Kael Silvermark reached the edge of the deep woods before dawn and found the king's guards had nailed the trail shut. A wide wooden gate stood between two posts across the path he had walked since he was a boy. Beside it, a chiseled boulder bore the decree in deep-cut letters: no solo hunters past this line without a warden's seal. A hunter had been mauled here last week. Kael had known the man. He had gone to the man's sister two days ago and told her how her brother died. Kael carried a bow on his back and a double-bladed staff across his shoulders. He was twenty-eight now. His father had told him about the Silver Beard when he was twelve, the secret table where the king seated his best hunters. A seat took three kills big enough to quiet a room. Kael had one. He had dropped a barrow wolf alone at two hundred yards, and Bram had seen it. The other two kills lived past this gate. He walked the fence line until he saw the shack. It was small, stone, thick-walled, built to hold one guard and a ledger. Smoke rose from the pipe. Kael knocked. The warden opened the door in half-buttoned livery and looked at the staff before he looked at Kael's face. "I need a seal," Kael said. "I hunt for the crown. My name is on your ledger." The warden checked. He found the name. Then he shook his head. "Solo hunters, no seals. King's order. Bring a partner and I'll sign you through tomorrow." Kael thought about lying. He thought about the ram the trappers whispered about, the one whose coat took the color of whatever stood behind it. A kill like that would quiet the whole table. He could not take it with a stranger at his elbow. "Who's cleared to ride with me?" he asked. The warden turned the ledger. One name sat on the approved list for the deep woods this season. Bram. Kael read it twice. Bram already held his seat. Bram had nothing to gain from walking Kael to a kill and everything to lose by sharing the story of it. Kael asked the warden to send word to Bram's lodge by the lake, the pine-shingled place with the bay windows where the senior hunters wintered. The warden wrote the note and sealed it. Kael paid the runner from his own purse and walked back down the path he could no longer take alone. The gate stayed shut behind him. To earn the table he had chased since he was twelve, he now had to ask a man already seated at it for a favor.

Kael walked back up the ridge above the gate and made a camp where he could watch the trail. He pitched a small canvas shelter between two pines and built a fire ring from creek stones. The runner had left at dawn for Bram's lodge. A round trip was a day if the man rode hard. Kael sat inside the tent flap and unstrung his bow. He rubbed the string with wax and drew it through a cloth until the fibers lay flat. Then he set the double-bladed staff across his knees and worked a whetstone down each edge. The sound filled the quiet. It was the only work he had left to do. By noon he had sharpened the staff twice and re-waxed the string. He walked the ridge to keep his legs warm and stopped at a trail marker planted where two paths crossed. The paint on the board had faded to the color of wet bark. Beneath it, the ground was scattered with elk droppings gone dry and pale. The herds had already moved through. Every day he sat here, the game walked farther north. He thought of the ram the trappers spoke of, the one that took the color of whatever stood behind it. If he did not enter the woods within the week, the ram would be gone with the rest. He followed the ridge further and came on a tower set at the edge of a clearing. It was built of rough logs lashed with green branches, three stories high, and each side carried the same mark burned deep into the wood: a crossed arrow inside a ring. Bram's mark. Kael had seen it on lodge doors and on the flanks of packhorses. He had not known it reached this far. The tower said what the ledger had said. Bram hunted here. Bram was cleared here. Kael was a guest asking permission on ground another man had already claimed. He went back to the fire before dusk. He heard the horse before he saw it. The runner came up the slope alone and held out a folded square of paper sealed with wax. Kael broke the seal. The note was three lines in a heavy hand. Bram would meet him at the gate at first light. He would sign as partner. His share of any kill was half. Kael read it twice and folded the paper into his coat. He fed the fire and sat with the staff across his knees. He had his way into the woods. He had also given away half of whatever he brought out.