Then he glimpsed a small head of fair hair, so fine it floated like flowerdown above pointed ears, and he knew.
The humans had Stormlight.
One of the tall ones' hunters was carrying her in his coarse hands, carrying her to the center of the camp at arm's length, gingerly, as if even in his triumph he was afraid of her. Other humans, women and striplings mostly, were crowding and swirling around, jostling each other for a chance to see. yet unwilling to come too near; a clear space always showed around the hunter and his captive. Even in his panic Tanner could see that Stormlight had not been hurt, at least not yet. And she might not be if she used her wits. The humans acted more than half frightened of her.
**Stormlight! Be calm, be canny. I will bring help.**
**Imy chief, I am sorry. There is something wrong with me. I was clumsy and slow, he saw me**
**Never mind that now. Keep your wits about you. Use their fear of you to fend them off. But do not make them so afraid they become enraged.**
**Pleasecome back quickly...**
At the distance, Tanner could not see the look on her face. Horror held him staring one moment more, and then he tore himself away and sped through the treetops toward the forest.
**Ayooooah! Stagrunner!** With all the sending strength that was in him he summoned his wolf-friend to more quickly carry him the remaining distance back to the camp. Within moments the wolf came leaping to his side, and for the first time in many seasons, and in high daylight, yet, Tanner rode, at speed.
**Ayooah-yoh! Wolfriders, to me! Brook! Brightlance! Joygleam! Oakstrong! Scarp!**
All those who were strong and fit for fighting he summoned by name, sending, and when Stagrunner stopped, panting, at the crest of the hurst, he heard slight, squirrellike rustlings in the beeches as they came to him. Hesitantly they came down to the ground, exposed to view in the blunt daylight, and stood around him with wary eyes-.
They and many whom he had not summoned, Fangslayer among them.
"The humans have captured Stormlight," Tanner told them. "You cubs and nursing mothers, you elders, back to the trees, to hiding." His tone was curt, for only those he had summoned should have come to him; the others should have stayed in safety. "You who will follow me, bring weapons, send for your wolf-friends."
No one moved except to shift from one foot to the other and to shift eyes, glance at neighbors. None of them summoned their mounts.
"How did the cub come to be captured?" Fangslayer asked harshly, his voice sounding oddly loud, like the calling of the crow, in the forest hush. "How do you come to know of it?"
"There is no time now to talk of it!"
Brook said, softly, too softly, "You were spying on the humans, you and she, were you not? And you ventured too near. Is it not so?"
"And now the tribe is to pay the price of your folly," said Fangslayer. "Many lives might be lost, to try to save one."
Tanner felt his hands turn cold where they rested on the thick fur of Stagrunner's neck. He said, "Which of you wishes to challenge me for the chief's lock? Brook? Fangslayer?"
"I am too old," Fangslayer said stiffly.
"By the high ones, I think you have gone as mad as Two-Spear," Brook muttered. His hands balled into fists, and he shouted, "Yes! I will challenge you!"
He strode forward. His fists swung up as if that would help him. But he faltered and slowed to a stop as his leaf-brown eyes locked with the wolf-gray ones of his chief in a battle of wills, a sending that only they two could hear. And while Stormlight in the human village down below wielded the thin blade of human fear and used it to hold her enemies off, Tanner wielded the fragile weapons of mind.
In a few moments Brook's fists fell, his face turned away. Tanner reached out and placed a hand on his sagging shoulder. But his gaze looked fiercely around at the others.
"I am your chief," he told them. "Does anyone dispute it?"
No one answered. The glances of some fell to the ground.
"Then hear me. Some of you have spoken truly. It is my duty as chief to see to the safety of the tribe. I have seen the faces of the humans, and I believe that they will be terrified of us if we strike now, in number, that they will flee, that no lives need be lost. But I have also seen your faces, and I will not require any of you to follow me. For my own part, I must go to the human village. I have no choice. Stormlight and I are Recognized."
A murmur of astonishment ran around the tribe. Even Brook's eyes snapped up. "When?" he demanded.
"Lately." Tanner smiled briefly, crookedly at him, then sobered. "I must go to her at once, alone if need be. I name you chief, Brook. I myself will tie the lock on your head, for I have seen your center, and it is good." He reached up to pull the leather thong from his hair.
"No!" Brook caught hold of his arm to stop his hand. "Keep it! May you keep it for eight hundred turns more. I will come with you to the human camp." .
"And I," said Joygleam.
"And I," said Oakstrong.
And others. And others, and more, and they were all coming close to him, crowding around him with hands outstretched or upraised as if in triumph, and Tanner tilted back
his head and shouted aloud, with no thought for caution any longer, "Ayooooah! Wolfriders!"
Before the sun had dipped low in the sky he had ridden Stagrunner to the laurel thickets at the edge of the forest, where he looked out at the human village, a score of strongly armed Wolfriders at his back.
**Stormlight!**
**Lhu!**
Tanner stiffened and swayed on Stagrunner's back, dizzied. It was his soulname,
**Soulmate,** he asked her, **have they harmed you?**
**No. The tall ones are quarreling over what to do with me.**
**Be ready. We are coming.**
His mind turned to the others, Brook at his one side, Joygleam at the other, the many at his back, and his sending embraced them all at once, and they all answered him. Out of the score of them, some frightened, most uneasy, sending made a unity, strong, steady, fierce.
**No killing, my people, unless it is necessary. But if it is, smite hard.**
**We are ready, our chief.**
"Ayooooah, Wolfriders! Attack!"
The human young relived it all of their brutish lives in nightmare.
Out of the shadows of the forest, the wolves, a storm-gray scud of them, streaming forward at the speed of birdflight, their gaping mouths showing their long, white teethand on each one, long hunting knife or sharp lance upraised, aa creature, a demon, with fierce eyes that seemed to glow, upslanted and wild as the eyes of the wolves. And before there was time to do more than scream, the flood of them swept into the village.
Tanner, in the lead, sped straight to Stormlight, saw her squirming out of her bonds as if they were so much strangleweed. A few quick strokes of his sharp leather-cutting knife to help her, and she was free. **My eyes see with joy,** she greeted him.
He caught her up much as the shrieking human females were snatching up their children; he set her on Stagrunner before him. **My hands touch with joy,** he told her before he turned his eyes and mind back to the others.
The Wolfriders had needed to do no more than rush and threaten. The humans were fleeing, falling like storm-toppled trees in their frenzy to get away. Only a few, doughty Lift-Leg among them, stood their ground, and they all seemed too stunned to raise weapon. No bloodshed yet, Tanner saw.
"I have our sister, my people. Quickly, back to the hurst!"
Like one large, leaping wolf they wheeled to obey him. But a human hunter was in Tanner's way. The man who had captured Stormlight, he was not as frightened as the rest, for his slow mind was intent only on his prize, and he saw it escaping him. With a bellow of anger he raised his club to strike