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—DRAMATIS PERSONAE—
Uicha de Orak, a young man of no renown or loyalty, might not be leaving after all
Battar Crodd, Death Knight of the 13th Renown and Quill of the Orvesian Witnesses, indulging in some teachable moments
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8 New Summer, 61 AW.
The village of Ambergran, North Continent
292 days until the next Granting.
Uicha abandoned his plans to visit the general store. In fact, he vowed to never go back into town again. He had money. There would be places to buy supplies on the road. He could figure things out, even if it meant a few nights on an empty stomach.
Tomorrow. Tomorrow would be the day for sure. He wanted a full day of sunlight to put as much distance between him and Ambergran as possible.
Also, Uicha didn’t know how to build a campfire. He could spend tonight practicing, so he’d be a little better prepared for life on the road.
He tried to distract himself with a mental list of things he’d need for his journey, but anger kept percolating within him. The way lifelong neighbors now looked at him like he was some kind of outsider. Well, that wasn’t exactly new. Their masks were fully off now. Shouting at him, throwing stones. He hadn’t even done anything except survive, like the rest of them.
And then there was the Orvesian girl and her unsettling offers. Her soft body falling into his arms, blood trickling down the side of her head. Uicha refused to explore the conflicting emotions he felt about that. Instead, he pictured Battar Crodd looming over all of them with his twinkling blue eyes and impromptu sermons, like he found the ruination of their lives so, so regrettable.
Uicha’s knuckles were white on the reins when he rode Clipper into the barn. By the time he’d finished tending to the horse, the anger still hadn’t faded.
He decided to practice his swordplay. His mother’s gleaming scimitar in hand, Uicha slashed his way across the yard. He imagined Orvesians in their black paint fleeing from him. He swatted away rocks thrown by ignorant farmers and charged after them. Every enemy that Uicha could imagine quailed before his assault.
His heartbeat was so loud in his ears that Uicha didn’t hear them approach.
"It's a sincere performance. Someone that's never used a blade might actually think you know what you’re doing."
Battar Crodd stood at the edge of the wheat field, his sharp blue eyes smiling at Uicha. The black stripes across his face had been freshly reapplied since that afternoon. A breeze rustled the black feathers that decorated his caftan, and Uicha noticed how one of the Ink symbols on his chest had faded. That must’ve been the Ink that let him make that choking stench.
Much to Uicha's bafflement, the Orvesian had a sleeping puppy draped over his forearm. He gently stroked the wrinkled back of the dog's neck with his index finger. A tremor passed through Uicha’s sword arm that he knew didn’t go unobserved.
"If you're interested in really learning, I could give you lessons," Crodd said eventually, when it became clear Uicha would only gape at him. "I was a teacher once, amongst my people. History. Not swordplay. But you'd find I have the temperament for tutelage."
"What do you want?" Uicha finally managed to ask.
Crodd took a few steps closer, squinting at Uicha’s neck. "Still no mark on you. After today, I'd hoped to see a blackbird."
Uicha clasped a hand over his throat, but realizing that was a pointless gesture, he let it drop.
"I'm no Orvesian," he said. “I never will be.”
Crodd chuckled and strolled closer still. Uicha stood his ground. But then, a dozen more Witnesses emerged from the wheat, carrying tools and pulling carts. At the sight of them, Uicha stumbled backward.
"Your fields are overdue and your staff is gone," Crodd said. "We're here to help with the harvest."
“You're here to help…” Uicha murmured.
"It will all be properly accounted. We have people good with numbers. We'll carve out a fair share for you," Crodd explained. "However, the bulk of what we earn from your fields will be put back into the town. You saw what’s happening. We need to help these people get back on their feet."
"You're helping them? Handing out blankets, doing chores…" Uicha laughed, embarrassed by how hysterical he sounded. "You just killed half of them!"
Crodd stopped a few yards away. "The gods killed them, Uicha. Not me."
"You told the gods to do it. You wished for it."
Crodd made a face. He gently maneuvered the puppy off his arm, holding it out belly up toward Uicha. The dog's small tail flopped lazily.
"I wish you would kill this dog," Crodd stated. “I wish you would slice it in half with your pirate’s sword.”
"What?" Uicha took another step back. "No."
“You dare to deny me my wish?” Crodd theatrically exclaimed. "Why, young man, you must be more powerful than the gods themselves." He set the puppy down and it scrambled over to sniff at Uicha’s ankles. "I find the annihilation of Ambergran repugnant,” Crodd continued. “What sort of gods would permit it? What sort of gods would encourage it? A boy playing swords in his fields has more wisdom than these creatures we’re forced to worship."
Uicha bent down to scoop up the puppy, juggling the runt awkwardly while still keeping his sword drawn. "Do you carry around small animals just to make this point?"
Crodd smiled and shook his head. "I found him and thought of you. The unmarked boy. All alone out here. I thought you might benefit from a companion."
The other Witnesses had already begun work in the fields. A burly Orvesian stripped to the waist took a scythe to the rows of wheat with mechanical rhythm. Two others trailed behind him, gathering the stalks into bundles and depositing them in a cart. Uicha raised an eyebrow. There were a handful of Orvesians behind Crodd who didn’t carry farming implements. Instead, they brandished shovels and pickaxes. This bunch stood by idly while Uicha spoke with Crodd, almost like they were waiting for him to leave.
“I’ll keep the dog,” Uicha decided in an instant. “But I don’t want you here.”
Crodd cocked his head. “You would deny your neighbors the bounty of a harvest in their time of need?”
“You aren’t my neighbors,” he responded. “If someone from Ambergran wants to harvest my fields, they’re welcome to it. But I won’t have you murderers on my land.”
Uicha had never really referred to it as his land before. The phrase tasted strange in his mouth. He hadn’t suddenly developed an attachment to this forsaken farm and the stupid town it abutted. He just wanted the Orvesians gone. He wanted very badly to say no to someone.
That infuriating twinkle of amusement never left Crodd’s blue eyes. “You know, in the days of my grandfather, you might have used that to protect your domain,” he said, nodding toward Uicha. “The sword, I mean. Not the puppy.”
Uicha’s hand was sweaty on the hilt. He halfheartedly raised the blade toward Crodd, but only an inch. He knew it was a pointless gesture.
“Of course, I have a sword, too.” Crodd reached up to tap the handle of the two-handed broadsword strapped to his back. “There are many formidable warriors among my people. If it wasn’t for the gods’ protection, we could’ve swept through this place like fire. And yet, in the end, the result is the same. Perhaps cleaner, perhaps not. It’s all a conundrum, isn’t it?”
If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
His words went in circles. Uicha found his gaze drifting to the man’s chest, where spirals of Ink marked his renown. Even with one section faded, the collection was impressive.
“So, you’re unable to exert your will with brute force, pointless as that would be for you against me,” Crodd continued. “The only option really left to you is the laws of gods. The Quills have special magic to rid unwanted visitors from the lands where they hold domain. Unfortunate for you that Tabitha Gentlerain has disappeared. I think she may have gone a bit mad.” Crodd stroked his square jaw, as if something had just occurred to him. “Might be interesting to see, actually, what would happen to an unmarked boy should a Quill work a banishment upon the land. I have a quill of my own, you know.” Crodd waved his hand and a golden inkwell manifested, swiftly dispatched with a second flourish. “Experimentation is how we learn the limits of our world. Perhaps this land now belongs to Orvesis and it’s you who needs banishment. Should we find out?”
“This is my land,” Uicha repeated, holding tight to that statement. “If you won't leave…” He trailed off, hunting for a threat.
“You should come to one of my sermons,” Crodd continued over him. “Witness with us, and you might better understand your predicament.”
“I'm not joining your cult.” The words came with a harshness that made the puppy squirm in his arms. “I’ll burn the fields! I’ll—”
Uicha saw the way Crodd's face changed. Was it the word cult or was it his threat to burn the fields? Either way, Crodd’s blue eyes went dull and the amused quirk of his mouth flattened. And then, in the blink of an eye, the Orvesian stood directly before him. Uicha hadn’t even seen the man move. A coldness radiated out from Crodd and prickled against Uicha’s skin. He felt chilled all over, the will leaking out of him. The man’s closeness felt the same way as falling in a dream. It was a nightmare come to life.
“Don’t say something you’ll regret,” Crodd warned, his voice like boots crunching over ice. “Now, go inside and let us carry on our business undisturbed by petulance.”
Just like that, Uicha was back inside the farmhouse, the door slammed and bolted behind him. His body had taken over and he had fled for safety. His heartbeat pounded in his ears. He shuddered and his breath came out as mist. Outside, he could hear the Orvesians chatting and laughing. His arm was wet with dog piss. A magical sensation of fear had radiated out from Crodd – not real, Uicha told himself, yet that didn’t stop his knees from shaking.
He set the puppy down shakily but gently, then screamed and flung his mother's sword across the room. It clattered against the wall, putting a long slash through the dining room tapestry depicting a sunset over the Flamingo Islands.
Get out of this place. Take only what he could carry. Go find his grandfather or don't. Just get away. Just–
Uicha noticed a glint of metal peeking through the shredded wall hanging. Half in a daze, he walked forward and yanked the artwork down.
There was a metal slot in the wall. A barely perceptible keyhole. Tracing his fingers across the wood, Uicha felt the outline of a hidden panel, so subtly installed that he could barely see it in the daylight. There was no place to insert a pry-bar, hardly any gap in the wood at all. To open the panel, you’d need the key or you’d need to take an axe to the entire wall. Knocking on the wood, Uicha thought he heard the reverberation of metal underneath – so maybe even an axe wouldn’t be enough.
What had his parents been hiding from him?
Immediately, Uicha retrieved the elaborate key from his parents’ lockbox and returned to the dining room. The key fit smoothly into the lock and turned, but the panel didn’t open.
Uicha cocked his head. He heard a sound like crickets from within the wall. Leaning his head closer, Uicha realized that something inside the wall had started ticking. The puppy danced around his feet, barking at the strange sound now emanating from the wall.
“A bad sign, do you think?” Uicha whispered to his canine accomplice. He wasn’t entirely sure why he was whispering in his own home.
The ticking picked up speed. Uicha jiggled the key, tried to turn it back in the other direction, and then attempted to yank it loose. The key wouldn’t budge. His palm had begun to sweat, so Uicha readjusted his grip.
“Ouch!”
A needlelike protrusion on the key’s shaft had stuck his palm. Uicha tugged his hand back to press the wound to his lips, watching as a thin rivulet of his blood was drawn down the length of the key and into the lock.
The ticking stopped.
The panel in the wall hissed open just far enough that Uicha could slide his fingers under the edge and push it aside. He revealed a small, metal-lined compartment. There were narrow vents cut into the walls that emitted small puffs of smoke, as if some hidden mechanism had begun heating up and was now abruptly quenched.
Inside the compartment, Uicha found two letters and a cloth-wrapped bundle no bigger than a loaf of bread. He glanced down at the puppy, but he’d since lost interest and instead busied himself with chewing the tapestry.
The first letter was written on paper finer than anything sold in Ambergran. A rigid script entirely bypassed any salutation, the terseness communicating authority:
> I trust you find this first payment satisfactory. They will continue so long as our agreement is kept.
>
> The gadgeteer who delivers this message is to be given full license to make the necessary alterations to your home.
>
> If your sketches are accurate, those wards should prove more than sufficient. You will be in no danger. You must simply do nothing.
>
> We will have no further contact until such time that I arrive to claim the object.
>
> -AR
Beneath the initials was stamped the open tome symbol of the Magelab. Uicha shook his head, completely mystified. His parents had never mentioned anything about some kind of arrangement with the Magelab. They’d never even mentioned mages.
Uicha immediately recognized the writing on the second letter. His stomach tightened at the sight of his mother’s flowing cursive. The letter was dated Freze 58. Almost three years old.
> Uicha, my love,
>
> Small chance you ever read this. Shudder to think at the bad luck that might have brought you in here. Nonetheless, I feel the urge to write it all down, jinx or not.
>
> Your da and I did some business with an archmage of the Magelab named Ahmed Roh. We thought we was hustling him but in the end I think he hustled us. Been working for him ever since, not that it’s much work. We just keep this thing locked up in here.
>
> Your da thinks it’s a paperweight. A bauble. I’m not so sure. Strange dreams, sometimes.
>
> It’s your burden now and I’m sorry. Track down Roh, bury it back in the yard, burn the whole farm down and show Ambergran your back. I doubt it matters much to me now, except that your happiness would make me rest easy.
>
> Love always,
>
> Mama
Uicha’s hands started to shake and he worried he might tear the page, so he set it aside near the pile of documents he’d been going through the night before. The map of their farmland his father had made—the one with what Uicha thought were markings for wells—caught his eye.
Some of those Orvesians had been carrying shovels and pickaxes. Peeking through the front window, Uicha watched the silhouettes of the Witnesses as they moved through his fields. Late in the day to start harvesting, no matter how dire the needs of Ambergran.
The Orvesians were looking for what Uicha’s father had already dug up. That had to be the case.
Uicha made sure all the curtains were drawn and the door securely bolted before he took the cloth-wrapped bundle out from the hidden alcove. Through the cloth, the object felt hard like metal, but didn’t have much weight. As he set it down on the table, something shifted around inside—like flour in a tub.
Carefully, Uicha peeled back the cloth, which he now realized was one of his old baby blankets. A warm azure glow bathed his face and hands. Static shocks buzzed the tips of his fingers when they got too close to the object.
He stared down at a sausage-shaped capsule of pure silver. The metal shone smooth in the rare spaces where it hadn’t been carved into with jagged runes, the purpose of which Uicha couldn’t begin to understand. The wards were aglow with blue light and emitted a faint sensation of repulsion when Uicha held his hands over them.
“What is this?” Uicha whispered.
Sensing movement, Uicha glanced away from the glowing capsule just in time to see the puppy gallop into his bedroom. Was he hiding?
When Uicha next looked at the capsule, all the runes had winked out.
“Um,” he said.
An invisible hand closed around his throat. Not choking, more like caressing. Gently, fingers like cold breath dragged across the sides of his neck and met at the blank space on his throat where he once had the mark of Ambergran. Uicha tried to take a step back from the table, but found himself rooted in place. He wanted to slap the hand away, yet his arms wouldn’t lift.
The room was very dark now. When had the sun set? The sudden loss of light actually calmed Uicha. He’d fallen asleep; this whole thing was a nightmare. At any moment, he would sit up in his bed and—
From the darkened ward grooves on the capsule, a black substance crawled forth. The stuff looked like ants, clumps of scrabbling ants, theirs tiny legs all caught together by pitch, so that the hideous forms tumbled end-over-end toward Uicha like writhing tumbleweeds.
Movement across the room. A woman sat in the rocking chair by the fireplace. Uicha couldn’t make out her features in the gloom.
He found he had a voice. “Mama?”
“No,” the woman responded. “I’m sorry, child. But no.”
Uicha tasted dirt. The chittering sludge from the capsule had crawled up his chest, over his clean expanse of neck, and shoved into his mouth. The room seemed to close in on him, like the walls of a coffin. Uicha squeezed his eyes shut and—
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13 New Summer, 61 AW.
The village of Ambergran, North Continent
287 days until the next Granting.
Uicha woke up gasping for air. A nightmare, just like he’d thought.
Except, he was laying on the floor next to the kitchen table. His body felt hollowed out, like someone had carved loose his bones and then jammed them back inside his quivering body. He groaned and his mouth and throat felt impossibly dry.
Uicha flinched as nails skittered across the floor. It was just the puppy, happy to see him, licking his cheek. His face felt crusty and Uicha got the sense that this wasn’t the first time the puppy had licked him, but it was the first time he had enough strength to gently shoo him off.
“I grew concerned when I heard the dog whining, so I let myself in.”
Turning his head, Uicha found Battar Crodd seated at his dining room table. His parents’ letters and map were spread out before the Orvesian. In one hand, Battar held up the capsule. Half of it, anyway. The thing had split into two equal sections. Battar held it up so that Uicha could see the hollow inside.
Empty.
“My friend,” Battar said softly, “we have a problem.”
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