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Chapter Thirty-Three

The orderwall that marked the entrance into Harkwood Steading was a shimmering veil of lightning on the horizon. Estev told them it was a new addition, hastily constructed following the eruption of violence in Anvelheim. There must be a great deal of panic in Fulcrum, Rae thought. Chaos hasn’t reached this far into the Ordered World since the days of the Heretriarch. Not including Hadroy’s little insurrection, of course.

A ripple of excitement went through the ship’s passengers as soon as the barrier came into view. Everyone shifted forward on the deck, straining to get a better look, until the crew had to force people back to prevent the ship from becoming unbalanced. As guests of the captain, Estev and the others had unrestricted access to the command decks, as well as the stormnest and nacelles. This allowed a fine view of the approaching orderwall. Rae was enjoying the spectacle when Estev joined him.

“Not very subtle work, is it?” Estev said. “Harkness hasn’t seen an orderwall on its borders for generations. It seems the bastellan and her cadre have forgotten how to form the thing gracefully.”

“Looks a lot like the orderwall back home,” Rae said.

“Yes, well, Hammerwall was on the border. Subtle measures were not called for,” Estev answered. “But even with the troubles there and in Aervelling, this all seems a bit much, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know,” Rae said. “How many people have to die before extreme measures are called for?”

Estev didn’t really answer, just laid a hand on the railing and sighed deeply. They stood there for a long time in companionable silence.

Rae blinked and let his wandering mind focus on the approaching barrier. Slow lightning flickered out of the ground, shifting back and forth like kelp in a current.

“I’ve lived long enough in the shadow of such a wall,” Rae said. “I trusted it, and it failed.”

“Hopefully we all have better luck with this one,” Estev said. “Fulcrum stands, as the justicars are so fond of saying.”

“The only way this wall will matter is if Anvilheim falls, right? There are hundreds of justicars securing that border, and still thousands upon thousands of people are fleeing this steading. Fleeing toward Fulcrum,” Rae said. “The justicars wouldn’t have built this wall if they were sure Anvilheim would survive. Right?”

Still no answer. Rae snorted.

“This Rassek fellow has them that scared? They honestly think he’s going to make his way here, knock down this wall, and keep going?” Rae threw his hands up in frustration. “How are we supposed to believe anything the justicars say? The orderwall is supposed to protect against the incursion of Chaos, yet one demon has punched his way through two of them already. What’s a third going to matter?”

“There is more to Rassek than the justicars understand,” was all Estev would say. Then the Pearlescent began its transit through the orderwall.

A stray stroke of blue-ish lightning flickered over the hull. For a second, Rae could taste the storm in his mouth, and feel it stirring through his blood. The storm mote hummed in anticipation of reunion. He clamped down on it, willing the wraith to silence the yearning. Cold fury wrapped around him. It wasn’t until after they were through the barrier, and the lightning had returned to its sentry, that Rae released the wraith. Estev was watching him closely, one hand on Rae’s shoulder. Once it was clear Rae wasn’t about to channel his spirit, Estev cleared his throat and continued, as if their conversation hadn’t been interrupted at all.

“Until we know why he’s after you and that wraith, we have to assume he’ll keep coming,” he said. “The more orderwalls we can put between you and him, the better.”

“Even if it means risking the lives of all these people?”

“Even then,” Estev said.

“You talk like you know he’s still alive,” Rae said. “You said otherwise in Anvilheim.”

“You have to trust me, Rae. Rassek will always be a threat. Dead or not.”

Rae grimaced and looked away. Estev was asking a lot. Perhaps La and Mahk were right. Perhaps it was coming time to strike out on their own.

He stared down at the villages that bordered Harkwood Steading. He counted the narrow streets, the grid of buildings that faded into woodlands, and then farmland beyond. An orchard stretched to the west, neat rows of trees in full bloom, surrounded by a thicket fence. A square of soldiers marched in an outlying field, practicing their formations, bristling with pikes and the puffy clouds of musket shot. Proud banners flew from their ranks. Rae gripped the handrail.

It didn’t matter. The way things were going, this place would fall any day now, or in a week, or a month. Their orderwall pierced and their nice ordered existence snuffed out like so many candles.

Worthless, all of it worthless. Chaos would come here, and destroy everything, just as it had in Hammerwall, then Anvilheim. Each massacre was worse than the last. The farmers, the soldiers, the gardeners, the children . . . all as good as dead.

Unless they could stop him. Unless Rae could stop him.

They just had to get to the Heretic’s Eye. Maybe they’d find something there. All he could do was hope.


The main deck was still crowded, despite the fact that many of the passengers had opted to disembark shortly after the Pearlescent cleared the Harkwood orderwall. Bedrolls and makeshift tents tangled the rigging, shrunken figures huddling between coils of ropes and in the lee of barrels and against the gunwales. Those figures watched Rae’s progress with unveiled anger. There was word among the crew that both they and the passengers hadn’t been sleeping well. Dreams, and darker things, haunted the night. Rae prayed it wasn’t his wraith causing this, but feared what else might be stalking them. Blackened eyes followed him as he marched across the deck. He tried to avoid their gaze, tried to ignore the desperate faces, the wrinkled faces.

Where are they running to? Rae wondered. Fulcrum can’t hold them all. Even if it could, is even Fulcrum proof against Chaos? Where can we go, when the Ordered World seems to be falling apart? Everything’s falling into Chaos. What’s left?

—there is always death. Yveth’s voice in his head came unbidden and unwelcome. chaos does not reach into oblivion. The shadowlands are the last refuge of all humanity.

“And what kind of hope is that?” Rae muttered aloud. A few deckhands, scrambling through their chores, stopped and stared at him. There must have been some manifestation of the wraith, because their eyes were filled with horror. He reeled it in, feeling the sun grow warm on his face, and the frost melt from his breath. He couldn’t even control the manifestations anymore! How was he supposed to face a demon, when he couldn’t even face himself?

Rae hooked a hand into the rigging and clambered up into the sails. He felt better here, and had spent a lot of time among the sails in the last few days. The stormnest was the only place the others rarely went. It was the only place Rae could really be alone. And even there the wraith lingered. It waited. It watched.

The wind elementals that roared through the sails recognized him, maybe even sensed some echo of the storm mote that had been his first binding. A warm song flowed through his bones as he climbed higher and higher. He left the deck behind, and his sister, and the worries of a dying world, an angry Mahk, and the demon on their trail. This high in the air, Rae could almost believe he was flying, carried on the clouds. He reached the stormnest and looped his legs into the leather harness. There was no sign of weather, but he didn’t want to slip and tumble accidentally into the void. Unslinging the sword from his back, Rae laid the shattered crystal blade across his knees and ran a hand along its cold length. Lights played through the depths of the spiritblade, flickering like lightning.

I wonder if the wraith could save me from that? he mused, leaning back against the main mast and closing his eyes. How far can you fall before even a wraith will die from the impact?

—all the way from Heaven, the wraith answered.

“That’s hardly a satisfactory answer,” Rae said. The wraith shivered through his soul, something like a laugh, if laughter were written in uncomfortable silences. Rae held the sword out, sighting down the fuller like it was a musket. “Is that what you were before you died, Yveth? A lawbinder?”

—you’ve seen my soul. you know that isn’t the case.

“The demon, right. Binding that demon would have obliterated you, the angel, and the demon as well. Just the stormbinder, then.” Rae planted the tip of the sword against the gnarled deck of the stormnest and fed a little bit of his soul into it. The shattered pattern in the blade lit up, casting the bound soul’s design across the wooden planks in scintillating lines of light. Slowly, Rae rotated the spiritblade to reveal the entire tapestry of souls, mortal and profane and elemental, wound tightly together. The demon coiled through like a cancer. “Why did you bind a demon?”

—i don’t remember. i barely remember my name. There was a long silence. When the wraith’s voice returned, it was quieter. so much is lost to me.

“Estev says he knew you, once. Or at least, someone with your name.” Rae didn’t think it would help to tell the wraith that Yveth Maelys was still alive, and ruling the justicars in Fulcrum.

—i thought he seemed familiar.

“Did you know him? Did he know you?” Rae asked. The wraith was silent. There was so much he didn’t know, things Estev wouldn’t tell him, or the wraith. Things he had to find out for himself. “Do you think I can trust him?”

—i don’t know much about trust. not anymore.

“I find I know less about it than I thought I did. I thought I could trust my father, and it turns out he was lying to us. I wonder if Mom knew. She must have.” Dissatisfied, Rae stopped channeling and let the pattern disappear. He wrapped the sword back up and tucked it under his leg, then leaned against the mast and closed his eyes.

“Lalette,” Rae said finally. “I can trust La. To be a pain in the ass, if nothing else.”

This time he took the wraith’s silence for agreement.


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