by David Bokman
“I felt… stronger?”
“Precisely. You and Cad felt stronger, and Na’s arcane affinity seems to have increased greatly. When I travelled through the rift, it altered my lifespan. I’m a hundred and thirty years old, but my body seems to believe I am around forty. It seems the rifts somehow bestow some of their magic upon those who travel through them. I believe this is also the explanation for how The Atlas got his… powers.”
“So you’ve known about these rifts all along?”
“I have, and I have been searching for them for my entire life. The one I came through closed a few years after it spat me out, and since then, I have not found another one. Or… I hadn’t, until one opened at the manor near Grensby, over a hundred years later. I am certain they have never opened in this manner, or to this extent, before. If they had, surely there would be more information written down about them.”
“Have you also known how to close them this entire time? That information could have saved Cad’s life, Mae.”
“I haven’t. I only know that they close by themselves after a while. If I had revealed this knowledge to the Townmaster, I think it would only have expedited her attack on us.”
“You still haven’t told us what The Atlas told you, though.”
“He told me that a great disaster befell Istig a few decades ago. He told me all who lived there are dead, that it is nothing more than an empty piece of ice floating through the sea.”
“What happened to them?”
“He would not tell me.”
“Well, who’s to say he isn’t—”
“He knows, Sam.”
“I’m… I’m sorry, Mae,” said Na.
“Don’t be. Everyone I knew must have died decades ago by now anyway. But still… Returning to my homeland does not feel as appealing, knowing that it no longer exists.”
“Your plan was to return via the rifts?”
“If it was possible, yes. It appears it is, but now there is no reason to.”
“So what will you do now, then?”
Mae looked out into the forest, soaking in the birdsong and the wind and the water. “I… haven’t decided yet.”
Although they knew they could not stay too long, all the heralds agreed that they would take a few moments to say goodbye to Cadwell. “We should build something for him,” suggested Sam.
“He would probably have hated that, but I agree.”
“Perhaps we don’t have to build something…” Sam walked away a few paces. “Look, what about here?” He was standing next to a great rock not too far away from the stream. “This feels like a place he wouldn’t hate.” Samson drew his dirk, held it in his hands for a few moments, and then buried it into the ground, in front of the rock. “For Cad.”
Mae walked up next to him, pulled out a dagger, and struck it into the wet ground next to Sam’s dirk. “For Cad.”
Na, too, planted her weapon in front of the rock, finishing the bouquet of steel. She looked at the rock surface in front of her. “I could do something with this, I think.” She sat down next to the blades and put one hand on the rock. It only took a few moments for her hand to light up slightly and for letters to start appearing in the stone surface, as if chiseled out by an invisible stonecutter.
In memory of Lieutenant Cadwell Churchcross, the Riftleaper
A match for a hundred swords
“Riftleaper?”
“I don’t know, it just sort of came to me,” said Na. “Should I change it?”
“It’s perfect. I’m not even sure Cad would hate it.”
“He’d appreciate it,” said Mae, “It’s a good thing. I’m glad you did it, both of you. Say your final goodbyes if you have to, then I suggest we continue south for as long as the forest takes us.”
Even though none of the heralds truly had a home to speak of, travelling south still felt like travelling home, even for Mae. It feels like travelling back to an easier time, Sam thought. Back when all you had to worry about was serving cactus soup and pouring ale. In spite of all that had happened, though, he still could not say he missed that life. It was an easy and safe life, but it was not a fulfilling one.
The trio remained in the forest for a few days, constantly moving south. When the foliage eventually cleared up, they realized they could not have been more than a few days away from Grensby, where it all began. It can’t have been much more than two months ago, yet it feels like two decades.
“What do you say?” asked Mae, as they exited the forest, getting the first good dose of sunlight in several days. “Further south, or should we aim for Grensby?”
“Grensby,” the others said almost in unison. “There’s no risk the guards followed us this far, right?”
“There’s always a risk, but I strongly doubt it. They can’t save enough guards to send out a large force, and they wouldn’t be stupid enough to send a small party into the woods to chase us down.”
“So that’s it, then? We’re safe?”
“Oh, I doubt we’ll ever be safe. Kardh’Ao is slow to forgive, Zena probably even more so. We’ll be on the run for the rest of our lives, I’d imagine.”
“Like Jaio?” asked Na.
Mae, smiling, said, “Sure, a bit like Jaio, I suppose.”
The answer seemed to give Florianna some sort of comfort, and she rode on, hopeful about their otherwise hopeless situation.
Grensby was not how Samson remembered it. For all the years he had been there, it had been a small place where everyone knew everyone. Some people leave when given the chance, and none ever visit. Nothing to see out here in the desert. But nowadays, that was not entirely true. Nowadays, there were two rifts in close vicinity to the village, which presumably were what attracted the visitors. And visitors, there were plenty of. Sam saw horses hitched all across the road, and people he had never before seen were wandering through the streets without much of a destination in mind. On a day like this, when the sun stood high and bright in the sky, the heat was almost unbearable, being reflected from the sand below. The heralds had ditched their heraldic clothes on the first day in the forest, knowing that they would only attract attention.
“We probably aren’t considered heralds anymore,” Mae had said, “so there’s no point in keeping them.” They had all kept their emblems, though. Never know when they might come in handy. In any case, Sam was glad they had changed to more appropriate attire; wearing leather and silk out here would be worse than spending the night in a furnace.
“So the rifts can’t have appeared all across the land, then,” said Na, after the third person they had stopped said they were here to see the strange purple holes in the ground. “If they had, then there would be no point in coming all this way out here to see them.”
“And we didn’t see any rifts on the way back down here. I think maybe they are slowing down, or have stopped appearing altogether,” said Mae. “Only way to know for certain is to keep investigating them. First, though, let’s get some ale.”
It had not been a calm day in the tavern so far. As Florianna, followed by the others, opened the doors, she was met by more people than you should reasonably be able to fit in such a small building. Even Samson was intimidated by the activity. “In all my days, we probably never had more than forty people in here,” he said. “But today, there has to be twice that.” All the tables were full of people eating their supper, and all the space between the tables was full of people downing ale and laughing loudly. All the sounds and sights and smells were almost enough to drown out even the stench of the rotting cacti.
Samson looked over to the desk and was momentarily surprised not to see Alf behind it. Alf is gone, he had to remind himself. Just like Cadwell. Instead, he saw Constan, Jasmine, and some other person he did not recognize. They’ve expanded. Three servers? I always managed fine on my own.
Sam and his friends, with some trouble, made their way up to the desk, standing next to a big, old man on their left and a younger, smaller man on their right. “Hi,” Mae
began, “could we get—”
“Thim?” Constan looked like he had seen a ghost.
“Samson, nowadays, but yes, it’s me. Good to see you, Constan.”
“Where the hell have you been? I haven’t seen you in… where have you been?”
“Get me an ale, and I might tell you. Decent activity here, huh?”
“Come to see the rifts, most of them. Some think them a sign from the Gods, some think them the beginning of the end, but all of them pay us for food and lodging, so we don’t complain. At this rate, we might even be able to start thinking about renovating the place.” Constan was pouring ale as he spoke. “For your friends, too?”
“Please.”
Constan placed three large tankards of ale next to the trio. “So, tell me everything! Where have you been, what have you done? And why are you back?”
Samson turned around and looked at The Barrel, taking a sip of ale. “We’ve… seen the world, Constan. For better or worse, we’ve seen the world, flaws and all. And I doubt our journey is finished. This is just the start of our trail.”