The dragon laughed as the people fled, their weeping as sweet to her ears as summer fruit.

But even as the great Tiamat curled her serpentine form around the stolen throne, the king of Leifen turned to the hero Ffamran for aid in their plight. "The castle is well protected. The dragon harries us at every turn. Her ten eyes are always watching," said the king. "But you? You were never once caught in all your years of sailing the skies as a pirate. It is said that you know all the secret ways into that city."

The king cared not for pride when his kingdom was at stake. He knelt before Ffamran, whose ship was as yet untouched by dragonfire. "I beg you, Ffamran Highwind. You are our last hope, lest Leifen be lost to us forever."

"Arise, my friend," Ffamran said. "For while I do not know if any can reclaim the city in the sky from this creature of the sky, I shall at least make the attempt."

The paladin had become a wiser man than was warranted by his youthful age. Resolved in his quest, he went to his wisest counselors.

Of the sorceress, the pale and beautiful Shiva, Ffamran asked, "How might we gain entry to the city, to face our foe?"

"The dragon's defenses are of magic built, and with magic we shall dispel them," said Shiva.

Of the barbarian Ifrit, ruddy and fearless, Ffamran asked, "And when we face the dragon, what can men do against so great and terrible a beast?"

And Ifrit said, "Fight. Fight and win."

From "A Spell to Pierce Magics", The Ars Paladia, as translated by Melanie the Wise, Queen Consort of King Titus VI of House Plein.

The bed in the attic room - more of a cot, really - was terrible. Thad woke feeling as sore and stiff as he imagined an old man might.

No wonder Jack had been willing to let Thad have it, opting instead for a hastily made pallet on the floor. Thad had tossed and turned for hours, trying unsuccessfully to get comfortable, and had only just begun to drift off when Jack rose, asking if Thad wanted to go out into the village with him. Thad had a vague recollection of grunting a declination before managing to fall asleep at last.

The house was quiet when he woke again, and from the look of the morning sunlight, Jack had only been gone an hour or more. Thad didn't give that much thought. He'd started to notice that time passed differently for him sometimes, particularly when he was sleeping. It didn't concern him, particularly when it meant he got more rest than he would have otherwise.

He headed down the stairs, sneaking so that none of the floorboards so much as creaked. He could hear Sarda in Lukahn's room, talking in his sleep. Thad had listened to him on the ship sometimes, but had concluded he was speaking nonsense. It was entertaining nonsense most of the time though, so he paused, putting his ear to the closed door to see what Sarda had to say.

"Tortoises!" the man muttered. "As big as castles! The mountains shake when they move!"

Right, Thad thought, grinning as he imagined it.

He passed the room where Lena slept. Her door was open, and he could see her there on the bed wrapped up in what looked like Jack's coat. She'd slept on top of the blanket, Thad saw. The house had been sweltering when they arrived, but apparently the night had been a cold one. Jack must have checked on her before he left. Thad noticed her window was open, something Jack must have missed, so Thad crept across the room to close it for her before he proceeded downstairs.

The armchair in the front room was empty, but a few embers still smoldered in the hearth. Thad poked at them, adding a small log from the bin beside the fireplace. The day would warm soon enough, he supposed, but not for an hour or so. He sat cross legged on the floor, watching the flames, when he heard a door at the back of the house and felt Master Lukahn coming in from outside.

"Good morning!" Thad said, turning to greet the man with a smile when he approached the front room.

Lukahn paused, seeming startled. "Hello," he said in a kindly voice. He carried a basket on his arm, and Thad saw the ivory flash of eggshells inside. "I seem to recall boys your age sleeping until midday when they could get away with it."

Thad shrugged. "I do sometimes."

He saw the man nod, his eyes smiling above his silver beard and mustaches. "My son always liked to. Liked to eat as well. He was always hungry. You?"

"Yup," Thad said, nodding.

"I thought you might be," Lukahn said. He chuckled. "Well, as it seems you're up now, I suppose I'll cook these right away. Come, sit at the table and talk with me."

He cooked the eggs over the stove in the other room. Thad sat at the table as he'd been bid, answering Lukahn's many questions. They weren't the sort of questions Thad expected. Lukahn didn't ask where he was from, or what brought him to Crescent Lake. Instead, he asked strange things. What was Thad's favorite story? Favorite color? Favorite season? And as Thad answered each of these, Lukahn asked, "Why?" so that Thad had to explain his answers.

"I figured you should practice on the easy questions," the old man said when Thad asked him about it. He'd joined Thad at the table by then, his cooking complete, though he'd made enough eggs for what looked like six people, along with links of sausage and slices of pan-fried toasts moist with butter.

Thad frowned as he sipped from a mug of warm goat's milk. "Practice for what?"

"The inquest," Lukahn said. "The sages will be summoning you for an interview today. Did no one tell you?"

"Oh," Thad said. "Yeah, they mentioned it. I didn't know it was today though."

Lukahn shrugged. "It's possible they haven't decided yet. I get ahead of myself sometimes. Regardless, it will be today, and it will be all day. You'll want to take some food with you. I made extra."

"Oh," Thad said again, looking down at the full serving dishes. That made sense now. He ate some of the sausage, which was greasy, but the skin had just the right amount of crispness to it. "They said you were a prophet."

"Some call me that, yes," Lukahn said. "It's close enough to the truth."

"Sarda's a prophet too. But you're not like Sarda. Sarda doesn't make any sense."

"The man who came here with you?" Lukahn asked.

Thad nodded.

There was a creak at the top of the stairs just then. Thad extended his senses through the aether and felt Sarda's aura coming down, almost as if he'd heard his name. He seemed remarkably refreshed for a man who apparently had such vivid dreams - while his hair and beard stuck out at odd angles, the old prophet smiled. His eyes, though somewhat vacant, were bright.

Lukahn stood to greet him, bowing formally. "Master Carmine," he said politely. "Will you join us for breakfast?"

Sarda nodded. "Yes, yes! I told you I would, didn't I?"

"No," Lukahn said, retaking his seat. "You hadn't got to that part yet. But we're delighted to have you." He motioned Sarda toward one of the empty chairs, then passed him a clean plate from a stack beside the serving bowl that held the scrambled eggs. "We were just discussing the gift of prophecy. This young man tells me you share that talent."

"Oh?" Sarda said, cocking his head. "I thought we'd covered that already... hadn't we?"

"Not as such," Lukahn said.

"Oh..." said Sarda quietly. His face creased in concern. "Shouldn't we get around to that?"

Lukahn nodded, chuckling amicably. "Yes, yes, quite." He smiled, addressing Thad but pointing toward Sarda. "True prophets can't control what they see," he said. "Me, I can read the aether a certain way. Doing so, I can see beyond the present - it's my specialty - and sometimes something happens in the aether that makes one single possibility clear."

"And that's a prophecy?" Thad asked.

"Yes," Lukahn said, nodding approvingly. "A prophecy. But I can only see a few things this way. It's like the aether is a person shouting at me, just one person. But the aether shouts louder for a true prophet. Instead of one person, it's a crowd. For a true prophet, following the present is like trying to listen to one person speak in a crowd of hundreds, all talking at once. Maybe sometimes one person is louder than the others, but it's not always the person right in front of them."

"That sounds like me," Sarda said. "I forget who's in front of me all the time."

Lukahn chuckled. "Now, now," he said kindly. "It's not forgetting. You're simply remembering things that haven't happened yet."

Sarda shrugged, biting into a forkful of eggs. "Is there any salt?" Lukahn pointed toward a small salt cellar in the table's center. Sarda made an appreciative noise, reaching for it.

"Should we wake Miss Lena before it all goes cold?" Lukahn asked.

"No," Sarda said, speaking with his mouth full. "Lena went to Onlac."

"What? No, she didn't. She's upstairs," Thad said. Surely Sarda would have seen her in the other room on his way down?

Lukahn nodded. "Ah, dreaming." To Thad he said, "You have to learn to see things like he does. It simplifies understanding."

Sarda nodded again. "It seemed a shame to call her back. And Jack is there too, but not really. He's really somewhere else."

"Jack went out early," Thad said, though he noticed the way Lukahn's mouth twisted in distaste to hear that Lena was dreaming about Jack. He really doesn't like him, Thad thought. "I think he said he was going to the library."

Lukahn's jaw twitched. "He's not allowed in there!"

"He's not?" Sarda said. "But he's so smart!"

"He's a harbinger of death," Lukahn said.

Thad raised an eyebrow. Jack? A harbinger of death? That didn't seem right at all. Jack hated fighting, let alone killing. The mage tended to run rather than fight when he had that option. Thad distinctly remembered a time Jack had lit some wolves' tails on fire rather than kill the beasts, nevermind that the animals had been trying to eat him at the time.

Sarda must have felt the same, for he scratched his head in confusion. "Are we talking about the same Jack?" he asked.

Lukahn nodded vigorously. "It's true! I foresaw it fifteen years ago, mere days before he arrived in the village!"

Thad sighed. Maybe he is like Sarda after all, he thought. Great. Two crazy men, and here he was, stuck with both of them.

Sarda pursed his lips, staring off at nothing.

Lukahn frowned. He seemed about to argue, but just then, there was a knock at the door. It opened as Orin let himself in, grinning his wrinkled grin at Thad. "Ah, good!" he said. "You are already up! I never know when you might take it upon yourself to sleep through the day."

"Hello? Master Lukahn?" a man called from somewhere outside. Coming up the path behind Orin, Thad recognized Phin, the white mage from the Circle of Sages who had spent so much time in the library with them the day before. Phin didn't have his white robe today, the one Pearl had stained with ink. Instead, he wore a long, fitted white tunic with a stiff collar and cuffed, full-length sleeves trimmed in red ribbon. It looked as if the tunic was designed to match the official white robes, a sort of uniform to go underneath them. He smiled at Thad. "Young man, the sages would like to speak with you this morning."

"Now?" Thad asked.

"If possible," the sage said.

"Sure," Thad said, shrugging. "Anything to get away… um, I mean…" He cringed, looking back at Lukahn, but the other man seemed focused on his food for some reason. "I don't have anywhere else to be, I guess." He hopped up from his chair, moved past Orin and out the door.

Phin, however, didn't move from the path. "You should be there, Silas," Phin said. "You know your resignation isn't official."

Thad rolled his eyes. That's right… The crazy man is a sage. He tried to imagine someone like Sarda being allowed to run a village. No wonder Jack hates this place.

Lukahn, however, only shrugged, helping himself to another bite of sausage.

"He doesn't really need to come, does he?" Thad asked.

Phin's smile turned awkward. "Well, I can't require him to accompany you, no."

"Great!" Thad said. He looked at Orin, and the old monk motioned him onward. Thad nodded. He didn't need prophets and prophecies. Orin would be with him. Orin had been with him when he met the Mage Council in Cornelia. Thad knew Orin wouldn't let anyone mistreat him. "Alright," he said, ducking past Phin to hurry up the path. "Let's go."

Lena groaned. She woke stiffly, reluctant to open her eyes, her body curled up so small and tight in the middle of the old straw mattress that it hurt to stretch her legs, her back.

It had been a cold night. The air felt fine now, but she vaguely remembered shivering, sleeping restlessly because of it. Then she'd begun to dream of home, of laying on the beach after a swim, the cool breeze giving way gradually to warmth as her skin dried in the sun. In the dream, Jack was beside her. Only a dream, though. She sighed, feeling the dream drift away.

She stretched again, grimacing as she Cured a small ache in the side of her neck. She blinked against the light that came through the window, reaching a hand up to rub the sleep-grit from her eyes, and felt the blanket's strange weight as she moved, noticing only then, not a blanket, but the dark leather of Jack's coat draped over her. Despite the aches of her poor night's sleep, Lena smiled, burying her nose in the collar and breathing deeply, the scent of him a familiar comfort as her sleep-addled brain tried to make sense of the unfamiliar room.

She rose slowly, her thoughts full of Jack, of her dream, as she began to hear voices from downstairs. Not Jack - she knew Jack was gone. How do I know that? She laughed at herself. There was no way she could have known that. The house muffled the voices so that she could neither make out the voices' owners nor their words, but she thought one of the speakers might be Lukahn. And so the other wouldn't be Jack, she concluded. That must have been it.

Still, it was no comfort thinking she wouldn't have to face Lukahn alone if someone else was there with him already - she didn't want to face the man at all. Something about him, about the way he treated Jack, that fear and bitterness, made her extremely uncomfortable. I don't have to talk to him, she told herself. I can tell him I have to… that I need to… She huffed out a frustrated breath. Surely someone, somewhere, needed her.

She considered this as she made herself presentable. There was no mirror in this room. Lena wondered if perhaps the woman who had lived here, Iris, was the sort of white mage who considered mirrors vain. She sighed. Well, there was vanity, and then there was decency, particularly when one had curly hair. She spotted a comb on the dressing table, but it seemed wrong to her to use it. The woman it belonged to was dead, after all. Her grieving father hadn't kept it there to be used by some traveller. Instead, she ran her fingers over her hair, through it, pulling at the knots that seemed to form spontaneously in her sleep. Where do they come from? Honestly.

When she felt her appearance couldn't get any better given the tools she had available, she donned her white hood, slipping Jack's coat over it, then made her way downstairs. Her stomach had begun to growl by then, and the breakfast smells drifting up from below had her reconsidering her plans to make a hasty exit.

When she reached the kitchen, a room she hadn't seen the night before, she found that the voices she'd heard belonged to Lukahn - as she'd suspected - and to Sarda. The two sat companionably across from each other at a small dining table. The table bore two large platters - one heaped with scrambled eggs, the other with toasts and sausage. An empty plate waited at the seat to Lukahn's right, and Lena suspected that he had placed it there especially for her. As hungry as she was, she still didn't want to sit beside him.

"Ah, there she is," Lukahn said, rising to greet her with a formal bow. He glanced up at her as he rose, stopping halfway as his eyes drifted down to the coat she wore. Lena felt his distaste with the garment deep in her bones, but the man shoved it down, his face betraying nothing. "Miss Lena. Welcome."

She shivered, the effects of his second-hand disdain sending a chill up her spine. She cleared her throat, forced out a "Good morning," though conjuring up a smile seemed beyond her, unnerved as she was.

"Won't you please sit down?" Lukahn said, gesturing toward the empty chair beside himself. "You and I have things to discuss."

She had just started eyeing a piece of toast when his words caught up with her, snapping her gaze back up to meet his. "We do?"

Lukahn chuckled. "Indeed. I've waited a long time for you to get here."

"Oh? But I…" She had no excuse to turn him down, none that wouldn't be a lie, not really. And she couldn't just turn him down - the man was her host for the moment, after all. He'd done nothing - so far - to warrant rudeness from her. "Well… I…" she floundered for something, anything, to say. She did not want to sit beside him, did not want to speak with him with only Sarda around as a buffer.

But it seemed Sarda was precisely the buffer she needed, for he suddenly perked up and said, "No, no! It's not time for that! Not at all! She's meant to be at the clinic today!"

"She is?" Lukahn asked.

"I am?"

"Of course! No time for chats! They need you!" Sarda insisted. He rose from his seat and began shooing her backwards out of the kitchen, toward the front door. "Yes, yes! I don't know why I didn't see it sooner! Very important! They can't get by without you, you know?"

"Who?" she asked.

"The healers, of course. You have to be there. For the healing. Off you go!"

"Wait! I don't know-" Lena said as he shoved her out the door and closed it behind her, "...the way." She sighed. Oh well. She hadn't wanted to talk to Lukahn after all. This was as good an escape as any. She thought longingly of the platter full of toasts, then shook her head. No, it probably wasn't worth going back inside. Alright, then. She headed up the path away from the house, hoping that this clinic, wherever it was, wasn't too hard to find.

Kane liked Dahlia. She was gruff and short with him, but she was also honest, bluntly honest, in a way that almost reminded Kane of a white mage. She reminded him of Lady Alliana, the white mage who had taken care of him at the palace when he'd been a child, though he couldn't think why. The no-nonsense black mage was so different from the kind, grandmotherly figure he remembered.

She worked him, but she also worked beside him, turning the soil, spreading mulch in preparation for the coming winter. It was like the work he'd done with Gabriel in the Melmond Reach, but without that feeling of desperation. There, he had worked to keep the people safe; here, he worked because it needed to be done.

"Good," she said, as he emptied the barrow one last time before breakfast. They'd had an early start, doing the heavy lifting, she'd said, before the heat of the day could set in. "Another turn of the moon or so and we won't have to worry about the heat," she said, spreading the mulch with a garden hoe. "Autumn by then, well and truly. And much to be done. But not today, I think. It'll be a hot one."

"How can you tell?" Kane asked.

The older woman shrugged, laying her hoe across the empty barrow. "Experience, mostly. Come on, then. We'll go the long way 'round, check the berry bushes before we head in. If the birds haven't picked them clean, we can add those to our breakfast."

"Lead the way," he said, maneuvering the barrow back toward the path.

They meandered around rocks and trees, the Randells' land mostly forested. Dahlia, an earth mage, had planted things in natural clearings rather than clearing the land. She'd told Kane about shade plants, and drought-tolerant plants, and plants that bloomed in the spring. Kane had listened politely, but knew he wouldn't remember most of it.

"Everything has a place," she said, pointing at the undergrowth. "And a purpose. The pine needles feed that flowering shrub. The shrub, meanwhile, drives off the bore beetles that terrorize the pine tree." She stopped on the path ahead of Kane. "There. You smell that?"

Kane stopped, sniffed the air. "Is something dead?"

Dahlia shook her head. "Snake den. They have a very distinctive smell. Snakes are good for the forest - they keep the rodent populations in check. Full of diseases, rodents. Even still, try to avoid the snakes."

"Why? Are they dangerous?"

Dahlia chuckled. "Only if you fall in their den. Avoiding their scent is a good way not to do that. Don't bother them and they won't bother you."

She showed him the berry bushes, how to tell which berries were ripe, which were best, and they gathered these in a cloth Dahlia pulled from a pocket of her black robe, though they left a generous portion for the birds.

Later, with the barrow stowed in a shed and Kane all washed up, he sat in the sunshine on the garden wall, his muscles warm and worked. He ate a late breakfast of sweetbread with berries and cream, and with it he drank cold tea, chilled by some spell. The sun was climbing, the heat just beginning to prick at him, a perfect counterpoint to the cold drink. Dahlia had suggested he go for a swim in the lake during the hottest part of the day, and Kane found he was looking forward to the idea.

He sipped his drink, feeling the dappled sunlight on his face as it drifted through the trees, hearing the sounds of birdsong and breezes. This place, he decided, wasn't so bad after all.

The morning was pleasant as Lena wandered the path. In the month they'd spent sailing from Melmond, autumn had begun to creep in, pushing summer out at the edges. The sun shone bright and clear through the trees, still green and leafy. Lena knew she would have to take the coat off soon. It was far too thick and heavy to be comfortable on such a mild day. Lena worried about Jack being without it, though. Jack was always cold. She thought about looking for him, returning his coat to him, but she wasn't sure where the library was, and she didn't feel comfortable exploring the village on her own. So she stuck to the path, hoping to stumble upon it or the clinic.

It was the clinic she found first. She realized she had passed this building the night before, though Lena hadn't realized in the dark what it was. Now though, it was obvious. A heart-shaped symbol of healing was painted on a wooden sign that hung on a post beside the path. The white stone walls were carved in a pattern of musk mallow, a common ingredient in potions, while the square bed in the yard out front was planted with rows of healing plants, chamomile and echinacea in full bloom.

A woman in a paint-flecked white robe sat on a stool among the flowers, a canvas on an easel set before her. On the canvas, a sprig of purple echinacea flowers was just beginning to take shape beneath her paint brush. She looked perhaps forty, a little younger than Redden, with a pleasantly plump frame and blond hair cut close to her chin. She barely looked over as Lena approached, flicking her eyes up and down Lena only once before turning back to the painting. "You're the one from the ship?" the woman said, less a question than an unenthusiastic observation.

"Yes," Lena said, somewhat taken aback.

The woman nodded, slipping her paintbrush into a little apron at her waist. "They said there was a white mage."

"'They'?"

The woman shrugged. "The Circle. They said you might come by." The woman stood, pulling a rag from the back of her belt and wiping her hands on it before putting it back again. "Come in and be welcome," she said without meaning it, leaving the easel behind as she moved toward the white building. Confused, Lena followed her inside.

It was an open structure. The wide room held four sick beds - all empty - along one wall. An operating table, clean and vacant, stood in the middle. The wall opposite the beds was curtained off from the rest of the room, but the curtains were tied back at the moment and Lena could see that it held a long counter where another mage in a white robe stood brewing a potion, her dark hair tied back as she squinted at a beaker that she held over a small candle flame with a pair of tongs. She glanced toward the door, and Lena was startled to see the glow of a corona in those narrowed eyes before the woman turned her attention back to her task. "Just a minute."

"You're a black mage!" Lena said, surprised. The woman at the potions counter only grunted at that, though Lena felt the words the grunt was meant to convey. "I'm sorry," she said quickly. "I only meant-"

"We've both sworn the White Oath," the blond woman, the painter, said bluntly.

"Of course," Lena said. "I am sorry. I know it's possible for a black mage to- I've just never met…" She trailed off. This isn't getting off to a good start at all, she thought. She took a breath, tried again. "What are you making?"

The woman at the counter didn't answer.

After an uncomfortable silence, the blond woman sighed, speaking for her colleague. "Antidote," she said. "For a goat. Seems to have eaten something it shouldn't."

Lena nodded. She hadn't spent much time around goats, but there'd been a few in Onlac and she knew they would eat anything.

As the dark-haired woman finished up, putting the beaker in a wooden cooling rack and washing her hands in a nearby basin, the blond woman said, "If you're not going to introduce yourself, I suppose I'll start. I'm Amandine. This is Moira. I take it you have a name?"

"Oh! Um, Lena. Lena Mateus," Lena answered.

"Mateus?" Amandine said, looking thoughtful. She stood easily a head taller than Lena. "Any relation to Eric Mateus?"

"Yes!" Lena said, thrilled to hear his name from this stranger, wondering if the woman might be friendlier knowing where Lena came from. "Yes! He's my father!"

But Amandine only nodded. "Do you hear that, Moira?"

"Yes," Moira said, drying her hands on a towel as she moved in beside Amandine, a united front against Lena, making her feel out-numbered. "Haven't heard from Matty in years. We studied together at White Hall, back before the mage war. How is he?"

Lena blushed. "He... passed away. Eight years ago."

Amandine shrugged. "May Ramuh catch and keep him," she said, as if by reflex.

"I seem to recall he was Levitian," Moira put in.

"He was," Lena said. "But I appreciate the sentiments either way."

"What happened?" Amandine asked. Moira elbowed her in the side, making a face, but Amandine only shrugged. "White mages don't just die of nothing. Was it the Brotherhood? I know they're still a problem in Cornelia."

"No, not that," Lena assured her. "It wasn't in Cornelia at all. We were living in Onlac - that's on the northern continent, right on the beach. There was a swell - a rogue wave, some call it. He... he drowned."

Moira nodded. "Eight years? That's when the quakes started getting bad here. About the time they started hitting Cornelia too, from what I'm told."

"Yes," Lena said. "My teachers said they were connected, the quakes and the swells."

"And did your teachers happen to mention the cause of those quakes?" Amandine asked archly. Moira elbowed her again.

Lena cocked her head, confused not by Amandine's words but by the lowly simmering anger behind them. "No… I… I didn't think anyone knew…"

"Ha!" Amandine barked, a single, cruel laugh. She focused her gaze on Lena - no, Lena realized, on the coat she wore. "We have a few theories."

Lena gasped. She couldn't mean Jack? "You're not honestly suggesting-"

"Don't even speak his name," Amandine said. "Not here. Not to me." She turned and stormed out, slamming the door behind her.

Lena stood, stunned. She'd told Jack, only the night before, that the people of this village didn't all hate him, but this woman, this white mage, did. For a moment, she couldn't speak, taken aback by the force of it.

Moira sighed. "Ignore her. There's no reasoning with her when she gets like this. It's best to just let her brood."

"She hates him," Lena said, still reeling from the state of Amandine's emotions. It was worse than what she'd felt from Lukahn.

Moira only shrugged.

Lena gaped. She felt Moira's indifference, and even that shocked her. Indifference toward a person she herself cared for so deeply? It was like someone saying they were indifferent to life. Lena couldn't help but think the woman should have felt something, anything.

Moira sighed, seeing Lena's expression. "'Dine's not the only one. The boy's trouble."

"How can you say that?" Lena asked.

"It's nothing personal," Moira said, shrugging again. "Lukahn's rarely wrong about what he sees. Jack's return means trouble for us, you mark my words. He may not do it on purpose - it may not even be his fault - but he's bound to cause something."

"I can't believe that," Lena said, shaking her head. "I don't know how any of you can believe that. If you knew him at all-"

"I don't," Moira said. "That's the thing. I don't think he's ever said more than two words to me. Hardly talks to anyone."

"He's shy!" Lena protested.

"Sure, I know that. But there are those who see that shyness as scheming. Like he's hiding something behind that mask he wears."

"But that's- He's-" Lena sputtered. It was ridiculous. "Surely everyone knows why he wears that! The scars-"

"Yes, but how'd he get them?" Moira asked patiently. "No one knows. Not even Wrede, and he was the one who helped Iris heal him when she brought the boy in. If Iris knew, she took it to her grave."

Lena fell silent. How did he get his scars? A fire, that was all she knew. He'd lost his mother, maybe even his father, and it hurt him too much to talk about it. Had he caused it somehow? No. No, she wouldn't believe that. "You're wrong about him," she said firmly.

Moira sighed, and Lena felt that indifference again. The woman truly didn't care. "Like I said, it's nothing personal. But this village is full of people like Amandine. They don't trust Jack, never have. If you go around siding with him, you're not likely to make many friends here." She smiled, but it was a condescending smile, an "I'm only trying to help," smile.

"I have friends enough already," Lena said.

Moira shrugged. "Suit yourself." She rolled her shoulders, turning back to the potions counter. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have work to do here. Let yourself out the back there, so you won't run into 'Dine when you go."

Lena hesitated, remembering Sarda's words. "I… I was told you might need me here."

Moira arched a thin, dark eyebrow, looking around the silent clinic, at the empty sickbeds, before looking pointedly back at Lena. "No," she said simply.

"No," Lena said. "No, I suppose you don't." She wanted out. Away. Away from people, both hateful and indifferent. She crossed the room, stopping with her hand on the back door latch. "Could you tell me the way to the lake from here?"

Moira cocked her head. "The lake? Sure. You came from Lukahn's house? Just go back the way you came. Do you remember passing a side path? One with a big tree at the corner? Just follow that."

Lena nodded and let herself out, skirting the clinic's outer wall, giving the front gardens a wide berth as she went back to the signpost on the path. She followed the path to the big tree, past it, and her breathing slowed and deepened when she heard the gentle lap of waves. The path stopped at a quiet, reedy cove on the lake's northern curve, and Lena sat on the water's edge, knees tucked up and clutched to her chest as she let the sun warm her face.

She didn't know how long she sat there before the call of the water grew too tempting, too strong, and she shrugged off Jack's coat and her robe and set them aside. She pulled her tunic over her head, cast off her shoes, and stood in her shift with her bare feet in the chilly mud, the lake lapping over her toes. The water was almost icy, but she needed it.

She waded out, gasping at the sensation, and when she'd gone deep enough that she could duck her head under, she did so, swimming farther out, letting the water bring relief, the cold a welcome distraction from other people's feelings.

She swam, hardly coming up for breath. She swam until her head felt clear again, her emotions as dull and numb as her fingers, her hands, her toes. When she climbed out at last, she sat in the sun beside her clothes, shivering as the air dried her, as she waited for the day to warm up. It was cold, yes, but not as cold as the people here. No wonder Jack was always freezing.

It was late before Redden left the library, towing Jack along. The sky was orange, the light fading, as they walked in silence back to the Randells' cottage through the sleepy little village. People were returning to their homes from their various places of work; none of the people they passed on the path raised a hand or offered a greeting to them. Redden knew it was because of Jack.

He'd found the lad in the library that morning, already busy at work. Redden had marveled at Jack's skills as a scholar, the thoroughness of his notes, the number of books he'd already found. Even now, Jack walked with a stack of books he said he intended to look at more closely after dinner.

Redden only had one book himself, a book on aetherial theory from the many that the sages had already combed through in the wake of the aether burst. Jack had ignored those, Redden assumed because he'd already read them. He knows Teleport, for Titan's sake. What more could those books teach him? Redden felt he'd be lucky to get through even a fraction of the book he carried in one evening's study. Jack might read fast, but Redden thought the lad had been overly optimistic in his own late-night reading plans.

Or perhaps he simply couldn't decide on one, Redden thought. He remembered a time when he was freshly arrived in Cornelia, the new third council lord of the young prince, and the mages of Black Hall had given him access to their library. He'd spent weeks with books all over his chambers, stacked on the floor, covering every flat surface, even in his bed, until he'd met Rachel and hastily tidied up the rooms in case his courting should proceed as he'd hoped it would.

He had a sudden memory of his life after he'd successfully courted her, of reading in his bed by candlelight, his wife asleep beside him, snuggled up under his arm, with the infant Kane between them, a comforting weight against his hip. Redden couldn't remember what he'd been reading at the time, but he savored the memory, sweet as honey.

It was, Redden realized, everything Westen had ever wished for him. The man had been a father to Redden, more than his own father had been, simply by being there, by caring. It was everything he wished for his own son, that feeling of love and contentment. Redden smiled, unable to imagine Kane reading for pleasure with his family asleep beside him. Jack, though... Redden could picture Jack in that scenario all too easily. We really are alike, he and I, he thought. Bookish lads like us were never meant to hold a sword.

He was still lost in such thoughts when Jack led them up the path to the Randells' front door, but despite the lateness of the hour, the kitchen was nearly empty, containing only Lena sitting at the table and Mistress Randell by the stove. The two stopped chatting as Redden and Jack stepped inside. Dahlia looked up at them briefly but then turned back to her cook pot. "See, now?" she said. "I told you they'd be along. Jack knows what time we eat around here."

Lena smiled warmly at them both. "I was starting to wonder where everyone was." She was wearing Jack's coat, her hands barely visible through the cuffs that were too long for her.

"I'll admit to being curious about that myself," Redden said, pulling out a chair to sit beside her.

Jack nodded a greeting to her, but he crossed the room to set his books on the mantelpiece before he sat on her other side. "Where's Kane?" he asked.

Dahlia shrugged. "Still in the garden, I expect. Said he'd work a bit more while the light held. I wasn't about to stop him."

"Orin and Thad?" Redden asked.

"Oh, the Circle won't be done with them for another hour, at least. We needn't wait." So saying, she pulled a stack of bowls from a cupboard and began dishing out their meal, mashed potatoes covered in a hearty sauce of corn and peppers and onions. She set a bowl before each of them, with one in front of an empty chair to await Kane, and in the table's center she set a bowl of tiny bright red tomatoes. The back door creaked as Kane stepped in but Dahlia pointed outside. "Wash," she said.

Kane sighed and left without a word.

She smiled. "If your son works any harder for me, Lord Redden, I may keep him."

Redden chuckled. "Well, I've no use for him at the moment. I can't imagine him in a library. Boy never could sit still."

Kane returned, holding his hands up for inspection.

Dahlia nodded, pulling out the chair beside her own, the one with the extra bowl.

Kane grinned when he saw it. "Smells great," he said, plopping into his seat and picking up a heaping spoonful.

"That's because it is," Jack said. His scarf was down, his own spoonful small and delicate, and between each bite he covered his mouth with his free hand.

"Yeah?" Kane said, grinning wider. He shoved the spoon into his mouth, then groaned, closing his eyes in apparent bliss. He nodded as he chewed and swallowed, then turned a charming smile on Mistress Randell. "Marry me."

Dahlia laughed. "Oh, you are a blunt instrument, aren't you?"

"Staggeringly," Redden mumbled around his own mouthful of the delicious concoction.

"How easy this one is compared to Liam!" she said, lovingly swatting Kane on the back of the head. "Haven't once had to argue with him about the finer points of aetheric theory. No, sir! Food goes in, work comes out."

Kane nodded enthusiastically. "If all the food is this good? Yes, ma'am."

Dahlia winked at Lena. "Men are simple. They each have their own motivations, but once you know what that is, they're yours forever." She pointed at Jack, lowering her voice to a whisper as if she knew a great secret. "This one, you hand him a book and you'll have no trouble from him for the rest of the day."

Lena smiled. "I knew that already."

"That's the truth," Redden said, patting the book he'd brought back with him, the one he'd set on the table out of the way of his dinner. "Though you'll need more than one book, I suppose."

Kane looked at him questioningly, but he didn't speak with his mouth full.

Redden pointed to the stack Jack had left on the mantel.

"Hmm," Kane said, swallowing his latest bite. "What's all that then?"

Jack blushed crimson, looking down at his meal. "Nothing you would understand."

Kane frowned.

"A lot of magic and conjecture," Redden said. "We know that what the sages have called the 'aether burst' was directly related to the orbs somehow. That's information the sages didn't have before. We're hoping if we look over what they studied, we'll find something that they didn't."

"Yeah?" Kane said, sitting up straighter, taking interest, but he directed his question at Jack. "And what have you found?"

"Nothing," Jack said.

Kane glared at him.

Jack sighed. "Nothing yet. I... I actually wasn't studying what the sages were studying before. I was... I was studying necromancy."

Jack cringed as Lena choked on the bite she'd been eating. She coughed and Redden patted her back firmly. She reached for her water glass as Kane narrowed his eyes and said, "You were studying what?"

Jack kept his eyes down, radiating embarrassment. "Your sword woke when we killed the necromancer. I thought... well, what if it's related to necromancy somehow?"

The table fell silent. Jack didn't look up, but Kane continued to glare.

"It's a good theory," Redden admitted grudgingly. "And one I hadn't thought of."

"Is it?" Lena asked, her voice small and choked. "Related, I mean?"

"I don't know," Jack said softly. "It's... a hard subject to read."

Lena reached for his hand, gripped it on the tabletop, her forgiveness clear.

Kane huffed out a breath, and though he continued to glare, he directed his gaze toward his food. The glare faded as he ate, but the conversation had died, beyond the skill of any necromancer to revive.

They were still eating in silence when the door slammed open and Thad trudged in, followed by Orin and Master Randell. The boy all but collapsed into the table's last empty chair, seeming dejected, like a whipped dog, as he set his head on the table.

"Thadius!" Lena said, alarmed. "Whatever is the matter?"

The boy whimpered. "I have to go talk to them again tomorrow."

Randell shook his head, pulling one of the spare chairs up beside his wife. "He says it like we beat him!" he said, bending down to kiss Dahlia's cheek before he went to the stove and dished himself up a serving. "But it was only talking, I promise!"

"They even provided us a splendid lunch," Orin said as Randell handed another bowl to him. "Though not as splendid as this meal appears to be. Thank you for opening your home to us, Mistress Randell."

"My pleasure," Dahlia said.

Her husband sat, placing a bowl in front of Thad. "Eat up," he said.

Thad lifted his head slowly, as if he couldn't be bothered, but after a single forlorn sigh he began to shovel the food into his mouth.

"And what will the rest of you do tomorrow?" Randell asked.

"Kane can stay here if he wishes," Dahlia said.

Redden chuckled. "Oh, you don't need to come up with things for him to do. I was only joking earlier. I'm sure we can keep him out of your way."

"Nonsense!" Dahlia said firmly. "He's been a great help to me today. I could work him every day for fifty years and never run out of things to do. Gardens are like that."

Kane shrugged. "I don't mind."

"I'd like to help with the research," Lena said.

Jack looked up at last, looked at her. "My lady, no."

"It's white magic, isn't it? N...N-necromancy," she said, stuttering out the last word. "I've studied white magic more than you have. I might see something you wouldn't."

Redden nodded. "That seems best. I'll help with it too, lad."

"I don't like to think of you reading the things I've read today. Either of you," Jack said. "It's too horrible. You shouldn't have to."

Suddenly, Redden realized Jack hadn't taken another bite, not once since he'd confessed to studying that hated subject. How disturbing was it? he wondered. And yet the lad had been reading on it all day. "No one should," Redden said. "Including you. But if someone must, we'll do it together."

"Together," Lena said, nodding. Again, she reached for Jack's hand.

Jack pulled away, reaching up to reposition his scarf over his face. "Excuse me," he said. "I think I need a walk."

"I'll go with you," Kane said, pushing his bowl aside as he stood.

"No," Jack said hastily.

"I'll go with you," Kane repeated, more firmly, motioning Jack ahead of him out the door.

The table lapsed into silence once more. Thad finished off his dinner and held his bowl up for more. Orin pushed his own unfinished bowl across to him.

Redden looked over Lena's bowl, to Jack's, still more than half full. He thought again of Jack, reading contentedly in bed, a wife and child beside him, except now Redden couldn't shake the thought that the book Jack was reading in the image was one of necromancy. I want more than that for you, lad, Redden thought. So much more.

Author's Note: 8/7/20 - Another month of quarantine and wearing masks everywhere. How's everyone holding up? I sincerely hope everyone is okay. Personally, I seem to have hit my stride in "these uncertain times", sort of settled into what everyone is calling the "new normal". I've been writing again, lots, often, and regularly. There's less "OMG! Panic!" than there was when all this started. I'm finding it easier to think creatively.

I know I've mentioned before that I routinely do all my gardening with some form of mask on (usually a scarf or bandana) but you guys… It's different when you have to wear one all the time. I just keep thinking, "If Jack can do it, so can I." Nevermind that Jack is fictional. And that I, myself, made him up. He can still serve as a fine example to all of us. Jack wore masks before it was cool.

I've had a slew of new readers this month, including a few who have left lovely comments and reviews. Welcome! I'm so glad you're all here. You're all a bright spot in my days, even if you're only a number in the "views" stats. I'm excited about these upcoming chapters. I hope you enjoy them.