Chương 19

Honor is for fools and the dead. Harker followed the cliff he'd camped under as the dark pressed close. It was the lowest part of a tall ridge that ascended toward the Gnarl, and soon the trees peeled back from it, allowing his path to be easily scanned in the dim moonlight. The Eidhrin followed behind, footsteps stumping along the dirt. Harker felt electric. Adrenaline buzzed through his limbs like a swarm of wasps, refusing to let him stay still.

Stillwater dragged his feet, pulled in Harker's wake like a toddler on apron strings, only far quieter. Too quiet. The Eidhrin watched everything with his pupilless yellow eyes and sour smirk, hands tucked into his pockets as if he were on a casual stroll through the market. He hung back, sometimes as far as a dozen yards behind, but whenever Harker increased his pace the Eidhrin followed suit. He's tethered to me. Harker could feel… something… between them. It came and went, as ghostly as a slight breeze.

Is twelve yards his limit? What happens if he strays further? Stillwater didn't let him find out. He stayed relatively close, though he made it a point to wander off the trail and into the woods several times over the course of the next hour. He'd always come back, but it was unnerving to see his glowing yellow eyes emerge from the deep shadow between trunks. Harker was pretty sure that was the point.

His monstrous shape coupled with his human clothing was already off-putting, and something about his gait prickled Harker's flesh. Unnerved or not, Harker made sure to mask his reactions beneath studied disconcern. He had years of practice dealing with monsters—until now, they had simply worn human faces. This was a game, and Harker had no intention of losing.

"You wanted an oath of service," he said after some time.

"Why? What use would I be to you?" Stillwater shook his head, staring off into the woods.

"Very little."

"Then why?"

"Why does the sun rise in the morning, human? Because it chooses to do so."

"The sun doesn't choose—""Why are you being hunted, human?" The question caught Harker off guard. Stillwater walked with his hands clasped behind his back, eyes scanning the trees.

"Why do you care?"

"I find it curious. Young, even by human standards, is being haunted by what can only be relentless foes."

"Relentless?" Harker gestured around them.

"Do you see such figures?" Stillwater grinned.

"Then we are traversing this forest beyond the midnight hours for leisure?"

"Exercise is good for your health." Stillwater's grin soured.

"I'll not let you sandbag my repayment, human. Tell me true: what hunts you?" Harker considered the sky. The clouds were rolling in from the south again, where they bunched up against the mountain. Could this be used against him? What was the Eidhrin's angle? No matter how Harker turned it, he couldn't find one. But the right bait can catch the largest fish. A little honesty went a long way, especially when the other person thought they were winning.

"A company of men, the least of which are First Depth Talents. A pair of nobles." He gave a heavy sigh.

"And a Stitcher." Laughter broke the night. Harker glanced over his shoulder to see the Eidhrin folded over, eyes almost closed with mirth.

"Oh, is that all? I suppose I am meant to ward them off one by one?"

"No, I don't plan on fighting them."

"Still no lies," Stillwater muttered.

"Curious and curiouser." Was it so strange not to lie? Harker found them to be inconvenient at best and disastrous at worst. Yet was the truth so grand? If he'd lied to the Vinell's, Harker might have reached his cottage and escaped beyond the Drop before the storm or Stitcher fell atop of him. Or you'd have walked right into the Illwroughts anyway. Harker frowned. He was getting distracted. The Eidhrin stirred his thoughts far too easily. Focus. Why is lying important? And how can Stillwater tell?

The creature was still talking.

"I've lived a long time, and I've rarely seen so many hunting down a single person, let alone a child." Stillwater spat something green onto the ground.

"What have you done to offend them?"

"Nothing on purpose."

"An accident, then." Stillwater nodded to himself.

"Of course. Misfortune clings to the weak." The disregard needled at Harker's pride, and he nearly replied, but he held himself back. Law 2A—Show Nothing. His ego had suffered worse in the Vale. The creature was hunting information, and he was good. Harker had to turn things around.

"So you claim you're not a Tideling." Stillwater stiffened.

"Bah! And you doubt it?"

"I don't know enough, clearly." Harker opened his arms, palms up.

"What makes Gilken so different?"

"Everything! First off, we're smarter, stronger, and twice as handsome." Stillwater adjusted his necktie.

"Tidelings are spindly, big-eyed bastards who couldn't bargain with a stone." The old tales were rather vague on Eidhrin, other than their appearance being horrible and beautiful at once, and he was starting to doubt that. Still, a great many names existed for the creatures, from Mosskin to Whisperfolk, but Harker hadn't imagined they'd be separate kinds of beings entirely.

"Gilken are better at bargains then?"

"By far, human, and I am the best." Stillwater preened, pulling at his suspenders.

"Few could best me at my height, and even fewer could survive to regret it." A watery growl accompanied the last of his words—a not-so-subtle threat. And a weakness. If others could best Stillwater at his strongest and Harker had, then it stood to reason the Gilken was impaired somehow. Harker could use that.

"The best." Harker shot the creature a glance over his shoulder.

"I heard your whispers, Stillwater. If that is your best, I think you should find a new line of work." Stillwater said nothing, but he'd stopped scanning the woods, and stared at Harker for several long minutes. The sound of their feet on stone was loud in the dark, and Harker couldn't help his rough breathing. He was tired, but there was no reason to admit to that. The game was not yet won.

"What is your Talent, human?" That pressure returned. It prodded at Harker's chest around the area where his reservoir sat within him like fingers digging into soft clay. Yet it didn't get far, as if the clay rebounded, filling in where something tried to grip it. Harker kept walking, ignoring the pressure. Is that my Stature? Had he always possessed it? Why had he never noticed its presence? It was clearly something to do with Bargains, perhaps a resource akin to his reservoir.

"Well?" Stillwater asked. The pressure redoubled. Realization was swift. He's trying to compel me to answer. Harker saw no reason to admit he noticed the attempt.

"Perception. My senses are greatly enhanced." Harker blinked, a frown bending his face back toward the creature.

"How did you do that?" Stillwater grinned. It was large enough to nearly split his squat head in two, and his finned ears wiggled.

"So you have a useless trick."

"Useful enough to catch you." The Gilken's smile withered.

"Yet not enough to face your hunters."

"Just so. Hence…" Harker gestured to the night and walked a bit faster. Stillwater hustled to keep up.

"Great Tides, human! Your strides are too long by half. Slow!" The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Harker didn't. It was petty, but so was the little monster.

"Do you live in the Gallant?"

"What?" Stillwater asked between breaths.

"Do you live—?"

"I heard you, fool. I just couldn't believe your stupidity." Stillwater huffed as Harker continued to outpace him.

"You haven't the words to understand my origins."

"I didn't ask about your origins. I am wondering why you singled me out. Was it where I decided to enter the Gallant that day? Were you waiting?"

"It's not every day that a human would vent gallons of the untempered sea directly into the river. It draws notice." Harker figured as much. His misdirect had earned him a barnacle on his back. He swallowed and allowed some real worry into his voice.

"How'd you notice that?" That grin again, only this time Stillwater's eyes flickered from Harker back toward the forest, below them.

"You have greater worries on your hands, human." Gut sinking, Harker spun. No more than fifty feet away was a copse of pale trees crowded around a faintly glowing tidepool. Had it not been night, he might have missed it entirely. The Sea bubbled through the pool, lacing the natural spring like poison in a cup, and around it sprang dozens of different plants, all overgrown and oversized. It was a treasure trove for an herbalist had it been unoccupied. It wasn't.

Three creatures basked along the shores of the tidepool, small but still half the size of Harker himself. At one time they might have been martens, but their lengthy bodies had been malformed by the Sea's power. Their dark fur was patterned by silver scales, thickening along the way until their entire hindquarters vanished into a thick, finned tail. Tide-touched at least. It was the least sort of Bestial Aberrant, if they could be described as such. Mutated but only lightly aggressive.

They shouldn't attack unless provoked. They were dangerous, certainly, especially to someone without refined skin… but they weren't Illwrought. Harker took several careful steps back, glancing along the ridge to check his exits. If he could get around the bend, it was likely the Aberrants would leave him alone.

"What are you doing?" Stillwater asked, entirely too loudly. Harker glared at him.

"The best fight is the one you never enter."

"Eugh." The Gilken sneered.

"How boring!" He picked up a rock the size of his head.

"Creatures! I bid you good evening!" Stillwater hurled it into the tidepool. It splashed down, clipping one of the Aberrants and sending the others scurrying away in a flurry." What are you doing?" Harker demanded. The Eidhrin just laughed. Then it was too late. The Aberrants flowed forward, eyes aglow with a blue-green madness. Their bodies rippled, moving like a cursed combination of eel and weasel, the Sea fluttered around their bodies in a gush before they hurled themselves directly into the rock.

They vanished with a wave-like ripple.

"Depths!" Harker spun in a circle, knives out as he tried to spot the creatures. Anything exposed to enough of the Sea found itself changed, and the worst were those with something akin to a Talent. The ground rippled, flickering here and there as the silvered tails of the beasts disturbed the surface of the stone.

"Stillwater! How is this saving my life?" The Gilken leaned against a rock, arms folded over his paunch.

"I am the least of your concerns right now, human." A blur leapt out of the earth, cutting across Harker's body at a low angle. Claws slashed at him, opening up his shin before it dropped back into the rock without a splash. Harker bent forward, cursing, only to have a second slash across his exposed back. He reared up, hissing in pain. Control the terrain! He backed up, trying to limit the directions the Aberrants could reach him, but their ability was utterly unpredictable.

They slipped through dirt, stone, and clustered roots with equal ease, and always attacking from his blind spots. He had little choice.

"Sovereign Sight!" He let the Talent roll out of himself for three feet in every direction. The rush of sensation shook through him as a cloud of details collapsed onto his mind. Vision darkened across the edges and dizziness clamped his inner ear, forcing him to stumble when he tried to step. An Aberrant cut into his hip.

"Don't fall down!" Stillwater said in a sing-song tone. Harker caught himself, spinning through a strike—and caught one of them. His knife sparked against the thing's scales without penetrating, but he'd hit it. That's… he swallowed bile. Promising. More strikes arrived, thigh and calf getting sliced open, but the pain was just another piece of information that overloaded him. Harker could feel the things moving around, but he could also feel the cold air and the hot blood down his leg.

A soft chuckle from Stillwater and the taste of dirt and his own boots. Focus! The creatures circled him, their hearts thundering louder than thunder; their wriggling tails slick and strong and sharp. Their musk was a mix of the sea and something far earthier, and it spiked with every movement they made. Focus! Harker tried, but too much was happening all at once and he could barely keep his feet. He dropped his Talent, hoping to regain his faculties, but immediately lost sense of the Aberrants.

They had burrowed too deeply into the earth for the faint after-effect of his Talent to sense them.

"Where—" He sucked in a short breath as he felt them emerge from the earth—but they were too fast. All three leapt up, clawing for his chest. Harker got his forearms in the way and only his leather bracers kept his throat from getting slashed open. They dropped, disappearing once again. Harker couldn't play around. Law 4—End It Quick.

"Sovereign Sight!" Just as before, his Water and awareness spread three feet in all directions, only this time he held it. The Talent shook him, the disorientation nearly costing him his life as one of the Aberrants leapt for his throat. Harker barely got his blade between them. It struck off the things' fangs, finding no purchase, but kept the creature away for another moment.

"Lucky strike!" Stillwater shouted from the side. Harker didn't reply; couldn't. The weight of sensation was too much. Ten thousand details vyed for his attention, each one as important as the next until it was a soup of undifferentiated chaos. His Talent, this Vestige, it was impossible to think through. So he stopped trying. One of the Aberrants leapt upward, hooked claws slashing for his back. Harker moved. His knife slashed against its side. It fell with a yelp. That's…

He lost the thought, lost himself in the rush of sensation. Harker stopped trying to make sense of it all. He let it flow. Jolts of awareness rolled through him. The taste of the night breeze. The birds that wouldn't quiet their slow chirping. The creatures moving in spiraling lines around him. There! An Aberrant leapt out. Harker swung, and this time his knife found purchase. Wet warmth gushed over his fist, and the creature dropped to the ground, its eye and part of its skull ripped through by his knife. Dead.

The survivors didn't like that. They snarled, a watery burble that keened in pitch as they rushed his legs. He fumbled through their attacks, but the dizziness was too hard to shake. He stomped, nearly slipping on one Aberrant's hide, and opening himself up to a slash on the back of his thighs. You're thinking again! Stop it! Harker threw himself into familiar movements. He'd trained for combat, if not for this sort of foe, and it rolled through him like high tide.

The Aberrants leapt and bit, slashing with their curled claws, but Harker stayed on the defensive. He caught glancing blows off his bracers, earning himself heavy slams from silvered tails, but he shed no more blood. Abandon defense, son. Everything has a weakness. Law 4A—Seize Their Minds! He stepped back, the ring of his Talent moving with him, and the Aberrants followed. Yet they no longer spiraled around him freely. The cliff?

It loomed behind him, but the monsters swam up its stone face just as easily as the rest of the ground. Yet their pattern of attack changed. Why? His senses snagged on it, refusing to budge despite his insistence on flow… there was strangeness in their movement. They only attacked twice on the left, then straight ahead, then behind. They avoided the right entirely. Not just the right. He could feel them divert their path again and again around… something. The stone. They're avoiding certain kinds of stone!

A second Aberrant leapt from behind, and Harker was already twisting toward it. He thrust up, knife catching the thing in its soft underbelly. It screeched and writhed, ripping the blade from his hand, and dropped to the ground. Harker scrabbled after it, but the last Aberrant cut across his path. It slashed at his boot, forcing him back, before diving deep. It vanished. Where'd it go? Is it… No, stay near the rock it can't swim through. Harker released his breath.

He let his Talent roll through him and the jagged flow of it straightened for just a moment as details pressed to every one of his senses all at once. Deep beneath his feet, the earth rippled. Harker jumped straight up, heavy boots falling back toward the earth just as the Aberrant crested. It had no time to react as he crushed its face, snapping its body in half across the stone.

"Wrack and ruin!" His ankles twisted on the bulky body, his landing nearly throwing him on his rear. Still, he had presence of mind enough to stab his knife into the beast, cutting into its chest, and stopping its writhing. It died. He'd won. A slow, pointed clap sounded from across the cliff.

"You." Harker breathed through his dissipating disorientation. He glared at Stillwater.

"You called them."

"I did." The little bastard pulled at his suspenders, rocking back and forth on his heels.

"You're welcome."

"Why would I thank you for this?" Harker asked, standing up with his knives.

"Because this is me, saving your life." He snapped his suspenders against his chest.

"I needed to see how you fight and use your Talent. Now I know a great deal." Harker swallowed a thousand biting remarks. They would get him nowhere.

"Explain."

"Your soul is broken, that's clear. It will break further if I don't step in. You're lucky I found you."

"Yes, I feel quite lucky." Stillwater tilted his head as if eager for something, but his expression faded to disappointment.

"Ah, well. Now that I've seen the damage in you through your Water, I can advise on a solution to save your measly life. One that will fix your insides and open up a whole new set of options for you." Harker was coming to hate that grin.

"A solution."

"We need to find a town…and you need a Current."