Barclay continued to blubber, smearing snot all over the front of Patrick’s tunic, but Patrick didn’t notice. The sight and sound of his god wailing was the only thing that mattered. For the first time in a long while, Patrick felt truly afraid.
“Fire is an inimitable beast,” the great Isabel DuTaureau had once said. “It is the essence of the heavens, personifying the giver and the taker at once. It can be tamed, but with care, for it is greedy. Just like its brother, snow, a little is wondrous-too much and life ends.”
Patrick had received that bit of wisdom after burning his hand over a cookfire while trying to roast gooey bits of a reduced sugar concoction. The reply was typical of his mother. He had been around nine years old at the time, and he’d run to her in hopes of a soft touch and some soothing words. Instead, she’d delivered a lecture on the philosophic components of fire, before sending him to the temple for the healers to mend his blistered fingers.
Even so, her words were all he could think of as he watched flames lick out of the small circle of stones before him two nights after the discovery of the barn. The paradox was palpable. Fire had made it possible to cook, to keep warm, to make tough wood pliant. Fire made up the sun that rose each morning, allowing plants to grow and forming the unmistakable distinction between day and night. Fire allowed them to send the souls of their deceased to the Golden Forever.
Yet fire was also used to forge steel, which was then crafted into knives, daggers, and swords. It was used to destroy fields of grain in order to starve frightened people, and then to end the lives of those very same individuals. This was a recent usage unique to gods and men…and elves.
Patrick grunted, shifted on his rump, and tossed another log onto the fire. Winterbone was beside him, the dragonglass crystal on its hilt reflecting the flickering flames. He shuddered, the image of the barn once again before him.
“Patrick?” asked Barclay.
He glanced across the flames, to where the youth was reclined on the other side of the pit. Barclay had rarely left his side since the discovery of the barn, which was still hidden in the trees atop the hill just beyond their camp. What had once been an amiable fourteen-year-old on the cusp of manhood had become a quivering child. He hadn’t asked a silly question for two days. Instead he walked with a sulking gait, his lower lip constantly quivering. Not that Patrick minded much. At least he had silence.
On second thought, perhaps silence wasn’t at all what he needed, for silence seemed to invite doubt.
“What is it?” Patrick asked.
“I can’t sleep,” said Barclay, twisting in his bedroll. “I’m scared.”
“We’re all scared,” replied Patrick.
“Not you. You’re not scared of anything. You weren’t even scared of…of…that.”
Patrick shook his head. He wanted to tell the boy that of course he’d been scared, that all he could think about was running back to Mordeina and curling into a ball while his sisters comforted him.
“Just close your eyes,” he said instead. “What’s the dumbest animal you can think of?”
“Uh…a sheep?”
“Well, picture a huge herd of sheep, and start counting them all. Don’t stop counting either-got it?”
“Really?” said Barclay, his expression blank.
“Just do it,” Patrick said. “Trust me. I’ve done this plenty.”
“Do you use sheep too?”
Patrick cleared his throat.
“Sort of. I more use articles of clothing. Now go to sleep.”
Barclay placed his head back down on his folded surcoat and closed his eyes. The boy’s lips gradually parted and closed as he counted. By the time he hit thirty-nine, he was fast asleep.
“Sweet dreams, boy,” Patrick said softly. “Someone has to have some.”
There would be none for him tonight; that much he knew. Not after the last two days.
He shook his head, trying to force the lingering image of all those burned and screaming corpses from his mind, but it was no use.
“Shit,” Patrick muttered. A chill overtook him as a light breeze caught him unawares. The fire had died down to embers, casting an eerie red pallor over the stones that formed the pit. He picked up Winterbone and used its tip to turn a log, one side of which remained untouched by the greedy flames. As soon as the bark touched the glowing cinders, it began to catch, fingers of red and yellow flame licking along the underbelly until the log was fully aflame, exuding warmth once more.
Fire giveth; fire taketh away.
He cocked his head, listening for the despairing resonance of Ashhur’s weeping. It was still there, though less intense now, a moaning from the far-off clearing at the top of the rise. Maybe he’ll be done soon. Maybe he’ll wash all his sorrow away. A wave of hopelessness passed through him. The people of Paradise meant nothing to those who wanted it destroyed. Be it Karak or the elves, it was only a matter of time before bloodshed found this massive traveling enclave and reduced it to stinking piles of rotting meat just like those inside the barn. He grunted, knowing he should find peace in the fact that when the end came, his god would be by his side, but he couldn’t. No amount of preaching about love and forgiveness would spare him the pain of what was to come, and he could in no way bring himself to accept his fate without a fight. Poor lost Nessa had instilled this combative spirit in him. Unyielding faith in an ideal was Bardiya’s realm, not his.
Thoughts of his old giant friend made him curse and jab Winterbone’s tip into the coals with more vigor. It was folly for the great Bardiya Gorgoros to deny his own god, to ignore his brothers and sisters in creation and isolate the wards of House Gorgoros from the approaching hostilities. The Kerrians were able hunters and gatherers, strong and athletic and independent. They were proficient with bows and spears, and regularly held competitions of physical strength-competitions Patrick had joyfully participated in when he was younger. Like Nelder, they had ousted the Wardens from Ker, opting instead to make their own way, using Ashhur’s teachings as their guide. It was a sovereignty their god had only accepted after a lengthy summit with Bessus and Damaspia. If only the people of Ker would join our fight, thought Patrick. Their numbers, their skills, might swing the odds back to their favor.
Then again, perhaps they would simply roll over and die at Bardiya’s orders. Scoffing, Patrick tipped back his skin, drinking down a massive gulp of potent corn whisky. The liquid burned going down, and he immediately felt dizzy. His anger at his friend only grew.
“Bite me, Bardiya,” he whispered, emptying the skin. He wished he were with his friends from Haven, who had taught him to think and fight on his own. His stomach turned in knots, and as the world began to spin around him, he collapsed onto his side, holding his gut to keep from retching. He felt sick and dizzy, but he finally faded into a dreamless sleep, his heart beating in tune with his god’s sobs.
When he awoke, his neck was sore from lying in an awkward position. The hump in his back throbbed, a headache pounded behind his eyes, and his mouth was dry. He spotted the skin lying to his right and knocked it away, cursing himself for taking to liquor to quell his depression. I should have found a nubile young thing instead, he thought groggily. The aftereffects, come morning, are far less painful.
Patrick lifted his head, experiencing more than a tiny bit of pain. The firepit was dusty and dry, and Barclay was nowhere to be seen. The sun was high in the sky, shining down on him from a hole in the canopy above. Trees rustled in a warm breeze that wafted the smell of roasting bacon.