Assassin's Apprentice

by S. R. Vaught; J. B. Redmond

  You tried to take them into the woods, to hide them away, but here—Aron paused next to the burned husk of his family’s wagon—here, the axle broke because of the rough terrain.

  A little farther into the woods, he discovered the carcass of the old ox. And here, the ox gave out, and you cut its throat to quell its suffering.

  Aron knew if he was following his family’s tracks so easily, guardsmen would have had little difficulty doing the same, especially when the trail was fresh. Wolf Brailing knew how to disguise his movements, but a wife, six sons, and two daughters did not.

  So it was that Aron was only mildly surprised to discover the partially burned bones of his family, piled together in a clearing, chevilles still attached to their skeletal ankles.

  Though he knew what he was seeing was only an image, only a reflection of what lay on the “normal” side of the Veil, Aron reached out and brushed his fingers against the bones of the tiniest hand. Then a larger bone that might have been his mother’s wrist, protruding from the pile.

  At least they seemed peaceful enough in posture, as if they were all dead before their bodies had been stacked and burned and mingled.

  Had they understood what had happened when they rose as manes and fled mindless and hungry down the byway toward where he waited? Had they known even a moment of awareness?

  The rage inside Aron bred more rage and more, until the feeling seemed to grow teeth and claws of its own to dig out of his consciousness and eat the world.

  He let his hands wander across the smooth and grooved bits of his brothers, his sisters, his parents. Something nudged at his awareness, something out of place or not quite right, but beyond the obvious horror of seeing them all dead but still banded, undispatched, their spirits doomed to rise so terribly, he couldn’t grasp what his enhanced senses were trying to tell him.

  All he knew for certain was that this sight would live in his mind forever.

  He would etch it there, his own private world-carved-over-the-world.

  He would let this image guide him this day, and every day to follow.

  My promise—no, my oath—to you, he thought, drawing back his hand even though he didn’t want to surrender the contact.

  Time was passing.

  Time was running out, and he wanted—needed—to act now, with this picture fixed firmly over his other thoughts.

  Aron gave himself over to the clawed thing inside him, that thing made of fury and single-minded vengeance, and left his family behind.

  This time, he moved much faster. East, then north. East, then north.

  In due time, Aron saw little ginger-haired Raaf Thunderheart and the Stone Brothers who took him away from his family, riding hard along the Brailing Road below. The boy was awake now, face bruised, eye swollen closed. He clung to the waist of one of the Brothers as they galloped down the Brailing Road, horses’ hooves kicking up stones as they hammered around curves and over small smells. The Brother he was riding with carried a flaming torch, just enough light to cast off the growing shadows on the byway. The other Stone Brother carried the Harvest prize, but that boy was too busy clinging to the horse’s neck to offer much resistance.

  Aron moved on, still hoping for the best for Raaf, though that hope was distant now, just a shapeless blob, nothing in size against Aron’s thickly clotted anger.

  He shifted the force of his own will once more, north another fraction. Then west, a smaller fraction.

  And finally, finally saw a clump of soldiers who looked to be guardsmen. Their banners bore the yellow and sapphire blue of Dyn Brailing, and their shields carried the symbol of the ruling seat of his former dynast—the head of an eagle with its wide, all-seeing eye.

  Was this Lord Brailing’s rear guard?

  Aron ground his teeth, or rather the essence of his teeth, but it felt real enough.

  Just the sight of that banner, that shield, made the fire in his blood more painful.

  And now the question he hadn’t been able to answer.

  Was it possible to strike at people from the other side of the Veil?

  In moments, Aron would know the answer to that question, no matter what it might cost him.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  ARON

  Aron knew all too well that he could hurt someone who had gone through the Veil with him, or anyone whose essence hovered near his own. He had hurt Dari and Stormbreaker, the only two people now left in Eyrie that meant anything to him.

  And they believe it’s wrong, using my mind-talents to harm someone else, except under threat, to defend my own life in case of attack.

  Below Aron’s awareness, the Brailing guardsmen went about making their camp safe for the night, oblivious to rock cats prowling nearby, and even some mocker foxes and hoards of rats displaced by village fires. They were certainly oblivious to Aron, too, and his vengeful intentions, or they’d be drawing swords to defend themselves.

  Stormbreaker had insisted Aron should use his graal only to defend himself from an immediate threat, if at all.

  Lord Brailing’s Dynast Guard wasn’t attacking him now.

  But wouldn’t they set upon him soon enough, if they found him?

  He brought forth the image of his family’s bones to answer his own question.

  If Lord Brailing or anyone loyal to him realized Aron had escaped the slaughter along the Watchline, the soldiers would hunt him until they killed him, too. He was within bounds and ethics to see to his own safety.

  So why did this line of reasoning seem shabby to the point of being threadbare?

  Stop it. Just concentrate, and do what you came to do.

  When Aron thought these things, the audible manifestation of the words sounded much like his father’s voice.

  His dead father’s voice.

  Aron took that for an omen that Wolf Brailing would approve of satisfying this blood-debt. If he were alive, he might even help Aron complete the task.

  Besides, what were Aron’s lessons with Dari for, if not to make him more powerful—and ultimately, a better killer, just like his weapons training with Stormbreaker was designed to accomplish?

  Drawing strength from the fresh, vivid picture of his murdered loved ones, and more strength from the memory of his father’s approval when he showed strength and competence, Aron focused on the soldiers and counted them. Close to a hundred—many, but not enough to be the rear guard. Lord Brailing’s dynast army numbered in the tens of thousands, and Aron couldn’t imagine a rear guard any smaller than a few thousand.

  So this was a patrol.

  Perhaps one of the patrols who broke the Watchline.

  The essence of Aron’s fists flexed.

  If he imagined the soldiers dead, if he put enough power behind the thought, would they die?

  No. It’s not that simple. I have to convince them to die. To kill themselves or one another.

  He thought about the example Stormbreaker had given the morning he and Dari first explained Aron’s legacy. A man on a cliff, surrounded by mockers—

  But there weren’t any cliffs here.

  And would the effort Aron exerted trying to plant some dangerous “truth” in the soldiers’ minds kill him, too? It might, he figured. Especially if he tried to take down more than one life force.

  Spilled blood always comes at some cost, Stormbreaker had told Aron only minutes ago. And Dari and his father had taught him that time on the other side of the Veil, simply staying in the altered state of meditation, especially farther and farther through the Veil—such journeys had a cost, too, in energy and health.

  Why hadn’t he thought of these things before?

  So foolish.

  He should have come up with something truly terrifying to “suggest” to the soldiers before he ever crossed through the Veil. But there was nothing for it now. He was here and they were here.

  Aron’s attention shifted back to the rock cats and rats near the soldiers.

  How much would it cost him to stir the animals toward the camp?


  Could he even manage such a feat?

  That might be more fair. At least the guardsmen would have a chance to defend themselves, a fair shot at survival.

  Which is more than they gave my family.

  Aron’s consciousness leaned toward the rock cats, but at the last second, he reeled himself back and cursed to himself.

  This isn’t wrong. Just reach for the rock cats. Imagine something for them to see. A wounded stag, perhaps? Help them imagine the scent of fresh blood. They’ll go into a frenzy, and—

  And—

  And… this is wrong.

  It was all Aron could do not to shout again.

  How could it be wrong? As far as he was concerned, he had a blood-debt owed to him by the entire Dynast Guard of Dyn Brailing, not to mention Lord Brailing himself.

  But Dari and Stormbreaker said this was wrong. The Stone Guild would probably judge it wrong.

  His essence tightened and seemed to hum with frustration inside the “cover” he had established for himself.

  For killers, Stone has damnably many rules about how to take a life.

  The Code of Eyrie contained a law against random murder, but no prohibitions about harming people from the other side of the Veil. The Canon of Stone, however, was a different matter. Aron was pretty sure the last of the six new tenets he had memorized and recited, Libra i’honore—judgment with honor—somehow prohibited what he was considering.

  Yes, that’s what was troubling his mind. That, and his father’s teachings. Kindness, honest labor, honor, and truth. Where was the honor in this? The honest labor? Never mind the kindness, or even the truth.

  I’d be judging these soldiers without a proper reading of charges and sentencing—the justice all of the Judged receive. I’d be executing them without offering them a chance at combat, and the innocent would die with the guilty.

  His entire being twitched with heat, with rage made manifest on the other side of the Veil, barely contained by his cover.

  No soldier carrying the banner of Brailing is an innocent, and they don’t deserve kindness. That much is the truth. And there is honor enough in doing away with murderers.

  Aron gazed at the prowling rock cats again, feeling the blaze of that angry, angry heat covering his body, feeling the claws of his need for vengeance scooping out his guts.

  Suddenly, he was closer to the rock cats, seeing them more clearly, and the cover around his thoughts and essence evaporated. His eyes fixed on the big fangs. The bloodstained paws. He could almost reach out and touch one of the tawny, spotted coats.

  Is it you? called a voice, as loud and sonorous as a bell from a Temple of the Brother. It rang across the Veil like a living thing, snatching hold of Aron and yanking him completely away from the rock cats and the soldiers he had been planning to destroy.

  Wind seemed to strike him from all directions, blowing him upward, sucking him past anywhere he intended to go. He flailed the essence of his hands as if to grab hold of something, anything that might slow his mind-jarring ascent. On the other side of the Veil, there was nothing to hold. It was a place, but not a place. A realm of pure spirit, not substance.

  A pressure formed behind Aron’s eyes, then pain. The essence of his ears filled until he heard nothing but the squeezing thunder of his own heartbeat. Pound and pound and pound, and he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t feel anything but ice forming around him, on him, freezing his toes and fingers until he feared they would snap from his thin arms and legs.

  Here, said the voice, still a boy’s voice, but mingled with a girl’s voice, too.

  Aron stopped so suddenly his guts almost heaved through his eyeballs. He shook his head, tried to clear his mind, loosen the leather bands that seemed to squeeze his ears, and found his essence standing—no, floating … somewhere.

  A tall, beautiful woman in silver robes stood before him. In the nowhere-nothingness Aron now occupied, she seemed so vivid she couldn’t possibly be real. Her blond hair spilled in waves down her shoulders, and her cornflower-blue eyes narrowed as she studied him. Silver light blazed off her skin, laced with what looked like fine strands and shimmers of copper. Aron didn’t know whether to embrace her or cry out in fear of her.

  Goddess…

  The thought blended and swirled through Aron’s mind against his own will, and he barely managed to keep the word inaudible on the other side of the Veil. Guilt stabbed at him as he realized he had just betrayed his own mother’s beliefs about the Brother and the heavens above, but he couldn’t help it.

  Goddess … and yet …

  There was something fearsome in her presence.

  He had never seen one of Dyn Altar’s great white Roc birds, a predator even rock cats and mockers feared, but Aron imagined a Roc’s gaze would look as shrewd and hungry as this woman’s stare.

  With one graceful, terrifying hand, the goddess-monster reached for him.

  Aron let out a shriek and tumbled backward, away from her, flying, spinning, falling, and crying out until—

  Until he was floating again, somewhere too close to the stars and too far from level ground.

  Somewhere on top of the world.

  This time, the figure before him was a large, pale boy with golden curls and eyes so brightly blue they might have been made of sparkling light and pure water. The boy’s skin glowed a brilliant ruby, or rather the essence of the graal that hovered above the boy’s skin like a beacon.

  Snowflakes tumbled around them, imaginary yet real at the same time, and Aron’s teeth chattered. When he looked at his feet to see if he still had his toes, he saw pebbles and rocks and scrub plants he had never seen before, but knew from his father’s descriptions to be mountain vegetation.

  Behind him, there was nothing but a terrifying void, blacker and emptier than any hole Aron could imagine.

  He forced his awareness back to the boy. Where am I? How did I come here?

  Shadows loomed, and Aron thought he could make out a rough travelers’ shelter and a small stable behind the boy. Smoke issued from the shelter’s chimney, shimmering silver puffs in the moonslight, almost overrun by the snow. He couldn’t smell anything at all, or sense anything beyond the bone-shattering cold, and he wondered if that was because he was perceiving his surroundings through the boy’s thoughts instead of his own. Perhaps this was the boy’s method of answering one of his questions—where he was. Perhaps the boy was telling Aron all he knew of his surroundings.

  I was looking for you, the boy said, as if that answered Aron’s other question, about how he arrived. It’s me. It’s Nic. It’s been so long since I’ve seen your glow. Where did it go?

  The boy, who had called himself Nic, smiled and reached out a pudgy white hand, offering it as a dynast noble would, to have the knuckles touched with respect. Aron stared at the ghostly fingers, at the rounded wrist, uncertain of what to do even though he knew from his father’s teaching.

  Nic’s smile faltered, and he lowered his hand slowly back to his side. My apologies if I offended you. I’m not sure why I did that.

  Aron felt too dizzy and enraged at the interruption of his plans to respond.

  I don’t know why we’ve come here, Nic admitted. Perhaps I ran away from my home. Or … flew away. His expression shifted to one of puzzlement, as if he was rifling through his own memory and finding nothing but vague impressions. Yes, that seems closer to the truth.

  Aron pondered in silence for a moment, then shivered as the boy regarded him with those bright blue eyes, the loudest eyes Aron had ever seen save for Stormbreaker’s. That more than anything else calmed the clawing beast inside him, and made him focus on the situation at hand instead of dwelling on the disruption of his plans.

  Will you meet me when I come? Nic asked, quiet and sincere.

  Something in the boy’s demeanor reminded Aron of where he had seen him before, or a boy very much like him. The first night after his Harvest, before the manes attacked—wasn’t this the dying spirit he encountered on the other si
de of the Veil?

  Will you meet me when I come? Nic repeated.

  Aron felt a flicker of surprise. Come where?

  The boy hung his head, and for a moment Aron was painfully reminded of his younger sisters—though he was fairly certain Nic was older than he was. There was something soft about him, yet something strong, too. Something unforgettable.

  Curse him for making me think of my sisters, Aron thought, managing not to broadcast the thought across the Veil where Nic could hear it. He wanted to slap the boy, or grab him and hug him like a younger child. The conflicting urge was untenable, and Aron felt his essence waver.

  I’ll meet you, he said, more to stop Nic’s suffering than anything else, and hoping the boy might let him go, send him back, somehow undo whatever he had done to bring Aron to this place.

  Do you give your oath that you’ll meet me? Nic whispered. Not your promise, but your oath?

  The boy would never stop, never release him if he didn’t answer. Aron knew this deep inside his own instincts, and he felt trapped.

  Give your oath, Nic said again.

  Yes! Aron mind-shouted, just to make the boy turn him loose. Nic flinched away from him as Aron kept ranting. Now go—and let me go!

  The boy’s image vanished, just winked away from Aron like a snowflake that landed in a flame.

  The vague image of the travelers’ shelter wavered and disappeared, along with the weather, the ground, the rocks. Aron realized he was standing in that blacker-than-black void.

  No.

  Not standing.

  Falling!

  He cried out and flailed the essence of his arms.

  Something stung his face once, then twice, drawing quick tears to his eyes.

  Scaly, clawed hands reached into the nothingness and grabbed him, as if the beast inside him had become completely real. The hands yanked him down so hard he was sure every frozen bone in his body—real or spiritual—would splinter when he landed.

  “Little fool!” he heard, and the voice was female, yet not. Deep and growly and so powerful it blasted away all the fullness in his ears.