The next morning, Kain returned to public labor.
The imperial selection was over and the training ground stood empty, but his punishment had not vanished. The posts still needed reinforcement, the old fence still needed repair, and the state ledger still demanded two silver coins the Alseif family did not possess.
Kain hauled stones to the garrison's northern wall.
Every time he bent down, a dull ache answered from his bruised cheek. The blisters beneath his bandages had opened again, and the handles of the barrow were slick with blood.
Arnwald watched him from the upper platform of the wall.
"Slower."
Kain lowered the barrow.
"Yesterday, Sir Reynar said I do everything too quickly."
"Intelligent man."
"You didn't even hear what we were talking about."
"That makes no difference where you're concerned."
Kain tipped the stones into a hollow at the base of the wall.
"I'm leaving in four days."
"In four days and one morning."
"Then there is no need to repair something I'll never see again."
Arnwald climbed down the ladder.
His limp became more pronounced after a long walk, but the captain still moved faster than half his soldiers.
"Are you sure you will never see it?"
"No."
"Then repair it."
"Very persuasive."
"Do you want a long speech?"
"No."
"Then I was persuasive."
Arnwald went to the wall and tested the masonry with the toe of his boot.
"Today, you work until the evening bell. Tomorrow and the day after as well. The remainder of your sentence will be suspended for the duration of imperial service."
"So it has been forgiven?"
"No."
"What about the fine?"
"It remains."
"Then what's the point?"
"If you take the oath, the public-labor debt will be considered discharged through service. The cost of the ledger will be withheld from your first pay."
Kain looked at him.
"What if the Academy doesn't accept me?"
"You'll be assigned to a legion or garrison. They pay wages there too."
"What if I refuse service?"
"You'll return and complete the remaining days."
"The Empire has thought of everything."
"That is why it has existed longer than your patience."
Kain took hold of the barrow.
Arnwald did not leave.
"What else?"
"Did you hear anything during the examination yesterday?"
Kain went still.
"The magister already asked me."
"I am not the magister."
"A distant breath."
"A voice?"
"No."
"Words?"
"No."
"An urge to do something?"
Kain considered.
He remembered the cold in his hand clearly.
And the sense of depth inside the small sphere.
But there had been no command.
Not even a thought that could be called foreign.
"Only the feeling that someone was there."
Arnwald studied him for several moments.
"If it happens again before departure, tell Liara."
"She forbade me to do anything that might make it happen again."
"Then obey a prohibition for the first time in your life."
"Halvar says almost the same thing."
"Then Oksen still has two sensible people."
"Marta will be offended."
"Your mother is the only sensible person in Oksen. I was talking about the men."
He turned and headed toward the barracks.
"Captain."
Arnwald stopped.
"Why did you vouch for me?"
"Because you weren't trying to kill my men."
"I almost took the sword."
"Almost."
Arnwald spoke the word the way Halvar did.
Like the name of a disease.
"And because," the captain continued, "I have seen real criminals. They rarely throw themselves at armed soldiers for the sake of a goat and a crying girl."
"I wasn't crying."
"I meant Mia."
"I know."
"Then why did you clarify?"
Kain took hold of the barrow.
"So the conversation wouldn't become too warm."
"Work, Alseif."
By evening, Kain could no longer straighten his hands properly.
He returned home, pushed the door open with his shoulder, and stopped on the threshold.
His entire life lay on the table.
Two shirts.
A spare pair of trousers.
Woolen socks.
An old cloak.
A leather belt.
A wooden spoon.
A small knife.
The rolled blanket Arnwald had redeemed from the collector.
Marta sat by the window, mending a split seam in a traveling bag.
Mia was placing inside it the small objects she considered essential for a journey.
Kain saw a piece of chalk, three smooth stones, a wooden figure of a goat, and a dried sprig of rowan.
"What is this?"
Mia covered the bag with both hands.
"Your things."
"Why do I need stones?"
"They're good stones."
"How?"
"One looks like a bear."
Kain picked it up.
The stone did not look like a bear.
With considerable effort, it might have resembled a fat potato.
"And the others?"
"So the first one won't be alone."
Kain looked at Marta.
She continued sewing.
"I tried to explain," she said. "Then I decided two extra stones would not be the heaviest burden you carry."
Kain returned the stone to his sister.
"Keep one."
"The bear?"
"The one you call a bear."
Satisfied, Mia placed it at the bottom of the bag.
"What about the little Liska?"
"She stays home."
"Why?"
"Because the real Liska will be jealous."
Mia considered this and removed the wooden goat.
Marta finished the seam, broke the thread, and examined her work.
"Try on the cloak."
"It fits."
"The last time you wore it was in autumn."
"I haven't become a different person since then."
"Your shoulders have."
Kain put on the cloak.
It did pull across his back.
Marta came over, opened the old seam, and marked the cloth with chalk.
"Take it off."
"I can travel like this."
"You can. You could also walk barefoot and eat snow."
"Northerners do that sometimes."
"Northerners do many things, then come to me for a needle, bandages, and a letter to the dead man's family."
Kain removed the cloak.
Marta returned to the table.
"Is Ilva preparing too?"
"Yes."
"Ingrid walks around her house pretending to be pleased."
"She is pleased."
"That doesn't stop her from being afraid."
Mia sat beside the bag.
"Will Ilva travel with you?"
"As far as Avalon."
"And Toren?"
"He leaves a day earlier. North."
"The north is already here."
"To the capital of Valskar."
"Is it colder there?"
"Probably."
Mia wrinkled her forehead.
"Then why go?"
"To learn."
"You can learn from Halvar."
"Toren will learn the Blood of the Gods."
The girl looked at Marta.
"And Kain?"
"Aura," she replied.
The word sounded strange inside the small house.
Kain pictured the golden lines within the sphere.
Avalon.
The Academy.
People in knights' cloaks.
None of it belonged beside a table with one leg shorter than the others or Liska bleating beyond the wall.
"If I can," he added.
Mia looked at his chest.
"Where is it?"
"Where is what?"
"The Aura."
"Nowhere yet."
"Then how will you learn it?"
"I hope they explain that at the Academy."
"And if they don't?"
"I'll ask questions."
Marta said quietly:
"Now I truly fear for the Academy."
Kain smiled.
She did not.
But for the first time since the commission, her voice sounded almost as it had before.
The next few days passed too quickly.
In the mornings, Kain worked at the garrison.
After the evening bell, he helped at home.
He repaired the door hinge, reinforced the fence beside the shed, and replaced a cracked beam above the hearth, though Marta insisted it would have lasted several more years.
Kain did not want to leave anything broken behind.
Not even the things he had never noticed before.
On the third evening, he climbed onto the roof and replaced two dried, split boards.
"Are you going to Avalon, or preparing to die?" Marta asked from below.
"I'm just repairing things."
"In sixteen years, you have never once noticed that roof of your own free will."
"I notice it now."
"Come down before you give me more work."
Kain sat at the edge of the roof.
From there, he could see almost all of Oksen.
The wooden wall.
The landman's house on a low rise.
The garrison roof.
Halvar's smithy, with smoke rising above it.
The mill beside the river.
The northern road disappearing between the forests.
The southern road, along which the imperial group would leave in two days.
Oksen had always seemed cramped to Kain.
For the first time, it now seemed vast.
Not in size.
In the number of things he would have to leave behind.
That evening, he went to Halvar.
The smithy was closed.
The forge burned low, without its usual roar. Halvar sat on a chopping block, cleaning a short northern blade.
"You're late," he said.
"By how much?"
"Five years. Today, only a quarter of an hour."
Kain closed the door.
"Arnwald kept me."
"Arnwald is teaching you service."
"He's teaching me to carry stones."
"Service often begins with stones."
Halvar placed the blade on the table.
"Take off your boots."
Kain removed them and stood on the cold floor.
"Breathing again today?"
"Were you expecting the Flame?"
"At least the Spark."
"You're leaving for a place where developing the Blood has been forbidden."
"Liara forbade it until Avalon."
"The Academy does not teach the northern path at all."
"I know."
"Then why do you need the Spark now?"
"So I have it."
Halvar shook his head.
"It is not a tool you put in a bag."
"What if I need it?"
"If you try to call it without control, you'll need a healer."
"Ilva will be nearby."
Halvar raised the wooden stick.
Kain fell silent.
"Close your eyes."
He obeyed.
"Breathe."
Inhale.
Pause.
Exhale.
His heart beat heavily after the day's work.
"Do not seek strength," Halvar said. "Find the boundary."
"Which boundary?"
The stick struck his shin.
"Silently."
Kain steadied his breathing.
Pressure formed beneath his breastbone.
The familiar closed door.
He did not reach for the latch.
He simply listened.
"Say it."
"Blod min, vil min."
"Quieter."
"Blod min, vil min."
My blood.
My will.
Warmth appeared deep inside his chest.
Not as a flare.
It moved slowly, like blood returning to frozen fingers.
Kain held it.
One heartbeat.
A second.
A third.
The warmth began to rise toward his shoulder.
"Stop it," Halvar said.
Kain did not know how.
He tried to force the sensation back.
The heat intensified.
"Do not fight it."
"Then what do I do?"
"Remind it."
Kain clenched his teeth.
"Blod min, vil min."
The heat reached his elbow.
"It does not govern you," Halvar said. "But neither are you its master if all you know is how to give orders."
Kain slowed his breathing.
He stopped pushing the warmth.
He did not try to seize it.
He simply allowed it to stop.
The heat shivered.
Retreated to his shoulder.
Then to his chest.
And vanished.
Kain opened his eyes.
Halvar watched him without smiling.
"Was that good?"
The smith was silent for a moment.
"Not terrible."
"From you, that's almost praise."
"Don't get used to it."
Kain sat on the chopping block and pulled on his boots.
Halvar picked up the blade from the table.
It was a plain working knife in a simple leather sheath. The blade was short, thick, and unadorned.
He held it out to Kain.
"I already have a knife."
"You have a piece of iron someone once mistreated with a hammer."
Kain drew the blade.
Its balance was unusually precise. The edge was even.
"Did you make it?"
"No. Dwarves came in the night, forged it, and begged me not to tell anyone."
"So you made it."
"It is a tool, not a weapon."
"It has a blade."
"A spoon has an edge too. But if you fight with one, the Academy will remember you."
Kain returned the knife to its sheath.
"Thank you."
"Do not thank me until you understand the price."
"What price?"
"You sharpen it yourself."
"Terrifying."
Halvar looked at him.
"In Avalon, they will tell you Aura is superior to the Blood. In the North, many will tell you the opposite."
"What will you tell me?"
"That power loves fools. They are always ready to turn it into a faith."
Kain fixed the knife to his belt.
"The Academy doesn't teach the Blood. Should I forget everything you've shown me?"
"No."
"Then what should I do?"
"Breathe. Listen. Do not open the door without a master beside you."
"What if another master says he knows better?"
"Ask him how many students he has buried."
"And what is the right answer?"
"If he says 'none,' he is lying or has never taught anyone. If he gives you a number with pride, walk away."
Halvar stood.
"One more thing."
He clasped Kain's forearm just above the wrist.
Kain returned the grip.
The smith's hand was hot and heavy.
"Kraft du ei stann, er ei din," Halvar said.
Power you cannot stop does not belong to you.
"I remember."
"For now, only the words."
"When I return, I'll show you the rest."
Halvar tightened his grip.
"Return first."
The next day, Oksen saw the northern detachment off.
There were twelve volunteers.
Ten men and two women.
Among them was the northern girl whose sphere had shown red runes. Her name was Runa Veld. Kain knew her by sight, though he had almost never spoken to her. She was a tanner's daughter and usually worked beside her father, scraping fat from treated hides.
Now a short bow hung from her shoulder, and the token of a candidate for the Battle Sisters was fixed to her belt.
Three covered wagons and five warriors from the jarl's lands waited at the gates.
The lead rider wore a heavy wolfskin cloak. A silver torc gleamed at his neck.
He spoke with Arnwald while the families said goodbye to the volunteers.
Toren's father stood beside his son with both hands on his shoulders.
"Listen to your elders," he said.
"Yes."
"Do not trust anyone who promises an easy Spark."
"Yes."
"Eat everything they give you."
"Yes."
"Do not argue with a master of the Blood."
Toren looked at Kain.
"That one will be harder."
His father struck the back of his head with an open hand.
"Then start learning now."
Signa, Toren's mother, adjusted her son's collar even though it lay perfectly straight.
Then she did it again.
And again.
At last, Toren gently removed her hands.
"Mor, I'm not cold."
"You will be."
"Then I'll fasten it."
"Fasten it now."
He obeyed.
Kain waited at a distance until the family had finished.
Ilva stood beside him.
"Will you look at me that way when I leave too?" Kain asked.
"What way?"
"As though you're trying to make sure I'm still here."
"I'm making sure you don't start a fight with the northern detachment before they depart."
"I'm only standing."
"Which is why I haven't intervened yet."
Toren finally approached.
A bow hung across his back, a short sword at his belt, and a small wooden token bearing his candidate number was fastened to his chest.
"Beautiful," Kain said.
"What?"
"The piece of wood."
"In a month, I'll have a torc."
"If they don't throw you out."
"In a month, I'll have a torc," Toren repeated.
Kain nodded toward Runa.
"A She-Wolf."
"A candidate."
"She outran you in the examination."
"I wasn't competing."
"Of course."
Runa heard them and looked over.
"I was competing," she said. "He lost."
Toren watched her walk away.
"The capital will be difficult."
"Because of the training?"
"Because of her."
He turned to Kain.
For several moments, neither spoke.
Every joke that might have hidden the farewell suddenly seemed too short.
"So, Avalon," Toren said.
"So, the capital of Valskar."
"I'll return first."
"Why?"
"You'll get lost in the first large city."
"I can read signs."
"Oksen has one sign. It points to the mill."
"And I always found it."
Toren smirked.
Then he held out his hand.
Kain clasped his forearm.
"Vi stand saman," Toren said.
We stand together.
Kain tightened his grip.
"Even on different roads?"
"The road does not undo the oath."
"Did you invent that?"
"Just now."
"It sounds too intelligent."
"Then don't tell anyone I said it."
"Vi stand saman," Kain replied.
They released each other.
Toren clasped Ilva's forearm.
"Do not let him die."
"I am a healer, not a miracle worker."
"Then at least make him suffer for his stupidity."
"I am already trained for that."
"Good."
He walked toward the wagons.
Halfway there, he turned.
"Kain!"
"What?"
"If everyone in Avalon is as beautiful as they say, don't marry before I return!"
Ilva covered her face with one hand.
Kain shouted:
"Learn to talk to Runa without staring after her first!"
Several volunteers laughed.
Runa climbed into a wagon and said:
"He needn't hurry."
Toren went red to his ears.
The northern detachment set out.
Wheels creaked over the frozen road. The warband warriors raised their hands in farewell. Families walked beside the wagons as far as the outer gate, until the guards asked them to stop.
Toren sat on the rear board.
He did not wave.
He simply watched Kain until the road turned beyond the forest.
On the evening before Kain's departure, Marta sent Mia to bed earlier than usual.
The girl argued.
She said Kain might disappear in the night.
That southerners always left in secret.
That it was her duty to keep watch.
Marta allowed her to sit beside the hearth until her eyes began to close on their own.
Kain carried his sister to her pallet.
Mia put her arms around his neck.
"Will you come back?"
"Of course."
"When?"
"I don't know."
"That's a bad promise."
"Then I'll return before you grow taller than me."
She opened one eye.
"That's a long time."
"For you."
"Bring me something from Avalon."
"What?"
"I don't know. But not a stone. We have stones here."
"I've noticed."
"And not a doll."
"Why?"
"I'm grown up."
Kain looked at her.
"Then what should I bring a grown woman?"
"A real knight's cloak."
"They're rather expensive."
"Then a piece of one."
"Agreed."
Mia closed her eyes.
"Lir natt," she murmured, mixing Osmar with Valsk.
Kain adjusted the blanket.
"Good night."
When he returned to the table, Marta sat motionless.
A small bundle wrapped in dark cloth lay before her.
"Close the door," she said.
Kain checked the bolt.
Marta unfolded the cloth.
Inside lay an old silver clasp.
The metal had darkened with age. One edge was broken, as though the clasp had been torn from heavy fabric. Part of a raised emblem remained on its face, but someone had deliberately scraped away the center with a sharp tool.
Kain picked it up.
The silver was heavy.
"What is it?"
"It belonged to your father."
He looked up.
Marta did not look away.
"What was his name?"
"Not now."
Kain closed his hand around the clasp.
"You promised to tell me before I left."
"I promised to tell you what you need to know."
"I need his name."
"You want his name. That is not the same thing."
"Perhaps not to you."
"Not to you either. You simply don't understand that yet."
Kain placed the clasp on the table.
"Then why show me?"
"Because you are going to Avalon."
"So?"
Marta touched the damaged emblem.
"Old symbols are remembered better there than in the North."
"What does this symbol mean?"
"I don't know its full meaning."
"But you know something."
"Enough to hide it for sixteen years."
Kain looked at the scraped relief.
"From whom?"
"From people who may recognize the emblem before you do."
"What will they do?"
"I don't know."
"You never know anything."
"Sometimes that is the only honest answer I can give."
Kain rose from the table.
"Was my father a criminal?"
"No."
The answer came at once.
Without doubt.
Kain sat again.
"Then what was he?"
Marta closed her eyes.
"A man it is still dangerous for you to know too much about."
"Dangerous for whom?"
"Perhaps for you. Perhaps for him. Perhaps for all of us."
"Is he alive?"
This time, the pause lasted.
"I cannot answer."
"Can't, or won't?"
"Can't."
Kain leaned back against the wall.
"Convenient."
"No."
For the first time, Marta sounded tired.
Not irritated.
Not afraid.
Something older, something that had existed long before Oksen.
"It would have been convenient to lie to you," she said. "To give you the name of a dead man. Invent a simple story. Tell you your father died on the road or abandoned us. You would have hated him, pitied me, and stopped asking questions."
"Why didn't you?"
"Because one day, you will learn the truth. And then everything I taught you will become one more lie."
Kain looked at the clasp.
"Did he know about me?"
Marta's fingers tightened.
"He knew I was expecting a child."
"And he left?"
"Kain."
"I'm only asking."
"And I will not answer."
He wanted to press her.
To ask why she defended a man who had never been there.
But he saw her hands.
Marta gripped her own wrists so tightly that her fingers had gone white.
Kain exhaled.
"What should I do with the clasp?"
"Wear it out of sight."
"What if someone recognizes it?"
"First ask how they know the emblem."
"And then?"
"Do not believe their first answer."
"Very useful."
"It is all I can give you."
She took a thin leather cord and threaded it through the broken ring on the clasp.
Kain placed it around his neck.
The metal rested against his chest.
Cold.
Heavy.
Marta hid it beneath his shirt.
"I shouldn't show Reynar?"
"No one, unless you must."
"Liara?"
Marta hesitated.
"Mages least of all."
"You are from Osmantis yourself."
"Exactly."
Kain touched the clasp through the cloth.
"When will you tell me the rest?"
"When the knowledge can help you instead of merely making you visible."
"That may mean never again."
"It may."
He looked at her.
"I'll learn the truth anyway."
"I know."
"Doesn't that stop you?"
"Nothing has stopped me for a long time. I am only trying to buy you time."
Marta stood.
She approached her son and touched two fingers to his forehead.
Then his chest.
Her open hand lowered, palm down.
The Osmantian gesture.
This time, she said:
"Mindar sel. Zair mur."
Kain had heard similar words from Liara.
"A calm mind. Remember the anchor?"
"Remember who you are," Marta translated. "Even when others begin explaining who you are supposed to be."
"And who am I?"
She ran a hand through his hair.
"Kain Alseif."
"Not much."
"Enough to begin with."
He barely slept all night.
He listened to the wind touch the shutters.
To Liska shifting inside the shed.
To Mia murmuring in her sleep.
To Marta rising several times, going to the hearth, and lying down again.
At dawn, the garrison bell sounded over Oksen.
Once.
The assembly signal.
Kain dressed, tightened his belt, and secured Halvar's knife.
The traveling bag was heavier than it should have been.
He found the bear-stone at the bottom.
The wooden figure of Liska lay beside it.
Kain removed neither.
The yard was cold.
The eastern sky had only begun to brighten. Frost still covered the roofs, but the first smoke of the day was already rising above the smithy.
The commission's two carriages waited near the gates.
Eight candidates had been assigned to Avalon.
Two for Aura examinations.
The girl with the air affinity for the Academy Tower.
Ilva and two other healers.
One engineer.
Kain.
Reynar checked the lists.
Liara stood beside the lead carriage, wrapped in her gray cloak. She kept the black case containing the sphere with her.
"We will not wait for late arrivals," Reynar said.
"The appointed time is still a quarter of an hour away," Kain observed.
"Which means that, for the first time, you have arrived early."
Ilva stood beside her mother.
Ingrid Norn handed her a bundle of herbs.
"These are only for the road. In Avalon, do not argue with your instructors about dosage."
"If the dosage is wrong, I will argue."
"Then first make sure you know more than they do."
"You taught me that yourself."
"Which is how I know how irritating it is."
They embraced.
Arnwald approached Kain and held out a folded document.
"Copy of the court ruling. Order suspending your sentence. The commission's assignment."
Kain put the papers in his bag.
"Has the state ledger forgiven me?"
"No. It is waiting for your first pay."
"I hoped the ink had washed away its memory."
Arnwald extended his hand.
Kain clasped his forearm.
"Do not make me regret removing your bonds," the captain said.
"I'll try to make you regret it for a different reason."
"That is precisely the answer I feared."
He released Kain's arm.
"In formation, listen first. Then think. Then act."
"What about talking?"
"After everything else. Preferably never."
Halvar stood a little farther away.
He said nothing.
He only struck a fist against his chest.
Kain did the same.
Mia came running last.
She wore both socks, but one had slipped to her heel again.
"I forgot."
She caught Kain's hand and tied a red woolen thread around his wrist.
"What is this?"
"So you can find the way home."
"How will a thread help?"
"It comes from our house."
"Is this Liska's wool?"
Mia frowned.
"It doesn't matter."
"Then it is."
"Don't take it off."
"I won't."
She embraced him.
This time, she did not ask whether he would return.
Kain was grateful for that.
Marta approached last.
She carried a bundle of bread and dried meat.
"For the first two days," she said. "Do not eat it all at once."
"I know how to ration food."
"Yesterday, you ate half the winter cake."
"It was small."
"It was meant for six people."
She placed the bundle in his bag.
Kain waited.
Marta did too.
Other families were saying goodbye around them. Children cried. People gave last instructions. The commission clerk counted the travelers for the third time.
"I don't know what to say," Kain admitted.
"Is that a new feeling?"
"Very."
Marta smiled.
Only a little.
"Then remember it."
She embraced her son.
Kain smelled smoke, wool, and herbs, the scent her clothes had always carried.
"Asha seth," Marta whispered.
"What does it mean?"
"Return with the same breath you leave with."
"That's impossible."
"Then at least return as yourself."
Reynar climbed onto the step of the lead carriage.
"We are leaving!"
The horses moved.
Kain climbed into the rear carriage with Ilva and two other candidates.
The wheels creaked.
Mia walked beside them until the carriage gathered speed.
"The cloak!" she shouted. "Don't forget the cloak!"
"A piece!" Kain called back.
"A big one!"
The guards opened the southern gates.
The carriages passed beyond the wall.
Kain looked back.
Mia waved both arms.
Arnwald was already returning to the garrison.
Halvar stood motionless.
Marta did not wave.
She held one hand to her chest and watched her son leave.
Oksen slowly receded.
First, the people disappeared.
Then the gates.
Then the wooden wall and the rooftops.
The smoke above Halvar's smithy remained visible beyond the trees longest of all.
Kain touched the clasp beneath his shirt.
The thread of Liska's wool shone red around his wrist.
The knife hung at his belt.
The bag held a stone that resembled anything but a bear.
He was leaving Oksen as a poor debtor, a convicted offender, and an undetermined candidate for the Academy.
Not the most glorious collection of titles.
And yet the road before him lay open.
Kain turned to face south.
He did not know when he would see home again.
He did not know what kind of man would return.
Or whether he would return at all.
But the northern road had already carried Toren away.
The southern road carried Kain.
And somewhere between them remained a promise:
Vi stand saman.
We stand together.