Yann and Anríq crossed the drawbridge, passed through the invisible barrier, and headed back out to the road heading in the direction they’d been traveling when Avol and the others brought Anríq to their cursed town.

The boys had to travel through the same town to continue down the road, but no one stopped them there this time.

The gates stood open at both ends of town to let anyone in and out. No one had remembered yet to remove the skeletons and warning signs, but the townspeople would get to that eventually.

People smiled at the two boys when they walked into town, but everyone was too busy putting their lives back together to stop and talk.

Bustling energy filled the town. People worked in the streets and in their yards. Different people went into and out of each other’s houses.

Voices drifted from every window. A few children played outside and Yann even heard laughter in the distance. It didn’t feel like the same town.

He and Anríq passed all the way through town without talking to anyone. No one stopped them. No one even acknowledged that these two young men were the ones who lifted the curse.

Yann and Anríq left town by the other gate, passed down the road, and returned to the open countryside on their way to the horizon. Yann reconciled himself to go through the whole process again when they got to the next town.

Word would spread that a Servant was traveling this way. Anyone who needed help would come out to find Anríq.

Yann settled into that cycle as the basic formula of his life now—and not just because he was traveling with Anríq.

It made sense for Yann to do that, too. This process completed what he started in Middleborough. He only just came to accept it in the tunnels under the church house.

This was his life now—at least until he caught up with the rest of the Watch. This was his life now even after he caught up with the rest of the Watch.

He was still a member of the Watch. He was actually more a member of the Watch now than he had been before. He was as much a member of the Watch now as if he’d already taken his oath.

He’d already let go of the idea of getting together with Eliska—or anyone else. Did it really matter in the end?

His desire to get together with her—it had really just been a desire to protect her—to give her the care and connection she never got from anyone else.

So that was all part of service, too. It really just came down to that.

He wanted to serve her by helping her, protecting her, and caring for her the way she needed him to. He didn’t need anything for himself. He didn’t even really want anything for himself.

The boys camped by the side of the road that night. They didn’t talk around the fire. Yann settled into the comfortable intimacy between him and Anríq. Their connection had grown beyond words.

Yann would keep traveling with Anríq—probably forever. Yann no longer doubted that.

Eliska said the Servants traveled alone, but Anríq didn’t say anything about Yann going off to do his own thing.

Yann made up his mind to stay with Anríq until Anríq did say something. If Yann’s presence somehow violated Anríq’s oath, then Yann would have to go.

He wouldn’t stop being a Servant when he did. Nothing would ever change that.

They both woke up and left camp in silence the next morning. Yann didn’t even ask how far away they were from the next town. It would happen one way or the other whenever it happened.

He zoned out thinking about what the next town would be. Would it be another peaceful market scene or a magical catastrophe that would cost both boys their lives to fix?

He wasn’t thinking about anything in particular when Anríq stopped in the middle of the road, scowled, and looked around.

Yann stiffened instantly. He knew that expression too well. “What’s wrong?”

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Anríq shook his head, and before he could answer, the same vortex of collapsing Layers blasted down from the sky.

It never happened like that before. Yann had never seen the vortex anywhere else besides Costico’s castle.

The vortex erupted out of thin air, spiraled toward the ground in a whirlwind of swirling color and shadow, and forked into the hills a dozen miles west of the road.

Punishing wind struck both boys in the face. Yann raised his glaive, but he didn’t see anything over there—nothing but chaos.

Booming thunder echoed out of the Layers high above as they crashed down one on top of the other. They buckled with flashes of magical discharge going off all the way up to the heavens.

Yann squinted at the surrounding countryside. Would this Island collapse now, too?

He turned to Anríq to ask, but right then, the vortex ejected a solid wall of wild magic. It hurtled across the countryside. Yann couldn’t identify what this was except that it rushed him unbelievably fast.

The wall shimmered with colorful hues playing on its surface and then it smashed into him with bone-crushing force.

It didn’t sweep him away like so many other collapses. This one flooded over him and surrounded him on all sides like a vast sea of water—except that this was crystal clear with brilliant light shining through it from somewhere.

The water—or magic or whatever it was—blocked off his nose and mouth. He couldn’t breathe—and he could swim through it like water.

He floundered to figure out which direction was up or down. Anríq paddled a few feet away trying to hold his breath and orient himself at the same time.

Cows, wagons, household utensils, fence posts, and even a few windows got caught in the same magical flood. They floated in the substance, bumped into each other, and bobbed weightless in the sunlight.

The cows thrashed their legs trying to swim out of the stuff. They tried to swim up, but there didn’t seem to be any up to swim toward. The light came from everywhere and nowhere at once.

Yann’s chest strained holding in the last mouthful of air before he suffocated. Would this Layer collapse and spit him and Anríq out somewhere else? It better happen soon before everyone ran out of air.

Yann kicked out to get closer to Anríq, but right then, another cow shot downward from somewhere above him.

The animal streaked through the magical substance as if the cow just fell into a giant lake or something. It crashed down on top of him and pushed him twenty feet below Anríq.

Yann scrambled to get out from under the cow. He had to swim sideways to get clear of the animal’s hooves striking out in panic.

Yann kicked sideways…and bumped into something else. He didn’t think anything of it at first until he glanced behind him. Whatever it was felt sold enough that he might be able to push off it to propel himself closer to Anríq.

Yann froze when he saw what it was—and what it wasn’t. He didn’t see anything at first—not anything he might have bumped into. Whatever it was, it was invisible.

A mysterious invisible barrier separated him from a completely different landscape on the other side. That landscape was not inundated with water or any magical substance.

He stared through the transparent surface at his father, Wesh, and the men of the Watch engaged in a deadly battle against a completely different breed of Darklings.

They fought at the edge of a wood where the trees met open farmland. That landscape looked stable. The men must have found their way to another Island.

These Darklings weren’t massive fanged monsters covered in spikes and whipping tentacles. These were smaller but somehow even more deadly.

These Darklings looked more like misshapen humans with multiple limbs where their arms and legs should be.

They didn’t have any heads, either. Their bodies moved around on five or six regular human legs with six or seven regular human arms sprouting from the headless shoulders.

These Darklings could move much faster and they used conventional weapons. Each arm held a sword, battle axe, club, or mace.

Dozens of these Darklings surrounded the Watch with countless weapons. The Watchmen couldn’t get away.

Yann looked everywhere for Eliska, but he didn’t see her anywhere in the other landscape. Where was she? Did she finally abandon the Watch to its fate?

Yann put out his hand and touched the invisible surface. It felt like a sheet of glass blocking him from getting out there.

He looked around everywhere, but he only came face to face with the hopeless reality on the other side of the barrier. He was about to watch his father and his friends go down against these Darklings. Yann couldn’t do anything to stop it.

Desperate fury drove him insane. He pushed off from the surface, grabbed his glaive, and nailed the blade into the surface with all his might.

He delivered one blow after another, but he couldn’t break the surface. His efforts didn’t even attract the Watch’s attention.

He floated close enough that they should have been able to see him right next to them. He would have been able to call out to them if the barrier didn’t separate him from them.

He nearly broke his shoulders hammering his glaive into the surface as hard as he possibly could. Nothing.

Someone grabbed him and he spun around in wild panic. He almost turned his glaive on Anríq before Yann realized who it was.

Anríq scowled at him and pushed him away. Anríq puffed out his cheeks holding his breath, straightened his arm to hold Yann at a distance, and unhooked his club from his belt.

Yann’s heart threatened to explode out of his chest. He couldn’t hold his breath much longer and seeing the Watch in danger drove him ballistic.

Anríq swam in front of the surface and turned sideways to wind back his club. The battle outside escalated as the Darklings moved in for the kill.

Anríq swung his club and it smashed into the surface with a ground-shaking explosion. The blast shattered the surface and all that magical water crashed into the other landscape.

The flood slammed into the Watch carrying Yann and Anríq with it. All the cows, fenceposts, windows, and furniture swept away into the trees and took the Darklings with them.

End of Chapter 47.