right now they were still recovering from the battle and the hailstorm.

It was tempting to go take a look, but Neteyam was the older brother. He had to act like it. "We should go around," he said.

"Yeah," said Lo'ak. Tìtstew banked to the left.

They thought they were going out of their way, but it seemed like they didn't go quite far enough. As they crossed the river well south of the waterfall, there was a puff and smoke, and suddenly a rocket was coming at them.

Lo'ak cursed. " Tawng !" he commanded, and Tìtstew dove into the treetops. They wove through trunks and vines, scaring flocks of smaller flying creatures and getting shrieked at by a troupe of prolemuris. The rocket wove after them, locked on to its target. Tìtstew turned upside down and pulled his wings in to fit through the fork of a tree. Below them, in the crotch of the branches, was an irregular mass of spherical growths – the nest of a colony of black wasps. This was warm from all the activity within, and the rocket's sensors couldn't distinguish it from what it was chasing. It hit the nest and blew it to pieces, showering the forest floor in broken wood, scraps of paper, and fragments of shiny carapace and insect wing.

Tìtstew circled back and landed in another tree so they could survey the damage. One of the forks of the trunk had been blown away. The other was hanging on by a splinter that couldn't support it for long, and as the three young people watched, the wood groaned, bent, and then snapped. The branch dropped away, crashing through other foliage, and leaving a hole in the canopy nearly thirty metres wide.

The crashing died away into an eerie silence. All the animals around had fallen silent, leaving no sound but Neteyam's own heavy breathing and the frantic hammering of his heart.

"You're bleeding," said Lo'ak suddenly.

He wasn't talking to Neteyam, though. Prisha had blood on her lower lip. She reached for her face, then remembered her mask was in the way, and licked her lips instead. "I didn't want to scream again, so I bit my lip," she admitted.

"Good job," Neteyam told her.

Their heartbeats had begun to slow, but now the sound of an approaching engine set them all racing again. Tìtstew backed up against the tree trunk, letting the foliage droop over him to hide them, and the little group watched as a flying craft circled the destruction, then rose higher into the air but remained hovering, waiting for them to come out.

Everyone stayed very still. The sound of air rushing in and out of Tìtstew's spiracles seemed ridiculously loud.

Two figures approached on the ground – recoms, a male and a female. They came up to the splintered tree, which was still some fifty metres tall even without its canopy, and inspected the wreckage at its base. One still-living wasp came buzzing out of the remains of the nest and landed on the bark, and the male squashed it with the butt end of his rifle. There was then a brief, hushed conversation, and the two moved around the trunk in opposite directions, scanning the forest around them for any sign of life.

They met back at the near side, and the female took out a pair of binoculars and looked around at the foliage higher up. Tìtstew crouched a little lower, but it did no good – the female stopped her survey, and pointed directly at their hiding place.

"Oh," whispered Prisha. "It'd infra-red."

Heat. There were no kettleflowers up here to get lost in. They might as well have been shouting their location at the tops of their lungs.

There was only one thing to do now. Lo'ak took the rifle off his back and loaded it. Neteyam's only weapon was his knife, which wasn't going to do any good. "Crossbow," he said.

Lo'ak unhooked it and handed it to him. Neteyam slid down from Tìtstew's back onto the branch, and put a bolt in. It took all his strength to cock it – he had to stand on the string and pull with all his might, but he did it. He wished he had a child's bow, like the one Spider used. "I'll take the ones on the ground, you take the guy in the air," said Neteyam. Bullets went further than arrows.

"They're gonna know something happened," said Prisha.

"Then once they're dead we have to move fast," Neteyam replied grimly.

The male recom was walking towards the tree they were in, while the female hung back. Neteyam took aim at him first. Lo'ak tested the wind and aimed for the bottom of the cockpit, hoping to hit the pilot through the floor.

"One," Neteyam counted under his breath. "Two... and three ."

They both fired. The rifle went off with a rattle, spraying bullets into the sky. These found their target, and smoke went up from the flying machine as it began to tumble down and off to the north. The crossbow bolt left the string silently, but Neteyam had not accounted for the recoil. It hit his shoulder like being kicked by a direhorse, the pain amplified by the previous damage to that shoulder from the cave rocks and Syulang yanking on it. He was knocked off his feet and fell against Tìtstew, who cried out and flapped his wings. Prisha reached down and grabbed Neteyam's trousers to keep him from rolling off the branch, but the bow fell from his hands into the brush below.

"I've got you!" Lo'ak took hold of Neteyam under the arms and dragged him back up to the branch, moments before they heard the distant crash as the flying machine hit the ground somewhere not far away.

"You okay, Bro?" asked Lo'ak.

"I'm fine !" snarled Neteyam. He shrugged off both Lo'ak's and Prisha's hands and tried to rearrange his shirt, which was bunched up under his arms. How had he failed to anticipate that? He'd thought he was getting used to being smaller, getting familiar with his strength, and then he'd gone and nearly knocked himself out of this tree! Now they were down a weapon and they still had one enemy below them. The female recom would be calling for help at this moment, and it was all his fault!

When he looked down, however, he found her just standing there over her fallen colleague, perhaps too surprised to react. Lo'ak lifted the rifle again, but something on it must have caught the sunlight, because the recom scrambled back behind the still-standing trunk. When he fired, the bullets went harmlessly into the wood.

" Ra'un !" she shouted. " Ra'un !"

Neteyam and Lo'ak exchanged a puzzled glance. The word did mean surrender , but it referred to giving up an object or territory, not to conceding defeat. Whoever had taught this woman to speak Na'vi hadn't done a very good job. Was she actually giving up, or just buying time for reinforcements to arrive?

She peeked cautiously out from behind the trunk. There was too much distance between them for Neteyam to see her face, and yet... something about the way she moved was oddly familiar. He went to cup his hands around his mouth to shout back, remembered again that it was pointless when he was wearing the breathing mask – he was just doing great today, wasn't he? – and then poked Lo'ak instead.

"Ask if it's Bohan," he said.

"Who's that?" Lo'ak wanted to know.

"A friend. Maybe," said Neteyam. He honestly wasn't sure. She'd let him out of the flying machine, but maybe that was as far as that moment of sympathy had gone.

Lo'ak leaned forward and shouted. "Are you Bohan?" he asked in English.

The woman stepped cautiously into the open. "Neteyam?"

Neteyam sighed with relief. "A friend," he said.

On the ground, she had begun climbing over the wreckage to get to the tree they were hiding in. Lo'ak looked nervous about this, but Neteyam gave him a reassuring nod and climbed up onto Tìtstew's back behind him. The banshee swooped down to land in front of the female recom.

It was Bohan. Neteyam didn't know what she'd expected to see – maybe she thought somehow he alone had been able to ride this animal – but she was clearly surprised to find all three of them. Her startled eyes went from Prisha, to Lo'ak, and then settled on Neteyam clinging to his brother's shoulders. She grinned.

"You're okay!" she said. "I knew it! Bush figured you were pizza but Quaritch kept saying no, Sullys ain't dead until you've got a body, and sometimes not even then ! I kept my mouth shut but I knew he was right! You found your friends?"

"This is my brother Lo'ak," said Neteyam, "and this is Prisha Patel." Both his companions were looking at him uncertainly, waiting for an explanation. "Her name is Emily Bohan," he said, sticking to English so she would understand – he didn't want to repeat his earlier mistake of talking about Prisha right in front of her. "She helped me escape from Site Nine."

"It's wasn't that fancy, I just threw him out of a Kestrel," said Bohan. "There's not much time before come to investigate the crash. Shoot me in the leg or something and get the hell out of here."

"Wait!" Neteyam said. "You should come with us. You can help!" She certainly knew Site Nine better than he did. She'd been to the parts where they were trying to go. Maybe she even knew something about how recoms were made. She was definitely familiar with newer computers, and could help Prisha update her knowledge.

"Hey, no!" Lo'ak protested. "Tìtstew can't take another person."

Bohan held up her hands. "I can't," she said. "The day I went with you to the falls was the first time I'd been outside in months. I couldn't believe they didn't figure out I'd helped out. If I get in trouble again now, I'll be locked up again."

Neteyam knew that fear. She was feeling the same way he had on the way back to site Nine, when he'd had no choice but to jump. And then he had an idea. He knew how to solve both problems at once.

"We know where the banshees roost," he said.

"What?" asked Bohan.

"What?" asked Lo'ak at the same time. "You can't take her there! She hasn't earned..."

"Neither have any of the rest of them," Neteyam pointed out. He offered Bohan a hand. "Come on, come with us. We can't promise you the black one will want you, but we can't promise he won't." If she had a banshee of her own, Tìtstew wouldn't have to complain about carrying anybody anymore, they would have a guide, and Bohan herself would be free.

"Where do I go after that?" she asked.

"Anywhere you want," said Neteyam. "Nobody can stop you. Come on."

She looked over her shoulder. "I can't keep up, and he just said the banshee can't carry me."

"We'll find you a horse," Neteyam suggested.

That made her ears prick up hopefully. "Which way?"

Neteyam looked at Lo'ak, who pointed back in the direction they'd come. "Game trail. That way."

"We'll try not to get too far ahead," Neteyam promised. "Tree-hop," he told Lo'ak. "Keep below the canopy so she can see us."

Tìtstew took off again, circling the hole in the canopy once before darting in between trunks and landing on another branch around three hundred metres away. Below them, Bohan looked around herself, then took off running after them – just as the roar of rotors suggested another flying machine was coming. From their perch among the canopy, Lo'ak pulled a branch aside, and they saw the machine pass the destroyed area by. Instead, it began to descend over a plume of smoke a few hundred metres away – the place where the first vehicle had crashed.

After a few minutes, they spotted Bohan catching up to them on the ground. She waved, but did not call out. Neteyam waved back and pointed in the direction they were headed, and they set off again.

"Who is that?" asked Lo'ak. "Why do we trust her?"

"She's one of the recoms, like Quaritch and the rest," Neteyam said, "but she's not happy with it. She helped me. She's okay." He hoped she was right.

Lo'ak was not convinced. "What if they catch her? How do we know she won't tell on us to save herself?"

"She won't," Neteyam said, hoping he was right. Now that they were on the move, he was realizing he really knew very little about Bohan. He knew that her human husband didn't want her talking to their sons... and he knew that she got violent when she was angry, as she'd attacked the other recom in the exercise area and had thrown a human off a balcony. Neteyam did not know what had prompted either incident. He'd assumed they were justified because he felt sympathy with this woman. What if he was wrong?

Too late now. They'd just have to hope his instincts were correct, but his instincts weren't doing well for him lately. They were what had made him say mighty warrior , scaring Lo'ak so badly they'd almost crashed. They were what had told him he could make it across the vine, leading to him and Prisha falling from High Camp. They were what had led him to fire the crossbow without properly bracing. Neteyam's instincts were still for the wrong body, and listening to them was getting him in trouble.

They could just fly away. Once they were a good distance from whatever was going on at Kilvanoro, they could gain altitude and leave Bohan behind, lost in the jungle. Of course, then she'd be angry with them, and she could probably still call for help if she wanted. No, they would ruin everything if they did that. Now that Neteyam had made the offer, he had to stick to it.

Lo'ak kept Tìtstew flying from trunk to trunk, until they noticed that Bohan was taking an unusually long time to catch up with them. When next they stopped, they did so low to the ground, and waited there until she appeared, panting and stumbling.

"You guys... are like boot camp... all over again..." she gasped.

"Sorry," said Lo'ak, rolling his eyes. "We thought you were supposed to be a warrior ."

Neteyam wanted to shush him, but Bohan wasn't offended. In fact, she wheezed with breathless laughter. "Good one! Seriously, though, give me five minutes and then we can keep going."

Lo'ak grumbled about it, but he directed Tìtstew to climb down to ground level, so they could stretch their legs a bit while Bohan caught her breath. Neteyam decided this was a good chance to get some more information. Then, even if they had to leave her behind later, or if she tried to get them in trouble, at least they might have learned something. He climbed up to sit next to her on a root.

"What's going on at Kilvanoro?" he asked.

"You were there," Bohan replied. "There's gold."

"The yellow stuff," Neteyam nodded. "What do they use it for?" It was unlikely they just wanted shiny beads like the Sloatxayo did.

"It's good for a few things in electronics," said Bohan, "but mostly it's valuable by itself. There's enough people – I mean humans – here now that they need to build an actual economy, and that starts with gold. Bush is also more convinced than ever that the explosives are in there somewhere. Him and Quaritch think you led them into a booby trap. They're gonna dam the river, and get in there properly to mine the metal."

"What about the guards?" Neteyam wanted to know. "Pa'ay said there were people there. She went to check on them."

"Yeah." Bohan turned her head, looking up at the sky for a few moments.

Neteyam pressed harder. "Did they find them?"

She didn't look at him. "Yes. They did. Sorry, kids."

Neteyam's stomach turned inside-out. Did that mean Pa'ay was dead?

"I wasn't on the initial assault," Bohan added. "The team I was on arrived the day after, when it was all done but hauling the bodies away. I did wonder whether you knew some of those people."

He didn't know whether to believe that. Maybe she just didn't want to admit that she'd killed them herself. "Was one of them a woman with her head shaved, and many necklaces?" he asked.

"I didn't look that close, honestly," said Bohan. "I didn't want... that's one of the problems with this ." She held up her hands, examining the backs of them critically. The higher-ups say, those are the aliens, those are the enemy ... but what does that make me ? When the fighting's over and we're not useful anymore, what are they gonna do with us?"

Neteyam had no answer for her. He was still thinking about Pa'ay. When he'd said the words, I owe you my life and I hope to repay it someday , it had only been a nicety, not a formal oath. He'd known he would probably never get the opportunity, especially trapped in this human body – but he hadn't expected to be deprived of it so soon. Tarsem was going to be broken. They hadn't even had any children yet. It was possible for the People to take a second mate after the death of a first, but it was very, very rare.

"Who was... oh god." Bohan covered her mouth. "That wasn't your Mom , was it?"

"No," Neteyam said. What an awful thought that was. "That was Pa'ay. She saved my life in the mountains."

"I'm sorry," Bohan repeated.

"When she doesn't come back, Tarsem will send somebody to look for her," said Lo'ak. "He might even go himself." This was a cause for worry. Tarsem's death, with no heir appointed, would leave the Omatikaya leaderless.

"He'll see the smoke, same as we did," Neteyam said. Hopefully he would have the sense not to get too close.

"It probably doesn't help, but they haven't found the bombs yet," Bohan offered.

Neteyam couldn't think of a reply.

Then Prisha spoke up. "Are you carrying anything electric?" she asked Bohan.

"A couple of times," Bohan replied. "Oh, transponders, right. You know what to do about those?"

"I can at least turn them off," Prisha held out her hands. "I'll remove them later."

Bohan handed the objects over, and Prisha activated the first one.

"What's your password?" she wanted to know.

"Jeremy0818," said Bohan. "Or if it's not that, it's Callum0523. I just switch them every time it says it's time to change it."

Something important to her, Neteyam obeserved.

Prisha turned off the various programs in Bohan's computers before giving them back to her. "When we stop for a little longer I'll want to take the transmitters out entirely," she said. "By then they'll be actively looking for you."

"They will, won't they?" Bohan turned one of the devices over in her hands, then put both of them down on the ground. "Better safe, then," she said, and got to her feet. "Okay, I've got my wind back. Let's keep going."

It wasn't much further to the game trail, and once there, Lo'ak left Prisha and Neteyam with Bohan so he and Tìtstew could go on ahead and locate animals. He returned and announced that he'd found a little herd, and they followed him to where a half-dozen animals were gathered around, slurping up blue honey from a txeptay hive. The iridescent insects – humans called them black barons – were swarming around angrily.

"The stings don't bother the direhorses," Neteyam told Bohan, as they crouched in the brush a few metres away to watch, "but they'll bother you , so be careful. Lo'ak will tell you." He glanced up at his brother with a teasing grin. Lo'ak had stepped on one of the bugs as a child, and his foot had swollen up to twice its normal size. He met Neteyam's eyes, and grimaced at the memory.

"Dr. Dulac has been stung by those a bunch of times," Prisha agreed.

"Is the honey that good?" asked Bohan.

"No. She's an entomologist."

"Ah. Scientists ."

Neteyam brought the conversation back to the point. "Try the one furthest from the hive," he pointed to a young male who was waiting his turn while the more senior herd members ate. "When you approach, move slowly, and..."

Bohan held up a hand. "Don't worry," she said. "I got this. I grew up around horses. There were still a few left when I was a kid." She turned towards the male and squared her shoulders, and began walking towards him.

The horse was nosing at an itchy spot on one of his middle legs, but when he noticed her coming he lifted his head and raised his mekuru . Bohan kept walking, keeping her gaze down so as not to frighten the animal with eye contact.

"Hi, there," she said softly. "Look at you. Aren't you a handsome fellow?" She put out a hand, and the direhorse took a few cautious steps towards it, extending a kuru to get an idea of her scent. She let the tendrils brush her fingers, and then came up to stroke the animal's neck. "That's a good boy. Your buddies left you behind and now you just want a friend, huh?"

Lo'ak slowly shook his head in astonishment. "She wasn't kidding," he said softly.

"She wasn't," Neteyam agreed. Her ease with the horse made him feel better about deciding to trust this woman, but at the same time... how could the Sky People be the way they were, and yet know how to reassure an animal? It didn't seem to make sense.

Bohan kept a hand on the horse's armoured neck, and looked over her shoulder at the three young people. "I've never done this," she said, keeping her voice low to not spook the horse. "Are there... I don't know, steps?"

"No," said Neteyam. "Just make the bond."

"Geronimo," she murmured. She took the horse's kuru in one hand and her own in the other, exposing the feathery ends of both. Then she brought the two together.

The direhorse tossed his head and stamped one hoof as their nervous systems came into contact, and Bohan herself stumbled a little. Neteyam realized he was holding his breath. He'd never seen anybody make tsaheylu for the first time before. It was something Na'vi children experienced from before they were old enough to remember. Their first communion with Eywa happened when they were only a few weeks old. The avatar drivers had all gotten used to it years ago. Bohan just stood there quietly for a moment, taking it in. Neteyam could see her breathing fall into sync with the horse's.

"Wow," she said finally, and turned to now gaze right into the animal's eyes. "I can see myself! That is wild ." She put a hand on the animal's neck and stroked it again, at the same time bending her own neck in the direction of the touch. "Is that normal ?"

Her childish enthusiasm made Neteyam grin. The next time he made tsaheylu , he thought, he wasn't going to take it for granted. He'd go slow, and savour it the way she was doing. "Yes," he said. "You can mount now."

Neteyam would get to see this again when they had an avatar for Prisha, he thought. He turned to look at her, and found her watching enviously. Neteyam reached for her hand and gave it a squeeze, which startled her. She turned to look at him, saw him smiling, and smiled back, her cheeks a bit flushed.

Bohan put both hands on the horse's back and then paused, realizing she'd made tsaheylu on the wrong side – her queue was between her and the horse. She lifted it over her head, and the mounted the animal in an easy, fluid motion that did indeed suggest long familiarity. Her head turned left, then right.

"I can taste the honey," she said. "He's still got some in his mouth." Bohan licked her lips, and the horse's long tongue shot out in unison with her. "This is so cool . How do Quaritch and the rest do this all the time and not think it's the best thing ever?"

It was clear that she had control of the animal – the rest of the group could safely approach. The other direhorses didn't like this larger number of people, and trotted off as they approached, leaving the angry txepay to start rebuilding their combs. Direhorses were large animals, and Neteyam found he was rather uncomfortable with just how this one towered over him. He had to force himself to go right up to it and pat its nose, which made Bohan giggle.

"You're not supposed to just sit there," he reminded her.

"Right," said Bohan. She had her eyes closed, focused on what the horse could see, but now she opened them and then did something very odd. Although so far she'd behaved as if she'd been around these animals all her life, she now yanked on one kuru . This made her squawk in unexpected pain, and the horse whistled and reared up. Bohan was thrown backwards, somersaulting off its back and landing heavily on the ground, tsaheylu broken as the animal bolted.

The young people ran to surround and look down at her. "Are you all right?" asked Prisha.

Bohan groaned and sat up, accepting Neteyam's and Lo'aks offer of hands to help her to her feet. "I think so. Ow." She reached to rub the spot where her own queue met her neck.

"What did you pull on it like that for?" asked Lo'ak.

"That's how you turn a horse," Bohan replied with a grimace. "It was just force of habit." She looked around, but the direhorses were gone. "Let's find them and try again, I guess. This time, smack me if I cut you off at the instructions."

As she followed the direction the herd had gone, Lo'ak gave Neteyam a dubious look. "You think she's ready for a banshee?"

"I didn't say she was ready ," Neteyam told him, but he was worried, too. Bohan wouldn't need to betray them on purpose to get them into trouble, not when her instincts weren't any more in tune with her current body than his were.