Chapter 13 – The Road East

The carriage left at dawn.

Grey light. Wet gravel. The estate gates closed behind us with a soft, final groan.

I rode up front beside Hannah.

The carriage was a small one. Two horses. No coat of arms. The Duke had chosen it on purpose. He had said the word “quietly” three times at breakfast and meant it twice.

Hannah held the reins.

She wore travel leathers. Not the apron. Not the black and white uniform. A dark grey coat. Boots up to her knees. A real sword on her hip, not a wooden one. Her braid sat clean over one shoulder.

She looked like someone a demon ran from.

“Hannah.”

“Young master.”

“Are we going to talk for two weeks?”

“No.”

“Cool.”

“We are going to walk for two weeks.”

“That is different.”

“Yes.”

The horses kept pace. The road bent east. The estate gates dropped out of sight behind a low hill. The morning sun crawled out of the trees in slow, gold pieces.

My shoulder throbbed.

I pressed two fingers against the bruise under my coat. Still tender. Still purple. The pinky ring on my hand caught the new sun and threw a small, polite spark.

“Young master.”

“Yes.”

“Stop pressing on it.”

“I am not.”

“You are.”

“How would you know?”

“I trained the eye behind me.”

I lowered my hand.

She did not smile. The corner of her mouth did the small, almost twitch from yesterday. Tiny win. I added it to the gallery. The gallery now had a wing.

We rode for an hour.

The road turned from gravel to packed dirt. Birds woke up. A farmer with a cart waved at us. Hannah lifted two fingers. The farmer nodded, having paid him. She had a face that worked as currency.

I tried something stupid.

I closed my eyes. I pictured the candle under my sternum. The small warm coal Hannah had drawn with two fingers. I breathed in. I breathed out. The coal flickered. It held.

“Young master.”

“Yes.”

“You are humming.”

“I am focusing.”

“You are humming and focusing.”

“Multitasking.”

She did not answer.

She handed me the reins.

The leather sat warm in my hands. The horses did not notice the change. They kept their slow, even rhythm. The pinky ring went a degree warmer.

“Hannah.”

“Young master.”

“Why?”

“You will not learn from a seat.”

“I will fall off.”

“Then you will learn how to fall.”

“That is not a lesson.”

“In this house it is.”

The road climbed a slow hill.

I held the reins the way I had held the practice sword yesterday. Wrong. She corrected me without looking. Two fingers up. Wrists down. Elbows in. The horses, somehow, knew the difference.

A small thing landed in my chest.

Pride. Stupid pride. The kind of kid gets when his dad lets him hold the wheel for ten seconds in a parking lot. I told the feeling to sit down. The feeling did not sit down. It put its feet on the furniture.

We crested the hill.

The eastern road opened up below us. A long valley. Yellow grass. A river the color of dull metal. A line of trees at the far end, dark and thick and very, very still.

The forest.

I knew the forest from the wiki.

Not by name. By feeling. The kind of place readers skipped on a first read and came back to on a third. The kind of forest authors put things in when they did not want to explain those things yet.

“Hannah.”

“Young master.”

“That is the forest.”

“Yes.”

“The demon ran into that forest.”

“Yes.”

“We are going into that forest.”

“Yes.”

“Father is, somehow, fine with this.”

“Father chose this.”

I let out a slow breath.

The candle under my sternum flickered. I steadied it. The reins sat warm in my hands. The pinky ring did not warm. The pinky ring sat very still, like a cat watching a window.

We stopped at noon.

A small clearing. A stream. A flat rock the size of a kitchen table. Hannah swung off the wagon in a single motion. She landed without a sound. She caught the reins as I almost dropped them.

“Down.”

“My legs hurt.”

“Down anyway.”

I climbed down.

My legs did not hurt. My legs filed a formal protest. I landed on the grass. My knees almost folded. Hannah caught my elbow without looking. Her grip was light. Polite. The same wolf grip from the training hall.

“Walk.”

“Where.”

“In a circle.”

“That is sad.”

“It is recovery.”

“It is sad and recovery.”

I walked in a circle.

The grass crunched under my boots. The stream gurgled. A small grey bird watched me from a low branch with deep, professional disappointment. The candle under my sternum settled. The pinky ring, finally, went a touch warmer.

Hannah unpacked the food.

Bread. Cheese. An apple. I did not ask how she had packed exactly this. Hannah, apparently, knew everything. It was easier to assume she had been there in advance.

She tossed me the apple.

I caught it—tiny win. The gallery sighed in relief.

“Eat.”

“Yes.”

“Slowly.”

“Yes.”

“Then sit.”

“Yes.”

“Then we work.”

I bit the apple.

It was the best apple I had ever eaten in either life. That was, probably, exhaustion talking. The exhaustion could keep talking. The exhaustion had earned it.

We sat on the flat rock.

Hannah did not eat. Hannah watched the trees. Her storm grey eyes scanned the line of dark trunks at the far end of the valley. Her hand rested, casual, on the hilt of the real sword on her hip.

“Hannah.”

“Young master.”

“You think it is in there.”

“Something is in there.”

“That is not the same.”

“It rarely is.”

I finished the apple.

I set the core on the rock. The bird above me made a small, hopeful sound. I rolled the core toward the edge. The bird stared. The bird did not move. The bird, apparently, had standards.

“Hannah.”

“Yes.”

“Teach me a thing.”

“Which thing?”

“A small thing.”

“Define small.”

“Smaller than yesterday.”

She studied me.

A long second. Two. The blue glow under her skin did not light. Her braid did not move. Her stormy grey eyes did the math.

She picked up a flat pebble from the stream.

“Hold this.”

I held it.

It was a normal pebble. Cool. Smooth. A little wet. The pinky ring on my hand pulsed once, politely, then went quiet again.

“Heat it.”

“Heat it.”

“With your core.”

“Hannah.”

“Yes.”

“That is not small.”

“Smaller than a sword.”

“That is not a fair comparison.”

“It is the only one I have.”

I closed my eyes.

The candle under my sternum stayed lit. I pictured the line Hannah had drawn yesterday. From the coal. Up the spine. Down the arm. Into the palm. Into the stone.

The pebble warmed.

Not a lot. Maybe a degree. Maybe two. The kind of warmth a coin gets in a pocket. The kind of warmth that did not, in any reasonable definition, count as magic.

It counted to me.

“Hannah.”

“Young master.”

“Did it work?”

“A little.”

“How little.”

“You could keep the tea warm for a minute.”

“That is something.”

“That is something.”

I opened my eyes.

She was looking at me. Not the demon look. Not the wolf look. A new look. The look a teacher gets when a student does not embarrass them on day one.

I did not say anything.

I did not have to. The candle under my sternum brightened by a hair. The pinky ring went warmer. The bird above me, finally, took the apple core and left.

We rode on.

The valley stretched. The road thinned. The river slid alongside us, dull metal turning to dull silver as the sun climbed and then, slowly, fell. Hannah did not speak. I did not push it. The candle stayed lit the whole afternoon.

We packed at dusk.

The road dipped into a low fold of hills. We made camp under a stand of three old oaks. Hannah pitched the small canvas tent in under a minute. I tried to help. Hannah waved me off. She did it again, faster.

She built the fire.

She did not use mana. She used flint. She said real travelers did. She said mana was for emergencies. She said wood was for hot food. I sat on a log. The candle under my sternum hummed in the dark.

The forest sat on the horizon.

A long, dark line. Closer now. Quieter than it had any right to be. No birds called from inside. No wind moved the top branches. The pinky ring on my hand slowly grew cold.

“Hannah.”

“Young master.”

“Sleep in shifts.”

“Yes.”

“You first.”

“No.”

“Hannah.”

“I sleep last.”

“That is, statistically, more dangerous for you.”

“That is, statistically, my job.”

I exhaled.

I did not push it. The fire crackled. The smell of smoke and grass settled in around the tent. Somewhere, far away, an owl asked a question. Nothing answered.

The first stars cracked open.

I lay on my back on the bedroll. The bruise on my shoulder ached in a slow rhythm. The candle under my sternum stayed lit. The pinky ring sat cold against my finger and would not warm, no matter how I turned my hand.

Hannah sat by the fire.

She did not move. Her stormy grey eyes were on the forest. Her hand stayed on the hilt of her sword. The blue glow under her skin pulsed once, very softly, then settled. The fire painted her face in slow gold.

I closed my eyes.

I tried to sleep.

I almost did.

Then, far away, on the dark line of the forest, something laughed.

Not loud. Not close. The kind of laugh a girl makes at a private joke. Light. Soft. Pleased.

I knew that laugh.

I had heard it once before, in a dream of a wooden bench, behind a school, on a summer afternoon with cicadas in the trees.

I opened my eyes.

Hannah was already standing.