Night settled slowly over the valley of the Painted Dogs.
The last light of the sun had disappeared behind the western peaks hours earlier, leaving only a pale wash of moonlight across the mountains. The wind moved quietly through the tall pines, carrying the dry whisper of needles brushing against one another high above the camp. Without the main raiding party present, the valley felt strangely hollow. Fewer voices drifted between the shelters, and most of the fires had already burned down to dim red coals.
Torren lay awake beneath the furs inside his family's shelter.
He stared at the dark roof above him for a long time, listening to the slow breathing of the others who slept nearby. Normally the cold mountain air and a long day of climbing or training would pull sleep over him quickly. Tonight it refused to come.
The things the voice had told him earlier that day would not leave his mind.
The road.
The Andals.
The old wars.
The idea that the mountains had not always belonged to his people.
Children often heard stories and forgot them by morning. Torren did not. His thoughts moved slowly, circling the same ideas again and again like wolves pacing the edge of a campfire's light.
Eventually he pushed the furs aside and slipped quietly outside.
The cold struck him immediately. The wind had sharpened during the night, sliding down the slopes of the Mountains of the Moon like invisible water. Torren pulled his fur cloak tighter around his shoulders and glanced once toward the nearest fire. No one was watching him.
Within moments he was already moving up the slope behind the camp.
The path was familiar now. Torren had climbed it enough times to know which stones would shift beneath his feet and which roots could be trusted to hold his weight. Frost had begun to gather in the darker places between the rocks, making the ground slick in patches.
The valley slowly fell away behind him.
When he finally reached the ridge, the Painted Dogs camp looked small and distant below. Only a few faint red lights marked where the fires still smoldered among the trees.
Torren sat down on the same flat stone where he had spoken to the voice earlier that day.
For a long moment he said nothing.
The night sky stretched endlessly above the mountains, filled with more stars than he had ever tried to count. The wind brushed against his pale hair and tugged gently at the edges of his cloak.
Finally he spoke inside his mind.
Are you there?
The answer came quietly.
Yes.
Torren let out a slow breath. The response no longer frightened him the way it had the first time he heard it. The strange presence in his thoughts had begun to feel almost… familiar.
He leaned forward slightly, staring across the dark ridges that stretched toward the horizon.
You said the Old Gods are real.
They are.
Torren watched the distant peaks.
Do they see everything?
Not everything.
Then what do they see?
The voice paused briefly before answering.
What the trees remember.
Torren frowned slightly. The answer raised more questions than it solved, and he was about to ask another when the voice spoke again.
Look up.
Torren blinked and lifted his head.
At first he saw nothing but the stars.
Then something moved across the sky.
A golden eagle drifted through the moonlit darkness high above the mountains. Its wings stretched wide as it rode the cold air currents, barely moving as it circled slowly over the valley. In the pale light its feathers looked almost silver.
Torren watched the bird with quiet fascination.
It's hunting, he thought.
Yes.
The eagle glided along the mountain wall, rising slightly as the wind carried it upward.
Torren squinted at it.
How can it see anything? It's dark.
Its eyes are better than yours.
The bird climbed higher.
Torren continued watching, his eyes following the slow, effortless movement of the eagle's wings.
Then the voice spoke again.
Focus.
Torren frowned.
On what?
The eagle.
Torren stared harder.
For a moment nothing happened.
Then something strange stirred behind his eyes.
A faint pressure.
At first he thought he might simply be tired. The ridge seemed to tilt slightly beneath him. The stars shifted in ways they should not have.
The world lurched.
Suddenly the ridge was gone.
The mountains twisted around him.
And Torren was no longer looking up at the eagle.
He was looking down.
Wind rushed past him with a deep roaring sound. Cold air slammed against his face—except it was not truly his face anymore. The mountains stretched endlessly below him, grey ridges and dark forests unfolding like a vast map beneath the moonlight.
The Painted Dogs camp appeared far below as a tiny scattering of faint red lights.
Torren's heart hammered in panic.
What is happening?!
The eagle's wings beat once, powerful and steady.
The world tilted as the bird adjusted its flight, riding the night winds along the cliffside.
Torren could see everything.
The steep slopes.
The narrow hunting trails.
The pale ribbon of the High Road cutting through the distant passes.
Even the forests that clung stubbornly to the lower mountainsides.
He had never seen the world like this before.
Never from above.
The eagle suddenly shifted direction.
Something had moved far below among the rocks.
A rabbit.
The bird saw it instantly.
Torren felt the predator's hunger surge through the eagle's mind. The animal folded its wings and dropped.
The ground rushed upward in a dizzying blur of stone and shadow.
Torren panicked.
Stop!
The eagle did not understand the command.
The dive grew steeper.
The rocks surged toward him.
STOP!
The connection shattered.
Torren gasped as the world snapped violently back into place.
He collapsed sideways onto the cold stone of the ridge, breathing hard. For several seconds he could do nothing except lie there and listen to his own heartbeat pounding in his ears.
The mountains slowly steadied around him.
The wind whispered through the pines once more.
He was back.
Torren pushed himself upright slowly, his hands trembling slightly.
What… was that?
The voice answered calmly.
You touched another mind.
Torren stared into the darkness.
I was flying.
You were seeing.
Torren lifted his head again.
The golden eagle still circled high above the valley, completely unaware of what had just happened.
Did I do that?
Yes.
Torren swallowed.
How?
The voice paused briefly before answering.
Some people can enter the minds of animals.
Torren blinked in confusion.
Why?
Because their minds are open to it.
Torren watched the eagle glide higher into the night sky.
Can I do it again?
Eventually.
He rubbed his arms slowly as the cold wind slid across the ridge.
What is it called?
The answer came quietly.
Warging.
Torren repeated the word silently.
Warging.
The eagle drifted farther away until it became little more than a dark shape against the stars.
Torren remained seated on the ridge for a long time after that.
His breathing gradually slowed, but his thoughts did not. The mountains seemed different now. Larger. Stranger. As though he had seen something that most people in the valley never would.
Finally he asked one more question.
How many people can do this?
The voice answered simply.
Very few.
Torren looked down toward the dim lights of the Painted Dogs camp.
Then he looked back up at the sky.
The golden eagle had almost vanished among the stars.
For the first time in his life, Torren realized something strange.
The mountains were not only something to climb.
They were something to see from above.
And now—
He had seen them.