Chapter Nine
Rae and Lalette found their father in the dry fields, facedown, his limbs splayed like he had just suffered the world’s worst pratfall. The ground around him was scorched and torn, and a deep rut led away from his outstretched hand, about twenty feet long and at least a foot deep. At the end of the furrow was his shattered spiritblade, black steel shards baked into the soil. Rae stood and stared at the broken blade. It was easier than looking at his father’s lifeless body.
“He fought back,” Rae whispered to himself. “He summoned his elemental and he fought back.”
“Unexpected depths from your old man,” Mahk said. “What are you doing on the ass-end of nowhere if he’s a stormbinder?”
“Running away,” Rae answered. “Not far enough, apparently.”
Rae bent over and dug out one of the fragments of black steel from the shattered blade. It was cold in his hand, and smelled like heavy weather. He turned it over in his hands a few times, then slipped it into his pocket. Finally, he turned and looked at his father’s body.
La was on her knees at Father’s side, crying silently into the rough cloth of his tunic. Rae wrapped himself around them both—his sister, warm and shaking, his father, as cold as clay and just as still.
“He got it first,” Mahk said. He was waiting ten feet back, but his face was curled up in a frown, fists plunged in the front pockets of his coat. His gaze danced over the horizon, to the dead man, back to the distant farmhouse. “Whoever did this came out here, did in your pa, then to the house. Looks like he put up a hell of a fight.”
“Can you give us a moment?” Rae asked harshly. “We just lost our parents.”
“Aye, I can see,” Mahk answered. “But we don’t have the time. Whoever that was, he’ll be back. Was looking for something. Got a feeling he ain’t going to be happy with what he finds in Dwehlling.”
“We have to bury him,” La said quietly. “I can’t leave him like this.”
“He’s already gone. That’s just a body. Look, I know this is harsh, but—”
“Then shut up!” Rae snapped. “I know you’re a damned hard man, but just shut up for a minute. Our father lies here, slaughtered like a lame calf, while our mother burns to an ash in the remnants of our home. You have nothing, I get that. But we did, and we just lost it.” Tears were streaming from his eyes, hot and ragged, and his voice squeaked through the tight lump in his throat. He was inches from Mahk, without a memory of crossing the distance. The look on Mahk’s face was hard to decipher. Regret, a little sorrow, but mostly impatience. Rae hit him, but his fist collapsed against Mahk’s jaw. The pain hit Rae a second later. That only added to his tears. Mahk folded thick hands around his shoulders and, to Rae’s shock, pulled him close.
“I know how it is,” Mahk said. “Now you know, too. It doesn’t get better. Only better in your memory, and the worse for the loss.”
Rae collapsed against him and stayed there for a while. Eventually, Mahk pushed him away, not looking back as he walked to the body.
“We’ll bury him,” he said. “But then we have to go.”
“Not in the field,” Rae said. “This field will not be his last place.”
“The library, then,” La said. “Fire or no fire. He should be among his books.”
Rae and Mahk carried the remains back to the house, though Rae suspected his participation in hefting the burden was merely ceremonial. The flames had fully consumed the house, and were roaring steadily. They collected next season’s firewood from behind the stables, made a quick pyre, and set Tren Kelthannis on top. The wood wasn’t dry yet, so it took a while for the flames to catch, and when they did they burned smoky and damp. Rae summoned his mote of storm and drafted the flames, stoking them into a steady burn. Even the elemental seemed to moan a dirge in Rae’s soul. The gray pillar of smoke mingled with the black plume from the house, climbing into the sky.
“I told you this would go wrong,” La said, her eyes watching the smoke rise to the sky. “Screwing around with things you should have left alone.”
“Can’t blame this on me,” Rae said.
“Can’t I? We live in peace and quiet for ten years, then one day you decide you’re too good for this place.” La spoke through clenched teeth. “Start spiritbinding, just like father always warned against. And now they’re both dead.”
“Just bad luck,” Rae said. Has to be bad luck, he repeated in his head.
La sighed and shook her head. But she didn’t say anything.
“Our second fire of the day,” Rae said finally, his voice dull with fatigue. “A portentous Hallowsphere.”
“Don’t be funny,” La said. She hoisted her satchel over her shoulder and started for the road. Rae hurried up next to her.
“Where are you going? What are we supposed to do now?” Rae asked.
“I like Mahk’s idea,” La said. “Revenge. That bastard’s in Dwehlling. If he’s still there when I arrive, there’ll be hell to pay.”
“Did you see that guy? That was a bloody high mage! A justicar! Dad always said he was hiding from something. Do you honestly think—”
La whirled on her brother. Her eyes were red-rimmed from crying, but her stare could have punched holes in steel.
“Here’s what I think. That bastard killed our parents. I don’t know why, and honestly, I don’t care. They’re dead. He killed them.” She shoved him back with the stock of the scattergun. “I’m going to return the favor.”
She marched past him, making straight for the road. Mahk came up to stand next to Rae. He watched La march off, then turned his attention to Rae. His eyes weighed Rae.
“You said that guy was a high mage,” Mahk said. “How’d you know that?”
“He was wearing an isolation suit,” Rae said. “Only the most powerful mages need them. It means he spends a lot of time on a different plane, and can’t adjust to the material realm so easily. Lets him stay attuned to his bound realm.”
“You had me at ‘most powerful mages.’ Makes you wonder why he was coming after your pa, out here at the end of the world.” Mahk rubbed a hand across his face, smearing the ash from the fire across his cheeks. “Listen, I like her way of thinking, but let’s be clear: You go after that guy, you’re both getting turned into cinders. You know that, right?”
“Yeah, I know,” Rae answered. “She’s going to end up blaming me for this. Long as she’s burning to kill the high mage, she won’t turn that on me. Yet.” Rae mulled his next words for a long time. “He’s probably the one who ordered Morgan shot.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Justicar came by our house, two nights back. Said he was in the steading, looking for a diabolist.” Rae shrugged. “Connect the dots.”
“But that guy was a flamebinder, wasn’t he? All that fire?”
“You can bind more than one spirit, as long as they aren’t of opposing planes. If a spiritbinder does that, it will destroy his soul,” Rae said. “But Inferno and Hell go hand in hand, most days.”
“Well . . . shards.” Mahk looked at the burning pyre of the Kelthannis homestead. “I’m still going to kill him.”
“Then we have something in common, the three of us.”
Mahk snorted, clapping a heavy hand on Rae’s shoulder.
“I’ve got a place for us to hide,” Mahk said. “Give things a day or two to settle. We can try to figure out what to do next.”
“Sounds good to me,” Rae said. He wanted to spend some time with the sword at his belt, as well as the fragment from his father’s blade. There had to be some clue who did this, and why a diabolist wanted the spiritblade. He just needed time. If only he had Dad’s notes. But if they were in the house, they were burned to ashes, and any memory of them was gone with his dad. There had to be another way.
They scavenged a few supplies from the wreckage of the root cellar, and carried them out on their backs. They couldn’t take the main road, nor the road to Dwehlling, for fear of meeting neighbors concerned about the column of black smoke hanging over the Kelthannis homestead, or the high mage and his burning spirit, or even any of Mister Button’s associates. Instead, they set out on foot trails that wandered through the forest—trails traveled only by deer and other wildlife, and the occasional hunter or illicit lover, trying to pass unnoticed. They were overgrown and narrow, and dry leaves crunched loudly underfoot. Rae winced with each crackling step. Surely someone would hear them. Surely they would be found. But there was no one out here to notice. They were alone.
“I haven’t slept for two days,” Rae said. He was stumbling along under the weight of his satchel and the shock of the past twenty hours. “I can’t go much longer.”
“Fair enough. Lie down. Wait here. Exposure will get you, or that brass-faced monster, and then you’ll be dead. Plenty of sleep when you’re dead,” Mahk said.
“Just a bit farther, Rae,” La said. “Just a bit. We’re all exhausted.”
“Where is it we’re going?” Rae asked.
“Morgan kept a camp for moving illicit goods out of the Bastion. A secret place, in case things went bad in town.” Mahk cleared his throat. “It was our retirement plan.”
“Well, I pray this retirement plan included blankets and a stove. I haven’t been this hungry since—”
He ran full into Mahk’s broad shoulders, stumbling when he realized the big man had come to a stop. La squeaked as the three of them piled up.
“What? What’s going on?” Rae asked. He looked around nervously. “Are we being followed?”
“He’s been here,” Mahk said. “Just in passing.”
A strip of black ash cut across the trail, about twenty feet ahead of them. It was five feet wide, and the edge was as straight as a razor. Trees cut in half lengthwise had collapsed, and branches severed from their trunk lay across the burn lane, but the ground underneath was fine ash. The forest hadn’t been burned so much as annihilated, trees and stones and wildlife disintegrated into blackened grit. Mahk went up to the border and stirred the soot with the toe of his boot. It crunched underfoot, like broken glass.
“That’s more than just flame,” Rae said. He knelt at the edge, staring at the blackened ground. “Infernals want their fire to spread. You cut a path like this with elemental Fire, and it’s going to spread into the forest. This is a destruction more . . . fundamental.”
“Chaos,” La said. Rae nodded in silent agreement. “So you were right, that was the fiendbinder the justicar was looking for. What was he doing in Hammerwall?”
“It’s just a hop, skip, and a jump from the orderwall,” Mahk muttered. “You think there’s been a breach?”
“If so, the justicars haven’t sensed it yet. But how big does it need to be to let a single fiendbinder through?” Rae wondered. “Unless they came from coreward. Whispers say there are still undetected fiendbinders in the Ordered World. Serving the demons of Hell.”
“Enough of that talk,” Mahk said, shivering. “I don’t want to hear it.”
“And I don’t want to cross that,” La said. Rae leaned forward, looking left and then right. The strip went for miles before it veered off.
“Doesn’t look like we have a choice,” he said. “We can jump it.”
They did, one at a time, Mahk going last with all their packs on his back. He stumbled when he landed, but they cleared the strip without disturbing the crisp ashes.
Morgan’s hidden camp was a mile farther down the trail, nestled into a stony nook with a brook between the boulders. Bright green moss covered everything, from the stones that lined the water to the crooked trees and the bark roof of the cabin. The shelter was barely as tall as Mahk, made of thick logs that were going soft with age, with a single door and a shuttered window. It was built into the hill, three walls and a roof, with a tumbledown stone chimney that looked a thousand years old, if it was a day.
“This is . . . surprisingly cozy,” Rae said. He dropped his satchel next to the door and looked around the campsite. There was some kind of shed built between two boulders just up the hill, and a firepit hidden near the creek. The water lapped happily against the stones, and fish darted through the clear depths.
“Yeah. Drink here, shit downstream,” Mahk said. He put his shoulder into the cabin door, popping it open. He came out a few moments later with a stack of blankets. “Two of you can sleep in there. That place has memories. I’m fine in the rough.”
La and Rae both had to crouch to step inside. The cabin had one room and a sturdy bed, with stacks of firewood next to the hearth and a small cupboard filled with preserves, topped by a stone bowl with two cups. Rae took the bowl outside to collect some water. Mahk was already bedding down beside one of the boulders, nestling into the blankets.
“Should one of us be keeping watch?” Rae asked.
“If that mage finds us we’re as good as dead,” he answered sleepily. “I’d rather not see it coming.”
Rae shrugged, then dipped the stone bowl into the stream. The water was so cold that his hands went instantly numb. He carefully made his way back to the cabin. Mahk was snoring before he reached the door.
Inside, La was sitting on the bed and staring blankly at the cold hearth. Rae set down the bowl, rubbed some warmth into his hands, and faced his sister.
“So we should probably get a fire started,” he said. “Wouldn’t want to make it this far only to freeze to death.”
“I suppose,” La answered. Rae waited for more, but when it became clear that his sister had nothing else to say, he knelt beside the hearth and started arranging kindling on the andiron. The wood was good and dry, and in a few minutes the fire was crackling warmly. It took a while for the flue to warm up, so the room filled with smoke. Rae coughed.
“Sorry about that,” he said. “Should have heated the flue first. Always forget.” La didn’t answer. Rae looked around the room. “Don’t like the idea of sharing a bed with my sister. You take that. I’ll just settle on the rug here. Think you’ll be warm enough?”
“Are we going to die?” Lalette asked. Rae froze, halfway through piling blankets on the floor. La tore her eyes away from the fire and looked at him. Rae often forgot how much younger she was than him, how she was only barely not a child. In that moment, he couldn’t forget. Her eyes were soft with tears, and her cheeks, so often red and lively, were as pale as death. Her lower lip trembled. The sight of that cut Rae to the heart, worse than seeing his mother dead, worse than burying his father. He went to one knee.
“La, I swear, I swear, nothing is going to happen to you. Nothing. I’m going to keep you safe. No one is going to hurt you, I promise.” He tried to put his arms around her, but she shrugged him away. He pulled back.
“You can’t make that promise,” she said. “You don’t know. You’re just my brother. Mom and Dad couldn’t keep themselves safe. They’re dead, Rae . . . they’re—”
Her voice broke, and this time when Rae hugged her, she leaned into it. They sat there for a long time, draining whatever misery they had been holding in. Eventually, the weight was gone, or at least lessened enough to be held tight. Rae held his sister a while longer, but finally realized that she was asleep, her face smashed against his shoulder. He leaned her back and covered her with a blanket, then knelt in front of the hearth. The flames were low, and the stone hearth radiated heat. He raked the coals and then pulled the screen across before lying down. He fell asleep listening to La’s even breath, and the trees creaking in the wind outside. It had been so long since he had slept to the song of trees. The farmhouse was surrounded by fields, too far from the forest for the sound to reach him. But some of his earliest memories were of a cottage in the woods, the house where his family had lived when he was in the service of Baron Hadroy. He had almost forgotten. The sound stirred his heart, and lulled him into a deep, dreamless sleep.