I feared my own kind more than anything the natural world could ever threaten me with.

We were both smiling, in that bittersweet way one does when imagining something the heart longs for and the head would dread.

The knowledge that he had left me with no intent ever to return had come over me in tiny droplets of realization spread over the years. And each droplet of comprehension brought its own small measure of hurt.

Wide gape the gates of yellowed bone. A tongue of plank is our path between the teeth as we walk toward the gullet. Here I will be devoured. This is a true thing, near unavoidable on any path. I must enter those jaws.

And like a child, I'd be testing the people who loved me, pulling away from them almost for the sole reason of seeing if anyone would come after me.

His face was so ravaged, it was like looking at death itself. Except for the smooth, silvered part of it. By creeping degrees, his human hand lifted. He turned it over, showing a bloody palm. His cracked lips moved. Beloved.He could not say the word, but I knew it. So did his Fool.

And so the Wolf of the West rose from the stone! And so he will rise again if ever the folk of the Six Duchies call to him in need.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, Nighteyes was frantic. 'Poisoned. That water is poisoned.' I couldn't frame a thought to reassure him.

There's something stalking us. Off to the side of the road, moving through the forest.'Kettricken smiled.