Yann squatted down next to Niyazi while he arranged some twigs into a cone. Eliska didn’t notice.

She sat down on the ground next to Anríq talking his ear off about everything the group had seen and done, their experience with the gypsies, and Wesh’s belief that the Voyant Mendicat wanted something one of these men was carrying.

Wesh ignited the sticks to light a fire. Neils pulled out a length of cured leather.

Eliska had used her magic to tan the hides of the last hog Neils killed and a few gars the other Watchmen had hunted on their travels.

Neils unfolded the hog hide to open the package. It contained the last of the party’s food supplies.

He handed out chunks of meat to Wesh and the other Watchmen. Neils gave a piece to Eliska. She didn’t stop talking when she handed it to Anríq.

She was too busy talking to notice that Neils didn’t give her another piece. She didn’t ask nor did she take her attention off Anríq even once.

He listened in silence while he turned the meat over in his hands frowning at it. Then he folded his hands, shut his eyes, and bowed over the food before he started eating it.

Neils glanced at Yvan and Yvan nodded.

“Eliska,” Neils interrupted.

She jerked around as though she just noticed the others. Neils held out a second piece of meat to her.

She hesitated like she had to think about why he was giving it to her. Then she remembered and took it before she turned back to Anríq.

He barely acknowledged her. He stared down at the food in his hands while he ate and listened to all the information she kept dumping into his ears.

“And Wesh thinks the girl might have seen something in the river about where we came from and where we were going. If she did, maybe she knows who’s coming after us. Wesh thinks that might be why she kept trying to talk to Yann while I was unconscious. She might even know why they’re coming after us, but we would have to figure out how to communicate with her…..”

“How do you know so much about these Servants, Eliska?” Yvan interrupted.

She spun around. “Huh? Everyone knows about the Servants—everyone in the Coil does, at least. The Servants are everywhere.”

“If they’re everywhere, why haven’t we seen them before?” Omer asked.

“I mean they go everywhere. There aren’t that many of them, obviously. Not many people go as far as completely turning their backs on the Barbarian way to follow a different path. The Servants get shunned by their people and can never go back to their tribes, but when they do leave, they go everywhere—all through the Coil. They travel around until they find someone who needs help or healing.”

“Are you sure it’s a good idea to tell him so much about us?” Barsali asked.

“How can he help us if he doesn’t understand our situation? Besides, it wouldn’t be right to ask him to help us without telling him exactly what he’s getting into. He has to understand the danger. If you were going to help someone stay alive against the most powerful wizard in the Coil, wouldn’t you want to know going into it that you were going against the most powerful wizard in the Coil? I would. I would think you lied to me beforehand to trick me into something if you didn’t tell me everything.”

“You have a point,” Yvan replied.

“He doesn’t look like much,” Niyazi remarked. “I mean—he’s big and everything, but he’s just a kid. How do we know he’ll be able to do anything?”

She turned back to Anríq and made eye contact with him. It was the first time he’d ever really acknowledged that the group was talking about him like he wasn’t here.

He responded by pulling back the gauntlet on his left arm. He tugged it up to his elbow to reveal a bunch of short parallel lines tattooed onto the inner surface of his wrist and forearm.

Three blocks of five lines each started at the wrist and ended with a block of three lines.

“He’s eighteen….” Eliska explained.

Anríq laid the flat edges of his righthand fingers across the top blocks of lines. He covered up six lines.

“He says he’s been alone in the Coil for six years,” Eliska went on. “He left home when he was twelve.”

“Jesus!” Yvan breathed. “That young?”

A hush fell over the group as everyone stared at Anríq. He kept his eyes down while he pulled the gauntlet back into place and tightened the laces to secure it around his wrist where it had been before. It covered up the tattoo that marked how old he was.

No one spoke while he did this. The whole group stared at him as the truth sank in.

Yann didn’t think it was possible to meet someone as impressive as Eliska—or maybe even more impressive.

No wonder she made such a big deal about Anríq and went to such lengths to bring him into their company.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

He had powerful magic in addition to being one of the most physically intimidating men Yann had ever seen in his life. Anríq was hands down the biggest, strongest man here, but his boyish features and silent ways made him seem almost fragile by comparison.

He was only a year older than Yann and yet Anríq had been alone in the Coil for six years.

He must have strong magic to do all that—strong magic and expert training in the use of his weapons.

He was a Barbarian. He must be devastating when he had to fight anyone—which could turn out to be more often than anyone expected.

He hadn’t been wandering around doing whatever he had to do to survive the way Eliska had. He went out into the Coil by choice. He went looking for trouble to help people and serve humanity.

Yann found himself shrinking from Anríq, especially when Yann saw Eliska hovering around him. She pushed herself at Anríq and came up with new topics to keep talking to him. She didn’t stop engaging with him once even though he never talked back to her.

She gave him her undivided attention and only engaged the rest of the group when they asked her a specific question.

She gave Anríq no indication at all that anything special ever happened between her and Yann. She barely took the time to introduce Yann to Anríq. She made a bigger effort when it came to Yvan.

Should Yann resent that? Should he be concerned that Eliska suddenly relegated Yann to the background the instant Anríq showed up?

Yann tried not to read too much into it. She was just making Anríq feel welcome. No one else would do it.

She was trying to smooth things over between Anríq and the Watchmen by explaining what he could do for them and why accepting him was the best idea.

Yann couldn’t help but simmer over it, though, especially when Neils handed out the second round of food.

He handed Eliska hers first and the same thing happened. She immediately gave her piece to Anríq before she only belatedly remembered to get a second piece for herself.

Anríq reacted the same way. He kept his eyes down and bowed to her when she gave it to him.

“Why doesn’t he speak for himself?” Vidal asked. “Why does he let you do all his talking for him?”

“I told you. He’s taken a vow of silence,” she replied. “You might be some of the only people anywhere in the Coil who don’t know about the Servants. Most Servants don’t have to explain themselves to anyone. People go searching for them if someone needs help. Then it’s up to the person asking for help to explain what they need and ask the Servant to do something about it. Most people don’t need an explanation going the way.”

“What if he knows something that could put us in danger?” Niyazi asked. “How will he communicate with us to warn us?”

“If it’s anything that could threaten us or even benefit us, he’ll tell us,” she replied.

Yvan turned to Wesh. “You said you knew about these Servants. What can you tell us?”

“Not very much,” Wesh replied. “I’ve only heard of them from my studies in the Temple. I didn’t know they were Barbarians who turned away from their people.” He looked up at Eliska. “Are they only Barbarians?”

“Of course they’re only Barbarians. They’re the only ones who have to make such a sacrifice by forsaking everything their people stand for. It wouldn’t mean anything if they didn’t turn their backs on their tribes, families, and traditions for the sake of all humanity.”

Wesh frowned and rubbed his chin again. “I see what you mean. Yes, it makes more sense now when you put it like that.”

“Have you heard of these Servants helping people?” Yvan asked.

“No, nothing like that,” Wesh replied. “We only heard them mentioned in passing—no actual accounts of their actions. I think the Templars would remember if we heard of Barbarians defending people or using their magic to heal them.”

“You can take my word for it,” Eliska interjected. “I’ve done more than heard about it. I’ve seen it.”

Yvan’s head shot up to stare at her. “You have? You’ve met these Servants before?”

She nodded. “I’ve met three of them. One of them was an old woman. The other was an old man and the other was a middle-aged man. Anríq is the youngest one I’ve met.”

Yvan scrutinized Anríq more closely. “It’s a shame he can’t explain to us why he left his people so young.”

“That’s none of our business,” Eliska cut in a little too harshly. “Who cares why he left? He’s here now.”

“So….we just have to go on the same way we were before…..and pretend he really is one of us?” Rien snorted in Anríq’s direction. “The rest of you might trust him, but I don’t. I’m going to stay up tonight and keep an eye on him to make sure he doesn’t do anything to us.”

“He won’t do anything to us,” Eliska sneered. “If he wanted to do anything to us, he would have already done it. None of you would have been able to defend yourselves against him. He could have killed all of you if he wanted to.”

“Would you have let him?” Yann blurted out.

She rolled her eyes at him. “I wouldn’t have gone near him if I didn’t recognize right away what he was. I wouldn’t have invited him to join us and he wouldn’t be sitting here right now. He isn’t dangerous to us. When are you going to admit that? You don’t have to resent him just because I knew about him beforehand and you didn’t.”

That killed the conversation. Anríq didn’t interrupt to defend himself.

He kept silently taking bites of the meat Eliska gave him. He kept his eyes down through the whole conversation.

Neils saved the situation again by wiping as much of the grease and fat off his hog hide and folding it up. He put it in his pocket with a sigh.

“That’s the last of the food,” he remarked. “I wonder if we should hunt along this river before we move on. We could be crossing another grassland for a long way before we find anything else.”

“You and Vidal go take a look before the sun goes down.” Yvan turned to Wesh. “Can you see what’s out there?

“I’ll try.” Wesh started to straighten up.

Before he could do anything, Anríq leaned forward and traced his forefinger in the dust at his feet. “The Dark river is here.” He scratched a forked, crooked line through the dirt and then drew boxes with crosses inside them. “There are towns here…..and mountains here…..”

He drew pointed triangles in a line to indicate mountains.

“Thank you!” Yvan exclaimed. “I don’t suppose you can tell us if any of those towns would be safe for us to travel to.”

“Nowhere will be safe for us to travel to,” Omer pointed out. “The Voyant will follow us no matter where we go. Isn’t that what Wesh said? Isn’t that the whole reason we’re out here—to stay away from people?”

“None of those towns will be safe for you to travel to,” Anríq interrupted. “The Dark river will take them soon.”

He planted his finger into the forked lines he’d created to indicate the river. He continued it until he bisected the whole landscape.

The forks separated the towns from each other. In some cases, the lines cut straight through the towns themselves.

“You can see all that?!” Wesh gasped. “Can you tell when it will happen?”

Anríq leaned back against the log behind him. “No one can see that.”

Yvan scowled at Anríq’s drawing. “If you’re right about the Dark taking this Island, then we shouldn’t go in that direction.”

“The only alternative is going back the way we came,” Eliska pointed out. “That will take us back to the edges that we already know are unstable.”

“Why can’t we just travel to another part of the Ancestral Empire?” Barsali asked. “The whole Island can’t be unstable.”

“It might not be now, but they will be once the Dark starts to spread,” Wesh replied.

“Then we should head back toward the south even if we meet more people there,” Yvan decided. “At least we’ll be in a more stable part of the Island even if we are more likely to bump into someone who is searching for us. At least we won’t end up back in the Coil.”

End of Chapter 25.