Page 42 of Of Empires and Dust

“Oh, she’s done it before. Now, we were both drunk and she swore her hand slipped, but I’m not so sure.”

Both Magnus and Rist laughed, and the man passed Rist the skin.

“That was about three hundred years ago in a little tavern just north of Fearsall. Shithole of a place… She took a shine to you, lad. Might not seem like it, but she liked you. I can see why.”

The smile that touched Rist’s lips was one born of nothing but sadness, and the laughter in his throat was cut from the same cloth.

“It’s not that funny.” Magnus looked at Rist as though he’d grown a second head. “I tell a lot of fucking fantastic jokes and you barely ever laugh. And now you laugh at our dead friend?”

“No,” Rist said, still laughing. “I’m thinking of what she said to me the day I got my robes.”

“She threw a stick at me that day,” Magnus mumbled. “Fucking hurt. What’d she say?”

“Not much.”

“She never said much. But what?”

Rist put on his best Anila impression.“‘The robes suit you, Brother Havel.’”He hesitated for a moment, feeling the tears suddenly welling in his eyes. He took another swig of the whiskey, hearing it slosh in the skin. “The way she said ‘Brother’…” He gave a fake smile, clenching his jaw. He had no idea why he was telling this to Magnus of all people, but something about the man felt like home. “The way…”

“It’s all right, lad. Take your time. She’s dead now. She’s got all the time in the world.”

Rist choked, caught off guard by Magnus’s candour. He took a moment to gather himself. “Why do you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Make a joke out of everything?”

Magnus reached across and snatched the whiskey from Rist, draining the dregs of the skin in one go. “Sometimes, Rist, if you don’t laugh, you’ll cry. And I fucking hate crying. Always gives me a damn headache. Anila…” The man looked up at the stars. “I would have burned the world for her. She was family, and I’m going to feel her absence every moment I live. It’s a strange thing. You can go without laying eyes on someone for years and think little on it, but when you know you’ll never see them again, everything is different…” He ran his tongue across his lips. “I heard her, that day. I heard what she said – what I should have said. I tend to talk too much until it’s time to say something important, and then I go mute as a dead fish. Anila, on the other hand, had a way of saying a lot with very few words. She had a way of making people feel good about themselves. That’s a rare quality. Even rarer now.”

Magnus tossed the waterskin to the ground at the foot of the boulder, then reached into his pocket and produced a small flask, taking a swig.

He offered the flask to Rist, and Rist stared at him in disbelief. “You didn’t remember a shirt, but you remembered more whiskey?”

Magnus shrugged, pulling his lips into a dopey smile that seemed strange on the enormous man. “Whiskey is more important than shirts, Rist. If I teach you nothing, I’ll teach you that.” He leaned back, resting his hands on the boulder and looking at the campfires and tents spread around them. “Garramon made a good choice with you. You’re a little strange, but all the good ones are. Gods know I’m at least five points short of a star.” He drew in a long breath, patted Rist on the shoulder, and stared into his eyes, nodding. “I’m pretty sure I’m going to puke.”

Before Rist could even begin to process what the man had said, Magnus slid from the boulder with surprising grace for a man with more whiskey in his veins than blood.

Once on the ground, Magnus spread his shoulders, drew in an enormous lungful of air, and emptied the contents of his stomach into the dirt.

Garramon folded his arms,the scent of peppermint wafting from the mug of tea in his right hand as he looked down over the map pinned to the table before him. He stood in Fane’s tent, which, although large, was sparse to the point of being austere. His old friend had never been one for luxuries.

Fane sat cross-legged on the ground, leaning back against the edge of his cot, a book in his hand. He’d been there for hours, barely a word passing between him and Garramon. That had often been the way of their friendship, a quiet comfort that seldom needed more than company.

He took a sip of his tea, just hot enough to provide him with the faint satisfaction of almost burning his lips but not quite. He let out a sigh, looking around him at the scattered marble markers and icons strewn on the cotton floor. They had been like that since before he’d arrived in the tent, with the table flipped on its side. He’d lifted the table back into place but refused to do the same with the markers. He wasn’t Fane’s mother. That lovely woman had died many centuries ago.

With one last look at the map, his gaze moving from Ilnaen to Steeple, Garramon dropped himself into the foldout chair across from Fane, crossing his right leg over his left. He cupped the mug with both hands, allowing the tea’s warmth to spread through him. The sooner spring came, the better. He hated winter.

Fane lifted his gaze from the book before letting out a sigh. He slid a thin red steel bookmark from his trouser pocket, marked his place, then set the book down on the ground. He sat there wordlessly for another moment, drawing his knees to his chest.

Fane pursed his lips, leaning his head back against the cot. He seemed more frustrated than upset.

“We allowed the Chosen to cross.” Garramon shifted in his seat, resting the base of the mug on his leg. “That was our goal. Champions of Efialtír himself walk this very camp. They stand guard at your door, sentinels of The Saviour. Without them we would not have survived Achyron’s knights. We lost many, but this can only be seen as a victory. We are one step closer to ending all of this.”

Even as he spoke, Garramon doubted his own words. It wasn’t that he’d lost faith. He still believed in The Saviour. But he had started to weigh the cost, placing the bodies of the dead on the scales in his mind.

Fane lifted his head, nodding slowly. “You speak true, old friend, as you so often do. But no, Ilnaen proceeded precisely as I’d expected it would. Plans must be laid within plans to counterbalance the inevitable failure of all plans. Achyron’s knights would never have allowed us to draw Efialtír through the void that night, but now, if we take each step carefully, we will be in a position where there is nothing they can do to stop us. First, however, we must find this damn Heart of Blood.”

Garramon switched his legs so his left leg sat atop his right, relieving the pain that had set into the side of his knee. He glanced over at the icons and markers that dotted the floor. Something had ignited Fane’s fury. If it had not been Ilnaen, then what? He pushed the thought to the back of his mind. “What is our path forward then?”

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