I fear that when I view this day from the distance of the future, such a spat will be the split between us. My sister can still see sense, I know it. I will try again.

  -King Ugallion Saeth

  I don’t find sleep. We bought rooms at the tavern before settling down to drink, thinking that we would get too drunk to go anywhere else, not that I have anywhere else to go. I don’t think I’ve seen a familiar sight in months. Jor’Mari is kind, more kind than he tries to let on, but that grove beneath haloed lights only reminds me of the orchard. I haven’t seen a pear tree in months, haven’t heard the soft gurgle of the brook running off the end of the property, haven’t sprung up in the morning to see to chores, haven’t laid awake in a bed that was my own pining for any other life, haven’t been asked to haul sugar and milled grain back from the millers, haven’t been invited to chop fruit for a pie, haven’t even seen a kitchen in…No, I remember a kitchen; the memory does nothing to pull me from the sheets.

  Light makes a slow crawl across the floor, a beam cutting through the closed slats of the shutters. There is something in the dancing of the dust motes inside the line of luminescence, the chaotic twisting of their waltz, which arrests me as I lay on crumpled sheets. I could spend the whole day lying here, watching until the sun set over the wall and pulled me back into the shadow where the thoughts that daylight banishes still linger, waiting for me. Nothing in the world seems as tempting as curling up in the sheets and lying there for the rest of the day. Thoughts whisper to me that is exactly what I should do, that there is nothing for me outside of the door anyway.

  I know the self-pity for what it is, and throw it to the floor along with the plush pillow from the bed. Throwing the emotion aside, just makes my terrible side whisper to me that I must be callous. I can’t tell that part of me that I’m wrong; it’s probably true.

  Opening the door and stepping into the hallway, I nearly collide with the back of a man. Dovik turns, the door across from mine clicking close behind him.

  “There you are,” he says, backing up to give me room.

  “I thought you were down the hall.”

  “No,” he answers quickly. “You must be confused; you were pretty drunk last night.” I recall distinctly not being drunk, but it doesn’t really matter. “We were wondering where you went.”

  “I needed some air,” I say, pulling my own door closed.

  “Air, of course.” He stops, looking me over. “Are you alright, Charlene?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You don’t seem fine.”

  “I’m tired,” I say, rubbing at my eyes. Gods, I don’t often feel it, but this morning I do. “I didn’t get much sleep last night.”

  Dovik arches a brow. “Oh, really.”

  “Does this place have breakfast?” I push past him, making my way to the stairs.

  “I believe so.”

  They do not provide anything as substantial as a full breakfast, a bit of coffee that lacks the bitterness I know and a single scone. I’ll need to find something else when I go back to the other hotel. There are so many restaurants in this city, I don’t think that I could try them all in a lifetime. Well, perhaps in my new lifetime I could. I still don’t understand the thought, being able to see centuries pass me by without age ever really touching me. That is how the long-lived naturally see things: elves, celenials, dwarves. Maybe they could tell me about what’s ahead.

  “I thought you were hungry,” Dovik says. Sitting back in the sunlight near the window, reclining in his chair and idly stirring a cup of dark tea, you might not notice the tussled hair, the way his eyes flinch at the natural light. He makes an effort not to seem like the previous night affected him at all, but even his fine blue coat is a bit ruffled. No, wait, that is a different blue coat, almost identical except the buttons on the sleeves are brass instead of silver. How many of the same coat does this man have?

  The silver spoon in his hand clinks as he taps the tea off against the rim. He looks back at me, those eyes of his, I know they see nearly as much as mine, and I bet his mind makes up more than the difference. He expects an answer.

  “I am hungry.” I follow his gaze down to the half-eaten scone on my plate, a jar of raspberry preserves open on the table next to it. “But I don’t feel like eating.”

  “There is a cafe a block down if you would want to try there.”

  “No,” I say. I catch myself playing with a lock of my new crimson hair, feeling the strands rub with friction as they roll over one another, and force myself to quit it. “Here is just fine.” The light spilling from the window provides a slight warmth where it washes over my skin, but Grim is cold today despite the season. It always is really; I just never noticed before.

  “I won’t try to banish your melancholia,” Dovik says, “because I know that doesn’t work. If you wish to share it, know that my shoulders can bear quite the load.”

  “No doubt.” I stare down into the dark brown of my drink. It is so still, I can almost see my reflection in it, but the image is hazy and shaped all wrong.

  We sit in silence a while, making a constant of the warm sunlight, sipping away as we watch people pass on the street outside the window. There is something in the contrast, such movement and purpose out the window, a still contemplation here. Dovik seems almost like a painting, a refined man of good means and origins. He will do well. Even when things turned so dark for him, he held up to it. I want to ask him how he managed such a thing, but that isn’t the kind of thing you ask.

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  When I look down again at my cup, I find only the dregs of blackened grains sitting in a sad puddle. A sigh escapes me as I set it down, my thoughts hard but of a purpose. This should be said.

  “I am leaving,” I say.

  “Of course you are.” Dovik turns a smile on me. “What? Did you think that I thought you were staying?”

  “I suppose that I don’t really know what I thought you thought.”

  He sets his own cup down, looking at me earnestly. “Grim was only ever a stop on the road for you, farm girl. It is for almost everyone that came here for the contest. Honestly, I have been wondering why you stayed so long.”

  “Other than the amazing sights of your city, the availability of everything I might want being at my fingertips, the company?”

  “Yes, other than that.”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I never really considered it before. I have everything now that I think I will need for a long time. The only thing I am lacking is a place to go. It wasn’t until recently that I realized.”

  “Oh?”

  “I need to go home,” I say. “Back to the orchard, back to Gale. I only realized recently how much I miss it, and what a terrible thing I did to my parents by leaving the way I did. I simply wrote them a note, saying that I will be away for three years. What kind of daughter does that?”

  Dovik winces. “I’m sure you had a reason for doing it.”

  “I was angry at my brother and rushed into a contract with a powerful and mysterious woman. Arabella would have let me visit home and see my parents if I really asked her to. Maybe, I was afraid of them talking me out of going?”

  “That is a pretty bad reason,” Dovik says.

  “A child’s reason.” I lay my forehead against my knuckles. “They are going to be so angry with me.”

  “I would be.”

  I look up at him. “You aren’t helping.”

  “Was I supposed to be?” He takes another sip of his tea, looking out the window at a flock of three women in pretty dresses and bonnets. Despite the new oiled and groomed beard, despite the scars on his face, he is still just a boy, isn’t he?

  “You told me that you would,” I say.

  “True.” He considers for a moment. “Then my good and helpful advice would be that you return home. Lucky for you, you have a flying ship capable of the voyage.”

  “I do. I should likely start preparing for that trip, find some maps.”

  “Jor’Mari has been waiting for transport back to the Empire as well,” Dovik says. “He seems to have spent a bit too much of his coin to purchase a good trip home. The man refuses to tell me about it, so I can’t arrange passage for him without hurting his pride. You think he might be able to spare a bit with how much he has.”

  “I can take him as well,” I say. Now that I think about it, I have no idea where Jor’Mari lived in the Contiguous Empire of Ramancalla. I will need more maps. “The least I can do really.”

  “Jess also mentioned something about wanting to visit Gale,” Dovik adds. “Something about it being part of her pilgrimage, to see as many places and civilizations as possible.”

  “Why do I get the feeling that you are about to tell me how stuffy Grim is becoming?” I ask.

  He shrugs. “Now that you mention it, I have been feeling a bit beneath the thumb of my family. Before, when I wasn’t strong enough to protect myself, I can understand how they might have had cause to keep me here, but now it is different. I am different. There is more of this world to see than a big wall and a forest. I intend to see it.”

  “Yes, I am going home, but then I need to return to my own path. I need to continue getting stronger; I need to keep pushing myself. That will be dangerous.”

  “More dangerous than what I’ve already faced?” Dovik asks. The scars on his face catch my attention, and I know that I never intend to face something quite so dangerous as that again. “Facing dangers is what magicians do, at least the good ones that don’t spend their few centuries drinking and partying. Though, I do certainly enjoy those.”

  “Wouldn’t it be better for you to push yourself here, on the edge of such a grand forest of monsters?”

  “It would for you as well,” he says. “My family will permit you to use the hunting grounds if you desire, and you know that.”

  “I have a reason to leave.”

  “So do I.” He leans forward, laying his hand on mine, making me truly consider him with just the force of his being. “We have seen too much darkness and misery here; I want to show you what the good part of being a magician can be, the parts that I have dreamed all my life to grab ahold of. Imagine the four of us, pushing the boundaries of civilization, hunting the monsters that cause hurt to so many. Us, being able to do something about that. Us, being able to watch out for each other and to push each other further. It could be such a thing, Charlene. All I ask, is that you picture it.”

  I don’t even need to, because I have been on that team before. Maybe it had all been in my own mind, thinking of myself as only attached to Halford’s team, never being a real part of it, but I had sat by those fires, eaten and laughed as we talked about the dangers of the day. The cold never seemed to creep around those fires.

  My heart aches at the memories, calling me to return home all the sooner. How nice it might be to find myself around those kinds of fire again.

  “They would need to agree to it,” I say.

  “A good thing they already have,” Dovik says.

  “You’ve thought of everything, haven't you?”

  “I have been known to be a planner.” Dovik reaches into his pocket. “I never did give you your birthday gift.”

  He pulls a bit of silver that catches the sunlight, shining so bright. He sets it on the table next to my open jar of preserves, a simple badge made of silver, a flat arrowhead shape just a bit bigger than my thumb. I pick it up, seeing the military-precise scrawl set into the metal.

  Adventurer’s Insignia: Silver Grade – Team Blue Horizon

  “Blue Horizon?” I ask.

  “I came up with the name. It is a good one, I think. I would you like to join, become the fourth member,” he says.

  “There is a problem,” I say, holding up the badge. “I was never registered with the adventurer's guild in Gale, or anywhere else for that matter.”

  “Ah. I’ll need to take back that present for a little bit,” he says, plucking the badge out of my fingers. “I could get into all sorts of trouble giving a thing like that to someone not registered. You will consider my plan, though?”

  I look down at the dregs of my coffee, feeling too much like those last little grains that used to hold flavor. “Yes. I like the idea. It will be a good thing.”

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