CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Deckard tried to allow time to take its natural course.
The passage of time was required to help anyone process grief.
And he was grieving; he could readily admit that.
Losing Evylin, truly and decidedly—hearing once and for all that she didn’t want him—was an event he needed to mourn.
So he’d given himself the space to work through the pain and sorrow clinging to him.
However, he was beginning to think this was a wound that would never close.
Since their separation from the rest of the troop, Deckard had readily distracted himself.
Though the first hour of their ride went by in frightfully taut silence, soon Rafferty piped up and hadn’t stopped talking since.
He’d asked Auden nearly constant questions about their journey, the ins and outs of Waulden culture, and obscure magical lore.
The weasel speculated on the Time Keep and what might be inside.
Normally, Deckard would have found it annoying, but he came to be thankful for Rafferty’s incessant chatter, since it served to keep his mind off Evylin.
When Rafferty wasn’t distracting them, Auden insisted on working with Deckard on his magic. He was relentless in his lessons. Even on horseback, Auden would take every moment available to guide him in the connection with Day and Time magic to the exclusion of all else.
“Why are you so focused on just those two?” Rafferty asked on the second day of travel. “If he’s a Night Mage, wouldn’t it be better for him to perfect his connection with Night magic?”
“No,” Auden said firmly. “I told you: Night magic is dangerous. Even if it doesn’t drive a Mage mad, it taints them, spurring them to violence and malevolence. Jonn needs to learn other ways to use his power.”
“Well, what about that fourth existent, the hidden one?” Rafferty asked, then furrowed his brow. He mouthed, “Day, Night, Time.” Counting them out on his fingers, he looked to Auden. “What was it again?”
“Space,” Auden said. “I can’t use it.”
“Why not?” Deckard asked.
“Because it’s extremely difficult to connect with,” he explained. “I know of several Night Mages who can access its power, so maybe you’ll manage the connection one day, but it won’t be under my tutelage.”
Deckard didn’t care to think about his continued training after their mission ended.
He remembered Evylin’s sharp words in the woods: “I’ve made no promises to the Alliance.”
But he had.
To allow her to go to Dunneshead, Deckard had promised to join the Alliance in whatever capacity they requested. A foolhardy choice, but one he’d made knowing the possible consequences. He just hadn’t thought he’d have to face them alone.
Though the distraction of Auden’s training and Rafferty’s conversation kept Deckard from dwelling on his regretful circumstances too much, the nights weren’t so kind.
They’d fallen into an easy routine within just the last two evenings.
Each time they stopped, they’d make camp, eat dinner, and rest. Deckard volunteered to take the second watch, the most undesirable shift.
He’d always survived on less sleep than others, his inner strength dedicated to the task at hand.
But sitting alone in the dark of the night with only the trees and Rafferty’s snores for company, he could no longer escape his thoughts.
After a few short months of marriage, this was the longest he’d been separated from Evylin.
Somehow, in three months’ time, he’d forgotten the thirty-two years prior.
Now, he couldn’t remember life before her.
He felt unbalanced, like he’d lost a limb.
In every conversation, he expected to hear her ready banter, the air hanging dreadfully silent without her voice, light and raspy all at once.
Worst of all, he’d forgotten how cold and empty it felt to sleep alone.
Where her form used to lie, warm and tucked close to his heart, was now a barren void as though she had been carved from his very flesh.
Was she faring any better than he? Deckard hated to think of her as happy without him, but he hated the thought of her feeling isolated and hurt even more.
Both nights of his watch, Deckard stared out into the thinning forests of Wauld as they made their way toward the marshes.
He’d scanned the purple night as it shadowed the world around him.
It would only take a thought, an intent of will, to summon Hewitt’s ghost. But with Rafferty and Auden sleeping around him, he couldn’t risk them waking to his conversation.
Still, Deckard knew it was time. He needed to speak to Hewitt, to confess his failure, and to beg for the ghost’s advice. So as they rode the next twenty-three miles under heavy rain clouds, he formed his plan.
“Day after tomorrow we’ll enter the marshes,” Auden told them as they made camp that evening. “They’ll take up the majority of our journey until we enter Vaura Reach.”
“I take it there won’t be much hunting to be done in the marshes,” Deckard noted.
Auden shook his head. “None at all, unless you count the amphibious creatures that fill its swamps.”
“In that case,” Deckard grabbed a rope from one of his saddlebags, “Rafferty, you and I should hunt. We need to take our last opportunity to ensure we don’t go hungry.”
Completing the construction of their tent, Rafferty hopped up. “Sounds good to me.”
Leaving Auden to prepare what little supplies remained for a meal, the two Ephrians headed off into the trees.
Near the South, the temperatures were more moderate and the terrain flatter.
But near the marshlands, it was wet and muddy.
Insects buzzed and chirruped. Birds swooped low on their return flight north after the winter season.
While they didn’t have Ethenn’s bow or hunting skills, Rafferty had picked up enough from him to be useful.
They moved through the slick terrae, setting up traps with the twine they’d brought on their journey and the branches they’d gathered.
Deckard found a particularly thick fallen branch of pine, which he broke apart, keeping the larger end for himself.
The rain grew heavier as they worked, and they drew their hoods more snugly over their heads.
“I don’t care what the Calders say,” Rafferty grumbled. “This rain isn’t natural.”
Remembering Auden’s lessons informing him that it wasn’t natural but the effects of the Relics’ imprisonment, Deckard wiped his hands on the inside of his cloak. “Whatever the case,” he said, “I’m ready to return to Ephria as well.”
Rafferty gave a huff of agreement. Then his small eyes narrowed in thought. “What do you think it’ll be like? When we get back.”
“Before or after the monarchy is overthrown?”
He considered it, tying off another trap. “After,” he concluded. “Once we’re done with this whole thing.”
Knowing that he would never be done with it, Deckard chose to play along instead. “I suppose that depends on the Alliance’s plans. I’m not privy to their governmental regime, but I hope that it will bring a better world than the one we have now.”
Rafferty brushed his hand through the air. “I’m not interested in politics, Colonel. I want to know what will happen to us. Will we still be soldiers? Will we continue to work with the Calders?”
Deckard’s throat tightened. “I have no way of knowing that, Rafferty,” he lied. He knew two things for certain: He would work for the Alliance, and his marriage to Evylin would be annulled. Those things nearly guaranteed that their troop would split, if not disband altogether.
“Don’t be a spoilsport,” Rafferty pressed. “If you don’t have a good guess, tell me what you want to happen.”
Completely uninterested in baring his soul to the weasel, Deckard kept his eyes on the final trap he was securing.
“I don’t know,” he said sourly. “Maybe we’ll remain as soldiers, but from what the Calders have told me, I believe the Alliance is expecting them to work in a more official capacity with the government.
Due to that, I doubt we’ll have any direct working relationship with them.
As far as the rest of us go, they’ll probably want Evylin, Ethenn, and me to do some specialized work for the government as well. ”
“Because you’re magical?” Rafferty surmised.
“Yes.”
“And what about Thommy and me?”
“Likely, they’ll need officers for their army,” Deckard said. “I’d imagine they’ll grant you whatever position you desire after the service you’re doing for them now.”
Rafferty pursed his lips. “Nah, I don’t think I’d want that.”
Deckard looked up at him. “To be an officer or to be in the army?”
“Either,” Rafferty said. “I’m sort of done with this whole . . .” He waved a hand through the air at the trees around them. “Thing.”
“Really?”
“I mean, it isn’t the worst job I’ve had.
But it gets a bit old, you know? Travel hundreds of miles this way.
Get a Relic. Travel hundreds of miles that way.
Get another Relic. Keep traveling for hundreds of more miles in the pouring rain until you’re pretty sure you’ll never be dry again. It’s monotonous.”
Deckard chuckled as he rose. “It is, isn’t it?”
Mud squelched under their boots as they moved away from the traps they’d set.
Deckard led them to the base of a tree, its roots massive in the wide space of terrae around it.
While they could return to camp right away to retrieve their catch later, Auden’s meal wouldn’t be ready for some time. And Deckard had plans of his own.
Rafferty didn’t question Deckard as they sat beneath the tree’s budding boughs. Instead, he lounged on one of the large roots, his back against the trunk. “So,” he said, the word filled with expectation.
Deckard looked over at him, pulling out a dagger to begin removing the bark from the pine branch he’d found.
Rafferty raised his white-blond eyebrows, a wily lift to his lips. “You and Eve . . .”
Deckard turned away to stare at the branch in his hand, chipping bits away.
Rafferty wasn’t dissuaded. “You two never . . . ?”