THE night air nipped at Dev's skin as he made his way to the back door of the kitchens. He was glad of the chill—it cooled his boiling blood.

The Lourdes girls would be the death of him, he was sure. Spoiled Aster and vain Ursula had been intolerable since the day he began his service at Lourdes Manor. Today had pinched the young Keeper's last nerve.

"Stupid, no-good, pampered princess brats!" he growled to himself.

The young Herman standing guard at the kitchen's servants' entrance cast a downward glance at him. Dev glared back, flinging open the rickety wooden door. A gust of warm, wet, savory air, the steam of a dozen cooking pots, dampened his face.

"Eh!" Gatch, the girls' nanny-woman, stood over a large wooden table. She held a bowl of oddgob, Chef Ingle's usual stew of leftovers. "What's all that about, little Dev?"

Little Dev. He was nearly fourteen, and taller than Gatch to boot. The little she insisted on was another irritating part of life at Lourdes Manor.

He ignored her and stormed up to the table— well, not even really a table. The servants of the Lourdes' house had no table. It was, in actuality, a counter, one the cooks used for chopping, and dicing, and rolling out dough. Dev always ate his dinner standing at that counter, the occasional piece of onion or carrot flying into his meal.

He slammed his fist down, and Cook Darby looked up from her creamed potatoes with a frown. Dev returned it. He'd dealt with enough attitude for one day.

"Well, well," said Gatch, shoving a spoonful of stew into her mouth. "Someone's in a right sour mood this evening." "Chef Ingle," he barked, "can I get some oddgob here, or what?" The wiry chef raised an eyebrow and looked at Gatch. Gatch just shook her head. Ingle grunted, but scooped a ladleful of stew into a wooden bowl.

Dev grabbed the hot bowl, burning both his hands, but he swal lowed down the pain.

The crunchy, beady eyes of a particularly ugly crustacean stared up at him from the brown gravy. Binger heads. He hated binger heads. He slammed his fist on the counter for the second time. "Turds of Tawn!"

"Jumpin'!" shouted Gatch. "A very sour mood!"

Dev shouldn't have been so blasphemous, especially as a Keeper. But he couldn't hold it in any longer. All he could hear was Ursula's voice in his head— her arrogant, nasal voice. "She called me her servant!"

"Who did?"

"Me!" he shouted. "Her servant!"

The kitchen went silent, save for a quiet bubbling. Gatch, Chef Ingle, and Cook Darby stopped what they were doing and stared at him, their old foreheads folded in half with worry. The other kitchen helpers looked anywhere but at Dev.

"Who did?" ventured Gatch finally.

Dev dropped his eyes to his bowl and shoved a crunchy, rubbery binger head into his mouth, his face suddenly red. Chewing would keep him from speaking; he'd already said too much. Keepers were supposed to be mild and forbearing and ... well, all the things he wasn't being.

"You serve Alcor," said Ingle, a confused look on her face. "No other."

Dev shook his head.

"Is this about Lady Ursula?" Gatch asked quietly.

Dev kept chewing.

"Lady Ursula?" said Chef Ingle. "What about Lady Ursula?" Dev sighed. He'd opened this door, he might as well go through. "She said I was her servant. As though I were nothing but a stableboy." There was a simultaneous gasp from Ingle and Darby, Ingle dropping her soup ladle with a loud clatter onto the floor. Dev winced. He shouldn't have spoken. Rizlan would not approve of him venting his frustration to half the Manor like this. It wasn't as if Ursula could be changed. Very little about Lourdes Manor could be changed.

"That—that— that girl!" The scrawny chef fingered the bear pen dant around her neck, her face contorted with fury. "Blasphemous! Disrespectful! Gatch, how dare she speak to a Keeper that way?"

Here it comes. Dev hated when Ingle got on about faith—about the Chosen Keepers and all that. Her piety sometimes embarrassed him. Yes, he had been selected at birth by the stars to be a Keeper of a High Beast—and not just any High Beast, but the most powerful and beloved of all the stars' children, the Hemoth Bear—but it was Master Rizlan, Mizar's Keeper, who led the faith at Lourdes Manor. Dev was only an apprentice, and truth be told, he studied scripture less than Riz would like.

Gatch nodded understandingly at him, a kind smile on her face. "Lady Ursula can be thoughtless at times." Dev didn't answer. "You have to understand, little Dev"—he shoved another disgusting bin ger into his mouth—"that she hasn't been raised with the same... vigilance to scripture as you."

"No vigilance, more like!" growled Ingle. "Imagine! A noble demanding service from a Keeper! It's disgusting! He was chosen! Chosen! This boy is a servant of the Hemoth Bear! Not of her spoiled behind!"

Exactly, Dev thought. He was chosen to dedicate his life to Tawn and his descendants. How could Ursula Lourdes not understand that? Sure, Dev spent his days shoveling bear dung, washing Alcor's stall, and studying scripture until he fell asleep on his books. But that was his duty. Keepers were not supposed to care for their own wealth and comfort. Keepers cared only for their Beasts.

Gatch put a hand on Dev's shoulder. "Ursula doesn't fully under stand that you work for a Higher Power than her father. To her, he is the Highest Power."

That was ridiculous. A man with more power than the Hemoth Bear? More power than the On-High?

"If that mother of hers spent more time taking care of her spiri tual well-being instead of indulging her every selfish whim—" shouted Ingle.

Everyone turned quickly to the kitchen door, terrified that Jasper Lourdes's wife would suddenly appear to punish them for speaking ill of her older daughter.

With a hand over her mouth, and in a hissing whisper, the chef finished: "—she wouldn't be the laughingstock of the Highen. Her and the little one."

Dev raised an eyebrow. As though the spoiled nature of Ursula and Aster were entirely the fault of Lady Lourdes. Dev knew the Lourdes better than he'd known any family of his own, and this was the truth: Jasper Lourdes adored his daughters. He adored them so much that he indulged them in everything. Oftentimes, that meant letting them neglect their Star Writ readings, or forgo a riding lesson, or sleep late—despite Lady Lourdes' objections.

And the lack of discipline in the Major's home was no secret to the Highen, either. Most people had a low opinion of the Major's daughters. No one believed Alcor would choose Ursula for Major when her father and Mizar came off the post. Not just because she was unprepared, but—these whispers were increasingly common in Tawnshire Town— because the On-High would reject her as punishment for Jasper's decision to hand a holy dragon egg to the Ring Highen, something no Major had ever done before. Did not the On-High entrust the Shadow Dragons to the Bear Highen, and the Bear Highen alone? Was it not sacrilege to trade their young like crops or cattle?

But if the girls weren't chosen to succeed Jasper, oh, what a disaster it would be. The Hemoth Bear had chosen a Lourdes for a millennium. It was a thing that kept Dev up at night—if Aster and Ursula proved to be the first Lourdes in a hundred generations to be unworthy of the Hemoth Bear, who would Alcor choose? What strange new lord or lady, Dev didn't like to wonder, would he and Alcor spend their lives alongside?

"Can we stop talking about this?" he grumbled.

He could feel the old women trading concerned looks over his head. Perfect. No doubt Gatch would talk to Master Rizlan about this when he returned from the front. Even if she didn't, Ingle and Darby were bound to gossip with every servant at the Manor; it was only a matter of time before Dev's complaint made its way to Lady Lourdes herself. Either way, when his mentor returned from battle, Dev would have to listen to another lesson on the importance of silence.

A wise Keeper uses his words sparingly, Riz always said. Consider words your gold, young apprentice. To keep them behind closed lips is to stay a wealthy man.

If that was true, then Riz was poor indeed.

He never chattered or gossiped. But he did lecture Dev nightly about the duties of a Keeper: offering counsel; divining prophecies; fortelling the future; caring for the Highen's sacred beasts; and record ing great events, that his writings might someday be added to the holy Star Writ. Most of their evenings lately, though, had been devoted to training Dev to open his mind to visions sent by the stars. Dev had yet to see anything, and he knew that Riz was getting frustrated. He should have seen something by now.

At least Dev wouldn't have to endure a lesson tonight. Though he missed Master Rizlan desperately, he had to admit that he liked having the Keepers' quarters all to himself.

Eager to enjoy some privacy, Dev lifted the hot stew of bin ger heads to his mouth and slurped up what was left. No time for chewing—an evening of peace and quiet was at the bottom of that bowl. With the last drop drunk, he slammed the bowl down and let out a belch.

And noticed everyone staring at him.

Including Lady Lourdes.

The Major's beautiful wife stood in the middle of the kitchen, staring down her nose at him. Her fancy gown glittering with pre cious Ursan amber was almost laughable, it was so out of place in the kitchen.

"I trust you enjoyed your meal, young Keeper." Her voice was rough, like the leathery bottoms of Alcor's paws. All that Celeste root she smoked had worn it out.

"Yes, my lady," he mumbled, adding a polite bow.

"I am pleased to hear it." She didn't look pleased. She looked downright disgusted, with frowning crimson-painted lips. Her dark eyes kept him frozen to the spot, afraid to move. He could feel his palms getting slick with sweat.

And then she blinked and turned to Ingle. In an instant, she'd forgotten Dev completely. "The girls are in low spirits tonight, Chef Ingle. They miss their father, and I fear they've grown restless. I've decided a change of menu is in order."

Ingle curtsied, so low she nearly fell over. "Of course, my lady. What did you have in mind?"

Dev fought the urge to shake his head. Ingle spoke the worst of Lady Lourdes, but she always bowed the lowest.

"Lamb pies." The words cracked from Lady Lourdes' mouth like the snap of a whip. "I don't care for them, but I do believe my Aster is fond of the ones you make. I should like an assortment of greens on the side, of course."

"Of course, my lady," said Ingle, already abandoning Darby's creamed potatoes.

Dev pursed his lips. He would have preferred those potatoes to Binger heads.

With a curt nod, Lady Lourdes left them, the train of her dress floating behind her, twinkling.

A change of menu, Dev thought. An entire meal tossed aside as though hundreds of Tawnshirians living a few hundred tail-lengths down the hillside in Tawnshire Town wouldn't have loved just a taste. It had been a very dry summer, and the yields of good Tawnshirian crops— lettuce, parsnips, chard, leeks, tomatoes— were low. The war was not good for business in the city, either. The unwanted potatoes was a true waste.

But creamed potatoes was a rich man's food, a king's food, not fit for the low and the humble. So Ingle had tossed it all, as was expected. Dev left the counter and pushed open the kitchen door, the cool night meeting him with the refreshing smell of cherry trees from the Manor's orchards.

Ingle grabbed him by the shoulder. "Take this," she said, smiling and holding up a raw lamb shank wrapped in parchment. "For the little prince."

As inappropriate as Gatch's little was for Dev, Ingle's little was even more ill-fitting for Alcor. Alcor was certainly not little. Not anymore. But still, Ingle loved to sneak him treats. And Alcor was happy to eat them.

Dev nodded and took the shank.

The night's quiet and the chill of the wind surrounded him as he crossed the Manor's grounds. He let out a sigh of relief: the day was almost over. A quick stop in to Alcor with the shank, and then the hours were his. He'd curl up in front of the fire and watch the blaze until he fell asleep.

He could think of nothing he'd enjoy more than doing absolutely nothing at all.