Of Mortal Dreams: Chapter VI

Adevan

Nights in Blackmoor had always been clear, far enough away from the farmlands and dust storms of the Shaandilar, but they were nothing to the sky that now arched overhead as Adevan moved quietly through the hidden valley. It first turned a pitchy purple, dusted by pale white stars and tattered clouds, then it darkened perceptibly to a bottomless onyx. The ghostly clouds were swept away by a high-flying wind, and the stars began to glint like polished metal. For the first time in his long life, he saw the true contours of the Gosway—the ancient, glimmering star-path that had led travelers across sea and land before all the maps and all the roads. Bats dove for moths and an owl swooped low. He heard the guttural chitter of a fox and the scuttle of a mouse. His eyes adjusted to the change in light easily and, at the darkest hour, when a mortal would only see blackness, Adevan’s eyes captured the rich hues of a world painted by night.

Adevan was no stranger to dark, solitary journeys. When the sky above the western range—which lay east of him—turned the color of wine, and the owls and foxes and little rodents stilled, he knew that dawn was near. Slowly peeling back the shadow of night, the sun arced over the mountains and etched their jagged outline into the face of the peaks across the valley. In the quiet glow of dawn, with the swell of birdsong around him, he found a narrow, winding road that kept in step with the river for as far as he could see to the south. He lengthened his stride but kept to a mortal pace, should he encounter another traveler. Yet by midmorning, he still hadn't crossed paths with anyone.

He was sitting against a tree, chewing on his dried rations under a high sun when he heard a distant howl. Then another. Shrieks and screams followed.

At once, the world around him came into blistering focus. He swung up into the straight-trunked tree at his back and pulled himself high among the boughs. From his new vantage point, he deepened his hearing and combed the forest with his far-reaching eyes. There was a road on the other side of the valley and across the river. It was wider than the one he had been traveling, more like a thoroughfare. As he watched, two figures sped across it, running in his direction, one right after the other. The first was a man and the second was a woman with inky hair. Neither were visible for long.

The howling had gone quiet but took up again. A few moments later, two wolves loped across the same road, noses to the ground. They were fenwolves, creatures of the old world—larger, faster, more intelligent, and far more vicious than their common counterparts. The two mortals were making an impressive effort, but there was no chance that they would reach the river gorge in time.

Unless. Unless something drew the wolves away. Even if only for a moment.

Adevan cursed as he dropped out of the tree and began sprinting towards the river gorge. He was faster than a fenwolf and, on open terrain, they would never catch him. Without mortals to worry about, getting cornered was the only serious risk that he could recall from his fair share of wolfhunt.

He was at the gorge. He was leaping over it. He careened through the layer of branches on the other side, landed, and followed the sounds of the wolves. Monstrous flashes of grey and black, they charged through the forest, snapping at one another as they went. They were young and inexperienced, and when Adevan sped across their path, they were easily thrown off course. He heard them hard on his heels, faster than he had remembered fenwolves to be, and eager to flank him. They smelled of mortal blood, their maws glistening crimson. He drew them north, veered towards the gorge again, then leapt back across it.

Back on the eastern side of the river, Adevan spun to look at the treeline on the western rim. At first, he thought the wolves might have jumped after him and fallen into the water below. But then, one after the other, they emerged from the shadows. They were as large as he had ever seen, one grey like mountain stone with hackles the color of smoke, and the other black as midnight. Both had sharp, coppery eyes that reflected every fleck of light. They paced and sniffed at the edge of the drop off, as if judging the distance. Then the lighter one growled and snapped, turning back the way they had come. The other watched Adevan for a moment more then followed. They howled in quick succession and were gone.

But the fire in Adevan’s veins was slow to fade. He hadn’t tested his speed against a worthy opponent in years. Feeling oddly reckless, he bounded along his side of the river, peering down into the frothing water. The two runners were nowhere to be seen. They had jumped, clearly, but he wasn't sure they had survived. The river swelled and ribboned wildly its entire length, engorged by tree branches and logs, then turned into a series of waterfalls. Once over that first drop, they would almost certainly perish.

Wait. He slowed and stopped. Just before the first cascade of falls, two sets of soggy tracks led away from the river. The gorge was shallower here and, looking down, Adevan saw a stubborn tree jutting out of the stoney ravine. There were scrapes and bloody smudges on the ledge beside it—they had climbed out. Up top, their tracks were uneven and labored. Both told him that at least one of them had been badly injured. Strangely, the smaller tracks indicated greater injury at first, but abruptly regained their even pacing. The sudden shift seemed to take place beside a patch of pale earth.

Not earth. Ash.

Adevan knelt and held a hand out over the misplaced pile of dampened ashes. Far from being warm, they were colder than the air around them. He smelled no smoke or even traces of it. Frankly, there hadn’t been enough time for the two runners to have built a fire. They couldn’t be more than a short run in any given direction. He looked back at the ashes and, as he did, a memory rose to the surface.

Ashes without fire. He’d seen this before. Orzan.

The boy-mage had been a strange case, a failure Adevan would never forget. At sixteen, he was still the oldest free mage Adevan had ever found. By the time Sisela got word of his existence, he could already devour natural matter with a mere touch—trees, plants, animals, other mortals, if he wasn’t careful—and leave only ashes behind. Blackmoor’s hunters had hesitated to take him, afraid he would turn on them, and that hesitation had cost the boy his life.

Adevan unfolded and breathed deep. The river water dulled the scent of the runners but, now that he was looking for it, he picked out the faint whiff of shadowed magic. It was neither light nor dark just shadowed, like Orzan’s had been. Judging by the change in her prints, the woman was a mage and had consumed something to heal herself. Clearly she had not siphoned her companion, as his tracks led away from the river. That was promising. Once a mage tasted the power of mortal life, it was hard to resist.

And she has dark hair. As Iven’s drift had said.

Tracking them at speed, Adevan’s route bent east and the forest dropped away. Towering, crisscrossed hillocks rose on his left, peppered by shaggy goats and small, horned sheep grazing on time-worn paths. Outcroppings jutted out of the towering pastures, excellent places for shepherds to keep an eye on the flocks, except there were no shepherds. A drinking jug, a handful of daisies half-woven into a crown, and a staff had been haphazardly thrown on a flattish stone beside the road. The jug had been knocked over. There were signs of a brief struggle in the damp earth but no blood or torn clothes, and the long scrapes he would expect from a kidnapping were absent. It looked as though someone had been tackled, fought for a moment, then gotten up and joined a much larger group. The many footsteps belonged to men and women of varying ages and sizes, and shared one commonality: Their strides were almost randomly directed, as if they had all been drunk.

The mess of footprints flowed south, in the same direction he was going, and entirely obscured the tracks of the two runners. Fortunately, the scent of shadowed magic had deepened enough that Adevan proceeded, but he was now wholly dependent on his nose in his search for the mage. Seeing his own shadow outlined perfectly on the ground, he glanced up at the sky. It had been too long since he’d checked. No black wings.

The river curved away from the road now, and the forest began to feel unnaturally quiet. His footsteps were loud, no matter how softly he moved. The day had just started to feel warm but a southern breeze chilled him to the bone. When he rounded a corner to find a flock of sheep ambling across a narrow path with a village in the near distance, he knew that something was very wrong.

“Something isn’t right. It’s too quiet.”

That voice. He felt as if he’d heard it before. Beyond the sheep and the waist-high gate that led into the village, one of the two runners appeared. She was tall and narrow, with olive skin and black hair that hung loose around her face—the mage. Whatever she had consumed had healed her enough, but a paleness still lingered under her natural color. Her clothing was torn, bloodied in some places, and she wore a knife at her side.

“They haven’t been gone long,” a man replied then shouted: “Hello? Anyone here?”

Adevan wove between the sheep, making his way towards the village. The movement drew the mage’s attention. At first, she seemed unsure of what she was looking at, as though she might be seeing a ghost. Then recognition hardened her face, giving her a cold look. She slowly drew her knife.

Dark hair, a long knife, an empty village and one companion.

Iven’s mage. He had found her.

“Leith,” she said, her voice sharp.

Her comrade appeared abruptly. He was a thick, reddish kind of a person with broad shoulders and a snarling mouth. He had no visible weapon but carried a lumpy satchel, and wore the thick clothing and leather plating of a warrior. His face certainly had the scars to prove it. Slowing his approach, Adevan raised his hands. The mage methodically slipped into the periphery and her companion stepped forward. They knew one another well.

“What do you want?”

“Just passing through. Looking for something to eat and a place to stay for the night,” Adevan answered, still advancing. “You, too, I take it?”

The young man nodded—halfheartedly. The satchel he carried swung awkwardly, revealing the truth. They hadn’t intended to stay the night.

“Where is everyone?”

The warrior shrugged. “Care to guess?”

Adevan dropped his hands and pushed through the village gate. The mage kept her distance, keenly aware of wherever he moved. She still hadn’t sheathed her knife.

“Is there a festival or some such?”

“No,” Leith said, glancing around. “We’d have heard about it.”

“So you’re from here, then?”

The mage interrupted: “No one passes through Laregan.”

This close to her, the heady scent of magic was impossible to mistake, though it had a changeable quality that he knew to expect from a mage like Orzan. She shook her hair out of her face, her gaze no longer shrouded. Beyond the naked distrust in her eyes, their color struck him, and not pleasantly. They were gray like the splintered shale of the mountains. Like shattered silver.

He scoffed a little. “I guess some of us do.”

“Then where did you come from?”

Adevan gestured up and backwards, at the northern pass. “The other side of the mountains. Everyone’s talking about the wool from this area,” he said. “Thought I’d come see for myself. Kyric’s a friend.”

Flashes of curiosity passed over their faces. The mage fell silent. “And where are you headed?”

“To Tor.”

“We’re on our way there,” Leith said, friendlier than he had been. “If you’re looking for wool, that’s where you’ll find it. The best.”

The mage looked displeased, her jaw stiff and her silvery eyes fixed on Adevan. Gods, he had seen those same eyes before. He couldn’t remember where or in whose face he had seen them, but was beginning to realize that it had been a bitter experience.

Leith was still talking. “...what d’you say? Three’s better than two, and you’re a stranger to our mountains.”

Adevan shrugged as if he didn’t care. He would have tracked them anyway.

“Fair enough—I’ll join you.”

“Good,” the man offered. “I’m Leith Borsbyn of Laregan”—he swept his free hand around at the empty town—“and this is Varitha Sabrynnac of Tor.”

“Just Vara,” the mage corrected, finally sheathing her knife.

Sabrynnac. It mirrored house names from the southern coast. In fact, she resembled people from that part of Arras. Probably the southern isles.

They watched him with a mixture of expectation and impatience. Waiting.

Ah, he still hadn’t told them his own name. One look at the mage and Adevan decided it would be stupid to lie where it wasn’t necessary. She would know it.

“Adevan.” Then, glancing over at her: “Just Adevan.”

She looked away pointedly.

“Right, well, the horses have scattered,” Leith observed. He gestured at a nearby pen—empty. “We’ll have to go on foot.”

They fell into an uneasy line with the man ahead, the mage just behind him, and Adevan bringing up the rear. She never looked back but maintained a hearty and constant distance between them. She was keenly aware of his presence, just as he was of hers. Once, when more than the usual distance separated them, she berated her companion.

“You shouldn’t have asked him to join us,” she hissed. “We don’t know him or why he’s really here. And I don’t think he’s here for wool.”

“Of course he isn’t,” he bit back. “All the same, I’d rather have him with us than behind us.”

“He is behind us,” she muttered bitterly.

“Don’t be stupid. You know what I mean,” he said. “We want him in sight and not lurking at a distance.”

The mage said no more but the exchange had told Adevan a great deal. Mind to mind conversation was a favorite and useful mage device, yet she had whispered to her companion as though that was her only option. That would suggest she really had no idea what she was. It also told Adevan that, whatever her reason for distrusting him, it wasn’t because he was a halfblood. She couldn’t know Adevan was a halfblood, or she wouldn’t have tried to whisper around him. It had no effect on whether he could hear her.

She didn’t know anything. Just like Orzan.

“You two look like you’ve been through something,” Adevan said, loud enough for them to hear. “What happened to you?”

“Wolves,” Leith shot back over his shoulder.

“Wolves,” he repeated. “How’d you get away?”

“Jumped into the river,” the young man finished. “Got lucky.”

Lucky indeed. Leith had slowed down to Adevan’s pace but the mage refused to join them. She ventured ahead, rather than be too close. Stubborn.

“Why are there just two of you?”

“We’re scouts. The larger company was to follow but things went bad.”

“Guess they did.”

“Leith,” the mage called, sounding apprehensive. “Come look at this.”

Up ahead, the mage had stopped and was looking at something near the side of the road. Leith moved to join her, already grumbling, and Adevan wished to the gods that they would lower their voices. The forest was too quiet and too still, and a faint, dank stench had crept up on him. It was the smell of death. He had been so distracted by his fellow travelers—one in particular—that he had forgotten to take note of his surroundings for too long.

Adevan wasn’t surprised that she had discovered the body of an old man, pale as fog and lying just off the road. The claggy scent was stronger around him. Adevan knelt and extended his hand over the body. To a mortal, it would be cold, but he could still detect the faintest warmth. Beyond the obvious fact that he was dead, the man was certainly in no condition to be walking through the forest and probably hadn't been in such a condition in years. The skin and hands were frail, the eyes bleary, the legs almost entirely without muscle. He hadn’t been well for a long time.

“He hasn't left his hut my whole life, if he’s who I think,” Leith muttered, answering Adevan’s unasked question. “Why would he be out here?”

“And alone,” the mage added. 

“He wasn't alone. There are tracks everywhere.”

Yes, there were tracks. But Adevan was more interested in the fact that the old man was missing a shoe and had walked long enough that the ball of his foot was nearly raw. Even in old age, that much pain should have slowed him down.

He must not have felt it.

“I can see the tracks,” she said drily. “But I just don’t think someone would have left him where he fell.”

“And what do you think?”

“That he followed them, not that he was with them.”

“Oh, I see,” the young man said scornfully. “I didn’t realize it made a difference.”

She hesitated. “Well—maybe not a difference, but it’s a possibility.”

Adevan was about to stand, but a discoloration on one of the man’s wrists caught his eye. It was partially hidden by his sleeve and Adevan quickly pushed the cloth back, exposing all of the lower arm. The bickering stopped.

“What is…that?”

The mage was standing over him, the closest to Adevan she had yet been. He unfolded a little too quickly and she jumped back. Her hand flew to her knife hilt. It seemed to be a matter of comfort for her. Leith took a knee and began examining the old man’s arm.

“It almost looks like a hand.”

“It is a hand,” Adevan finished.

Leith frowned. “A hand that burns?”

“The mark is clear.”

“But,” the mage murmured, looking down at the body again. “What could dothat?”

Adevan had seen many things, but never this. The companions glanced between one another, each seeking clarity in the other’s eyes. But they were all equally puzzled and disturbed. She took a breath.

“We should bury him.”

Leith shook his head. “I’m not breaking my back for this.”

“Good grief,” she scoffed. “What if he was your grandfather?”

“And you’re sure he’s dead?” The silence swelled. “There’s nothing you can do?”

“No, he’s gone,” she managed to say. “Long gone.”

There it is. Adevan hummed, as if he was only surprised by and not keenly interested in the revelation that she had been a healer, or something akin to it. Every free mage he’d ever encountered or heard about had shown healing abilities. So far, Iven’s drift had been accurate. Now, it was Adevan’s turn to do his part. It had been a long time since he’d asked the litany of necessary questions, but they came rushing back.

“Are you a healer?”

The mage didn’t look up at him. “I was.”

“Oh,” he mused. “When was the last time you healed somebody?”

She didn’t answer as quickly this time, shifting on her feet. Leith was watching her. The rot of shame clouded the air between them.

“Over a year ago,” she said firmly.

“Why so long?”

Anger bloomed in her. An intense, burning scent. “It just stopped.”

“Why?”

Now, she met his eyes with growing defiance. “I don’t know.”

A lie.

“You do,” he replied, holding her gaze. “You know exactly why it happened.”

Her mouth quivered and her grey eyes went wide, glistening in the failing light of the day. Leith stood, dusting off his hands. Neither Adevan nor the mage were yelling, and Leith was no halfblood, but that made no difference. The air between them crackled with the force of her rage and shock. Even a mortal could feel that.

“What happened?”

Leith shook his head. “Stop.”

“I killed someone,” she bit out. It almost sounded like a confession.

“How?”

She held out her shaking hands, palms up.

“I was attacked. I touched them and they turned to ash,” she finished. “A just reward, I should think.”

But regret cut through her voice. “How many did you siphon?”

“What—three. What does it matter?”

“And how many since then?”

Her shoulders buckled a little. With too much force, as though she was trying to convince herself, she said: “Accidents. All accidents.”

She hadn’t answered the question.

“Is that true? Were they truly accidents?”

Leith held a hand out, as if to calm them. “That’s enough.”

“Yes, I swear,” she said, wincing. Her voice faltered. “At first, I thought the loss was temporary, so I tried to heal again—” She sucked in a breath, as if she could pull everything she had already said back into her mouth. “It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter.”

“Vara, stop talking.” Leith turned on Adevan, his face red. “Who are you? Are you from Umber?”

Adevan pushed him to the side easily. “I can help you.”

The mage looked up at him. Naked hope flickered across her face. Then she scoffed, almost madly, and climbed back onto the main road.

“Enough!”

Leith’s chest was heaving from the irritation at being disregarded so easily. Adevan said no more. He knew what he needed to know.

“We might as well settle down for the night or risk falling into a ditch, walking in the dark,” Leith muttered, wiping his brow. “Bloody waste of time.”

They rejoined the road then followed it until the ground rose, and they found some open space on one side. Adevan would have rathered that Leith didn’t build a fire, but he had no good reason for it, so he said nothing. It was a sensible size. What rations the warrior had gathered in the empty village—some kind of root vegetables and salted meat—were split between them. The mage didn’t say a word. Her eyes had a far off, empty look.

She’s remembering.

“I’ll take first watch,” Adevan offered. Judging by their physical state, they’d be asleep in moments and, if he didn’t wake them, they’d slumber through the night. “Not as tired as either of you, from the looks of it.”

Leith thanked him reluctantly. Food untouched, the mage stretched out onto her side, facing away from them and the fire. Leith did the same and, as Adevan had predicted, their breathing was soon steady. He kept the fire low but going, so that it became hot embers. The forest was still too quiet and the scent of death yet lingered. They weren’t far from the old man’s body, but he still thought the smell would have faded more.

Five days.

He hadn’t seen Sisela for five days and it would be at least that many before he got back, making this the longest time they’d been apart in over twenty years. He had more than nothing to show for it, certainly, but the situation was increasingly complicated. Inconveniently, Iven’s drift had not detailed how he was to get the mage to come with him.

Unlike other mages he’d found, she wasn’t on the run from the Counsel and her family or house weren’t in danger. There was no clear and present reason for her to come with him. Adevan had seen the hope in her face, when he said he could help her, but she had also been quick to hide it.

Not promising. He would have to find a way to convince her and quickly.

As night began to slip away, he stood and stretched, sighing loudly enough that the mage stirred. She had rolled onto her back and her breath rose into the cold. He put another stick on the fire and stoked the embers until they caught again. The flames fluttered in a breeze from the west. He wrinkled his nose. The smell of death no longer hovered faintly in the air. It had somehow grown stronger. But it wasn’t coming from the direction where the old man’s body had fallen.

Strange.

It was almost dawn, and a low-hanging fog had rolled in. The swirling mantle spilled over gullies and floated among the trees, their dark trunks rising out of the billows like masts on sinking ships. Bushes and brambles dotted the landscape like misshapen islands in a pale sea. But as Adevan watched, he noticed that there were other shapes between the trees—silhouettes that turned his blood as cold as a mountain river.

Part of him realized that they had been there when it was dark, when he hadn’t thought to look for them. He was forced to accept that they had, in spite of his gifts, crept up on him. They stood, here and there, near and far, facing in varying directions. Every breath or so, one or two would turn and their eyes would scour the forest. They were looking for something.

No. Someone very powerful was using them to look for something.

Adevan sank slowly, first to one knee then flat to the ground. By then, the mage was wide awake and watching him from where she lay. He heard her heart pounding away in her chest. She understood that they were in trouble, but she couldn’t know just how true that was. Adevan knew of only one mage with the power to control this many people at once and the standing to do so. He hadn’t left Arysdur in years, but that didn’t matter.

It’s him.

He should have known.

She was like Orzan. She was like all of them. He was too late.

Vara trembled beside him, as if she felt his fear as her own. As soon as she saw what he saw, she would know it for herself. He almost choked on his own tongue when he finally spoke.

“Keep very still.”