Chapter One

Siobhan plopped onto the bench and leaned over, pushing a set of blond bangs out of the way. “Rune? You fall asleep studying again?”

A bloodshot eye slowly creaked open. “No.” The ex-assassin pushed back from the table, rolling his head around on his shoulders in a clear gesture of stress and exhaustion. “I just gave my eyes a break, is all.”

“I see.” She studied him openly, planting an elbow against the table and propping her chin in her hand. Ever since they’d returned to Goldschmidt six months ago, Rune had been studying nearly non-stop. If he wasn’t learning reading and arithmetic from Markl, he was engrossed in pathmaking lessons with Grae. His brain hadn’t yet melted or started smoking from the overuse, but Siobhan had a side-bet with Wolf on when it would happen. “I know you have your first pathmaking test tomorrow, but…”

Rune swallowed hard. “Grae says he’s a stickler.”

Ahhh. Hence why he was so nervous. “I think he meant he was a stickler for manners, dearling, not the finer points of pathmaking. You’ve only been learning half a year anyway, they don’t expect you to know it all at this point.”

“Eh, but,” Rune faltered, eyes darting about the hall. At this mid-hour of the morning, no one else was about, as they were all on their own routines. He lowered his tone anyway to a more confidential level. “It’s Grae that’s my master. And I’m his first student!”

“Hence they’ll expect more out of you than any other apprentice in your position?” she finished doubtfully.

He nodded emphatically.

“Rune.” Siobhan took in a deep breath for patience. “Dearling. I don’t know where you got the idea that Grae was this prodigy at pathmaking and he understood everything the first time it was explained to him. That’s not the case. He struggled to understand concepts just as much as you are.”

Those wide blue eyes nearly crossed. “But he’s a genius at it!”

“He certainly is. But his genius lies in using what he already knows and taking those concepts to form something extraordinary. Rune, it took him five years as a master Pathmaker before he figured out how to create the coral pattern, you know. And I was there the first time he tried it, and it didn’t work!”

“It didn’t work?” Rune repeated incredulously.

She chuckled at not only his flabbergasted expression but the memory of those days. “It took a solid week of him fussing and experimenting before it finally worked right. And even to this day he’s making improvements on it, as the pattern looks a little different every time I see it.”

“Oh.” Rune sat back and looked blindly at the far wall, processing this.

Siobhan sat and waited him out patiently, letting him come to his own conclusions.

“Siobhan…” Rune asked slowly, “Were you there when Grae took his test as journeyman?”

“I was.”

“How did he do?”

“He was so nervous the entire test he could barely speak. We all wondered if he’d pass.”

Rune’s forehead wrinkled up in bemusement. “Who tested him?”

“Master Lynn,” she answered with rich amusement.

“Same Master Lynn that’s coming ta test me?” Rune hazarded.

“Same one,” she confirmed cheerfully. Patting him on the shoulder she said kindly, “As long as you can speak, answer questions, and not accidentally send those two into a marsh somewhere, I think you’ll be fine.”

All the tension just drained out of him. He ran a hand roughshod over his face. Something that could have been an amused snort came from behind his hand, but she couldn’t see his face to be sure. He finally lowered it and looked at her directly. “Yah, I can do better than that. He’s due in at dinner. Wake me up before then?”

“You finally going to sleep?” she asked, not unsympathetic, although very amused that he had pulled an all-nighter to be ready.

“I think I’d best, don’t ya?”

“Can’t argue that,” she agreed, shooing him off with both hands.

With a heavy tread, Rune disappeared up the stairs and to the third level. His was the only bedroom up there, as everyone else took up rooms on the second story. But he seemed to like his loftier perch.

She watched him go, shaking her head slightly. If that was all it took to give him some breathing room and lower his tension, she should have said something three days ago when they’d been informed Master Lynn was coming.

They still had rough days with Rune. He oscillated between being a troublemaking rapscallion to this broken child that did anything and everything to please the people around him. The first month alone had been no joking matter, once he realized that they fully intended to keep him. Siobhan had woken up many a night to find him on her bedroom floor, which Wolf hadn’t taken kindly to. But six months of consistent love, attention, and patience had brought about startling results. Rune showed signs now of steadying out, becoming more confident with his place here amongst them.

Conli drifted out from his clinic with an empty pail in his hands. He glanced up the stairs to catch a glimpse of Rune’s disappearing back. “Did you finally convince him to sleep?”

“I convinced him there was no reason to be nervous,” she corrected. “He’s the one that decided to sleep.”

“Good.” Conli clearly didn’t care about methods, but results.

“You were right, all those months ago,” she said on a sigh, pushing away from the table. “I’m really a mother to him.”

He patted her on the shoulder, an amused smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth. “Still feel odd?”

“With a child taller than I am, why would I?” she growled sarcastically, although she couldn’t help but smile as he chuckled. “No, not really. I’ve gotten used to it now, I suppose.”

“You must have, otherwise you wouldn’t have given him your last name.”

She splayed her hands in an easy shrug at this. “He needed a full name. No one would take him seriously if he didn’t have one.” And it would have served as a social stigma, a mark of his past, for the rest of his life if he continued to be only ‘Rune.’ Siobhan hadn’t thought much of it, at first. She’d named Rune once already, why not complete the job?

But the look on Rune’s face when she’d offered made her realize she hadn’t thought it completely through. In that moment, he’d looked at her like a child that had just been handed a part of the heavens.

And in that moment, she’d gained a son, a child, whether she intended to or not.

“You realize that when he passes the journeyman test, we’re likely to have a lot of fights and arguments with other guilds,” Conli warned, his humor fading.

“I know,” she agreed heavily. No one took a pathmaking apprentice seriously the first few months of his training as very few could grasp the mechanics, theories, and calculations behind it. Having the talent was only the base level, the first step of what it took to be a true Pathmaker. But if a person could pass the first test into journeyman, then they proved that they had the capability to become a true master. At that point, they could even work with their master’s supervision.

That was part of the reason why another master had to come in and supervise the journeyman test, to make sure that the apprentice truly had the skills necessary, and wasn’t being helped along by his master. But another part of the reason was to register the newly minted journeyman on the list of available Pathmakers. When he was registered, anyone and everyone that needed pathmaking skills could call upon him.

When Rune made that list, every major guild on the four continents would surely cry in outrage that Deepwoods had not one, but two Pathmakers. They’d certainly be knocking on Blackstone’s door and her own, trying to get her to hand one or the other over.

Just imagining it gave her a headache.   

Conli eyed her with open misgiving. “Do you even have a plan?”

“I certainly don’t,” she responded congenially, “but am currently taking suggestions.”

He raised his eyes to the ceiling. “I’m not looking forward to this.”

“They’ll only badger us for about a year,” she said with mock enthusiasm that sounded hollow in her own ears. “After that, it’ll taper off. We’ll just take a lot of escorting jobs to far off, exotic places in the meantime.”

“You mean run away.”

Siobhan shook her head sorrowfully. “It sounds so demeaning and cowardly when you put it that way.”

“I have a destination in mind,” Fei said calmly from above her head.

She froze before slowly looking upward in creaking degrees. Fei lounged casually on one of the beams overhead, one leg tucked up against his chest, watching them with a distinct twinkle in his eyes.

“Fei. How long have you been up there?”

“A while,” he admitted candidly. With agility that would put a monkey to shame, he put a hand on the beam and swung himself off and to the floor with barely more than a thump. Her Saoleord skulker didn’t look at all fazed to be caught hanging about in the ceiling, every black hair in place, slanted dark eyes meeting hers easily. His habit of perching in obscure places had only gotten worse since Rune, the bad influence, had come into the guild.

Really, at this point, she’d be more surprised to find the man sitting on an actual chair.

Blowing out a breath, she waved a hand, encouraging him. “Well, let’s have it. Where do you think we should go?”

“Saoleord.”

She and Conli both froze. Saoleord? The city that no one ever visited and only natives could find? Granted, Fei was from there, so he could find his homeland easily, but in the eight years he had been with her, he’d never once suggested going back himself or taking the guild with him.

“Why?” Conli asked slowly, blue eyes studying Fei’s face.

Fei seemed to take a breath before admitting quietly, “Because I think we’ll need help very soon.”

Siobhan didn’t need to ask what he meant by that, not in a way. Ever since they’d returned from Wynngaard six months ago, the economy in Orin had taken a turn for the worst. The trade monopoly between the three guilds in Robarge and Wynngaard had certainly raised the capital to fix the Grey Bridges, but at the same time, it had done a devastating turn to Orin. People hadn’t been doing well over there to begin with, and now…well, most of the continent was on the verge of complete destitution. Everyone was watching Orin carefully with baited breath, waiting to see what they would do next. No one doubted that they would do something. When you pushed a person that far into a corner, they’d react one way or another.

Siobhan had spoken to Guildmaster Darrens on several occasions about this, trying to reason with him, but it had all come to naught. She didn’t have the power or persuasion to make the man change his mind, and even if she did, she’d have to convince the other guilds that were a part of this agreement as well.

So yes, she understood very well why Fei was worried. What she didn’t see was how going to Saoleord would help. “Fei, I’m lost. Why would you want to go home?”

He hesitated for a long moment before speaking, and even then he was obviously picking his words carefully. “Before I left home, I was being trained under a master historian. I was to take his place when he retired.”

She and Conli shared a startled look. That was the first time that Fei had mentioned anything about his past. A historian?

“It’s why I left, in a way,” Fei admitted wryly. “I was not suited to sitting about for long periods of time when I was young. I wanted to see more of the world with my own eyes, not simply read about it.”

Now that, that made perfect sense to her. Even now Fei couldn’t manage to sit still for more than an hour. Well, unless he was sneaking up on somebody. “Go on.”

“But I still learned much of the history of the world before I left. I have seen this pattern before. The last time that one country was pushed into an economical depression by another country, it led to war.”

Her blood froze. “War?”

“Can a war even be possible?” Conli objected. “A skirmish I can see, one guild or one city attacking another is very possible. But to have a war, an actual war as you mean it, you’d have to get several main guilds to cooperate enough to fight in a united front. We can barely get them to agree on trade agreements.”

Fei shook his head, mouth set in a grim line. “Orin is desperate. They will band together to pillage and loot, if nothing else. I tell you, the history that I learned showed this exact set of events happening over and over again. We are primed for war but are not ready for it. If Orin pulls together an army and marches against us, they can destroy us city by city without anyone being able to stop them.”

Siobhan felt a tremor run through her bones. She had a terrible premonition that Fei was right. This world hadn’t seen an army in hundreds of years for the exact reason that Conli had just said. So if an army did come against them, they wouldn’t begin to know how to fight them off or have a united enough force to do it with.

“How does Saoleord help?”

“My people have not forgotten warfare or tactics,” Fei responded quietly. “There are many master strategists that live there. If we had just one, I think we would be better off and able to face whatever comes our direction.”

“You realize that everything you’re saying is nothing more than hypothesis and conjecture,” Conli inserted uneasily. The tightness around his eyes suggested that even he was half-convinced. “We don’t know that Orin really can manage to pull an army together or that they’ll come to Robarge to attack.”

“I hope I’m wrong.” Fei splayed his hands in an open shrug. “But I’d rather be prepared for the worst.”

Siobhan heartily agreed with this sentiment. “And if nothing else, we get to go into a city that very few have ventured into, and it has the added benefit of escaping with Rune.”

Conli grimaced agreement. “That alone is a very good reason to go. Alright, when should we leave?”

“Three days from now?” Siobhan offered, head cocked slightly as she thought through logistics and timelines. “Assuming Rune passes his test, it’ll give him some good experience to take us all to Orin.”

“There’s no path to my home city,” Fei added.

She waved this away. “Rune and Grae love building paths, they’ll be delighted to make one. Granted, that means we’ll be digging about in the dirt for stones for two days or so.”

They all sighed in resignation.

Shaking it off, Siobhan said, “Alright, Fei, your suggestion is a good one. Since we can’t get anyone higher up to listen to us, it’s best we be prepared ourselves. We’ll discuss it over dinner tonight, see if there’s anything the others want to add in, but I’m all for going.”

Relieved, Fei simply nodded.

“In the meantime,” Conli added with a significant look toward the upstairs, “let’s just hope that Rune passes.”