“I’ve never seen you before, and I wouldn’t have turned a man of your courage and talent out of my service.”
“Yes… I mean, no, my lord.”
“That’s settled, then. Come along with me, we’ll get these little scratches daubed.”
Coe stood.
“My sword, my lord?”
“Yes. We may have need of that,” Dawson said, gesturing to where it lay, grimed with blood and snow and soot. “It seems I’m frightening all the right men.”
Marcus
Fire and blood. Merian shrieked her pain and fear and indignation as only a child could blend them. Her eyes were fixed on him, her arms reaching out. Marcus fought his paralysis, forced his arms to reach for her, and in moving them, woke himself.
The screams of the dead lingered in the cool air as he lifted himself up, still expecting in his half-dream to see the wheat fields and high, stately windmills of Ellis. Instead, the wide star-crowded sky of Birancour arched above him, the looming darkness of the mountains behind him to the east without even the suggestion of dawn. The burning smell of memory gave way to the sweet, astringent scent of ice lily and the distant presentiment of salt that was the sea.
He lay back in his bedroll and waited for the dream to fade. By long habit, he attended to his body. The constricting tightness in his throat eased first, then in his chest. The gut-punch ache in his belly faded slowly and vanished. Soon there was only the permanent hollow beneath his ribs, and he knew it was safe to stand.
They were battle scars. Some men lost a leg or a hand. Some men lost their eyes. Marcus had lost a family. And just as old soldiers knew when rain was coming from the ache of healed bones, he suffered now. It didn’t mean anything. It was just his own private bad weather, and like bad weather, it would pass. It was only for the moment that the dreams were getting worse.
The caravan slept, carters and mules both, in the deep night. The watch fire glittered on the hillside above him, no brighter than a star, but orange instead of blue. Marcus made his way toward it. The dry grass hushed against his boots and field mice skittered away. Yardem Hane sat silhouetted by the small fire, back turned to keep the light from blunting his eyes. Beside him sat a less familiar form. Marcus moved close enough to make out their words.
“The shape of a soul?” Master Kit asked. “I think I don’t understand what you mean.”
“Just that. A soul has a shape,” Yardem said. His wide hands patted the air in front of him. “And fate is formed by it. Whatever the world delivers to you, the shape of your soul determines what you do with it, and the actions you take make your destiny.”
Marcus turned his foot, scraping the ground loud enough to announce himself.
“Morning, Captain,” Yardem said without turning to look.
“You filling our cunning man’s head with your superstitious hairwash?”
“I am, sir.”
“Be careful, Kit,” Marcus said, walking into the dim circle of light. “Yardem used to be a priest, you know.”
Master Kit’s eyebrows rose and he looked his question from Marcus to Yardem. The Tralgu shrugged eloquently.
“Ended poorly,” Yardem said.
“It’s not a faith I’d heard of before,” Master Kit said. “I have to say I find the ideas fascinating. What shape is your own soul?”
“I’ve never seen my soul,” Yardem said.
Marcus sat. The warmth of the fire touched his back. High above them, a falling star streaked from east to west, fading almost before Marcus saw it. The silence felt suddenly awkward.
“Go ahead,” Marcus said. “Tell him if you want to.”
“Tell me what?” Master Kit asked.
“I have seen the captain’s. I was at Wodford the day of the battle. The captain rode by, taking count of the troop, and… I saw it.”
“And what shape was it?” Master Kit asked
“A circle standing on its edge,” Yardem said.
“What did you take that to mean?”
“That he rises when brought low and falls when placed high,” Yardem said.
“He needed magical visions to see that,” Marcus said. “Most people just take it as given.”
“But always?” Master Kit said. “Surely if God wanted to change the shape of a man’s soul-”
“I’ve never seen God,” Yardem said.
“But you believe in him,” Master Kit said.
“I’m reserving judgment,” Yardem said. Master Kit considered that.
“And what about you, Captain?” he asked. “Stories are you were a pious man once.”
“I choose not to believe in any gods as an act of charity,” Marcus said.
“Charity toward whom?”
“Toward the gods. Seems rude to think they couldn’t make a world better than this,” Marcus said. “Do we have any food left?”
The dawn crept in softly, the outline of the mountains to the east growing clearer against the stars, then the few finger-thin clouds began to glow pink and gold and light seemed to come from nowhere, to rise up from the earth like a mist. The carts changed from near-invisible hulks to wood and iron. Pot metal clanked from across the camp as the caravan master’s wife began cooking the morning’s mash of stewed grain and honeyed pork. The landscape changed from endless featureless darkness to hills and trees, scrub and stream. Yardem ran the guards through their morning drills while Marcus walked through the camp and pretended there was no cart in the caravan he cared about more than another.
The girl, Cithrin, followed the same routine as the others. She cared for her mules, she ate her food, she scraped the mud out of her axle holes. If she needed help, she asked Opal or Master Kit. Never the caravan master, never Marcus himself. But never Sandr either, and the boy had been avoiding her like his life depended on it, so that was for the best. Marcus watched her without being obvious. She’d gotten better since they’d left Vanai. Since they’d left Bellin, for that. But there were dark pouches under her eyes and the awkwardness of exhaustion in her movements.
Marcus found the caravan master squatting beside the lead cart, a wide scroll of inked parchment on the dirt before him: a map of south Birancour probably centuries out of date, but it would still show where the dragon’s roads were. His wife, breakfast duties finished, was putting their team in harness.
“Day,” the caravan master said. “Day and a half at most, and we’ll get onto a real road again.”
“That’s good.”
“Another three, and we’ll be in Porte Oliva. You’ve been there before?”
“A time or two,” Marcus said. “It’s a good winter port. Doesn’t get too cold. The queen’s governor isn’t too heavy a tax hand.”
“We’ll stop there, then.”
“Roads should be clear to Carse by early spring,” Marcus said.
“Not for me,” the caravan master said, folding the map. “We reach Porte Oliva, and we’re done. The ’van stops there.”
Marcus frowned and crossed his arms.
“There are some problems with that,” he said. “The job is to see all this to Carse.”
“Your job is to protect the caravan,” the Timzinae said. “Mine is to say where it goes and when it stops. Porte Oliva has a market. Road trade to Cabral and Herez, not to mention the rest of the cities in Birancour. Ships to Lyoniea, and the blue-water trade to Far Syramys. The cargo I was contracted to haul will sell well enough
