Chased By Fire (Book 1) by D.K. Holmberg

track the hounds. Tell Heller to leave one for me.”
    Cobin’s face darkened. “If Incendin is after the same as the Athan, then you might be seeing more of the hounds than you’d like.” He hesitated, thoughts working across his face. “Maybe you’d like some company along the way. I could go with you. I’ve been through the passes with your father a few times. Might not have your skill with sensing, but I can be plenty useful. Your ma can keep an eye on Bal while I’m gone. She owes me that much.”
    Tan laughed. “I’d like that. Not sure she will.” Cobin shrugged. “Shouldn’t be any reason the Athan wouldn’t want extra help. Especially if he really wants to move quickly.”
    “And if there are hounds…”
    Tan swallowed. He prayed they didn’t see hounds again. What he’d gone through the day before had been enough. At least if they faced them again, Cobin might be there. And Roine. He seemed comfortable with his sword. Not that a sword would be any better than a bow, but maybe a pack of hounds would be frightened by more of them.
    “Talk to your ma before we go, Tan. Sometimes I think you forget you’re not the only one struggling.”
    Cobin was right. He needed to talk to her. All she wanted was him to find something that made him happy. “I will.”

CHAPTER 10
Responsibility

    Tan found his mother sitting at the edge of town atop the low wall. A cool breeze gusted out of the north, whipping at his shirt and pants but somehow leaving her alone. The air smelled of rain and lightning, the threat of the earlier heat still hanging on. She stared into the mountains. Tan didn’t have to question to know what she thought.
    “We could return,” he said as he approached. “Live in that old house again…”
    She turned and smiled. Deep wrinkles at the corner of her eyes faded. Her hair, pulled tight behind her head on most days anymore, now hung loose around her shoulders the way his father had always liked it. She sighed. “Some things you can’t go back to.”
    Tan looked over her shoulder, up into the lower hills. Their old home was up there, now left abandoned. Little more than three rooms and built solidly by his father, it had a warmth to it that was missing in Nor. “I could go back.”
    “And do what? Spend all day hunting? With your father…”
    She didn’t finish. She didn’t need to. His father was a skilled senser. Hunting came easily for him. Tan didn’t have the same skills as his father. “You were happier there too.”
    She nodded and turned back to look toward the treeline. Bright silver moonlight shone down. A wolf howled distantly, the sound strangely reassuring. “I miss him.” She said it so softly that he almost couldn’t hear it.
    “I think that’s why I don’t want to go anywhere,” Tan said. He climbed over the wall and sat next to her.  
    She took his hand. Her fingers felt strong and soft, but so small compared to his. At least in that he took after his father. “We have mourned him well, Tan. Now it’s time to move on.”
    “Is that what you’re doing? Is that why Lord Lind treats you so well?” The words came out harsher than he intended, but she looked at him and smiled anyway.
    “Lind treats me well enough.”
    He noticed that she didn’t really answer. They sat in silence for a while longer. Another wolf howled, its cry low and lonesome. Tan let his eyes drift closed and listened to the trees, tracing the presence of the wolf high into the mountains. He thought of what Cobin said about the wolves and wondered who had killed them. The huge mountain wolves mostly left people alone, but when they attacked, they could be deadly. Killing three meant skill. And if someone were that skilled, they could just as well have avoided the wolves altogether. Hopefully he and Cobin could keep them away from the Incendin hounds as they made their way to the upper passes with Roine.
    “Do you know him?” he asked.
    She turned toward him, her face shadowed.