“Look, Ana. A Budrahrium.”

Lifting my eyes from the winding, rocky path, I glanced in the direction Kasamarchi was pointing…

…to see yet the same play of light and shadow on the hateful rocks. Has the whole world been reduced to these endless stone ledges and crevices?

“Where?”

“There. To the right.”

“Where?” Darting over the slopes barely covered with the rust of wilted shrubs, my gaze found nothing but sun-scorched stony silence.

“Look up.”

Lifting my head to the bright, burning-hot blue sky, I ran my gaze over the jaggy mountain tops on the horizon. Where the hell is that Budrahrium? Hey, stop.

Amidst the chaos of broken lines, my eyes made out a handful of regular shapes—a round tower with a spherical roof, tiny from this distance. Surrounded by lower, flat buildings, it brought the word “observatory” to mind.

“I see it,” I said.

A Budrahrium. This word puffed menthol-cold fear over my heart.

“Don’t be afraid, Ana,” Kasamarchi said, feeling this change in my mood.

“I can’t!” I screamed back at him.

His plan was pure suicide.

Budrahs will crush us like two bugs. Why the hell does he need to do this?

Over a month had passed since our encounter in Kasamarchi’s hut, but I could not forget the hissing stingers shot by the Cerberus.

And now this crazy plan involving Budrahs…

A month!

I’ve already been in Crealia for a month!

With no calendar or a watch, I’d have long lost track of time if not for Kasamarchi.

At home, I used to be friends with Father Time. But here, minutes and hours eluded me. When I had recently arrived, events flashed by like crazy, but time seemed to be frozen. The sun barely moved across the sky, and days were endless. But soon, the flow of time sped up; now, it felt like the sun was making its daily journey in just a couple of hours.

A month.

Eight dead dogs on the shore.

A spot of frozen grass where the Ice Hawk had melted away.

A poorly-trimmed broom—the remains of the Guard’s Cerberus.

By now, the Magister had little doubt about who had entered Crealia by the shore of the Ironsea.

Almost instantly, all roads had been blocked by patrols, forcing Kasamarchi and me into the woods.

The Burned One realized he had to destroy Asp as soon as possible. Surviving two fights, the serpent would grow stronger; after a dozen victories, it would become a real threat for the Magisterium.

He could probably guess that Asp and I were getting help. I could hardly have escaped the Budrahs so easily by myself. And when the patrol found the Guard’s Cerberus reduced to a mess of splintered wood on the broken floor, the Magister had probably figured out that my helper was the same boy whose body they’d failed to retrieve two years ago.

Just as they hadn’t found his Angel.

Patrols searched everyone who raised suspicion. Heralds shouted themselves hoarse in the squares, reproaching “the children of God” for failing to cleanse their land of filth and letting the Child of Evil enter Crealia. Keep your eyes open and report any vile Asper immediately should you see one.

However, checking every little thing—each wooden charm dangling from a little boy’s neck, each piece of rope holding a beggar girl’s messy hair—was an onerous task. And useless since homeless children roaming Crealia were countless; Kasamarchi and I did not look any different from the rest. Besides, there were no living witnesses of Asp in action.

Kasamarchi said we had to go to the Volcanites—a tribe of fiery creatures and metal-tamers who could make Asp virtually invulnerable. They lived across the Ironsea.

No way to accomplish this sea voyage on a crocoboat— its short legs were great for overcoming the Lizard’s current, but useless on larger bodies of water, with the bottom too deep to reach. So Kasamarchi suggested that we walk around the sea. By the north shore, since it was the shortest way.

I gaped at him, struggling to believe my ears. Walk around the sea?! How much time would it take? A month? A year? A lifetime?

But Kasamarchi explained that the Ironsea was small. In good weather, you could see the smoking volcanoes across it. He estimated our journey to the Volcanites would take no more than two weeks. He also insisted that our biggest concern was not time or distance—a week more, a week less; who cares?—but the North Peak in our way, with its foothills inhabited by unpredictable half-savage cave dwellers.

That was why, before taking this journey, we had to descend into the village of Lerk, teeming with guardsmen and spies, to find the house of the wizard who’d animated Angel for Kasamarchi’s father two years ago and… and apply the vulture’s feather.

I’d prefer to leave this place as soon as possible, before the Magister’s soldiers blocked all the passes. Lingering in Lerk was a total waste of time that could cost us the chance to get out. I said as much to Kasamarchi, yet he insisted that it would be better to waste some time but get to use the feather. And fighting our way through the roadblocks would be no trouble as long as we’d have…the Budrahs.

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“The Budrahs?” I was astonished. “What Budrahs?”

“Ours.”

“Oh, do you have any? How are you going to win them to our side?”

“By taking over a Budrahrium,” he answered impassively, leaving me speechless.

Is he serious? Taking over a magic farm where apes and horses are bred and then merged in the Bloody Basin into a one-and-a-half ton monster, as strong as twenty men? Just waltz in there and recruit some Budrahs to use them against the soldiers? Is he totally crazy?!

But I knew too little about this world to argue with Kasamarchi. My only advantage over him was four years of life. Of comfortable city life, without much trouble or difficulty. It was nothing compared to what Kasamarchi had already endured in his ten years of life. His life story was scarier than my worst nightmare.

Or, rather, now it was my worst nightmare.

“Okay,” I said at last. “Whatever. Let it be Lerk. And the Budrahrium. And the sea.”

We’d spent two weeks in the woods, waiting out the raid. According to Kasamarchi, this would be enough time for the Magister to conclude that we’d long left for the mountains and reduce the number of patrols in this area.

To make use of this wait, Kasamarchi trained me to use a dagger and even a sling. I didn’t really become very proficient with either. My biggest accomplishment by day ten was that my dagger hand no longer quivered, and my shoulder stopped growing numb as I swung the sling. However, Kasamarchi was surprisingly happy with my progress.

Two weeks later, on a moonless night, we went down to Lerk.

…to spend three more days lying in wait in the prickly burdocks next to the animator’s abandoned house, learning the patrol’s timing, and waiting for the perfect opportunity to sneak in.

The past fifty years had converted most Crealians into supporters of the new order. Some elderly locals would not think twice if they saw two vagrants lurking near a bad house. Remembering the herald’s proclamations, the old peasant would wobble to the nearest patrol and stammer the whereabouts of two suspicious ragamuffins to the tired officer with red, sleepless eyes. The officer’s drowsiness would evaporate in a moment, his gaze becoming cold and intent. In less than five minutes, the bad house would be surrounded by Budrahs, and its door would be broken down by guardsmen.

…Day and night, we lay motionless in the burdocks. I was going crazy with thirst, with ants creeping all over my body, and with a bursting bladder. Only in the dead of night would Kasamarchi, who did not seem to suffer at all, let me get the ants out of my clothing, take a gulp of water from the flask, and crawl away to relieve myself.

The nights were cold and scary; the days hot and even more terrifying.

Gradually, I started to get lost somewhere between sleeping and waking, stuck in a troubling daze. Was the last patrol passing by us real or just a hallucination of my wait-numbed brain? I wasn’t sure.

But everything comes to an end.

As the fourth day was dawning, Kasamarchi said a heavy rain would start by nightfall, allowing us to enter the house.

Not really believing it—there was not a single cloud in the bright sky, colored pink by the dawning sun—I still gave a silent nod.

Honestly, by this point, I didn’t give a damn about the house, the patrols, or anything else in the world. I felt like I would be stuck down here forever.

But by noon, the sky became overcast. By dusk, a cool breeze dispersed the stuffy heat, and muffled claps of thunder started to come from across the mountains, growing louder.

The burdock heads rocked anxiously around us. As the sun set, the heavy raindrops drummed on the dusty leaves. Darkness fell all at once, until a bolt of lightning ripped the violet dusk apart, turning the sky black-and-white.

A downpour of water came from the sky, drenching us instantly. Standing in the gleaming-wet burdock leaves, Kasamarchi shouted through the claps of thunder, “Come.”

In a couple of leaps, we covered the distance to the abandoned house. The boy ducked into the gaping black maw of the door first. I followed.

The air inside the hut was musty. My hairband clicked open, wet hair falling to my shoulders.

So this place has a Cerberus, too. What does it look like?

In the flashes of lightning, I looked around for the item they could have used for a Cerberus.

Dusty, lopsided shelves. Overturned chairs. Broken dishes. Nothing of that…

A table with an iron on it.

The iron!

Big.

Heavy.

With an intricate pattern right over its base.

…and not a speck of dust.

Before the darkness closed around us again, a belated clap of thunder came, followed by another flash.

The iron started to swell, as though ripped from inside by some strange force, until it burst open in several places. Turning inside out, it transformed into a hunched, fanged monster.

In a few heartbeats, a wild boar in iron plates stood on the table.

The expected paralysis of time.

A bottomless silence with no claps of thunder.

My point of sight shifting up and behind.

I am Asp.

It is easy this time, with just two options: Angel, whip, boar’s hooves; or Asp, spear, monster’s neck.

Done.

The glassy time unfroze, speeding up. A rumble of thunder resumed outside the window. My normal perceptions were back.

Uttering a mechanical roar that seemed to come from inside a steel barrel, the monstrous boar squatted to pounce…

…when a crack of Angel’s whip came, deafening in this cramped space, extinguishing all the other sounds but a muffled ringing in my ears.

The boar collapsed on its belly, losing its legs to the sweeping whip.

Darting towards the iron giant like a dark shadow, Asp stabbed its neck with the spear tail.

I stood up, my ears still ringing, but my hearing gradually returned. Picking my wet hair up, I looked around.

The broken tabletop on the floor, the table’s legs crushed by the impact.

A shapeless, blackened pile of metal—the remains of the iron Cerberus.

Kasamarchi puttering in the distant corner.

Lighting a candle, he put it on the half-destroyed altar. By its side, he laid down the rolled-up feather from his bag. A tiny pouch on a string from his pocket followed.

“What’s that?” I asked, nodding at the pouch.

“Burdock seeds,” he replied. “Too few. We need more.” Collecting all the seeds stuck to his vest, he started to pick them from mine. I stood motionless, remembering how my own mother removed burdock seeds and stalks of grass from my clothes when I’d come home after playing outdoors with local boys.

Completing the cleaning, Kasamarchi tossed all the collected seeds into the pouch and tied it. Then he brought the feather to the candle. As it caught fire, spreading a smell of burning flesh, Kasamarchi dipped the pouch into the thick white smoke.

Swinging like a pendulum in front of the altar, and keeping his eyes on the pouch, the boy sang over and over, “Bzzzzzz…bzzzzzz…bzzzzzzz…”

When the feather burned down, Kasamarchi untied the pouch, poured the bluish-gray ashes in and, still making that weird buzzing sound, kneaded the bag’s contents for a while. Tying the pouch, he put it back around his neck, slightly below the whistle.

There were fewer flashes of lightning outside, and longer pauses between a flash and a peal of thunder as the storm left Lerk.

“Let’s go.” Kasamarchi stood up. “The patrol is coming soon; Raven pointed to this place. To the Magister’s great surprise.” He flashed a white smile, adjusting the pouch around his neck.

Seizing my hand, he dragged me outside, into the subsiding rain.

***

…I woke from the memories.

The tired sun was rolling down, right onto the sharp rocks, losing its dazzling whiteness and filling with crimson blood.

The Budrahrium’s gray tower was already close.

“We’ll reach it by dusk,” Kasamarchi told me.

I sighed, enduring another cold, sticky lick from the rough tongue of Fear.