It was early the next morning that I found the body. I had been holding my horse back to keep him from plunging headlong down the mountain when he suddenly shied away from the trail we were following. I urged him forward and he reared back instead, whinnying in fear. I managed to back him up a few paces and dismounted after calming him down.

I slowly made my way down the mountain until I came to the body. It was one of the wolves from the pack that had accompanied the gray riders. He had been dead for some time and there was a gaping hole in his side. Bending closer, I saw a glint of light in the depths of his body. I slowly reached in and extracted one of the silver balls. It was hot and gleamed brightly in the morning sun. I watched as the blood that had coated it was slowly absorbed into the ball. Once it was gone, the ball cooled down and lost its gleam.

I carefully put the ball back in the pouch around my neck. I pulled the wolf off the trail and behind a tree, remounted my horse and we resumed our journey down the mountainside. My horse suddenly didn't seem so eager to rejoin his companions and was content to take his time as we made our way into the valley below.

I rode the length of the valley, following the terrain as it curved around other mountains and continued its gentle slope down. We stopped for the night by a lake that was nestled at the feet of three high mountains. At the far end, I could hear the roar of a waterfall and knew that I would be heading upward all day when we resumed traveling. I lit a fire that night and added firewood to the load my horse was carrying. I was getting low on food, so I decided to make the next day a hunting day to rehone my skills with the bow and arrow.

I changed my mind the next morning and decided to camp where I was for a day or two. I spent the day climbing the mountains surrounding the lake, hunting for small game. I managed to shoot a couple of small rabbits by the end of the day and roasted them over the open flames of my fire that night.

Early the next morning, I set off again, alternating between riding my horse and leading him up and over the mountains. We stumbled across more wolves that had died from the silver balls and I took care to retrieve them as we went along. Like the first wolf, each one had a growing hole where the silver ball had entered, which made them easy to remove. Each ball was hot when I first grabbed it, but cooled off quickly once it had regained its original appearance.

A couple of days later, we found the first horse. The ball had hit it high in the shoulder, lodging itself in the bone. The flesh and muscle surrounding it was eaten away and I could see where the bone was disintegrating also. The hole was as big as my hand and it was obvious that the horse had suffered before going down. When I pulled the ball out, pieces of the bone crumbled beneath my hand.

We came across two more horses the next day. The first one was in the same shape as the one we had found the previous day, but the second one was still alive. It lay on its side, thrashing in pain. I pulled my horse to a stop and dismounted to inspect it. The silver ball had caught it in the haunches burrowing deep. The hole it had made had spread to the size of my outstretched hand and every time the horse stirred, black liquid bubbled up from the wound.

I tried to shut out its suffering as I examined it. The edges of the wound smoked as the flesh dissolved before my eyes. The horse tried to struggle to its feet in fear, but it was evident that it was too far gone to make any significant movements. I stood up, pulled the Blade from its scabbard and cut the animal's throat, putting it out of its misery. After the horse had stopped thrashing, I retrieved the ball from the wound and put it back in my pouch.

My mount was spooked by what it had witnessed and was reluctant to move on, but equally afraid of staying. I spurred it forward roughly and we continued on, following the path of the gray riders. We spent the night high on a summit, partially sheltered from the cold wind by a stand of trees. I built a large fire to keep warm and thought about what I had seen that day as I prepared for bed.