"I don't know. But whether the former or the latter, I'm not particularly interested in punishing it. Yet I will give you a warning. Do not let this success go to your heads. You remain bound to the authority of the Black Book, which is in turn bound to the authority of the clergy of Mallon, which is itself bound to the authority of the king—and the king is bound to Taim himself. These chains must not be looked at as chains of bondage: but as a sacred duty, both to those above you and those below. No matter how good the intentions, whenever that duty is betrayed, everything is betrayed with it, from the simplest commoners to the greatest of the gods. Am I understood?"

  "Yes, Inquisitor Vara," Myla and I answered as one.

  She leaned back and nodded. "Then I am glad. Have I said that you did well today? You did well today. But you look like something a necromancer has reanimated. Now go and get some sleep."

  It was my favorite order I had ever been given.

  13

  I woke to a hustle and bustle I had been part of before: the unique rhythm of the preparation for war.

  I found Rowe straight away. "We're going to attack them, aren't we?"

  "What gave it away?" he said. "All the weapons? Or that if we don't, they're going to sack Mallon?"

  "What's the plan?"

  "Isn't one yet. At least not one that they're revealing to people like you and me. But the way they're acting, expect Vara to hit them the second she thinks we're ready."

  I didn't need an explanation for her haste: when you find yourself up against sorcerers bent on creating things like wights and undead golems, it's generally best to not give them the time to bring their plans to fruition.

  I felt much better after my sleep, and even better yet after I'd had a bath, which I typically don't favor—a certain amount of earthiness is the sign you keep in close contact with the world—but the events of the prior night and morning had given me a little too much of that contact. I found Garold and made sure to let him know I was ready for my next duty, whatever it might be.

  He smirked, mustaches twitching. "Whatever it might be?"

  "That's my duty, isn't it?"

  "Then you best hope I don't decide to have you face off against the bone golem."

  "You wouldn't really do that, though. Ah. Would you?"

  "You're the fearsome demon-slayer, aren't you? Can't think of anyone better to send in against the monsters."

  Garold tipped back his head and laughed loud enough to summon the dead, slapping his own hip, as if he'd made the world's greatest joke. So why did I have the suspicion he wasn't entirely kidding?

  The Black Book may have been preparing for battle, but that meant it was all the more vital to maintain the illusion that it wasn't. I'd been allowed to sleep in, but Myla and Lod were already manning the merchant stall, and I hustled across town to join them. I was a little sore from yesterday's exertions, but it wasn't enough to slow me down.

  "About time," Myla said as I arrived. "Why even bother showing up if you're going to sleep that late? We'll only be here for another two hours."

  "It's not wise to short yourself of your share of sleep," I said. "For one thing, what if our dreams aren't really dreams?"

  "What else would they be?"

  "The sights we see when we visit another realm of being. You see, clearly this realm is damaging to the body. That's why we get tired and wear down the longer we exist within it. But when we sleep, our minds travel to another place. One that doesn't damage us. One that by all indications restores us, allowing us to persist for another day in this realm. So, like I said. Not wise to short yourself of sleep."

  Myla blinked at me. "What lunatic did you get that from?"

  "Myself?"

  "You're very strange."

  A woman approached our tables. Myla turned away to greet her. After this, she said very little, even to our browsers and customers. I didn't see what was so disturbing about my idea. If anything I thought it was a little obvious. She could call it "strange" if she liked, but if anything, Myla's resistance to new ideas struck me as unsuitable for anyone who wished to some day be a full agent of the Black Book.

  "Maybe they're right."

  I glanced about, but Myla's words hadn't been prompted by anything I could see. "About the true threat being the undead? I'd say we proved that when we caught the enemy making the undead."

  "About nethermancers," she said. "About them being evil. Something that must be destroyed."

  I arched my eyebrows like the undergirdings of a bridge. "I didn't know that was a matter of controversy."

  "Did I say it was? Forget it."

  "Well, what do you mean?"

  She shook her head as if to dismiss the entire thing, then clenched her jaw. "When you're taught to believe a thing, are you always taught to understand it as well?"

  "No? Yes: my answer is no."

  "Do I believe—have I always believed—that it was right to scour the nethermancers from our lands? Of course. But I never understood it until this dawn, when I watched them remove the bones from a living man and use them to raise a monster. The people who could do such a thing are worse than the abominations they create."

  "Yes," I said. "Now I see what you mean."

  I was sorely tempted to play a bit of devil's advocate, and wonder out loud if the nether wasn't inherently evil, but rather a reflection of the temperament of whoever was using it—after all, it could be used to heal as well as harm, and to destroy abominations as well as create them. The same general principle was true of the ether, really.

  But, fool that I often was, I was wise enough in that moment to realize this wasn't the time. The bone golem had shaken her. Just like I'd been shaken the first time I'd seen the wights. I don't think people were meant to see such things. When you do, it turns you into something else. Something you don't ever change back from.

  ~

  The following day was more of the same for us. Inside the compound, everybody was rushing about getting supplies together, sharpening swords, and so forth, but from the outside, it was as quiet as a monastery. It was the coldest day yet, and as we headed for the plaza, frost gleamed on decorative shrubs and the small gardens tucked behind houses and between blocks.

  For whatever reason, our business was as brisk as the weather. We moved more goods that day than any two others combined. Lod didn't let us pack up shop until sundown. It was fully dark before we were on our way back. I could see my breath and the wagon's bench was cold enough I wished I had a blanket.

  We'd no sooner got the wagon back and the horses turned over to the grooms when Garold beckoned us to him. "Inquisitor Vara wants to see you. She's got a new assignment for you."

  We thanked him and headed for her offices.

  "What d'you think it'll be?" I said. "Scouting the enemy's position? We've already proven we can do that. Or will we just be part of the general assault?"

  "Don't be so eager for a fight," Lod said. "You just might get it."

  His tone had been mild. So why did the rebuke hit me like a hard slap? I was still wondering as much as we gained entry to the Inquisitor's room and were brought before her.

  "It goes without saying that everything you are about to hear must not be repeated outside this room." She motioned us to be seated, then got to her feet. "We've learned the people you followed into the desert are indeed members of the Southern Wind. We also know where they keep themselves, and that two nights from now, they will return to the Temple of Lost Exit to animate another of the bone constructs. It is at that time that we will make our move against them."

  I nodded. "Tell us how we can serve."

  "If Taim wills it, this will be the only head of the snake we need to cut off. But Taim would not favor us with that outcome if we didn't take it on ourselves to ensure there are no other heads to sever. To that end, I am sending the three of you to Barr."

  "What?" I said.

  "Barr?" Myla said.

  "Happy to do so for you, my lady," Lod said.

  "We can't assume that the members of the Scorpions you saw at the temple are the same ones that stole the dead in Barr earlier this year. It will be your job to hunt for any other members of their order there. If you find any of them, or even any reasonable suspicion of their activity, don't attempt to follow them or interfere in any way. Return here and inform me immediately."

  She smoothed her dress and seated herself. "But it's my hope there won't be anything for you to find—and that by the time I see you again, we will have exterminated all those associated with the threat to Mallon."

  She gave us a few more details, but I wasn't listening. Once we were done, Garold brought us to the quartermaster. Apparently we were supposed to leave that very night.

  "I don't understand it," I complained to Garold. "Anyone could ride to Barr and have a look around. We don't have any idea how strong our enemies—and their creations—might be. Myla and I are sorcerers. Wouldn't we be more use here?"

  "No," Garold said.

  "But surely trained scouts would be better suited to Barr than—"

  "No."

  "But you—"

  "No. Make me say it again, and it'll be with the back of my hand."

  To be on the safe side, I just nodded. Repeatedly.

  They allowed us to eat some dinner before booting us out on our way. Our cloaks mostly shielded us from the frigid winds cutting across the streets. Setting their cities on the mesas might help save the Colleners from invasion, but it really was no good for the winter. It was a relief to reach the lower town at the foot of the mesa, where we were far less exposed.

  I shook myself to get any lingering pieces of freeze off me. "Now then. Where do we pick up our horses?"

  Lod furrowed his brow. "Horses?"

  "The ones we're to ride to Barr on?"

  "Oh, we're not getting any horses."

  "Didn't Garold say that Barr is sixty miles from here?"

  "Yes."

  "Then why do you think we don't have horses?"

  "Why, because horses are for plowing fields." Lod sounded mildly affronted. "Hauling water. Bearing in the grain. They exist to help turn the dust into bounty, not to be ridden."

  We had started down the main road out of town and I was almost certain he was serious. "Everywhere else in the world thinks otherwise."

  "Is this everywhere else in the world?" Myla said. "No. We're in Collen. And in Collen, we use our own two feet." She watched me a moment, as if she was about to critique my walking technique, then gave a small shrug. "Besides, it's not just about principles. If we ride into Barr on horseback, we'll draw every eye in town."

  This made enough sense for me to shut my mouth. Smoke rose from nearly every chimney in the lower town. But instead of the smell of wood smoke, it was a mix of burning coal, dung, and sage. I couldn't decide if I liked it or not. Either way, it was a strange thing to think that something as basic as the smell of a town's winter smoke could be so different between one realm and its neighbor.

  The lower city didn't bother with serious walls, but it still had a short brick one to demarcate the border between city and wilderness. We passed through this and into the desert.

  Barr lay roughly sixty miles to the east. Lod led the way. I knew the old man must know his way around, or at the very least knew which way east was, but I couldn't help glancing at the stars to confirm our direction. The cold had frozen all the impurities from the night sky and the Celeset poured through the black firmament just like the river of stars it was named as. How high above us had the gods hung the stars? And what was their nature? If the sun nourished the crops of the field—but could punish them, too—what forms of nourishment and punishment did the stars and their constellations dole out?

  My ears burned from the cold. I lowered my head and raised my hood. Between the vastness of the desert and the blackness of the sky, it felt as though anything could swoop down on us at any moment.

  Yet I knew forces were watching out for us from above, and that we were watching out for each other as well.

  ~

  I didn't really think about how we were going to stay warm through the night until Lod declared it was time to make camp. As it turned out, the method was rather unsophisticated: swaddle ourselves tight in our cloaks, press ourselves together, and wrap the whole bundle beneath a thick felt blanket.

  It worked well enough to keep us alive. That's about as much as I'm going to say to its credit.

  We woke with the sun. One of the first things Lod did was hand me a small shovel. I gave him a puzzled look and he smiled at me. A few minutes later, when I went off in search of a sagebrush big enough to provide some privacy, I learned what the shovel was for.

  We got on our way, the wan sun glaring into our eyes.

  "Sixty miles," I said, trying not to mutter. I gestured to my distant left. "What's wrong with floating a boat in one of these canals and rowing it there?"

  "They don't run all the way to Barr," Lod said. "And this time of year, the water's too low. And what little there is of it's likely frozen."

  "Okay, but besides that?"

  He chuckled. "I never heard a body complain so much about having to go for a walk."

  "It's not the nature of the walk itself so much as the absurdity of its length."

  "Why, both Myla and myself had gone for a longer walk at six years old. Wasn't nobody there on the trip with us, either!"

  My brain couldn't find any purchase on what he had just said. "You must be sixty years older than she is. How on earth do you expect me to believe you two walked sixty miles together when you were six years old?"

  "Wasn't together, that's how."

  "But you just said—"

  He shook his wizened head. "The Long Trek. Each one of us has to do it before we reach our seventh year. Too scared to try? Then you don't belong here. You get shipped off. Don't have any room for the cowards or the weak."

  I rubbed my face. "If I'm following this right, when you're six years old, you're forced to go out on a walking tour? All by yourself? For more than sixty miles?"

  " 's what I said."

  "During a child's fourth and fifth years, they're made to practice and train," Myla explained. "During the spring festivals, those who've turned six within the last year are brought into town, where a drawing is held to decide whether a given child will make their Long Trek during the summer, or the winter. There are twelve routes in all, or at least there were when I was a child. Last I knew, the shortest of them was 64 miles."

  I gestured searchingly. "And they're all alone? What happens if something goes wrong? Or if they get hurt?"

  "Then they don't come back."

  "That sounds barbaric!"

  "Is it barbaric if that's what it takes to survive here? Would it be less barbaric to raise a generation of youth too weak to endure, create, and teach the next generation?"

  "Most people don't seem to have any problem doing that despite not chucking their children into the wilderness for days on end."

  "Oh, it's not half so bad as you imagine," Lod scoffed. "I still remember every moment of my Trek. And that's a real wonder, because most of it was damn boring! Well, other'n the blizzard, of course. And the giant spiders."

  I frowned. "Giant spiders? Did you fall into their nest?"

  "Nope. But that didn't stop them from chasing me halfway across the desert!"

  "Chasing you?" I glanced around myself in half-panic, then turned on him. "Are you winding me up? Filling the gullible outsider's head with tall tales?"

  "Not at all. But now I'm tempted to!" He had a good laugh at this. "You know, though, I'd have to do a heap of thinking to pull that off. Why go to such trouble when I can just tell what really happened?

  "Now you may not know it looking at my shining, youthful face. But I was called to take my Long Trek more'n sixty years ago. My lot was called for a winter journey, to begin about a week before the turning of the year. The route was between Toll and Donnal."

  "I know Toll," Myla said. "Where's Donnal?"

  "Burned to cinders by King Martin during the Bear Rebellion. Used to be a few miles north of Dart's Mesa, if you know it."

  "The deep desert."

  Lod nodded. "As I said, this was winter. That means they gave me warm clothes and a blanket, but that was it. Not even any water. Well, lucky for me, the night before my trek, a blizzard blew in. Woke up to a foot of snow on the ground. So much for my water troubles!

  "I set out from Toll at dawn. The way the snow muffles things, I'd never seen the land so silent and so still. Felt like I was the only thing in all the world. That was just fine by me. Only living things I wanted to run into between there and Donnal was things I could eat. It was cloudy that first morning, but the sun broke out that afternoon. I still remember the way it looked, like gold poured on the drifts.

  "That warmed things up a bit, so I thought it was a good time for a nap. No way to get a fire going, you see. That meant I'd have to walk through the night—or else my blood would freeze in my veins while I slept.

  "When dusk came, I woke up and I got walking. Step after step after step after step. The snow was thick and it was slow going. I couldn't press myself too hard, neither. Not if I wanted to last through the night. I doubt I bettered two miles in an hour. If anything it was more quiet than it had been during the day, but I kept thinking I was seeing things in the corners of my eyes—rabbits and the like, or little glimmers of lights. But every time I turned my head, there was nothing there.

  "By the middle of the night, it felt more like a dream than anything real. I kept looking up and seeing the wrong stars ahead of me and realizing I'd wandered off course and having to set myself straight. Then again, at least that gave me something to do. Something to think about 'sides how damn cold and tired my feet were. I won't say it was torturous. I will say that I'd never been so happy to see the sun rise in the morning—though, as it turned out, that would only be true for a single day.

  "I slept like the dead. For so long that when I finally got up, I was sure I must have frozen something. But everything seemed just fine. To pass the time before my legs were warmed up enough to hit the trail again, I found a rock with a good edge and chopped out a stout branch of sage. Now sage is hardly what you'd call strong, but it still felt damn good to have a club in hand.

 

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