A Warrior's Burden: Book One of Saga of the Known Lands

the cold climes of the edges of human civilization and had thought himself largely inured to the miseries such a climate provided, he was realizing that he was wrong. And he was cold. Cold inside and cold outside. It was as if he had forgotten what heat was, as if the world itself had forgotten. There was nothing but the white emptiness, white but somehow dark, too. A white that did not sparkle beautifully but that drained the world of color, of life, and though the land spread out before them in a vast emptiness that a man could get lost in, it was also suffocating, oppressive in a way that was hard to define. Matt had never felt like that before about the snow, but he felt it now. Perhaps the emptiness had always been there, but he only recognized it now because of the emptiness inside him, one that matched it.

It did not help that Cutter had said nothing for the last several hours as they trudged through the ever-thickening blanket of snow which lay across the world, the only sound the crunching of the forest beneath their feet and their ragged breaths. It didn’t make sense to Matt that a man could be cold and hot at the same time, could not feel his nose and face for numbness but could be sweating inside the fur coat his mother—or the woman who had raised him—had made for him. But then, nothing since he’d woken up the day before had made sense, and he was beginning to think—to know—that nothing ever would again.

“How much farther?” he asked, more for something to say than because he expected any answer.

He wasn’t to be disappointed then as Cutter only glanced back at him, his face a mask which gave away no clue as to his thoughts. “Farther,” he said.

And that was about the best conversation they had for the first half of the day.

There was nothing for him, then, nothing but the snow and his harsh breaths and a companion who said nothing, who didn’t even seem human, but like some automaton taking step after step not because it hopes to reach a destination or because it even wishes to leave another but simply because it knows nothing else. Nothing, then, to distract him from the thoughts which plagued his mind—a confusing jumble of hatred and anger and self-pity mixed with more than his share of guilt and shame. He wanted to scream, wanted to shout that it wasn’t fair and that the gods were devils, really, and that Cutter was the biggest devil of them all. What kept him from it, what silenced the scream before it ever reached his throat was that he was afraid the man would agree with him, and what could you say to such a thing as that? What could anyone say?

Nothing. He had nothing, was part of nothing, belonged to nothing, and when all those things were true what was there to say? Nothing. So he walked, an automaton in his own right, a puppet pulled along by motivations he understood no better than the marionette its strings.

Finally, his breath rasping in his lungs, his fingers and face too cold to be cold anymore, feeling as if they belonged to someone else, he stopped. “P-please,” he stammered. “Please, we have to stop.”

Cutter turned, and if the man was weary at all from their hike, he did not show it. Nor did he scorn or taunt Matt which might almost have been better, at least it would have been something, something other than the silence. Instead, the man said nothing, only nodded and crouched on the ground, his thick, fur-clad forearms draped over his knees as the snow fell around them and Matt panted, trying to catch his breath.

It was not comfortable, that rest, for he could feel the man waiting on him, and though he did not look at Matt, but behind them, as he always did when they stopped, he could feel the man’s gaze on him anyway, judging him, thinking him weak. And the worst was that Matt felt weak, weak and afraid and no more than a child. Hard to believe that only yesterday he and Felmer and his friends had been talking about joining the soldiers. Children pretending to be adults and doing a terrible job, fooling themselves and no one else, all of them wanting to show the other, to show themselves how tough they were, how brave.

But if the last day and a half had taught Matt anything, it was that he was not tough, he was not brave. Cutter was tough, brave, too, but Matt was not like him, could never be like him. The man seemed scared of nothing, moved by nothing, and Matt was scared of everything. He had nothing in common with such a man, no matter how much he wanted to. “You can fight,” Matt said, suddenly overcome with an idea.

Cutter glanced up from where he’d been studying his hands as if trying to divine some secret there. He said nothing, only watched Matt, watched him with something that might have been dread hidden in his pale, icy gaze. Or, just as likely, it was nothing.

“I mean, you know how,” Matt said, suddenly uncomfortable under that stare.

“Everything that breathes knows how. Men more than most.”

Matt winced. “That’s not…what I mean is you’ve been trained.”

Again, the man said nothing, only watching him, waiting for what he would say, and Matt shifted, uncomfortable under that scrutiny. “I mean…you could train me. To fight.”

“No.”

A single word, but spoken roughly, nearly in a growl, and Matt found himself offended by the man’s quick refusal. “No?”

Cutter said nothing, and dangerous man or not, Matt was angry. “Damn you then,” he hissed. “Damn you for everything. I hate you.”

The man did not snap back, as Matt almost wished he would, did not retort or argue or even threaten. He only stood, watching Matt and weathering his words and his