“I heard him mention another one,” Akelle said as they dragged the guard back into the room they had come in, where they bound and gagged him. “Do you know where he is?”
“The perimeter was all he said.”
Akelle nodded. When they finished and left the room, they left the door open, not daring another squeak of the hinges. Josen lead the way down the stairs, praying for silence.
The inside of Berden’s manor was as dark as the outside was illuminated, and Josen and Akelle made their way past room after empty room, working their way slowly toward the offices. Wherever Garson was, it seemed he wasn’t walking the halls.
There were, however, a pair of able-looking guards, a man and a woman, standing just outside the office door, looking bored. The secretary’s office doubled as a reception area for Berden’s personal offices, but this seemed extreme even for that. What was Berden so keen to guard? There was no chance of getting in this way with those two standing there.
“Plan?” Akelle whispered in his ear, coming to the same conclusion.
Josen gestured for him to follow. They backtracked a little way and stepped into a dark, empty dining room off the main hall.
“I don’t have any great ideas,” Josen said quietly when he was sure no one could hear them. “What do you think?”
“I’ll have to draw them away—unless you want to see if we can get in from outside?”
Josen shook his head. “If the guards are any indication, those windows are locked for sure. Plus, it sounds like Berden’s in some kind of meeting right now, probably in his office.”
“That’s what I figured,” Akelle said, peeking around the corner again. He sighed and thought for a moment, then shook his head. “God’s tears. Okay, I’ll make my way up to Berden’s rooms, make a mess like I’m looking for something—hidden documents, jewelry, whatever—then make a loud exit. Break a window. Once I lose them, I’ll head home.”
Nodding, Josen explained how to get to Berden’s rooms, and Akelle left with a quiet “good luck” as he disappeared into the dark hallway. Josen waited in silence for what felt like an eternity, hoping there weren’t any random guards between here and Berden’s rooms. He didn’t think it was likely—Berden was down the hall, not in his rooms—but there was always the chance. Eventually he heard the sound of exaggerated footsteps coming from the floor above him in the direction of Berden’s rooms. He could hear concerned voices coming from down the hall, and then something heavy crashed to the floor above. A window shattered a moment later, and two figures rushed past the dining room, followed closely by a third.
“Reverate Berden,” a voice said, “you should stay back with Reverate Riveran. Perce and I will find—” The conversation moved out of Josen’s hearing, and he waited to see if Berden or Riveran—whoever he was—would return.
He listened as the hurried footsteps disappeared around the corner and up the stairs, but none moved back toward the offices. This was the best chance he was going to get.
The door to the secretary’s office had been left ajar, but Josen paused outside, eying a statuette sitting on a dark wooden stand. He couldn’t determine the specifics of statue in the darkness, but he decided it didn’t matter. The little statue went quickly into the bag at Josen’s side, and a cloth-wrapped steel mask came out. With a quick burst of energy, Josen broke the steel, changing it into hard clay, then shattered it with a twist of his hands. He placed the whole thing, cloth and all, on the stand where the statue had been.
Feeling his window of opportunity closing quickly, Josen stepped through the door to the office without a sound. He moved to the desk and rifled through the papers he found there until he found what he was looking for—requests approved.
Josen pulled one out, studying Reverate Berden’s signature at the bottom. It was hardly ideal, rushed and in poor light, but there was no time. He rummaged through the desk, found a steel pen and a scrap piece of paper, practiced the signature once, and then pulled out the papers from his bag. There were two of them—identical requests for special permission to bring Abbahim’s flock of sheep through Basin Pass, except one was labeled “For Official Records.” Josen forged Berden’s signature at the bottom of both, blew the ink dry, and placed the “Official” one in the stack with the rest of the approved requests.
“Very clever.”
Josen’s heart lurched, and his head snapped up at the sound of the deep, resonant voice coming from Berden’s office. A man stood in the darkened doorway. With no light coming from the office, Josen had assumed the door was closed.
“Classic diversion. Your partner makes a ruckus somewhere else while you claim the real prize.”
Holy starving hells.
Josen’s blood turned to ice. That voice was familiar. Josen fought the nervous urge to reach up and check the cloth wrapped around his eyes to be sure he couldn’t be recognized. A surge of power rushed through him as he tapped his ceral energy, and his senses intensified. He could hear yelling voices coming from outside the manor—the sound of men running, giving chase.
Josen needed to run, to get away. The man thought he was here to take something, not plant evidence. Should he attack? If Josen hit him hard enough, maybe he wouldn’t remember Josen being here. Maybe he could…
“Now, that’s interesting,” the man said, stepping out of the shadow to take a closer look at the desk.
Josen glanced down to see the desk immediately surrounding his hands glittering in the darkness. He had broken it without realizing; the wood turned to quartz beneath his hands.
“Redhand. Who sent you?” the man asked, taking another step forward, “And how much rub have they promised? Because I can give you more, I guarantee it.” Josen knew he should run, but that voice—he knew that voice, trusted that voice. “I could use a gifted breaker like yourself.” The man took one more step forward, and his features came into sharp focus.
Josen’s heart dropped out of his chest as recognition flooded him. The voice, the thick shoulders, and the greying hair. His beard was shorter and neater, and he was wearing Reverate robes, but there was no mistaking the man grinning at Josen.
“Come work for me,” said Saul. “What do you say?”
Chapter 34
The words worked like a magic spell, releasing Josen from his paralysis. He stumbled backward, caught himself, and then did the only thing that made any sense to him: he ran.
Out the door and down the hall, Josen sprinted as fast as his legs would allow. A yell followed him as he ran, but the words didn’t make any sense—nothing made any sense. He didn’t slow down as he ran at Berden’s front door. He crashed through the wood even as he broke it into soft, rotten wood.
“Stop! Stop that thief!” he heard someone yell from behind him, but Josen was gone. He crossed Berden’s grounds in seconds and quickly scaled the outer wall, breaking handholds on instinct as he did. Josen disappeared over the edge, dropped to the ground, and then kept running.
His thoughts were a confused blur as he lost himself among the dozens of dark structures surrounding Berden’s estate. Saul was dead. He died months ago. At least, that was what he had been told. Why hadn’t Josen stayed? Why hadn’t he pulled off his mask and told Saul everything—asked for his help, asked him what the starving hells was going on? Josen took off his mask and slowed to a jog as he turned his course toward the Pass, moving as quickly as he dared.
He tried to focus on the task at hand, on the simple need to deliver the paper in his breast pocket to the Carters at the Pass, to get the Pass open so Abbahim could push his flock through before Berden had a chance to muck things up. Berden would have a much harder time protesting after the sheep had been moved, especially with all the right paperwork in place.
But God’s tears, what was Saul doing here? In the Basin? In Berden’s home? Alive?
Josen needed to talk to Tori. He was sure this wasn’t the storm she had been so adamant about, but it was huge. She could help him figure out what it all meant.
/> Josen pulled up short as he approached the Basin Pass, his mind only just now registering what his eyes were seeing. The Pass was dark. Deserted. The lanterns had been removed, and there was no sign of the Carter guards. Josen hurried to the small, makeshift barrack where the overnight Carter—stationed there to open the Pass in emergencies or other strange circumstances—would be sleeping. The door was ajar, as if someone had left in a hurry. No one was inside. Josen swore and kicked the door. It crashed against the inner wall, the violent noise satisfying. There was no telling what Berden would do if Josen didn’t get those sheep through tonight, and no telling if Josen would ever get the chance to bring them through again. He kicked the door again for good measure before turning back to stand at the entrance to the Pass.
“What am I supposed to do?” he yelled into the darkness. “What?” He yelled and let the ceral energy roll through him in a wave, the thrill of it stoking his anger and frustration and confusion.
Pass mist spiked up out of the ground a dozen feet in front of Josen, leaping into the air and dissipating almost instantly. Josen stared down the ramp where the mist had formed, then down at his own hands. He would never be able to bring the sheep through one by one, not even if he wasn’t concerned about keeping this particular ability a secret. But maybe…
Josen shoved a handful of Master Roetu’s ceral candies into his mouth and chewed, not caring that the hard candies stuck to his teeth and hurt his jaw. He stepped down into the Pass and broke. He could open the pass for himself. He could bring other people through with him.
Maybe he could do more.
Mist erupted around him as he walked, and the unpleasant burning, tingling pressure began as the mist climbed up his body. Josen ignored it. He walked down the ramp as far as he dared, the mist swirling high enough to obscure his vision. Then he took one more step, letting the mist engulf him. He stood, breathing deeply through the burning and shivering energy washing over his skin.
Josen flared his ceral energy, forcing the energy out in a radius around him, pushing in a way he never had before. The wash of exhilarating energy roared through him, followed by familiar pain in the back of his head as he tapped into the energy of the undigested ceral candy he just put into his mouth. Josen pushed harder, and the pain flared into agony, but he didn’t stop. He let the energy flow out of him, expelling it from every pore. He pushed for what seemed like an eternity, letting the energy wash through him, radiate from him, pulsating opposite the pass mist that pressed in on him. His bones were on fire. Josen opened his mouth to scream at the simultaneous bliss and agony, but nothing came out. Time stretched into meaningless eternity until Josen collapsed and the world went dark.
* * *
“Any word yet, sir?” Gad asked, his hands stuck in his armpits as he tried his best not to shiver. Ceralon was a cold, Goddess-forsaken place even in the summer. Far colder than Pomay, especially at night.
“No,” Abbahim said, placing a hand on Gad’s shoulder. He could feel the boy shivering. The shepherds hadn’t planned to stay so long in Ceralon and were all bare-chested. Most of them were huddled close with their sheep, trying to keep warm. They would just have to hold out until the Basin Pass opened. The Basin was much warmer. “I’ll let you know as soon as I know anything.”
“Y-yes sir,” Gad said with quick jerk of his head. “Thank you.”
Starve that boy, Abbahim thought as he moved on, walking among his flock, pausing to talk to his shepherds as he did. It kept him moving, kept him from focusing too much on the anxiety simmering in his guts. Be ready, Josen had said. The Pass will be open for you. I’ll see to it personally.
But it wasn’t. Abbahim had known he might have to wait, but he was sure it should be open by now. If Abbahim was staying up through the night growing ulcers for nothing, he was going to skin Josen alive and feed him to the goats.
“How goes it, Amille?” Abbahim asked his next shepherd.
“It goes w-well,” said Amille, shivering as well. He rubbed his hands together and put them back under his arms. “The sh-sheep have settled d-down, sir, and the rest h-has been good for the d-dogs.”
“Very good,” Abbahim said, mentally noting Amille’s lack of complaint despite his obvious discomfort. “We are just waiting on the young Reverate, but he promised me that…” Abbahim trailed off as Amille’s eyes jerked away, going wide. Light shone suddenly bright on his youthful face.
“What is…” Amille half whispered, a mix of confusion and awe filling his voice.
Abbahim turned to see what had caught the young man’s attention. Maybe that starving boy finally managed… The thought blew away like smoke on the breeze as Abbahim’s gaze fell on the Basin Pass.
Mist billowed up out of the Pass. It rolled and leapt, cresting and crashing like ocean waves. Light flashed from deep inside the mist, like lightning behind distant clouds. The mist mounted and grew, swelling silently up and out of the Pass. Abbahim couldn’t take his eyes from it. It was beautiful and terrifying. He had never seen anything like it, and he had no idea what it meant.
The bulging, violent mist slowed, and then receded, shrinking back into its soft, typical swirling inside the Pass.
Abbahim released a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.
“What was that?” Amille asked, cold forgotten.
Abbahim didn’t answer. He had never seen any Pass act in that fashion, and he was no stranger to the Passes. But Amille didn’t need to know that.
“Rouse your dogs,” Abbahim said instead. “I want sheep moving through the Pass in ten minutes.”
His shepherds performed valiantly, and they had the beginnings of the flock, large as it was, moving in an orderly fashion through the Basin Pass in short order. Abbahim didn’t have any idea why the Pass acted as it had, but he wanted to be through with this whole mess as quickly as possible. The sooner he could get his sheep grazing on Josen’s land, the better. Abbahim stayed behind, herding his shepherds as they herded the sheep, urging them to hasten their charges through the archway and the mist and into the Ceral Basin.
The mist was just beginning to recede, pulling away from the stony sidewalls of the Pass, as the final shepherd was herding his hundred sheep down the ramp. The shepherd, his hands wrapped tightly around his walking staff, glanced from the shrinking pool of mist to Abbahim.
“Go!” Abbahim said, hustling closely behind the anxious boy. “We don’t want to get stuck on this side. Move, move!”
Following the last of the sheep, he half trotted down the ramp and into the mist, the odd sensation of the ground rolling underneath his feet barely phasing him after all these years. The passage was quick and smooth, and Abbahim soon felt the cool Ceralon air around him vanish, replaced by the humid night air of the Ceral Basin. As he walked up out of the mist—very nearly spent on this side of the Pass as well—he was pleased to see that his shepherds already beginning to lead their flocks in the right direction. Some of the sheep had been frightened by the passage and were wandering off in the wrong direction, but there would be time later to gather those. For now, the most important thing was to…
Abbahim froze at the sound of a soft moan behind him, then spun as something heavy hit the ground. The noise had come from the Pass... But no one had come through after him.
Warily, Abbahim walked to the edge of the Pass ramp and peered down as the last tiny pocket of mist swirled into nothingness, revealing a motionless body lying on the stones. He hesitated, then approached the unmoving form—a man, judging by his size.
Abbahim’s heart sank as he recognized the boy. “Josen,” Abbahim breathed. Reticence was replaced with urgency as he knelt next to the young Reverate. His skin was cold and pale, even in the wan light of pre-dawn, but… Yes, he was still breathing. “What in Arka’s glorious name did you do, boy?” Abbahim whispered. He tried gently shaking Josen, but he didn’t stir.
Gently, gingerly, Abbahim arranged the boy’s limbs and rolled him up onto his shoulders with the long practice tha
t came from a lifetime of carrying sick injured sheep the same way—though the boy was heavy, and Abbahim was getting old. Arka’s breath, Abbahim thought, grimacing as he walked out of the pass with Josen slung across his shoulders. The sweet Goddess only knew what it was about the boy he liked so much. Whatever it was, Abbahim could at least do this for him.
Interlude: Vale, Alia, Tori, Jamis
Vale
Vale was at Josen’s bedside, absorbed in silent prayer when Josen woke. It had been two days since Abbahim found him lying unconscious in the Basin Pass. She had spent most of those two days in this very chair, sitting by her unconscious brother with nothing but time to think and pray. She had done plenty of both.
The room was comfortable and quiet, and Doctor Roetu insisted that Josen would be fine, that his body only needed to recover from some tremendous exertion the Doctor couldn’t explain. Josen needed rest.
There was no doubt in Vale’s mind that Josen had somehow engineered the minor miracle that had gotten Abbahim’s sheep into the Basin, with all the proper paperwork in place no less—though, by the look of outrage on Berden’s face, Vale privately doubted the authenticity of the paperwork.
Still, it seemed that Josen was the architect of yet another impossible escape from certain disaster. Between the manure from their own animals, the manure from Abbahim—both fresh and carted in—and the miraculous steam tractors, what looked like a ruinous season a few days before now had the potential to be one of the most successful and profitable harvests ever recorded.
Of course, there were no shortage of things that could still go wrong—farming was never anyone’s idea of a risk-free venture—but all those disasters looked absolutely mundane in comparison.
Which only left Vale’s own tower of personal problems—how to rescue Kalen, and the agreement Vale had made with Lady Stonelowe.
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