Some of them smiled, hard and brittle, as if enjoying a particularly good joke. One or two of them laughed aloud. Cinder turned back to me and the pity fell away like a cracked mask, leaving only the nightmare smile upon his face.
“Is this your parents’ fire?” he asked with a terrible delight in his voice.
I nodded numbly.
His smile slowly faded. Expressionless, he looked deep into me. His voice was quiet, cold, and sharp. “Someone’s parents,” he said, “have been singing entirely the wrong sort of songs.”
“Cinder.” A cool voice came from the direction of the fire.
His black eyes narrowed in irritation. “What?” he hissed.
“You are approaching my displeasure. This one has done nothing. Send him to the soft and painless blanket of his sleep.” The cool voice caught slightly on the last word, as if it were difficult to say.
The voice came from a man who sat apart from the rest, wrapped in shadow at the edge of the fire. Though the sky was still bright with sunset and nothing stood between the fire and where he sat, shadow pooled around him like thick oil. The fire snapped and danced, lively and warm, tinged with blue, but no flicker of its light came close to him. The shadow gathered thicker around his head. I could catch a glimpse of a deep cowl like some priests wear, but underneath the shadows were so deep it was like looking down a well at midnight.
Cinder glanced briefly at the shadowed man, then turned away. “You are as good as a watcher, Haliax,” he snapped.
“And you seem to forget our purpose,” the dark man said, his cool voice sharpening. “Or does your purpose simply differ from my own?” The last words were spoken carefully, as if they held special significance.
Cinder’s arrogance left him in a second, like water poured from a bucket. “No,” he said, turning back toward the fire. “No, certainly not.”
“That is good. I hate to think of our long acquaintance coming to an end.”
“As do I.”
“Refresh me again as to our relationship, Cinder,” the shadowed man said, a deep sliver of anger running through his patient tone.
“I…I am in your service….” Cinder made a placating gesture.
“You are a tool in my hand,” the shadowed man interrupted gently. “Nothing more.”
A hint of defiance touched Cinder’s expression. He paused. “I wo—”
The soft voice went as hard as a rod of Ramston steel. “Ferula.”
Cinder’s quicksilver grace disappeared. He staggered, his body suddenly rigid with pain.
“You are a tool in my hand,” the cool voice repeated. “Say it.”
Cinder’s jaw clenched angrily for a moment, then he convulsed and cried out, sounding more like a wounded animal than a man. “I am a tool in your hand,” he gasped.
“Lord Haliax.”
“I am a tool in your hand, Lord Haliax,” Cinder amended as he crumpled, trembling, to his knees.
“Who knows the inner turnings of your name, Cinder?” The words were spoken with a slow patience, like a schoolmaster reciting a forgotten lesson.
Cinder wrapped shaking arms around his midsection and hunched over, closing his eyes. “You, Lord Haliax.”
“Who keeps you safe from the Amyr? The singers? The Sithe? From all that would harm you in the world?” Haliax asked with calm politeness, as if genuinely curious as to what the answer might be.
“You, Lord Haliax.” Cinder’s voice was a quiet shred of pain.
“And whose purpose do you serve?”
“Your purpose, Lord Haliax.” The words were choked out. “Yours. None other.” The tension left the air and Cinder’s body suddenly went slack. He fell forward onto his hands and beads of sweat fell from his face to patter on the ground like rain. His white hair hung limp around his face. “Thank you, lord,” he gasped out earnestly. “I will not forget again.”
“You will. You are too fond of your little cruelties. All of you.” Haliax’s hooded face swept back and forth to look at each of the figures sitting around the fire. They stirred uncomfortably. “I am glad I decided to accompany you today. You are straying, indulging in whimsy. Some of you seem to have forgotten what it is we seek, what we wish to achieve.” The others sitting around the fire stirred uneasily.
The hood turned back to Cinder. “But you have my forgiveness. Perhaps if not for these remindings, it would be I who would forget.” There was an edge to the last of his words. “Now, finish what—” His cool voice trailed away as his shadowed hood slowly tilted to look toward the sky. There was an expectant silence.
Those sitting around the fire grew perfectly still, their expressions intent. In unison they tilted their heads as if looking at the same point in the twilit sky. As if trying to catch the scent of something on the wind.
A feeling of being watched pulled at my attention. I felt a tenseness, a subtle change in the texture of the air. I focused on it, glad for the distraction, glad for anything that might keep me from thinking clearly for just a few more seconds.
“They come,” Haliax said quietly. He stood, and shadow seemed to boil outward from him like a dark fog. “Quickly. To me.”
The others rose from their seats around the fire. Cinder scrambled to his feet and staggered a half dozen steps toward the fire.
Haliax spread his arms and the shadow surrounding him bloomed like a flower unfolding. Then, each of the others turned with a studied ease and took a step toward Haliax, into the shadow surrounding him. But as their feet came down they slowed, and gently, as if they were made of sand with wind blowing across them, they faded away. Only Cinder looked back, a hint of anger in his nightmare eyes.
Then they were gone.
I will not burden you with what followed. How I ran from body to body, frantially feeling for the signs of life as Ben had taught me. My futile attempt at digging a grave. How I scrabbled in the dirt until my fingers were bloody and raw. How I found my parents….
It was in the darkest hours of the night when I found our wagon. Our horse had dragged it nearly a hundred yards down the road before he died. It seemed so normal inside, so tidy and calm. I was struck by how much the back of the wagon smelled like the two of them.
I lit every lamp and candle in the wagon. The light was no comfort, but it was the honest gold of real fire, untinged with blue. I took down my father’s lute case. I lay in my parent’s bed with the lute beside me. My mother’s pillow smelled of her hair, of an embrace. I did not mean to sleep, but sleep took me.
I woke coughing with everything in flames around me. It had been the candles, of course. Still numb with shock, I gathered a few things into a bag. I was slow and aimless, unafraid as I pulled Ben’s book from under my burning mattress. What horror could a simple fire hold for me now?
I put my father’s lute into its case. It felt like I was stealing, but I couldn’t think of anything else that would remind me of them. Both their hands had brushed its wood a thousand thousand times.
Then I left. I walked into the forest and kept going until dawn began to brighten the eastern edges of the sky. As the birds began to sing I stopped and set down my bag. I brought out my father’s lute and clutched it to my body. Then I began to play.
My fingers hurt, but I played anyway. I played until my fingers bled on the strings. I played until the sun shone through the trees. I played until my arms ached. I played, trying not to remember, until I fell asleep.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Interlude—Autumn
KVOTHE HELD OUT A hand to Chronicler, then turned to his student, frowning. “Stop looking at me like that, Bast.”
Bast looked close to tears. “Oh, Reshi,” he choked out. “I had no idea.”
Kvothe gestured as if cutting the air with the side of his hand. “There’s no reason you should Bast, and no reason to make an issue out of it.”
“But Reshi…”
Kvothe gave his student a severe look. “What, Bast? Should I weep and tear my hair? Curse Tehlu and his angels? B
eat my chest? No. That is low drama.” His expression softened somewhat. “I appreciate your concern, but this is just a piece of the story, not even the worst piece, and I am not telling it to garner sympathy.”
Kvothe pushed his chair back from the table and came to his feet. “Besides, all of this happened long ago.” He made a dismissive gesture. “Time is the great healer, and so on.”
He rubbed his hands together. “Now, I’m going to bring in enough wood to get us though the night. There’ll be a chill if I’m any judge of weather. You can get a couple loaves ready to bake while I’m out, and try to collect yourself. I refuse to tell the rest of this story with you making blubbery cow eyes at me.”
With that, Kvothe walked behind the bar and out through the kitchen toward the back door of the inn.
Bast scrubbed roughly at his eyes, then watched his master go. “He’s fine so long as he’s busy,” Bast said softly.
“I beg your pardon?” Chronicler said reflexively. He shifted awkwardly in his seat, as if he wanted to get to his feet, but couldn’t think of a polite way to excuse himself.
Bast gave a warm smile, his eyes a human blue again. “I was so excited when I heard who you were, that he was going to tell his story. His mood’s been so dark lately, and there’s nothing to shake him out of it, nothing to do but sit and brood. I’m sure that remembering the good times will…” Bast grimaced. “I’m not saying this very well. I’m sorry for earlier. I wasn’t thinking straight.”
“N–no,” Chronicler stammered hastily. “I’m the one—it was my fault, I’m sorry.”
Bast shook his head. “You were just surprised, but you only tried to bind me.” His expression grew a little pained. “Not that it was pleasant, mind. It feels like being kicked between your legs, but all over your body. It makes you feel sick, and weak, but it’s just pain. It wasn’t like you’d actually wounded me.” Bast looked embarrassed. “I was going to do more than hurt you. I might have killed you before I even stopped to think.”
Before an uncomfortable silence developed, Chronicler said, “Why don’t we take his word that we were both suffering from blinding idiocy, and leave it at that?” Chronicler managed a sickly smile that was heartfelt in spite of the circumstances. “Peace?” he extended his hand.
“Peace.” They shook hands with much more genuine warmth than they had earlier. As Bast reached across the table his sleeve pulled back to reveal a bruise blossoming around his wrist.
Bast self-consciously pulled his cuff back into place. “From when he grabbed me,” he said quickly. “He’s stronger than he looks. Don’t mention it to him. He’ll only feel bad.”
Kvothe emerged from the kitchen and shut the door behind himself. Looking around, he seemed surprised that it was a mild autumn afternoon rather than the springtime forest of his story. He lifted the handles of a flat-bottomed barrow and trundled it out into the woods behind the inn, his feet crunching in the fallen leaves.
Not too far into the trees was the winter’s wood supply. Cord on cord of oak and ash were stacked to make tall, crooked walls between the trunks of trees. Kvothe tossed two pieces of firewood into the wheelbarrow where they struck the bottom like a muted drum. Another two followed them. His motions were precise, his face blank, his eyes far away.
As he continued to load the barrow, he moved slower and slower, like a machine winding down. Eventually he stopped completely and stood for a long minute, still as stone. Only then did his composure break. And even with no one there to see, he hid his face in his hands and wept quietly, his body wracked with wave on wave of heavy, silent sobs.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Roads to Safe Places
PERHAPS THE GREATEST FACULTY our minds possess is the ability to cope with pain. Classic thinking teaches us of the four doors of the mind, which everyone moves through according to their need.
First is the door of sleep. Sleep offers us a retreat from the world and all its pain. Sleep marks passing time, giving us distance from the things that have hurt us. When a person is wounded they will often fall unconscious. Similarly, someone who hears traumatic news will often swoon or faint. This is the mind’s way of protecting itself from pain by stepping through the first door.
Second is the door of forgetting. Some wounds are too deep to heal, or too deep to heal quickly. In addition, many memories are simply painful, and there is no healing to be done. The saying “time heals all wounds” is false. Time heals most wounds. The rest are hidden behind this door.
Third is the door of madness. There are times when the mind is dealt such a blow it hides itself in insanity. While this may not seem beneficial, it is. There are times when reality is nothing but pain, and to escape that pain the mind must leave reality behind.
Last is the door of death. The final resort. Nothing can hurt us after we are dead, or so we have been told.
After my family was killed, I wandered deep into the forest and slept. My body demanded it, and my mind used the first door to dull the pain. The wound was covered until the proper time for healing could come. In self-defense, a good portion of my mind simply stopped working—went to sleep, if you will.
While my mind slept, many of the painful parts of the previous day were ushered through the second door. Not completely. I did not forget what had happened, but the memory was dulled, as if seen through thick gauze. If I wanted to, I could have brought to memory the faces of the dead, the memories of the man with black eyes. But I did not want to remember. I pushed those thoughts away and let them gather dust in a seldom-used corner of my mind.
I dreamed, not of blood, glassy eyes, and the smell of burning hair, but of gentler things. And slowly the wound began to grow numb….
I dreamed I was walking through the forest with plain-faced Laclith, the woodsman who had traveled with our troupe when I was younger. He walked silently through the underbrush while I kicked up more noise than a wounded ox dragging an overturned cart.
After a long period of comfortable silence I stopped to look at a plant. He came quietly up behind me. “Sagebeard,” he said. “You can tell by the edge.” He reached past me and gently stroked the appropriate part of the leaf. It did look like a beard. I nodded.
“This is willow. You can chew the bark to lessen pains.” It was bitter and slightly gritty. “This is itchroot, don’t touch the leaves.” I didn’t. “This is baneberry, the small fruits are safe to eat when red but never when shading from green to yellow to orange.
“This is how you set your feet when you want to walk silently.” It made my calves ache. “This is how you part the brush quietly, leaving no sign of your passing. This is where you find the dry wood. This is how you keep the rain off when you don’t have canvas. This is paterroot. You can eat it but it tastes bad. These,” he gestured, “straightrod, orangestripe, never eat them. The one with little knobs on it is burrum. You should only eat it if you have just eaten something like straightrod. It will make you keck up whatever’s in your stomach.
“This is how you set a snare that won’t kill a rabbit. This snare will.” He looped the string first one way, then another.
As I watched his hands manipulate the string I realized it was no longer Laclith, but Abenthy. We were riding in the wagon and he was teaching me how to tie sailors’ knots.
“Knots are interesting things,” Ben said as he worked. “The knot will either be the strongest or the weakest part of the rope. It depends entirely on how well one makes the binding.” He held up his hands, showing me an impossibly complex pattern spread between his fingers.
His eyes glittered. “Any questions?”
“Any questions?” my father said. We had stopped early for the day because of a greystone. He sat tuning his lute and was finally going to play his song for my mother and me. We had been waiting so long. “Are there any questions?” he repeated, as he sat with his back against the great grey stone.
“Why do we stop at the waystones?”
“Tradition mostly. But some people say they
marked old roads—” My father’s voice changed and became Ben’s voice, “—safe roads. Sometimes roads to safe places, sometimes safe roads leading into danger.” Ben held one hand out to it, as if feeling the warmth of a fire. “But there is a power in them. Only a fool would deny that.”
Then Ben was no longer there, and there was not one standing stone, but many. More than I had ever seen in one place before. They formed a double circle around me. One stone was set across the top of two others, forming a huge arch with thick shadow underneath. I reached out to touch it….
And awoke. My mind had covered a fresh pain with the names of a hundred roots and berries, four ways to light a fire, nine snares made from nothing but a sapling and string, and where to find fresh water.
I thought very little on the other matter of the dream. Ben had never taught me sailors’ knots. My father had never finished his song.
I took inventory of what I had with me: a canvas sack, a small knife, a ball of string, some wax, a copper penny, two iron shims, and Rhetoric and Logic, the book Ben had given me. Aside from my clothes and my father’s lute, I had nothing else.
I set out looking for drinking water. “Water comes first,” Laclith had told me. “Anything else you can do without for days.” I considered the lay of the land and followed some animal trails. By the time I found a small spring-fed pool nestled among some birch trees, I could see the sky purpling into dusk behind the trees. I was terribly thirsty, but caution won out and I took only a small drink.
Next I collected dry wood from the hollows of trees and under canopies. I set a simple snare. I hunted for and found several stalks of motherleaf and spread the sap onto my fingers where they were bloody and torn. The stinging helped distract me from remembering how I had hurt them.
Waiting for the sap to dry, I took my first casual look around. Oaks and birches crowded each other for space. Their trunks made patterns of alternating light and dark beneath the canopy of branches. A small rivulet ran from the pool across some rocks and away to the east. It may have been beautiful, but I didn’t notice. I couldn’t notice. To me the trees were shelter, the undergrowth a source of nourishment, and the pool reflecting moonlight only reminded me of my thirst.
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