By the Sword by Mercedes Lackey Page A

over to Dierna.
    The girl lay quietly beside the rock, eyes wide and staring, face as white as cream. She blinked, but that was the only movement she made; for a moment Kero was afraid that she might have gone mad; or worse—not that she would have blamed her.
    But when the older girl came into the failing light from the fire, there was sense in her eyes, and she took the hand that Kero offered in both her bound ones, and allowed Kero to pull her into a sitting position.
    â€œK-K-Kerowyn?” the girl stuttered weakly after a long moment of silence. “Is it r-r-r-really you?”
    â€œI think so,” Kero replied unsteadily, putting one hand to her temple as she looked vaguely around for something to free the girl’s wrists. Although the mage’s dagger lay nearby, she somehow couldn’t bear to touch it. Instead, she retrieved her own knife and used it to cut through the rawhide of Dierna’s bonds.
    Once her hands were freed, Dierna clapped her sleeve to her still-bleeding cheek, and began to cry. Kero couldn’t tell if she was weeping out of pain, fear, or for her marred cheek.
    Probably all three.
    She started to look for something to use for a bandage, but when she turned around—
    An old woman in a worn leather tunic and armor that fit her as well as the bandits’ had fitted poorly appeared out of nowhere between her and the fire.
    Kero shrieked, and stumbled back, and turned to run—and shrieked again when she came face-to-face—literally—with the biggest wolf she’d ever seen in her life. Its eyes glowed at her with reflection from the fire, as she groped frantically after weapons she no longer held.
    â€œStop that, you little idiot,” the old woman said in a grating voice from directly behind her. “We’re friends. Obviously. ”
    That voice—
    She spun around again, just in time to watch the old woman stalk past her toward the body of the mage, the wolf eyeing both of them with every evidence of intelligent interest. The woman surveyed the body for a moment, then leaned over and wrenched her grandmother’s sword out of the mage’s corpse with a single, efficient jerk. Before Kero could say or do anything, the woman handed it to her, hilt first.
    She took it, stunned, unable to do anything but take it.
    â€œClean that,” the old woman growled, a frown harsh enough to have frosted glass on her beaky face. “Dammit girl, you know better than that! Don’t ever throw your only weapon away! Just because you were lucky once—ah, I’m wasting my time. Take that ninny of a sister-in-law of yours, and get back home.”
    And with that, the woman turned on her heel and stalked off to the nearest body, wrenching an arrow out of its back. Kero stood staring dumbly as the wolf jumped down off the rock and joined her.
    It was only then that Kero noticed that they were the only creatures living or moving in the whole camp. And no few of those bodies were slashed across throat or belly. Her work, or that of the sword—in the end, it really didn’t matter.
    She couldn’t help herself; it was all too much. Her guts rebelled, and this time there was nothing to stop them from having their way. She stumbled toward the rock and leaned against it, heaving wretchedly.
    She expected Dierna to be having her own set of hysterics, but after the first few heaves, as she dropped her grandmother’s sword from her nerveless fingers, the girl helped steady her while she lost dinner, lunch, and breakfast—and then even the memory of food. Finally, when her guts quieted down for lack of anything else to bring up, Dierna wiped her sweaty forehead with a dust-covered velvet sleeve, and helped her to sit down on the erstwhile altar.
    She looked around for the sword; it was just out of reach. Dierna followed her gaze, and patted her awkwardly on the shoulder.
    â€œI’ll get it,” she said, in a voice hoarse with