Chapter 11: A Small Victory

For two weeks, Kael went to the abandoned training ground every other day, and every time, Darin turned up an hour behind him with a basket of food and a new complaint.

“I want it noted,” Darin announced on the fifth visit, dropping the basket onto the stone basin with a thud, “that walking an hour each way in the sun is not a business expense. My father asked why my boots were wearing out so fast, and I told him I had taken up exercise. He laughed so hard he had to sit down.”

“You could stop coming,” Kael said from the middle of the yard, where he was running through the first stance with a wooden sword so that anyone watching from a distance would see a boy practicing forms.

“And miss the chance to watch a Voryn teach a merchant’s son how to hold a stick? Never. Besides, I made a sign.” Darin dug into the basket and pulled out a square of cloth painted with uneven black letters. “Brenner’s Academy of Bad Posture. Founded by me, staffed by you, haunted by a very disappointed ghost.”

Kael studied it. The letters leaned to the right, and the last word had been squeezed in so tightly that it looked like Posturer. “Where do you plan to hang it?”

“On the wall, where the ghost can see it. I think he will appreciate the attention.”

“I think he will be offended by the spelling.”

“Nobody has ever been offended by my spelling. They are usually too distracted by my prices.” Darin hung the sign on a nail, stepped back, tilted his head, and moved it two inches to the left. “There. Now it looks official.”

Kael almost said something sharp, then realized he was smiling instead. It happened more often now, which was inconvenient, because smiling made it harder to keep a calm face.

The real work, of course, happened behind the broken hall.

Once Darin settled into his routine of first stance, first cut, and complaining, Kael would excuse himself and sit in the corner by the spring. He had changed his seat since the day he saw the watcher on the tower. Now he sat under the one section of roof that still stood, where a heavy beam cut off any view from above. It was not perfect, but it was better than nothing.

He also checked the tower every visit, a quick glance from the edge of the yard, and every time the platform was empty. That told him nothing. Whoever had stood there once might have been a passing priest, or an old man who liked high places, or someone who had simply learned to be patient. Kael had not decided which, and he did not like leaving the question open.

An empty tower proves nothing, said Maltherion. A good watcher never stands where he can be seen twice.

Then I should assume he is watching now.

You should assume he is watching every day and plan around it.

I am. I practice in plain sight, I do not hide that I come here, and I let Darin make enough noise that nobody could believe we are doing anything serious.

That is almost clever. The boy has no idea he is a decoy.

He has a sign. The sign is an excellent decoy.

On the seventh visit, Kael settled under the beam, began the Black Ash Circulation, and sent the warmth from his chest along the narrow path in his right arm. The thread was a little thicker than before, about the width of a piece of string instead of a hair. He guided it into his palm and held it there.

Then he tried to widen the channel, and nothing happened.

Again, said Maltherion.

Kael pushed harder. The thread pressed against the walls of the channel the way water presses against a clogged pipe, and the walls pushed back. It felt like trying to stretch a leather strap that had been soaked in glue.

It will not move.

Do not force it. Try a smaller push, held longer.

Kael held a smaller push for a count of twenty. His arm began to tremble, and the thread slipped back into his chest. He opened his eyes and rubbed his forearm. From the far end of the yard came Darin’s voice, shouting something about elbows, far enough away that Kael’s murmur would never carry.