by AC Cobble
“He didn’t give it to you,” reminded Rew.
They were quiet for a moment. Then Jon asked, “Why not, do you think? Did he not believe I was ready?”
“No, of course not,” said Rew. He glanced at Blythe, and she shrugged back at him. “You’re just as much a ranger as the rest of us.”
“You are,” said Blythe, nodding.
“Here,” said Ang, handing the flask to Jon. “I’m glad I got to have a final sip with the old man while we’re out here, but this was meant for you.”
Flushing, Jon reached out and accepted the flask. He looked down at it in his hands, as if unsure what to do with it.
“Drink,” instructed Vurcell. “Finish it while we’re all here.”
Hesitantly, Jon drank, and the rest of them stood quietly, enjoying the company of their fellow rangers, privately remembering Tate.
When Jon finished, Vurcell turned to Rew. “These nobles,” started the man. “What’s your plan for them?”
“Blythe and Jon will accompany them to Falvar,” said Rew.
Blythe frowned, and Jon nodded.
Rew continued, “The sooner we get the nobles out of the territory, the better. Ang, Vurcell, you two will head out and look for more signs of Dark Kind in the wilderness. Go directly east and see if you cross any of their tracks. My guess, if there are more, they’ll also be headed north.”
Ang, gloved fingers tapping on his swordstaff, muttered, “A portal, Dark Kind answering to the calls of men… that’s powerful high magic, Rew. You know what this must be related to, don’t you?”
“I know,” said Rew.
“Will you answer the pull?” wondered Ang. “Perhaps you should go to Falvar instead of Blythe.”
“I will not,” claimed Rew. “I’m staying here, in Eastwatch, monitoring the wilderness. It is my duty as senior ranger. This is where I belong.”
Ang grunted, and Vurcell appeared skeptical. The two rangers, born a minute from each other and companions since that moment, couldn’t have looked more different. Their minds followed the same channels, though. They shared a look.
Vurcell said, “Some might argue that during a time like this, you’ve another duty.”
“Not a duty that I’ve accepted,” responded Rew.
“Accepted or not, the king won’t care, Senior Ranger,” remarked Ang. “I can see it in your eyes. I know you’re feeling the pull, the urge to leave. How long can you fight it?”
“Long enough that things will be well on their way if I succumb,” grumbled Rew. “I’m staying here in Eastwatch. You two, take the shift at the Oak & Ash tonight to watch over the children, and then Blythe and Jon can take over tomorrow.”
Ang and Vurcell shrugged as one then turned and left, heading in the direction of the inn. Jon sheepishly nodded goodbye and hurried after them. Rew and Blythe were left standing over Tate’s unmarked grave.
“I haven’t known you as long as those two, and I’m not nearly as sensitive to the swirls of power that course through this world,” began Blythe, “but—“
Rew held up a hand to stop her.
She crossed her arms over her chest and said, “I’ll lead the expedition to Falvar, but I think you should be the one to do it. I can get us there safely, but once we’re there… You can’t run forever, Rew. Someday, someday soon, you’re going to have to face up to what you are.”
“I’m the King’s Ranger,” he said. “I don’t want to be anything less or anything more.”
Chapter Seven
“My sister says I owe you thanks,” murmured the boy, Raif.
Rew inclined his head in acknowledgement, not commenting.
“Will you help us?” asked his sister, Cinda.
“I will,” Rew replied. “I’ll send two of my rangers to guide you through the wilderness and over the Spine. They’ll accompany you to Falvar, but I ask in return you implore your father to allow us access to his arcanist. There’s been unusual activity in the wilderness, and we need a more informed opinion than our own.”
“Of course,” said Cinda. “That is fair.”
Rew nodded. “I’ll send Blythe, the woman ranger who has been standing watch at the inn, and her apprentice, Jon. She’s made the journey over the Spine before, and she knows the way to Falvar.”
“That ranger, Jon, he seems little more than a boy,” mentioned Cinda.
“He’s older than you,” observed Rew.
She frowned at him but had no response.
“Rew,” said a voice behind him.
He turned to see Anne standing there with a frothy mug of ale in one hand and a stack of plates in the other. Her serving girl, Jacqueline, stepped around her with a steaming platter of roasted mutton. Carrots, potatoes, onions, and stalks of celery floated in the juices around the mutton, and Rew’s stomach rumbled at the rich aroma. Anne sat down the plates and gestured for the senior ranger to follow her to the side of the room.
Eyeing the heaped piles of seasoned meat voraciously, Rew walked after the innkeeper to the other side of the room where she handed him the ale.
“You said you’re sending Blythe and Jon to guide those children?” she asked.
He frowned at her. “They’re hardly children, Anne.”
She shook her head. “That lad is rather large, but he has no experience in this world. At his age, you’d—“
“I know what I’d done,” interjected Rew. “I know what I’d done, and that’s why I don’t think it’s fair to call him a child.”
“He hasn’t lived the life you did,” insisted Anne. “I spoke to them while you were gone, and they’ve been sheltered to an extent that’s hard to believe. Falvar, Spinesend, and Yarrow are the only places they’ve been to, and most of their time in those towns was spent behind the walls of the keeps. They’ve never been out of the eastern duchy, Rew. They’ve never been on the road without an escort of their father’s men. They are no younger than some we’d consider capable adults in Eastwatch, but they haven’t done the living. They don’t have the maturity to handle weeks of harsh travel.”
“Blythe is my best ranger now that Tate is gone,” hissed Rew. “She knows the way to Falvar as well as I do. What would you have me do, Anne?”
“Have her manage Eastwatch and monitor the wilderness,” said Anne. “Have her do her job.”
He tilted his head and asked, “You want me to accompany the children to Falvar?”
“Children, aye,” she said, stabbing him in the chest with a finger.
He shook his head, “I didn’t mean—It’s just because you were calling them that. I can’t leave my post, Anne. I’m assigned by the king to this territory, and this is where I must stay.”
“You’ve left plenty of times before,” challenged Anne, “and left for far longer than it will take to get to Falvar and back.”
“During times of peace and when I had a good reason,” he argued. “I fought a pack of narjags just two days past and a party of men the night after. Eastwatch needs me in uncertain times.”
“The answers to that uncertainty lie in Falvar,” claimed Anne. “The security of the territory means knowledge, and you won’t get it sitting here drinking ale in my inn.”
“You gave me…” he spluttered, his tankard held uncomfortably in front of him. He shook his head and decided not to pursue that argument. “I’m sending Blythe. She’s as capable as I, and she’ll get the answers we need.”
“She’s a ranger, Rew, but she’s not the King’s Ranger,” said Anne, taking a step toward him and putting a hand on his wrist. “If this is really about the Investiture, you think Baron Fedgley is going to spare his arcanist to discuss a necklace of narjag ears you found in the wilderness? If this is about the Investiture, do you think Blythe will learn what you need her to learn? Even if they don’t turn her away at the gates, do you think they’ll speak to her like they would you?”
“Fedgley’s children will get her an audience with the arcanist,” retorted Rew, “and as far as I’m concerned, th
e less I know about the Investiture, the better.”
“Children again, is it?” asked Anne, gripping his wrist tightly. “Whatever Fedgley’s designs, if the storm of the Investiture has made it to his barony, he and all of his people are going to be drawn in. No one is going to give a fig about a few narjags in the wilderness. You know that. If you want answers, Rew, you are the only one with the authority to make them listen to your questions. You’re the only one with the experience to untangle this knot.”
He grunted. “I’ll send a note…”
“I’m going with them,” said Anne suddenly.
“Wait, Anne, no,” he complained. “You’re needed here, at the inn.”
“I’ll be needed there as well, if it’s the Investiture.”
“You’ll join the baron’s service?” he asked, stunned.
“The less the baron knows of me, the better,” she responded. “I don’t mean to be drawn into the noble’s twisted games any more than you do, but I cannot sit here on the fringe of the realm when people need me. I can save lives, Rew. I can, so I have to.”
“And what of the people who need you here?” he asked. “What of the people in Eastwatch who need a healer?”
“They’ll be stitched up by the barber,” she said. “When the Investiture begins, it’s not in Eastwatch an empath will be needed most. Don’t try to tell me otherwise.”
“Cinda witnessed your work on Raif, and of course the lad himself knows what you did. The Fedgley children will tell their father what you’re capable of,” warned Rew. “You won’t be able to resist getting pulled into his service.”
Anne shrugged. “I’ve got a few weeks to convince them not to say anything, don’t I? I’m going, Rew, and you should as well. We’ve done good work here, these last ten years, but there are others who can manage things in Eastwatch. There’s no one else who can—”
“I’m not getting involved,” declared Rew.
“Then don’t,” replied Anne, “but come with us to Falvar. Come with me, Rew. If it looks like the whirlpool of the Investiture is too strong, that I’ll be dragged in, you can only pull me out of it if you’re there.”
“That’s unfair, Anne,” he complained.
She smiled at him. “Yes, it is.”
He was quiet for a long moment, and she let him chew it over. He guessed she knew what he would say. She’d cornered him like a feral hog led into a camouflaged trap. Now that she’d laid her ultimatum on him, made his decision about her safety, Anne knew she’d given him no choice at all. She was just waiting for the kill.
Finally, he asked, “When will the lad be ready to travel?”
“Tomorrow at dawn,” she responded.
Rew sighed and glanced back at the three younglings sitting around the pile of roasted mutton and vegetables. They were talking excitedly, glad to have a plan and someone to guide them. Glad that they’d survived the last few days as well, he supposed. He doubted they had any idea of what lay ahead.
“I’ll need to pack,” he grumbled.
“Eat first,” insisted Anne. “It might be your last good meal for a few weeks.”
He frowned at her, put his tankard to his lips, and drank deeply of the crisp ale. When he lowered the tankard, he told her, “Another of these, then.”
She winked at him and turned to the bar.
Ambling slowly, like a man on the way to the gibbet, Rew moved back to the table. He sat down, and the children fell silent. “Change of plans, it seems. I’ll be the one guiding you to Falvar.”
The next morning, Rew stood in the common room of the Oak & Ash Inn, rubbing his hand over his freshly shaven scalp. He was looking at the sparse pile of equipment the younglings had packed, his lips bowed into a sour frown. Finally, he said, “All right, then. I’ll sort through my pack and show you what I’m bringing. I should have realized… Ah, you didn’t know. We’ll get you fixed up with what you need to make a journey through the wilderness and over the Spine.”
Standing behind the three younglings, Anne smirked at him.
The night before, he’d finished his ale and his meal, another ale, and had stood to leave. Anne had told him that the younglings would need help packing, that they had little and wouldn’t know what to bring on the trek to Falvar. He’d waved a hand dismissively, insisting they’d gotten to Eastwatch somehow, hadn’t they?
They had made it to Eastwatch, but after he’d opened up their packs for inspection shortly after dawn, he wasn’t sure how. Anne had laid out bundles of food for the younglings, just like she and her staff did every time the rangers left on expedition, but that was the only thing in their packs that was actually correct.
Cursing himself for not paying more attention when he’d rifled through their gear while they were in his jail cell, Rew thumped his pack down on a table in the common room and began pulling out the contents. Food. A pot, a pan. Two changes of clothing and several sets of underclothes. A dozen socks. His razor. Soap. A spare belt knife. A set of needles. Thread for stitching rips in his clothing and thinner thread for stitching rips in his flesh. Packets of herbs that could be used for their healing properties or in cooking. He explained that as often as he could, he selected those that could be used in both. He ignored a whispered comment about eating medicine. He showed them a tarp and a bedroll. Twine. A whetstone to sharpen his blades, oil to polish them. Matches, and a pouch of black powder that could be used as a fire starter. Flint and steel in case that got wet or lost.
“I thought rangers could make fire anywhere,” interrupted Raif, scowling at the growing pile of neatly arranged items.
“If I had to, I could start a fire in a rainstorm, but I could do it a lot quicker with this,” he said, shaking the pouch of powder.
He sat it down, then dropped a clinking pouch of gold, silver, and copper coins beside it, but did not open that one to show the younglings. They didn’t ask, so he assumed they guessed what was inside. Their imprisonment for theft was too recent for anyone to want to discuss how the journey’s finances would be handled.
Rew sorted through a number of other items until the big youth interrupted again. “Not a lot for entertainment, huh?”
“We’ve a spare lute back at the ranger station if you’d like to carry it for two weeks through the wilderness, several days crossing the Spine, and then a few more days in the barrowlands,” replied Rew. “Do you know how to play the lute? I don’t.”
“That seems a rather long way,” complained Cinda. “Several years ago when we went to foster, it took us half that time going from Falvar to Yarrow.”
“You were on the roads in a carriage,” reminded Rew. “This won’t be an easy journey, lass, and I’m worried it will take even longer than I’ve stated if you cannot keep up. If you want to make it shorter, then my advice is start back toward Yarrow and find yourself a carriage.”
The girl’s lips pressed tightly together, but she didn’t argue. She and her brother needed the guidance of the rangers to avoid Worgon and his men. She knew it. Rew knew it. There was no point begging for that help and then disregarding the advice she was given.
Zaine leaned forward, hovering over the ranger’s provisions. “Nothing for spellcasting, either.”
“I’m not a spellcaster,” replied Rew.
“Rangers are rumored to use low magic,” said Cinda, suddenly becoming interested again. “Communing with the forest of course, mysterious abilities to hide their passage. Empathy wouldn’t be a surprise, nor would glamours. Some of my tutors speculated whether rangers were capable of transmutation.”
Rew laughed. “We’re just ordinary people, I’m afraid.”
“What’s transmutation?” asked Zaine.
“The ability to turn into an animal,” answered Cinda. She turned back to Rew. “You don’t deny a bit of low magic, then? Can you speak to animals?”
“I can speak to animals, sure, just like you can. I’ve never heard one respond. And walking quietly through the forest is a learned skill,” said Rew. “Avoi
ding fallen branches, not stepping on soft dirt, hiding oneself amongst the trees and the leaves, these things can be taught to anyone and it only requires a little bit of dexterity and caution.”
“Some ranger skills are mundane, of course, but that doesn’t answer my question about low magic,” remarked Cinda.
“It does not,” agreed Rew, beginning to repack his kit.
“I’m most effective if I understand the abilities of the rest of the party,” declared the noblewoman.
Rew eyed her, realizing that she was confirming the suspicions he’d had earlier. “You are a spellcaster, then? Why didn’t you do something to prevent your kidnapping from the cell?”
She frowned at him, like she didn’t want to admit her abilities, but she’d just chastised him for the exact same thing. “I am early in my studies as an invoker. My, ah, offensive capabilities were less than those of the spellcaster who kidnapped us. Then, once my hands were bound, there was nothing I could do regardless.”
Rew grunted. A nobleman’s daughter neck deep in conspiracy, training in spellcasting, drawn inexorably into the Investiture. Pieces were beginning to fall together. They were forming a picture that Rew wished he didn’t see.
“And you?” she asked.
“I know a few cantrips that are useful in the wilderness,” he said. “Low magic, as you say.”
“Low magic?” wondered Zaine.
“Low magic, like empathy, communion, and illusion, is all based on connections to nature or between people,” explained Cinda. “High magic, proper spellcasting, includes conjuring, necromancy, enchantment, and, most commonly, invocation. High magic is drawn from the strength of one’s blood. Both types are related, but high magic can be performed in solitude, without the connections required for low magic. High magic is more powerful, of course, and is the province of the nobility. Only those with noble blood are capable of casting it, you see.”
“Typically,” added Rew, ignoring Cinda’s sharp look.
“Did that make sense to anyone?” wondered Zaine. “High magic is for nobles, I get that, but what do you mean a connection is needed for low magic? What kind of connection?”