And then there was the rhyme.

  Perhaps she’d worked out the rest of the faded childish scrawl without realizing it and sleep had removed enough distractions for the words to rise to the forefront of her mind.

  Perhaps not.

  Given the unnatural appearance of the pond, it had to have recently been filled in by mage-craft—where recently referred to a time within the last sixty-three years. The location received sunlight for most of the day and the puddle—currently an arm’s length away from the toes of her boots—would supply water: the light and water necessary for the growth of seeds. If the tooth was a dragon seed . . .

  Lyelee dropped to one knee and began to dig. The dirt shifted easily. Unnaturally easily. There were none of the ubiquitous red stones in the hole.

  one hand deep in mage-worked dirt

  One hand deep was not a quantitative measurement.

  trap a death to free a life

  She curled the snake around the circumference of the hole and tucked the tooth into the center of the circle.

  three drops of blood to make it work

  Work and dirt did not rhyme. Sloppy. She pricked her finger with the needle she’d taken from Harris’s sewing kit, let three drops fall onto the tooth, and hurriedly filled in the hole, feeling slightly foolish.

  Illogically, the ground was flat once all the dirt had been returned, as though she’d added nothing to its volume.

  “I wouldn’t put your hand in the water.”

  She stood, brushed red dirt off her knee, and turned to face Keetin. “The water’s clear and there isn’t enough to fill the kettle.”

  “Pond had to go somewhere and there’s no point in tempting the shattered by waving a tasty bit of meat in their metaphorical direction.”

  “Metaphorical? Big word.”

  He grinned. “I know a few.”

  Past his shoulder, she could see Ryan waving a scale-mail vest. “Ryan wants you.”

  “Yes, he does. Because I was voted the best ass in the Citadel three years in a row.”

  “He wants you to put on your armor.”

  Keetin glanced back at the camp. Ryan waved more pointedly. “So it appears.” Lyelee wondered if Keetin knew he had his hand pressed against his chest again. “Which does not change the observation about my ass,” he pointed out as he turned. “You coming?”

  “Why not.” How long did a dragon take to sprout? When they returned this way, would she be able to definitively conclude that planting the tooth in this particular mage-craft-soaked location either did, or did not, produce a dragon? Would it need another hundred years? How long would she be in the grave before it emerged?

  “I had no idea you entered donkeys into competitions,” she said as she fell into step beside him.

  His laugh drew the attention of everyone in the camp, and he spent the next few moments repeating her juvenile play on words.

  No one asked her why she was at the pond.

  Lyelee frowned up at the evergreens. Had they moved closer?

  RYAN.NOW

  Ryan held his torch to a crack between the slabs that blocked most of the passage at the back of the cave and peered through.

  “What do you see?” Keetin called from the mouth of the cave. He didn’t like enclosed spaces and had declared he’d come no further in until he had to.

  “I see rock.”

  “Not exactly helpful.”

  “Thank you for that insight, Lord Norwin-cee.” Ryan stepped back, wiped his sweaty palm against his thigh, and shifted the torch to his other hand. “If we have to clear this, then we’d best get on with it.”

  He was surprised by how smokeless the torch had turned out to be. He’d expected them to use lanterns, but dead wood was easy to come by and lanterns meant oil and oil weighed a lot more than the torch-wraps Gateway had provided. Most of the smoke the torch gave off drifted through cracks in the barrier, leading the way.

  “Ryan?”

  When Ryan turned, Keetin had actually taken a step into the cave. “What?”

  “Weren’t we going to get on with clearing the rocks?” He stepped back out into the sunlight as Ryan joined him. “Where we means Nonee, of course.”

  Nonee waited below the cave for Ryan to give the order. Everyone was waiting for him to give the order. “All right. Let’s go, then. Nonee, if you would.”

  No one offered to help. He expected they all realized clearing the barrier would go faster if they stayed out of her way. After all, according to the chronicle, she’d built it.

  “You going to be okay?” he asked, following Keetin down to the missing pond.

  “I wasn’t the one staring at nothing for half the morning.”

  It hadn’t been that long. Ryan handed the torch to Destros, and hurried to catch up so he could help Keetin into his vest. “I’m not the one who got slammed by a lizard-dog.”

  “For the five thousandth time, Ryan, it’s a bruise.” Keetin rolled his shoulders, settling the weight. “I’ve gotten worse in the practice yard.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “Of course I am. Let it go.”

  “We’ll need to pause after completing the passage so I can record the effects,” Lyelee announced, not quite pushing between them. “The details will be useful to the Scholar’s Hall even if you don’t include them in your chronicle.”

  Keetin rolled his eyes. Ryan didn’t—but it was close. “Let’s get through the passage first.”

  And there was her your best will never be good enough expression. “You need to learn to plan ahead if you’re going to be Lord Protector.”

  “I’m planning to confine all scholars to the Hall,” he muttered to Keetin.

  Lyelee snorted. “I can hear you.”

  By the time Nonee finished, the shifted slabs of rock filled most of the cave, leaving only a narrow path down the center. Ryan wondered if she’d eaten the few remaining mushrooms before blocking access. Calluses on his fingertips caught on a rough edge of rock, lighter, even after sixty-three years, than the rock around it. Broken by Nonee’s fists to allow his great-uncle access. Rebuilt into a barricade after their return with the fuel, but whether to keep things in or out he had no idea. And wasn’t going to ask.

  The reopened passage stretched out into the distance, far enough he couldn’t see an end. Long enough that in his chronicle, he’d call it a tunnel and leave his heir better prepared—no matter how short a time they’d borne the title. Wider than Nonee, higher than Nonee and her pack, the walls were the expected rough rock, but the floor had been polished smooth. Reflections of torchlight danced across the surface. Reflections were not supposed to move like that. “Did the mages make this?”

  Nonee snorted. “Not on purpose.”

  Sword in one hand, torch in the other, Captain Yansav fell into place beside him. She’d insisted on the lead position, arguing an enclosed area wouldn’t confine her skills like it would Nonee’s. Given Nonee’s rock-breaking ability, Ryan doubted her assessment, but they didn’t have time for an extended argument about ancient weapons and modern beliefs about their use.

  The torch-wraps burned too clean and too bright to be the strips of oil-soaked cloth they appeared. Watching the light banish shadows to crevasses and distance, Ryan admitted that should he discover the wraps were entirely mage-crafted, he wouldn’t get rid of them. Today torch-wraps, tomorrow feed the hungry with food pulled from the air, the day after turn an infant into an immortal weapon. He could see the progression. He could also see and breathe in the passageway, and that didn’t seem like such a bad thing.

  “I don’t like this,” Curtin muttered.

  “Burn it, Curtin, you cry mage-craft every time we run into shit you don’t understand.”

  It seemed Servan had Curtin well in hand.

  “Are we there yet?” Keetin whined.

  Lyelee actually giggled. Tensions eased.

  It was cooler underground. Scholar Gearing perked up like a goose after the rain and joined Lyelee counting steps, the numbers a quiet background murmur correcting another missing specific that could mean absolutely nothing by the time Ryan’s heir made the trip.

  Nonee twisted to ease her pack through a tight section. Then again. Then Ryan’s left shoulder scraped the rock. Then both shoulders.

  “Hey, Nonee!” Keetin’s voice was just a little too loud. A little too cheerful. “It never gets too narrow for you to get through, right?”

  “It didn’t.”

  “Wonderful.”

  A hundred and eleven steps later, the passage widened and curved, the arc tight enough to significantly shorten the line of sight.

  “Dead end,” Captain Yansav called back.

  “No it isn’t,” Nonee amended as they gathered. She slapped her hand against a diagonal crack in the right wall slightly wider than the length of Ryan’s forearm.

  “Through there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Lead on, then.” Ryan spread his hands when Captain Yansav turned to glare. “If Nonee can still get through, we all can. If she can’t, we have to find another way.”

  “You broke the other rock.” Keetin had his teeth clenched. “Break this rock.”

  “Can’t. Might cause a cave-in.” The matter-of-fact rumble of Nonee’s voice sounded almost kind.

  “Anyone with eyes could see that,” Lyelee sneered.

  Ryan was almost positive Nonee did nothing but move toward the crack, but Lyelee backed up so quickly her pack bounced off Destros’s chest.

  Stuffing her right side into the gap, leaning back against the angle, Nonee shuffled sideways into the darkness, dragging her pack. Ignoring the captain’s clear, albeit silent desire to have him move away, Ryan gripped the edge and leaned in. He could hear leather scraping, quiet grunting, multiple small cracks, the fall of loose stone, and profanity in a language he didn’t know. Then he remembered the temple in Gateway and realized it might be prayer. Would prayer in this place also be profanity?

  “What do we do if she gets stuck?” Servan wondered.

  “We render you down for fat and grease the rock.” As everyone turned toward him, Destros spread his hands below an expression of affronted innocence, barely visible between helmet and beard. “What? It’s not like we need all three of us.”

  “The fuel is more important than individuals,” Curtin added, solemn tone at odds with his grin.

  “We also need someone who can hit what they aim at,” Servan pointed out. “And you’ve both got more fat on you besides.”

  Curtin tapped his chest. “It’s not fat, it’s fluffy muscle.”

  “More like fluffy . . .”

  “Enough.” Captain Yansav raised a hand to keep them quiet and turned to Ryan. “What do you hear?”

  “Nothing.” Not even breathing. He should have been able to hear breathing . . .

  “Through,” Nonee called, voice distorted. “Go two by two. Carry a pack between you.”

  “Packs off.” Captain Yansav lowered hers to the floor of the cave. “Guardians will be making multiple trips.”

  “Because we’re stronger,” Destros said, catching Scholar Gearing’s pack before impact.

  “Because I said so.”

  “That too.”

  “Nonee!” Keetin shuffled closer to the crack. “Are you coming back?”

  “No. She barely made it through,” Ryan told him before Nonee could respond. “Since you’re here, Keetin, you lead the way.”

  Keetin glared at him like he’d been betrayed by Ryan or the passage or life in general. “First so I don’t back out?” he murmured.

  “First so you don’t have time to work yourself into a panic,” Ryan replied, mouth almost touching Keetin’s ear, and added at a normal volume, “Watch your head.”

  Keetin and Destros with a pack between them.

  Lyelee and Scholar Gearing without a pack.

  This was going to take a while.

  When it was finally Ryan’s turn, he paused, right leg in the crack, and thought, This is impossible. There was no way an adult could work their way through such a minimal space. The mage must have included a compression factor in Nonee’s creation. Then he tilted his hips, found the angle, and slipped in. With Servan holding the other side of his pack, he shuffled sideways, breathing shallowly, body curved, shoulders back. He kept his eyes closed, not wanting to see if there were faces in the rock and wishing he hadn’t remembered there might be. His vest whispered warnings against alternate sides of the passage. Against both sides at the same time. He sucked in his stomach. It didn’t help. His left shoulder screamed from supporting the weight of his pack at an awkward angle, and his left hand began to cramp around the pack’s leather strapping. He forgot to count his steps and felt as though he’d shuffled forever. Finally, his reaching right hand waved in air and he opened his eyes to torchlight.

  “It’s a good thing tits squash,” Servan muttered, releasing his pack and flexing her hand the moment she was clear.

  “Under armor?” he asked, shoving his helm back into place.

  She glanced down at the scoring across the metal scales. “You’d be surprised.”

  Keetin, Nonee, and the Scholars made only a single trip. Ryan wanted to believe familiarity would breed calm if not contempt or comfort. It didn’t. The chamber on the other side of the crack had room for all of them to sit comfortably, so they took a moment to breathe when they were done.

  “What was that?” Head cocked, Curtin’s hand went to his sword. He frowned. “Sounded like . . . a soft . . . plop?”

  Ryan backed up as a pale brown spider, as big around as an old-fashioned copper coin, dropped from the ceiling, paused for a moment, then scuttled out of the light. He raised his torch. There were a lot more up there, the pattern of their movement a multi-legged version of the kaleidoscope he’d had as a boy.

  “The torches are warming the air.” Lyelee crouched and made an unsuccessful grab at one of the spiders. “It’s waking them up.”

  “It’s midsummer, why are they asleep?”

  “Busy spring?”

  Another two spiders dropped. Nonee carefully brushed one off her shoulder.

  “My lord.” The captain’s voice had picked up an edge and her shoulders had risen. “Lower your torch.”

  “But . . .”

  “Now!”

  * * *

  Ryan lost track of time. They burned through the original torch wraps. Lit new ones. He wanted to ask Nonee if they’d have enough, but if the passage had changed she wouldn’t know and it wouldn’t be worth Lyelee disdainfully declaring him insecure.

  Having become used to rock pressing close around him, he stumbled as he stepped out into an enormous cavern, the far walls only barely visible in the torchlight. Captain Yansav had her torch raised and her head tipped back. Assuming an absence of spiders, he looked up.

  The ceiling was at least three Nonees high. White cones pointed down into the cavern, their surface rippled as though they weren’t entirely solid.

  “What are they?”

  “Rock.” Scholar Gearing sat on a stump of the same white rock, the point lying some distance away. “Built up over time by dripping water. There’s caves by Midport with similar formations.”

  “But there’s no water.”

  “Now.”

  “There’s nothing to see here,” Lyelee said, arms folded. She nodded toward the shadows. “We travel straight across, according to the chronicle. We’re on the correct path and we’re nearly through. Let’s keep moving.”

  Keetin smiled, although his teeth were clenched. “She makes an excellent point,” he ground out. “Nonee?”

  “That way.” She pointed.

  Lyelee sighed. “Straight across. Like I said.”

  This passage out of the cavern looked identical to the passage they’d taken out of the cave. Not just the same, Ryan realized, touching a familiar pattern in the rock, but identical. “Nonee, have we gotten turned around?”

  “No.”

  Then the torches went out. One minute lit, the next not.

  “According to the Heir’s Chronicle, we’ll face ourselves in the darkness.” Lyelee sounded intrigued.

  Keetin didn’t. “We all know that, Lye. You know what we don’t know? The details, making the chronicle significantly unhelpful. The next Heir of Marsan gets the expanded version; do you hear me, Ryan? Your chronicle is going to have all the details. I’ll write it myself if I have to.”

  “Like that’ll happen,” Lyelee muttered.

  Ryan stepped sideways until his shoulder touched Keetin’s. Keetin leaned into the warmth. “You were there, Nonee. What can you tell us?”

  Lyelee sighed, her disdain distinctive in the dark. “Of us all,” she quoted, “only the weapon remained unaffected.”

  It took Ryan a moment to identify the soft click/hiss as Servan pulling an arrow from her quiver. He wasn’t the only one to recognize the sound.

  “Put it away, Servan.”

  “If I’m going to face myself, Captain, I’d rather do it armed.”

  “And I’d rather you not shoot the heir. Put it away.”

  The longer they stood here in the dark, the edgier everyone would get. Ryan took a deep breath and wet his lips. “Nonee?”

  She shifted position, bare feet scuffing against the floor, the sound distinctive amid the boots. “Move in single file, keep your right hand on the rock. In time, you’ll reach the other side.”

  “How much time?”

  “It varied.”

  “How,” Ryan began, and stopped himself. “Never mind. We should tie ourselves together. Didn’t the Heir’s Chronicle mention tying themselves together?”

  “Yes. The rope was severed.”

  “Severed?” Heads and hands were severed.