With spring in the air, all in the sea­port braced, for soon it would be raid­ing weather. I ate with the guards every night now, and listened well to all the ru­mours. Forged ones had be­come rob­bers all along our high­ways, and the stor­ies of their de­prav­it­ies and de­pred­a­tions were all the tav­ern talk now. As pred­at­ors, they were more devoid of de­cency and mercy than any wild an­imal could be. It was easy to for­get they had ever been hu­man, and to hate them with a venom like noth­ing else.

  The fear of be­ing Forged in­creased pro­por­tion­ately. Mar­kets car­ried candy-dipped beads of poison for moth­ers to give their chil­dren in the event the fam­ily was cap­tured by raid­ers. There were ru­mours that some sea-coast vil­la­gers had packed up all their be­long­ings in carts and moved in­land, for­sak­ing their tra­di­tional oc­cu­pa­tions as fish­ers and traders to be­come farm­ers and hunters away from the threat of the sea. Cer­tainly the pop­u­la­tion of beg­gars within the city was swell­ing. A Forged one came into Buck­keep Town it­self and walked the streets, as un­touch­able as a mad man as he helped him­self to whatever he wanted from the mar­ket stalls. Be­fore a second day had passed, he had dis­ap­peared, and dark whis­pers said to watch for his body to wash up on the beach. Other ru­mours said a wife had been found for Ver­ity among the moun­tain folk. Some said it was to se­cure our ac­cess to the passes; oth­ers that we could not af­ford a po­ten­tial en­emy at our backs when all along our sea-coast we must fear the Red Ships. And there were yet other whis­pers that all was not well with Prince Ver­ity. Tired and sick said some, and oth­ers sniggered about a nervous and weary bride­groom. A few sneered that he had taken to drink and was only seen by day when his head­ache was worst.

  I found my con­cern over these last ru­mours to be deeper than I would have ex­pec­ted. None of the roy­als had ever paid much mind to me, at least not in a per­sonal way. Shrewd saw to my edu­ca­tion and com­fort, and had long ago bought my loy­alty, so that now I was his without even giv­ing thought to any al­tern­at­ive. Regal des­pised me, and I had long learned to avoid his nar­row glance, and the cas­ual nudges or furt­ive shoves that had once been enough to send a smal­ler boy stag­ger­ing. But Ver­ity had been kind to me, in an ab­sent-minded sort of way, and he loved his dogs and his horse and his hawks in a way I un­der­stood. I wanted to see him stand tall and proud at his wed­ding, and hoped someday to stand be­hind the throne he would oc­cupy much as Chade stood be­hind Shrewd’s. I hoped he was well, and yet there was noth­ing I could do about it if he were not, nor any way I could see him. Even if we had been keep­ing the same hours, the circles we moved in were sel­dom the same.

  It was still not quite full spring when Ga­len made his an­nounce­ment. The rest of the keep was mak­ing its pre­par­a­tions for Spring­fest. The stalls in the mar­ket­place would be sanded clean and re­painted in bright col­ours, and tree branches would be brought in­side and gently forced so that their blos­soms and tiny leaves could grace the ban­quet table on Spring­seve. But tender new greens and egg­cake with car­ris seed top­pings were not what Ga­len had in mind for us, nor pup­pet shows and hunt­dances. In­stead, with the com­ing of the new sea­son, we would be tested, to be proven either worthy or dis­carded.

  ‘Dis­carded,’ he re­peated, and if he had been con­demning those un­chosen to death, the at­ten­tion of his other stu­dents could not have been more in­tent. I tried numbly to un­der­stand what it would mean to me when I failed. I had no be­lief that he would test me fairly, or that I could pass such a test even if he did.

  ‘You shall be a co­terie, those of you who prove yourselves. Such a co­terie as has never been be­fore, I would think. At the height of Spring­fest, I my­self will present you to your king, and he shall see the won­der of what I have wrought. As you have come this far with me, you know I will not be shamed be­fore him. So I my­self will test you, and test you to your lim­its, to be sure that the weapon I place in my king’s hand holds an edge worthy of its pur­pose. One day from now, I will scat­ter you, like seeds in the wind, across the king­dom. I have ar­ranged that you will be taken hence, by swift horse, to your des­tin­a­tions. And there each of you will be left, alone. Not one of you will know where any of the oth­ers are.’ He paused, I think to let each of us feel the ten­sion thrum­ming through the room. I knew that all the oth­ers vi­brated in tune, shar­ing a com­mon emo­tion, al­most a com­mon mind, as they re­ceived their in­struc­tion. I sus­pec­ted they heard far more than the simple words from Ga­len’s lips. I felt a for­eigner there, listen­ing to words in a lan­guage whose idiom I could not grasp. I would fail.

  ‘Within two days of be­ing left, you will be summoned. By me. You will be dir­ec­ted whom to con­tact, and where. Each of you will re­ceive the in­form­a­tion you need to make your way back here. If you have learned, and learned well, my co­terie will be here and present on Spring­seve, ready to be presen­ted to the King.’ Again the pause. ‘Do not think, how­ever, that all you must do is find your way back to Buck­keep by Spring­seve. You are to be a co­terie, not hom­ing-pi­geons. How you come and in what com­pany will prove to me that you have mastered your Skill. Be ready to leave by to­mor­row morn­ing.’

  And then he re­leased us, one by one, again with a touch for each, and a word of praise for each, save me. I stood be­fore him, as open as I could make my­self, as vul­ner­able as I dared to be, and yet the brush of the Skill against my mind was less than the touch of the wind. He stared down at me as I looked up at him, and I did not need the Skill to feel that he both loathed and des­pised me. He made a noise of con­tempt and looked aside, re­leas­ing me. I star­ted to go.

  ‘Far bet­ter,’ he said in that cav­ernous voice of his, ‘if you had gone over the wall that night, bas­tard. Far bet­ter. Burrich thought I ab­used you. I was only of­fer­ing you a way out, as close to an hon­our­able way as you were cap­able of find­ing. Go away and die, boy, or at least go away. You shame your father’s name by ex­ist­ing. By Eda, I do not know how you came to ex­ist. That a man such as your father could fall to such depth as ly­ing with some­thing and let­ting you be­come is bey­ond my mind to ima­gine.’

  As al­ways, there was that note of fan­at­icism in his voice as he spoke of Chiv­alry, and his eyes be­came al­most blank with blind id­ol­atry. Al­most ab­sent-mindedly, he turned away and walked off. He reached the top of the stairs, and then turned, very slowly. ‘I must ask,’ he said, and the venom in his voice was hungry with hatred. ‘Are you his catamite, that he lets you suck strength from him? Is that why he is so pos­sess­ive of you?’

  ‘Catamite?’ I re­peated, not know­ing the word.

  He smiled. It made his ca­da­ver­ous face even more skull­like. ‘Did you think I hadn’t dis­covered him? Did you think you’d be free to draw on his strength for this test? You won’t. Be as­sured, bas­tard, you won’t.’

  He turned and went down the steps, leav­ing me stand­ing there alone on the rooftop. I had no idea what his fi­nal words meant; but the strength of his hatred had left me sickened and weak as if it were a poison he’d put in my blood. I was re­minded of the last time all had left me on the tower roof. I felt com­pelled to walk to the edge of the tower and look down. This corner of the keep did not face the sea, but there were still jagged rocks aplenty at the foot of it. No one would sur­vive that fall. If I could make a second’s firm de­cision, then I could put my­self out of it all. And what Burrich or Chade or any­one else might think of it would not be able to trouble me.

  A dis­tant echo of a whim­per.

  ‘I’m com­ing, Smithy,’ I muttered, and turned away from the edge.

  SEV­EN­TEEN

  The Trial

  The Man Ce­re­mony is sup­posed to take place within the moon of a boy’s four­teenth birth­day. Not all are hon­oured with it. It re­quires a Man to spon­sor and name the can­did­ate, and he must find a dozen other Men who con­cede the boy is worthy and ready. Liv­ing among the men-at-arms, I was aware of the ce­re­mony, and knew enough of its grav­ity and se­lectiv­ity that I never ex­pec­ted to par­ti­cip­ate in it. For one thing, no one knew my birth date. For an­other, I had no know­ledge of who was a Man, let alone if twelve Men ex­is­ted who would find me worthy.

  But on a cer­tain night, months after I had en­dured Ga­len’s test, I awoke to find my bed sur­roun­ded by robed and hooded fig­ures. Within the dark hoods I glimpsed the masks of the Pil­lars.

  No one may speak or write of the ce­re­mony de­tails. This, I think, I may say: as each life was put into my hands – fish, bird and beast – I chose to re­lease it, not to death but back to its own free ex­ist­ence. So noth­ing died at my ce­re­mony, and hence no one feasted. But even in my state of mind at that time, I felt there had been enough blood and death around me to last a life­time, and I re­fused to kill with hands or teeth. My Man still chose to give me a name, so He could not have been totally dis­pleased. The name is in the old tongue, which has no let­ters and can­not be writ­ten. Nor have I ever found any with which I chose to share the know­ledge of my Man name. But its an­cient mean­ing, I think, I can di­vulge here. Cata­lyst. The Changer.

  I went straight to the stables, to Smithy and then to Sooty. The dis­tress I felt at the thought of the mor­row went from men­tal to phys­ical, and I stood in Sooty’s stall, leaned my head against her with­ers, and felt queasy. Burrich found me there. I re­cog­nized his pres­ence and the steady ca­dence of his boots as he came down the stable walk­way, and then he hal­ted ab­ruptly out­side Sooty’s stall. I felt him look­ing in at me.

  ‘Well. Now what?’ he de­man­ded harshly, and I heard in his voice how weary he was both of me and my prob­lems. Had I been any less miser­able, my pride would have made me draw my­self up and de­clare that noth­ing was wrong.

  In­stead, I muttered into Sooty’s coat, ‘To­mor­row Ga­len plans to test us.’

  ‘I know. He’s de­man­ded quite ab­ruptly that I fur­nish him horses for this idi­otic scheme. I would have re­fused, had he not a wax signet from the King giv­ing him au­thor­ity. And no more do I know than that he wants the horses, so don’t ask it,’ he ad­ded gruffly as I looked up sud­denly at him.

  ‘I wouldn’t,’ I told him sul­lenly. I would prove my­self fairly to Ga­len, or not at all.

  ‘You’ve no chance of passing this trial he’s de­signed, have you?’ Burrich’s tone was cas­ual, but I could hear how he braced him­self to be dis­ap­poin­ted by my an­swer.

  ‘None,’ I said flatly, and we were both si­lent a mo­ment, listen­ing to the fi­nal­ity of that word.

  ‘Well.’ He cleared his throat and gave his belt a hitch. ‘Then you’d best get it over with and get back here. It’s not as if you haven’t had good luck with your other school­ing. A man can’t ex­pect to suc­ceed at everything he tries.’ He tried to make my fail­ure at the Skill sound as if it were of no con­sequence.

  ‘I sup­pose not. Will you take care of Smithy for me while I’m gone?’

  ‘I will.’ He star­ted to turn away, then turned back, al­most re­luct­antly. ‘How much is that dog go­ing to miss you?’

  I heard his other ques­tion, but tried to avoid it. ‘I don’t know. I’ve had to leave him so much dur­ing these les­sons, I’m afraid he won’t miss me at all.’

  ‘I doubt that,’ Burrich said pon­der­ously. He turned away. ‘I doubt that a very great deal,’ he said as he walked off between the rows of stalls. And I knew that he knew, and was dis­gus­ted, not just that Smithy and I shared a bond, but that I re­fused to ad­mit it.

  ‘As if ad­mit­ting it were an op­tion, with him,’ I muttered to Sooty. I bade my an­im­als farewell, try­ing to con­vey to Smithy that sev­eral meals and nights would pass be­fore he saw me again. He wriggled and fawned and pro­tested that I must take him, that I would need him. He was too big to pick up and hug any more. I sat down and he came into my lap and I held him. He was so warm and solid, so near and real. For a mo­ment I felt how right he was, that I would need him to be able to sur­vive this fail­ure. But I re­minded my­self that he would be here, wait­ing for me when I re­turned, and I prom­ised him sev­eral days of my time for his sole be­ne­fit when I re­turned. I would take him on a long hunt, such as we had never had time for be­fore. (Now) he sug­ges­ted, and (soon) I prom­ised. Then I went back up to the keep to pack a change of clothes and some trav­el­ling food.

  The next morn­ing had much of pomp and drama to it and very little sense, to my way of think­ing. The oth­ers to be tested seemed ex­cited and elated. Of the eight of us who were set­ting out, I was the only one who seemed un­im­pressed by the rest­less horses and the eight covered lit­ters. Ga­len lined us up and blind­folded us as three-score or more people looked on. Most of them were re­lated to the stu­dents, or friends, or the keep gos­sips. Ga­len made a brief speech, os­tens­ibly to us, but telling us what we already knew: that we were to be taken to dif­fer­ent loc­a­tions and left; that we must co­oper­ate, us­ing the Skill, in or­der to make our ways back to the keep; that if we suc­ceeded, we would be­come a co­terie and serve our king mag­ni­fi­cently and be es­sen­tial to de­feat­ing the Red Ship Raid­ers. The last bit im­pressed our on­look­ers, for I heard mut­ter­ing tongues as I was es­cor­ted to my lit­ter and as­sisted in­side.

  There passed a miser­able day and a half for me. The lit­ter swayed, and with no fresh air on my face or scenery to dis­tract me, I soon felt queasy. The man guid­ing the horses had been sworn to si­lence and kept his word. We paused briefly that night. I was given a mea­gre meal, bread and cheese and wa­ter, and then I was re­loaded and the jolt­ing and sway­ing re­sumed.

  At about mid­day of the fol­low­ing day, the lit­ter hal­ted. Once more I was as­sisted in dis­mount­ing. Not a word was said, and I stood, stiff and headachy and blind­folded in a strong wind. When I heard the horses leav­ing, I de­cided I had reached my des­tin­a­tion and reached up to un­tie my blind­fold. Ga­len had knot­ted it tightly and it took me a mo­ment to get it off.

  I stood on a grassy hill­side. My es­cort was well on his way to a road that wound past the base of the hill, mov­ing swiftly. The grass was tall around my knees, sere from winter, but green at the base. I could see other grassy hills with rocks pok­ing out of their sides, and strips of wood­land shel­ter­ing at their feet. I shrugged and turned to get my bear­ings. It was hilly coun­try, but I could scent the sea and a low tide to the east some­where. I had a nag­ging sense that the coun­tryside was fa­mil­iar; not that I had been to this par­tic­u­lar spot be­fore, but that the lie of the ter­rain was fa­mil­iar some­how. I turned, and to the west saw the Sen­tinel. There was no mis­tak­ing the double-jag of its peak. I had copied a map for Fed­wren less than a year ago, and the cre­ator had chosen the Sen­tinel’s dis­tinct­ive peak as a mo­tif for the dec­or­at­ive bor­der. So. The sea over there, the Sen­tinel there, and, with a sud­denly dip­ping stom­ach, I knew where I was. Not too far from Forge.

  I found my­self turn­ing quickly in a circle to sur­vey the sur­round­ing hill­side, wood­lands and road. No sign of any­one. I ques­ted out, al­most frantic­ally, but found only birds and small game and one buck, who lif­ted his head and snuffed, won­der­ing what I was. For a mo­ment I felt re­as­sured, un­til I re­membered that the Forged ones I had en­countered be­fore had been trans­par­ent to that sense.

  I moved down the hill to where sev­eral boulders jut­ted out from its side, and sat in their shel­ter. It was not that the wind was cold, for the day prom­ised spring soon. It was to have some­thing firmly against my back, and to feel that I was not such an out­stand­ing tar­get as I had been on top of the hill. I tried to think coolly what to do next. Ga­len had sug­ges­ted to us that we should stay quietly where we were de­pos­ited, med­it­at­ing and re­main­ing open in our senses. At some­time in the next two days, he would try to con­tact me.

  Noth­ing takes the heart out of a man more than the ex­pect­a­tion of fail­ure. I had no be­lief that he would really try to con­tact me, let alone that I would re­ceive any clear im­pres­sions if he did. Nor did I have faith that the drop-off he had chosen for me was a safe loc­a­tion. Without much more thought than that, I rose, again sur­veyed the area for any­one watch­ing me, then struck out to­ward the sea-smell. If I were where I sup­posed my­self to be, from the shore I should be able to see Antler Is­land, and, on a clear day, pos­sibly Scrim Isle. Even one of those would be enough to tell me how far from Forge I was.

  As I hiked, I told my­self I only wanted to see how long a walk I would have back to Buck­keep. Only a fool would ima­gine that the Forged ones still rep­res­en­ted any danger. Surely winter had put an end to them, or left them too starved and weakened to be a men­ace to any­one. I gave no cre­dence to the tales of them band­ing to­gether as cut-throats and thieves. I wasn’t afraid. I merely wanted to see where I was. If Ga­len truly wanted to con­tact me, loc­a­tion should be no bar­rier. He had as­sured us in­nu­mer­able times that it was the per­son he reached for, not the place. He could find me as well on the beach as he could on the hill­top.