Chương 15

It's the living that's hard. It took a long time for dawn to come. Whether it was stress or some dark Talent, the dark seemed to stretch until it was as thin as his linen clothes. Harker made a quick change into his woolens, which did a far great job at keeping his body heat contained, though he felt a deep panic at the delay. No matter the quiet, it felt as if an Illwrought was two steps behind him at all times. They weren't.

His plan to keep mercenaries and monsters busy with each other seemed to have worked better than he anticipated. Don't rely on that. He ducked beneath another branch, his legs pumping steadily along the river. Stay ahead, stay alive. He was just off the Southroad, staying inside the riverwood where it hugged the banks of the Gallant. It traced a similar route, but where the rutted Southroad branched wide to avoid the bending river, Harker clung close.

Winter kept the worst of the undergrowth from sprouting, though he still needed to keep clear of thorn tree copses and other murderous flora. Despite it all, he started to make good time. The Chartermark was a constant distraction. It tingled, like a burn two months faded, reminding Harker of its presence every dozen steps. Yet as the dawn finally arrived, he found himself far more distracted by the leaden exhaustion in his limbs and the gnawing hunger in his belly.

He foraged as he ran, snagging nuts and berries that he recognized, but mostly he chewed on the dried meat he'd snagged from Garon's. It wasn't good, but it was enough. The day rolled onward, the sun banishing the morning's lingering cold while the gurgling rush of the Gallant offered constant companionship. Birds trilled, and the soft susseration of insects pressed close, uninterrupted by howls or the baying of hounds.

His caution threatened to bleed from him with every step, but Harker had not survived eighteen years by being careless. Law 3D—Follow The Plan. The first step was getting to Haver Hill. It wasn't as large as Vale but he could resupply there, find transport, confuse his trail… Wrack and ruin, it's happening again. Harker had learned the tells since fleeing the Vale. A swelling in his gorge and a tingling in his chest and limbs that presaged a blunt agony. The Sea was rising up through him.

Swiftly as he could, Harker stripped. Pack dropped along with trousers and socks, though the sweater was a tougher ordeal. He very nearly lost it as the garment came up over his head, but he held on. Just before the feeling consumed him, he dove into the Gallant. The Sea rushed out of him, and the river rushed in. Harker choked, vomiting Water in a billowing rush that leaked from his mouth, nose, and eyes. It vented from him like glowing silt, and was immediately carried downstream. Northward. Toward Vale.

Half drowning and wracked by bone deep exhaustion, Harker held onto his grim satisfaction. It wasn't a perfect solution, but it kept the Water from lingering in his clothes or in an obvious puddle in the woods. The Illwrought were tracking him by his Water—-it stood to reason that anyone else could as well. Without the Sea's stink on me, they won't know where I am. Well. They would know he was by the river. But that was the point. Law 1C—Become Nothing. It was far past time he set a false trail.

While he avoided the Southroad, his enemies wouldn't. Whatever was holding them up wouldn't last, and soon they would overtake Harker if he stayed in the same spot. With a final shudder, the reflux of Water fled Harker's system and he swam his way toward the shore. The currents weren't strong in this bend, but adrenaline pumped through his veins regardless. One of the first lessons anyone in the Vale was taught was that the dark beneath the swift currents were not to be trusted.

It was the same reason the Southroad didn't cling too closely to the Gallant. Fear of the old ways. Unless you mazed rivers with salt and cold iron you never knew what could swim out of them. Harker kept his cool until he'd climbed back onto the bank, where he made sure to put a solid five feet between him and the water. He was nearly spent, frozen from the river, and his insides felt scraped raw by the Sea… but he turned and watched the Gallant for several long seconds.

Illwrought, Aberrants, even the Great Beasts could be stopped by walls… but the Deep Children had far less restrictions. He touched the iron chain around his neck.

"Thank you, Anuan." It was silly perhaps—the Deep Children were tales told round Winter fires to scare children to sleep. Still, Harker wasn't against a little superstition if it helped. A little lip service to the Ancestor of Chains to keep him safe from Tidelings was a bargain that couldn't be ignored. In short order, he collected his discarded clothing and set off at a right angle to the Gallant. Harker crossed the Southroad, but only for a moment, then was off into the depths of the forested valley.

Mid-afternoon brought him close to Haver Hill. He could see it in the distance from between the trees. Walls rose up around the crown of a tall hill, filled with closely packed timber houses and streaming with woodsmoke from hundreds of chimneys. The Gallant bent around it, leaving it far to the west, and Harker could even make out the iron posts driven into the soft soil. Dozens of folks moved through the gates, bullhounds pulling wagons laden with family.

Others walked out on foot, packs overstuffed with food and handmade gifts. Here, Threllsnacht had proceeded without a single hitch, same as every year. This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Standing amid the Winter forest, Harker was suddenly hesitant to get closer. His cloak and sweater were marked by tugging thorns, his skin was streaked with dirt and sweat, and then there was his reflux. Harker put a hand to his chest.

If I approach looking like this, the gate guards will keep me in questioning for hours if they even let me in at all. Hunters might return as disheveled as he was, but they had game in tow… and they weren't Knacks. Haver Hill wasn't so far away that they didn't know about Harker Shoalborn, at least in passing—enough not to give him any courtesy. Knacks weren't worthy of it. Then again, was he a Knack any more? Resupply isn't necessary. I've got trail rations and the foraging is good.

Harker hitched his pack higher on his shoulders. I can last until Runnel. He took off, walking until the sun started to dim in the west. If it was up to him, he would have continued on, but the lash of fear could only goad his flesh for so long. After one too many times stumbling over an exposed root or leaning against a rough trunk only to doze off for several precious seconds, Harker forced himself to find shelter. The scent of urine and sharp musk led him to a large den dug into a small hill.

Trees and low bushes surrounded it, skeletal before Spring's touch, but more than enough to keep it from casual view. Harker was so tired he barely recalled stumbling through its opening—at one point he was couching outside and the next he was belly first in a layer of dried leaves and packed earth. Brief thoughts flickered through his mind, a hope that the urine stench would mask his refluxed Water, but then little else. Sunlight woke him.

It scuttled across his eyes like a beetle, even closed, and Harker recoiled, pressing into deeper shadow and soft loam. Loam? Harker opened his eyes and the first thing he saw was his arm pushed into the dirt. Gone was the packed earth and dried leaves. In its place was a rich soil, dark as night, and flecked with something that glimmered blue-green against the stalks of— For a long, unreasonable moment Harker feared he'd somehow crawled out of the den in his sleep.

Yet he could see the earthen ceiling arcing overhead, riddled with roots like fine white hairs. He was still in the den… but somehow, overnight, it had been transformed. Covering the once-bare ground were hundreds of plants, all taller than a foot and covered in leaves, fronds, and even blossoms. They'd experienced weeks if not months of growth in… Harker blinked at the slanted sun. It was at most an hour past dawn.

"Ten hours. From barren to this in such little time?" Harker sat up and winced. His muscles were sore, but worse was the ache in his chest and tributaries.

"So that's it." He must have loosed his Water during the night. Harker bent his arm, watching a faint crust of salt crumble to the ground. The loam withered where it touched, drained into specks of white. Frowning, Harker kept his limbs still and took a closer look around the den. Once he paid attention, it was impossible to ignore: each and every plant was Sea-touched.

"This is incredible," he breathed. Harker recognized many off hand. Gellberries. Corsel. Yarrow. Mealfeather. Staples of his craft, good for eating and healing in equal measure. He also saw others that were far more rare, no doubt carried into the den lodged in fur, droppings, or prey. Bloodstop, vondiir leaf, even a few carnivorous snappers. Poisons in the right dosages, but all of them useful. Aches nearly forgotten, Harker spent the next half an hour carefully harvesting all of them.

Harvesting, like listening, had nothing to do with Talent. It was entirely a matter of knowledge, precision, and care. Leaves, blossoms, and fledgling fruit were severed with a knife and the faintest of pressure from his fingers. Each was placed into a separate container. For some, the stalks were useful and he cut them an eighth of an inch above the soil. Those he bundled with cotton bandages soaked in water from his canteen. Others were lifted, roots and all, out of the dirt.

Lists of usage and treatments danced through Harker's mind, more than enough to buoy his flagging spirit. He'd studied his mother's tomes enough times to memorize every line, and though she'd only had a modest library of twelve books, the nearly translucent pages held a bounty of information in their cramped margins. Stalks steeped in hot water and mashed produce a potent topical numbing ointment. Bulbs consumed raw are excellent for indigestion, or render down into an incredibly sticky adhesive.

These create a heavy, noxious cloud to ward off groundswellers. A balm for strained eyes. Coagulant. Stimulant. And—hallowed Depths… In the corner of the den, so far against the curved walls that Harker had to stretch to reach it, was a single small plant. It was common looking enough, a simple stalk with three tear-drop shaped leaves. It could have been any number of herbals, save for one detail: purple-dyed edges. As if they'd been dipped in some rich ink, the leaves were bordered by an almost luminescent purple.

"It's grown in the most downslope place in the den, closest to my back while I slept," he muttered, not taking his eyes off the plant. Harker shifted his body to block the slanting light of the sun and the leaves started to glow on their own.

"It must have taken on a great deal of Water. More than any other plant." He adjusted himself, angling his body so he could reach the plant more easily. The stem was thick and covered with small prickles, and up close they glimmered with bits of purple as well. None of that was important, however; the real treasure was below the earth. With careful movements, he dug around the plant with his knife. Dirt broke easily, but stopped whenever he encountered the thin tension of a root.

Over and over he circled the plant, breaking the soil completely until the purple-prickle stem nearly toppled. He caught it with a wince and pulled. A nest of roots slipped free of the loam, thicker by far than it had any right to be. With trembling hands, Harker shook the remaining dirt from the rootball.

"I was right. The Ghostflower Root." A bulbous root in the shape of a tight spiral. Water glimmered across its layers, flaring outward in petal-like shapes that hovered around the root spiral like a mirage. Harker clutched it tight, uncaring about the small cuts the stem inflicted on his palm. Described in his mother's books were dozens of specialty herbs, many of them too fantastical to be found anywhere near their relatively small island.

Climate, weather, and soil composition were top reasons why some plants flourished while others failed. Among Sea-touched herbals, however, the presence of Water was the greatest differentiator. The Ghostflower Root was already incredibly rare—its seed might have sat beneath the den for decades without sprouting. It needed an absurd amount of Water, which no one but the truly insanely wealthy could ever afford.

"Ghostflower Root. Uses: spirit cleansing, Water refinement up to Second Depth, and," Harker swallowed.

"Tributary aid." If properly prepared and taken while establishing one's Current, it can help clear the initial blockages in mortal flesh. His biggest issue with his Water reflux was the fact that it overwhelmed his small reservoir and single tributary. He couldn't do much about his reservoir, but if he had a full set of tributaries spanning his entire body… He wet some bandages and carefully packaged the root away. Harker couldn't do anything with it yet. He didn't have a Current to push its effects along.

He'd always been told that he couldn't have a Current… but things had changed. It was past time to consider his curse. The Vestige.