“Bannan Larmensu’s,” Aunt Sybb finished when Jenn paused for breath.
“He was offered the place first,” Radd agreed heavily. “That was the sticking point for some, and I admit there were hard words said after the vote. To ask Bannan to give it up? You saw his face, Sybbie. I’m not looking forward to the task, let me tell you.”
“A shame. A man of fine character and upbringing, if I’m any judge.” The two paused and sighed together. Jenn looked from one to the other, wishing they’d stop agonizing and help her plan Wyll’s farm. “Thank the Ancestors,” Aunt Sybb said at last, “he hasn’t seen or set foot on the property yet. That should soften the blow, don’t you think?”
“Oh.”
It was their turn to look at her. Jenn swallowed.
“What is it?”
She’d seen Bannan take the road, thought with regret he was leaving the village, been sure he’d be gone in the morning.
Scatterwit, she chided herself. Distraction was no excuse.
Bannan Larmensu had left the village, yes, but not Marrowdell.
He’d been heading for the Tinkers Road. There could be only one reason. He’d gone to the farm he believed was his.
“What if he’s spent the night?” Jenn asked miserably.
She supposed it wasn’t at all fair to hope for mice.
An easy walk took him to the first trees, the trees themselves the leading edge of a wilder forest. Kydd’s caution about not felling such for wood tingled along Bannan’s nerves. He could see the truth of it by moonlight.
They weren’t trees. They were tall and tree-shaped and might pass by day, but not now, not when they awoke to whatever light played on them in the other world. They leaned toward him with interest, as if noticing his attention. Branches creaked, twigs snapped; echoes of other, unheard sounds. The occasional leaf startled him as it drifted by his face or brushed his body before rising again. Others—he could swear they moved along the branches.
Bannan stayed to the middle of the road and watched for roots. Not that he had any reason to think treading on a root would offend them, but he planned to be a very good neighbor. He’d take no chances.
No avoidable ones.
So when he reached the point in the road where trees to either side blocked out the moon, he deliberately slowed. The farm clearing should be to his right, past the first bend. By daylight, this was probably a delightful passage, shaded and level. Now, in the gloom, he wouldn’t trust what he couldn’t see.
Bannan tried looking beyond. The road had been silver and fluid earlier. To his relief, it retained a faint glow, sufficient to show the way. He walked a little faster.
The glow was stronger on the right, so he stayed to that side. No. Not stronger, he realized after a few steps. Some blight dulled it along the other side, something oozing from the wild forest.
More than once, following a skirmish, he’d seen where a blood-laden stream met another, how its darkness spread before being mercifully washed clear. This was the same. In that other Marrowdell, some darkness bled into the silver road.
Zehr Emms had been right. Thanks to the late-day storm, the night air was warm and sticky. Sweat soaked Bannan’s skin, yet a shiver worked icy fingers up his spine. A bit late to regret his impetuous rush to the farm, wasn’t it? He dared not stop here, but as he walked, his footsteps seemed to cover less distance. Or did the road grow longer?
Where, he thought ruefully, was Jenn Nalynn when he needed her?
Safely in Marrowdell, under a roof, within walls, surrounded by light and family. The life he would make, Bannan vowed, forcing his legs to move. He’d spent more nights on the ground than in his bed at the Larmensu estate, more years living among the guard, where luxury was a day’s ease without rain or an Ansnan patrol nearby, tossing ’stones and trading stories. He’d dreamed of simple comforts, not the estate. Longed for family, not a throng of servants or strangers. Why the Northward Road? Why the settler’s bind? He wanted a life of peace, where the work of his hands mattered to those he loved.
Would such lowly ambition dismay his loving sister? Who, though no stranger herself to rude camps or deadly campaigns, would live happily ever after in her baron’s town mansion, taking summers at the lodge in the hills?
No. Lila’d be glad for him, should he put down roots here and grow into a hairy old farmer surrounded by noisy brats. Given any encouragement, she’d visit like Jenn’s lady aunt from Avyo. Wouldn’t that cause a stir in Marrowdell, the arrival of a Vorkoun baroness and her entourage? Though doubtless Lila would prefer to dress rough and sneak horses from the stable, considering herself sufficient guard for her husband’s royal person and his sons.
A wonder Scourge hadn’t picked his fiery sister.
The formless dread grew worse. He must be nearing the source of the stain.
Bannan clung to thoughts of Lila, of bright days and hope, doing his utmost not to look left. Harder by the footstep to avert his gaze. Instinct and training screamed at him to watch for ambush, to hold a nonexistent weapon, to be ready to fight.
Not this. This wasn’t aware, not of him, not yet. To pay it attention, Bannan feared to his core, would draw what he couldn’t survive.
The glow disappeared.
He halted, afraid to take another step. He’d packed candles. Dare he light one? The night pressed against his face, tried to stifle his breath, muffled his hearing. “Been in worse spots,” he whispered, desperate for a voice.
A breeze chilled his ear. “I don’t think so.”
Bannan froze, sure the deep uncanny sound hadn’t come from a mouth.
The breeze lifted hairs across the back of his neck, then found his other ear. “Though there was the time you let the Ansnans pin us in that swamp. Between the leeches and the stench—”
It couldn’t be . . . “Scourge?”
A laugh in his ear.
Bannan stretched out his hand, sagging with relief when he touched hot, sweat-damp hide. He flattened his palm against it. “Keep Us Close,” he exclaimed, low and fervent. “Wonderful idiot beast,” with each word, he gave an affectionate slap. “Heart’s Blood, but I’m glad to see you.” Not that he could. See. But hear? “How can you talk?”
“I could always talk,” Scourge said testily. “Just not so you could hear me.”
“Now you can.” They might be standing in the dark beside some dreadful unseen blight, but Bannan couldn’t help grinning. “Ancestors Blessed. This is a marvel!”
“This is Marrowdell. The edge between worlds.” Said with the finality of sufficient explanation. “Take hold and walk with me. Unless,” a surprisingly familiar dark humor, “you prefer to wait and see what might rise.”
“No, thank you.” Bannan ran his hand up to Scourge’s back, then forward till his fingers tangled in that familiar coarse mane. He closed his eyes in utter trust.
Until the great animal turned and began to head in the wrong direction. Bannan’s eyes shot open. “The farm’s the other way,” he protested.
“Who’s the idiot beast?”
Rather than argue and lose, Bannan quieted and walked where Scourge led, unable to stop smiling. This would solve the old mysteries, he realized eagerly. What kind of creature was the not-horse? Why had he come to live with the Larmensu? Why allow himself to be ridden by men?
The unsettling question of why Scourge showed such relish for blood he might leave for daylight.
Before having a voice, Scourge had expressed an abundance of opinion. He’d believed the not-horse had his own particular wisdom, though there was one who might have a problem with a Scourge who literally spoke his mind. Bannan chuckled. “I can’t wait to see Tir’s face.”
“You should have seen yours.” The breeze in his ear conveyed great satisfaction.
Reassuring, that Scourge could somehow see in the strange darkness. Bannan readied another question, only to be told, “We’re about to pass the opening. Not a sound.”
The opening to what? If to the source of th
e stain affecting the road, Bannan was all too glad to be as inconspicuous as possible. He tightened his grip on Scourge’s mane and stared ahead, hoping for moonlight, finding only the smothering dark. He listened to his own footsteps, heard the hammer of his heart in his chest, wished them both silent.
Scourge made no sound at all. If not for the fistful of coarse hair in his hand, the heat and living smell of the large body beside him, he’d have thought himself totally alone.
Something else tried for his attention. Bannan’s head turned.
Turned, and couldn’t turn away. Worse, now the something pulled at him! Bannan stumbled and caught himself against Scourge’s side.
“Stay with me, truthseer,” a faint breath warned. “Don’t be drawn.”
Good advice, he was sure. Advice he’d take to heart. What was this place? As Scourge led him, step by step, Bannan planned what he’d say to the kind villagers of Marrowdell about their road and their farm. If he lived the night.
Another step.
One more, and moonlight flooded the road.
Bannan gasped. He couldn’t help looking over his shoulder.
Instead of the terrible darkness, the road stretched behind, brushed with soft light and tree shadow. It didn’t simply bend, as he’d thought, but rather sent a fork steeply up the tree-cloaked hill. Another road, one unseen from the village.
One they hadn’t mentioned. That had been the source.
Bannan didn’t dare look deeper. Not so close, not at night. “What,” he asked unsteadily, “was that?”
Scourge snorted and took a quick sidestep to pull free of his unresisting hand.
So now he played horse?
Accepting, for the moment, Bannan followed, lured by the swath of brighter light through a break in the trees ahead. It had to be the farm. His farm. His steps quickened as Scourge trotted ahead, tail flagged.
A lane welcomed him into as neat a yard as he’d ever seen. By moonlight, the buildings looked almost new. A generous barn with a loft. A trim little house with a porch. Over there, what might be a garden. A tree. Two more. By their shape, those could be apple, he thought. He hoped. Another tree, much taller, that should shade the home from summer’s heat. If it was a tree. He’d respect it, and have the shade.
Bannan took it all in, breathing as hard as if he’d been running. A shoulder-high hedge ringed the yard, separating it from the grain fields. Common fields, he’d been told; he’d have a share if he worked the harvest. Surely, the fields would be safe then.
Inside the yard, grass had grown hip-high and thick. It would have to be cut, or grazed. Both, if he could trade for a cow.
From this vantage, he saw the farm lay nestled between two of the long hills. The Bone Hills. A poor name for such lovely landmarks. Whatever the stone, the hills gleamed smooth and blue under the moon’s touch, like the nameless peaks in Ansnor that stayed snow-capped year long. They could be seen from Vorkoun. He remembered how much he’d longed to climb one as a boy, to touch the snow and ice for himself, to see the world from such a height.
He supposed a Rhothan might make that climb, one day. Unless the railroad proved too thin a glue for peace.
Didn’t matter here. Didn’t matter to him. Bannan shook off the past as he headed for the house. Spotting Scourge by the hedge, head high and staring west, he changed direction.
The bright moonlight lost the battle to pull more than shape from the not-horse. His eyes reflected cold white disks when he dipped his head to acknowledge Bannan’s presence, like the toads’.
Not a comparison Scourge would appreciate.
The creature wasn’t staring over the hedge, he stared through a gateless gap in its growth. Bannan peered past him. A narrow, well-used path ran alongside the tall grain, disappearing in the shadows. “Where does it go?”
“To Night’s Edge.”
A name, he thought, delighted. And a curious one. “What’s that?”
For a long moment, he didn’t think Scourge would answer. Then, distant and faint, “The way home.” With that, the not-horse turned away, his head low. “You should introduce yourself.” Having thus startled Bannan, who could see no one else, Scourge ambled like a tired old workhorse toward the barn.
Bannan glanced back at the path. “So it was truly good-bye, my friend, when you left me on the Northward Road.” If he hadn’t followed? The truthseer shrugged. What was done was well done, as far as he was concerned. They were together, still. As for explanations, he knew better than to press Scourge now.
Besides, there was the matter of an introduction.
Going to the center of the empty farmyard, he gave a short self-conscious bow. “My name is Bannan Larmensu. I hope to live here.”
No answer. Of course there was no answer. He was alone. Scourge had distracted him from further prying, that was all.
Meaning he’d lied.
Or had he?
Bannan found himself unsure of the truth for the first time in his life. It must, he decided, be how Scourge “talked,” using the air itself. A fine state of affairs.
The answer not appearing before him, which would have been convenient, Bannan went to the little house, guessing that would be as good a start as any.
And there he met, if not someone, then something.
Squatting on the porch, blocking the door, was the largest toad he’d seen yet. And the fattest. Its pale belly expanded pillow-like beyond its legs, until he wondered if it truly sat or somehow balanced on a very full stomach.
To open the door, he’d have to move the toad. Bannan put down his pack, then bowed with all the grace he possessed, brushing fingertips across dew-damp ground. As he rose, he lifted his hands and circled his heart. “My name is Bannan Marerrym Larmensu, late of Vorkoun.”
The toad’s eyes sank into its head then popped out again, but it didn’t budge.
“I’ve come with the consent of the villagers of Marrowdell. Like them, I have taken the settler’s bind and wish to make my home here.” He infused the words with all the formal pomposity he could. “I ask your permission to enter.”
Moonlight glittered on an astonishing array of needle-like teeth as the toad yawned.
What else could it want to know? Bannan smiled to himself. “Wen sent me,” he assured it, straight-faced.
With a satisfied grunt, the toad hopped to one side.
“My thanks, sentinel,” the truthseer said sincerely. And to Wen, he thought.
Taking a candle from his pack, he lit it from his striker, then put his hand to the door latch. Though tempted to pause, he lifted it and pulled the door wide.
Tried to pull it wide. The door moved about a third of the way on creaking hinges then stuck fast. Bannan lifted the candle and slipped through the opening, mindful of his feet.
“Well, well.” After all the strange, terrifying, and wondrous things he’d encountered today, nothing could have put him more at ease than the normal chaos of a long-abandoned cabin. He brushed a shelf clear for the candle, then took stock.
The place must have been den and playground for several generations of wildlife—including, from claw marks on one wall, at least one bear. Nothing scurried from his feet or light. Courtesy of friend toad, Bannan guessed.
And, somehow, Wen Treff.
He found a peg for his pack, took off his shirt, and set to work. Nothing fancy, this first night. He’d be satisfied with space for his bedroll. Bannan tied some straw from what remained of the bed to a poker for a makeshift broom, only to put that aside after his first sweep raised a choking cloud of dust. Instead, he used his boots to nudge debris out of the way until he’d cleared a small swathe in the middle of the room.
In the process, he discovered a stovepipe and stone hearth, but no stove. The left-hand wall boasted a fireplace with a stone bread oven to the side, but when he tried to look up the chimney, he found it blocked.
Too hot for a fire anyway.
He used his shoulder to force the rear door open as far as it would go, about a
handsbreadth. A small breeze ventured in, cooling the sweat from his skin. There were windows. The two at the front of the house were shuttered fast. The one at the back looked to be the main thoroughfare for whatever had lived here, and would, he thought cheerfully, need a new frame. And glass panes. He should be able to order those.
The neglected room called to him like no place ever had. Reckless and driven, Bannan lit the rest of his candles. There was a table, missing a leg. He moved it to the fireplace and propped it against the bread oven to use for sorting. Not all was ruined. He uncovered treasures. Three forks. A rusty pot. A bucket with no handle.
Which led him to think about water and the well. “Daylight,” he promised, carefully emptying an old nest from the bucket before setting it by his new pot.
The ladder to the loft was missing most of its rungs. He jumped and caught hold of the opening, then pulled himself up and through, hanging by his elbows.
A fine bedroom, Bannan thought with glee. He could stand easily under the peak. Windows at both ends let in moonlight and air. They’d been letting in birds as well, judging from the nests, and he hoped the toad had been thorough with the mice. Stars showed through gaps in the roof. A few shingles. Tir could help with that. Testing the floor boards he’d leave till morning.
At the thought of morning, Bannan yawned so fiercely his jaw cracked. He let himself drop back down. Tomorrow, he’d clean the place till it shone. Turn the damaged bed frame to kindling. Clear the chimney. Those first. He had tomorrow.
He had the rest of his life.
He pulled out his bedroll and laid it on the cleared portion of floor, then blew out the candles. Removing boots and belt, he lay down, folding his arms across his chest.
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