He could never have guessed that the floorboards beneath him were loose or that Krawg himself lay beneath them, hiding from a dispatch of furious guards. And even if he had, how could he have suspected how mightily Krawg was striving to stifle a sneeze?
Whether it was the force of the eventual sneeze, or Krawg’s powerful lurch from a lie-down to a sit-up, or Warney’s spasm of astonishment—it didn’t matter in the end. Warney rose from the floor like a boulder from a catapult. And the boat in which he sailed brained the ornery goat that a merchant had just bullied into a stall.
Krawg and Warney had run together, cursing at each other even as they took turns leading the escape. They learned in their hurry that the merchant was a guest from Bel Amica, and they would never forget his rage. He gave chase like a wild pig, fast as a fitter, thinner man. And it was not until they clambered over a fence into a children’s schoolyard and hid themselves behind archery targets that they were still again. Thus began one of the longest tests of their endurance.
Crouching at the end of the yard, holding the targets before them like shields, they whispered angry accusations at each other. But as the steam of tempers dissipated, Warney’s admiration kindled Krawg’s sense of pride. Soon Krawg regaled his fellow escapist with an array of stories about his wild exploits.
So their ritual began, and Warney came to think of stories as whispered and exciting prologues to some daring disappearance with a prize.
In those early days, Krawg’s stories were exaggerated and—Warney came to believe—stolen. Their twists and surprises were as hot as a panpatty snatched from the fire, and Warney learned that his hero, now his friend, was as skilled in plundering histories and biographies as he was in robbing laundry from the line.
But in time Warney’s doubts conjured questions, and those questions both aggravated Krawg and provoked him to narrate in more elaborate detail. Pleased to find an attentive companion whose curiosity seasoned his stories, and so delighted to train an apprentice in thievery, the Midnight Swindler had welcomed the Bandit as a partner. But there was never any doubt which thief was in command.
Together they had weathered a hundred crimes, and while they harassed each other unceasingly, they also had formed an unbreakable bond. It endured through their disputes, as when Krawg stole Warney’s occasional sweetheart. (That story always ended when the girl absconded with both of the thieves’ broken hearts.) It endured when they were captured and beaten and when Warney lost his eye in an epic escape. It endured when they were exiled from the safety of Abascar’s walls and were made to labor in the harvest until they were old.
One night Warney had wondered, “Krawg, what would drive a wedge between us since not a woman or a wound has ever come close?”
Krawg had given it some thought. “Satisfaction,” he sighed. “Riches would keep us from conspiring, either to snitch what’s not ours—but we don’t go that way no more—or to claim what’s ours rightfully. We’d get lazy and fat, and where’s the fun in that?”
Warney, stunned with the insight, had slowly wagged his head. “Gotta ’gree with ya there.”
Tonight as Krawg applied his talent to a story of ancient adventure, he lavished detail upon each scene, detail that often had nothing to do with the story but so enriched it with food for the senses and kindling for the imagination that Warney remained enthralled.
Sometimes those meanders would bring the story’s biggest surprises. And like some lucky wanderer who runs away, gets lost, regrets his foolish wanderlust, and stumbles inexplicably upon his own home, Krawg would reach the end of the tale and tie all fraying strands back together.
No story was told more often, in versions more varying, than this—a tale of rebellion, escape, ambition, and tragedy. Tammos Raak, hero to kings and thieves, had stolen children from a formidable cursemaster and led them over the Forbidding Wall. He had delivered them triumphantly into the Expanse and established a house called Inius Throan. Together, they lived in an ongoing celebration of freedom.
And this is where the storyteller came to a fork in the road. Thread-weavers in each house blamed the breaking on founders of other houses. They painted starkly contrasting pictures of failure and betrayal. But each tale concluded with Tammos Raak fleeing to save his life from rebels, wolves, or—in Krawg’s version—monsters. The hero had climbed up the tallest of the world’s starcrown trees and vanished in a cataclysm of fire that left a cavity called Mawrnash.
Krawg’s story, like other versions, was lit by the wrathful eye of the rising red moon. But the detail he imagined led Warney and his companions down a new trail. Warney forgot himself until Krawg fell into a silence, lost in the sadness his own words had opened up.
“Who knew,” said Cal-raven, “that a Gatherer could tell a tale we’ve heard a hundred times and make it something new? Your role in New Abascar is already established.”
Even Bowlder, who hated Gatherers, nodded.
This praise, and the color that covered Krawg’s smiling face, filled Warney with unexpected dismay. He had not imagined that Krawg might ever step into some new purpose. And if he did, what then would become of Warney?
8
KING OF BIRDS AND MERCY
Kaww!” rasped Warney. The raven glowered, guardlike. Its talons squeezed a path-barring branch as if to wring out its sap.
“Brains as brickish as old bread.” Warney lunged and thrust out his hands. “Kaww!”
The raven stared at Warney’s eye as if it were a grape.
Krawg pushed past, his netcaster propped against his shoulder like a spear. He marched right at the bird, and when it finally flew, the branch it had weighed down sprang up, disrupting a cloud of long-legged willowflies that swarmed about Krawg’s head. With foul announcements, he swung at the bugs with the caster.
Warney hurried along until the river’s roar forced him to shout. “Awfully far from camp. And the sun’s already high up. How do we know the king won’t ride off ’n’ strand us?”
“Cal-raven’ll never abandon his own. Let’s catch breakfast where it can still be got. Nuthin’ left in the woods. Critters are as gone as the starcrown trees of Mawrnash.”
Warney made after his friend, gnawing on questions that Krawg’s campfire tale about Tammos Raak and the starcrown trees had inspired. “Why’d they call ’em starcrowns?”
“The way they caught stars in their branches.”
“And Mawrnash, where they grew… How’d it get a name like that?”
“Why, for the Mawrn, of course.” Krawg climbed over a fallen tree and staggered down a steep riverbank, his feet punching up gobs of mud with each step. “You hear me comin’, fish? Comin’ to getcha!”
“Mawrn, Mawrn. That does me no good if ’n I don’t know what a Mawrn is, Krawg.”
Krawg stalked across the pebbled banks and toed the edge of the narrow watercourse that rippled through the ravine. “The Mawrn’s a creature that’s made of dust. Scattered across the ground—every speck a watchful eye and a whispering tongue. You can’t go near it without it knowin’ you’re there.”
“And what’s it do when it knows you’re there?”
“Nothin’ probably. But it drives the best men crackers, I tell you.” Krawg raised the netcaster and fired. The dart sailed in a high arc, the stream of silvery webbing unspooling behind it. When the barb stung the far shore, the net laced the surface of the golden water until weights sank it to the bottom.
Krawg took the caster and plunged its sharp point into the soft ground to anchor the line’s silvery span. “Once you’ve walked through the Mawrn, the Mawrn goes with you. Your shoes, your hair, your lungs. And then, the Mawrn owns you. Reads your thoughts, every grain a gossip. Nothing’s hidden from the Mawrn.”
“Jellypots,” Warney scoffed. “You mock me for believin’ in North-children and then start shovelin’ vawn nuggets like that? Mawrnash. Makes the Keeper sound as common as a dinner roll.”
“I never said the Mawrn is real,” said Krawg. “It’s just a ca
mpfire story, made up to explain a big hole in the ground.”
Glancing back, Warney witnessed the bird hopping along through the branches as if striking the notes of an ominous song. “That blasted raven’s following us.”
“The king?” Krawg turned, surprised.
“No, not Cal-raven. What am I? His mother? I’ve never called the king by anything but his formal name.” Warney snatched up a seedcone and threw it at the bird. The raven leaned to dodge but continued to stare at Warney as if it recognized him. “A shame, really, to name a child Raven just because he took his first steps chasin’ some blasted bird.”
“Cal, rava?” asked one of the ravens.
Warney stood quite still.
Then, one by one, more ravens began to appear as if summoned by the first.
Nervous, Warney strode along the shore upstream, the bird in unhurried pursuit. Arriving at a fallen tree that formed half a bridge across the water, he climbed onto its span and cast a pocketful of dried beetles into the stream. They glittered like jewels and pattered the water. The fishermen waited for fish to follow the bait into the net.
The ravens were all around Warney now, closer, perched on every twig and branch of the fallen tree. They began to caw, as if working up courage to push him into the stream. “Now, which one of you summoned Cal-raven from his cradle?” Warney grumbled. “Kawww. Kawww!”
Another raven spoke. “Cal, rava?”
“Krawg, one of these ravens is askin’ for the king!”
Krawg waved his arms and rasped, “Shush! You’ll scare the fish!”
Warney pointed at the guilty bird.
“What berries you been eatin’, Warney?”
“Cal, rava?” asked the raven.
Warney lost his footing and hit the water with such a splash that the ravens scattered. Krawg dove in to grab him by his sodden hood.
“Ballyworms, Krawg!” Warney choked, thrashing. “It called for him!”
“You’ve just scared off the king’s breakfast. We gotta move upriver.” Krawg dragged him to the shore.
“I gotta tell the king.” Warney clambered back up the muddy riverbank and dashed into the trees.
As he ran, he heard the ravens’ frantic pursuit, glanced back over his shoulder, and nearly collided with an approaching horse and rider.
Tumbling off the path, he recognized the man and shouted, “Master Cal-raven!”
Jes-hawk came running not far behind the rider. “Warney, let the king go. Come and see!”
Warney followed the archer back to the campsite, then further south into the woods to a flat patch of ground punctured by thousands of tiny beetle burrows. Bowlder and Snyde were circling a depression in the brittle earth. Warney reached out to grip a young tree like a walking stick to save himself from falling.
“Seven,” Jes-hawk agreed, scanning the trees. “Seven toes on this foot. And whatever it was, it came through sometime this morning.”
Warney’s eye bulged, and his grin was a fright. “Didja find a baby lying inside?”
“Cal-raven heard something, woke up, and rushed out of the tent,” said Jes-hawk. “Then came an incredible noise. We followed him here.”
“Did he hear the birds?” Warney asked. “Ravens everywhere! Calling his name!”
“Told you they were off eating mushrooms,” muttered Bowlder.
Snyde laughed quietly, kicking at the footprint so that its soft edge collapsed. “And you wonder why I’m concerned about the king. He leaves us behind to chase a monster. Oh, a very bright future awaits us.”
Jes-hawk cursed. “Saddle up. We don’t want to lose him.”
Just then Krawg stepped out of the trees with a net full of wrigglers. He glanced about. “Did I just let pinchers nip my ankles for nothin’?”
“You said the king wouldn’t leave us,” Warney blurted. “Well, he has.”
Following the massive footprints, surrounded by ravens calling his name, Cal-raven crossed the river and rode northward. He rode for hours, confident his company would keep up as he moved along the western edge of Deep Lake.
“Listen for the path.” He repeated Scharr ben Fray’s words to himself. “Listen.”
The ravens’ cries seemed to coax him north and west, through the Cragavar.
“I was there, Cal-raven,” the mage had said as they tossed stones to each other on the threshold of Barnashum. “I stood in your father’s courtyard when Auralia revealed the colors of her craft. The greatest mystery I’ve ever seen. That girl had knowledge that even the wisest of my Jentan brethren lack. Since that revelation, I’ve been crisscrossing the Expanse, looking for the right answers. You’ve seen the colors too. We both want to know where they come from. Well, I’ve seen something new. And if you are to go forward without doubt, you must see it too.”
“See what, exactly?”
“That’s just it. You need to see it for yourself, my boy. If you don’t, fear will get the better of you.”
He rehearsed his teacher’s instructions again. Mawrnash. While the red moon is high, find Tammos Raak’s tower. Climb to the crown. The instructions confounded him. The great starcrown trees burned to ash. How can I climb a tree that has fallen?
He ascended a rise and arrived in a wide space between trees. There he examined yet another footprint, a seven-toed signature. He waited.
His companions ascended behind him, regarding him with worry. Their vawns slowed, panting, and snuffled at the ground. He flung out his arms, triumphant at his discovery. “Scharr ben Fray promised me that the path would be clearly marked. Birds that call my name—that’s what he intended. But this? The Keeper’s tracks? Even he would be surprised. This is what I’m meant to do.”
“You mean to lead us even farther from Barnashum?” Snyde snapped. “I appeal to your memory. You once rode away from House Abascar, and the ground collapsed beneath it. Five nights ago you ventured outside Barnashum’s refuge, and a quake shook the Blackstone Caves. Now here you are, several days’ ride from the people who call you king. And you propose to keep on riding? Basing your decisions on vague and muddy impressions?”
Cal-raven went very still. “Jes-hawk, relieve Snyde of his reins. He’ll be heading home to help the people who concern him so fiercely.”
“Wait!” Snyde sputtered. “I cannot go back alone!”
Jes-hawk, smiling, brought his vawn alongside Snyde’s. The old man clung to his reins in desperation as Jes-hawk reached across to tug at them. Their vawns grumbled. A well-placed boot toppled Snyde from his vawn, and when he rose, he was costumed in mud.
“You’ll have time on the walk back to think about the benefits of loyalty and the disadvantages of treachery.”
“Treachery?”
“Shall we do this now?” Cal-raven spurred his mount forward so that his boot was close to Snyde’s face. “Tabor Jan and I knew someone in Barnashum was plotting against me. On the night of the quake, grudgers attacked me in the Hall of the Lost. I counted six. After the quake, five soldiers went missing. I think they fled, but their leader stayed behind to watch for another opportunity.”
Snyde tried to wipe the mud from his face with his sleeve but succeeded only in smearing it.
“Where did your five little helpers go, Snyde?”
“You’re insane.” Snyde bit off the words.
“Stonemastery is a marvelous gift. You can open windows in solid walls and hear your own people conspiring to kill you. We planned to bring all six of you out to the woods and deal with you. But you came after me sooner than I’d expected.”
Snyde looked searchingly to the others. “What’s he talking about?” They regarded him with scorn. “What an abhorrent, presumptuous—”
“Where did the other five go? Are we going to see them somewhere along the way?”
“We all know your willingness to believe incredible things. But this”—Snyde waved his arms—“this is incredible.” He seemed to be stretching, loosening up, as if preparing to make a grab for the knife strapped to Cal-rav
en’s ankle.
Jes-hawk notched an arrow into the groove of his caster. “How did you know I was outside Barnashum when the quake struck?” Cal-raven asked.
“What are you talking about?”
“You just told me that on the night of the quake I ventured outside. No one knew that…except my pursuers and the captain.”
Warney had wasted no time. He now sat astride Snyde’s vawn, backing it slowly away.
“You surround yourself with crooks and disregard those who protected your father from false counsel.” Snyde clenched his teeth but kept on. “Your people disrespect you, and you tolerate it. You attend to dreams and follow signs left by a dangerous man your father had the good sense to banish. And a disloyal witch enchants you with music unfit for a king—songs about trouble, doubt, even pity for beastmen. Where are the songs that exalted House Abascar and taught our children who to despise?”
“Lesyl sings the truth. That’s the foundation of New Abascar. And you speak of crooks? You swore allegiance to my father when he appointed you ambassador. By those vows you are bound to serve his successor. But you’ve mocked me. You’ve planned my assassination. And you complain of crooks? That you climbed to such favor proves how flawed my father’s house had become. What shall we do about you?”
Cal-raven reached out swiftly, clasped the line of tarnished medals on Snyde’s tunic as if they were a fistful of coins, and stripped them from his jacket.
Snyde cried out in shock. Then he lunged, seizing the knife.
Jes-hawk’s arrow found its mark, its feathered end protruding from the attacker’s ankle. Snyde stumbled backward. The knife fell. He tumbled down the slope and, clutching at his ankle, came to rest among the roots of a gnarled coil tree.
“Snyde ker Bayrast,” shouted Jes-hawk, “I denounce you as guilty of conspiracy to kill the king.” He notched another arrow to the caster. “No trial is necessary. We all witnessed that you took the king’s weapon and threatened his life.”
“My father’s law,” said Cal-raven quickly, “demands execution. But this isn’t House Abascar. I’ll leave your sentence to a higher authority, the master of this territory.”