[Narrowing Path 00] - The Cruel Path

by Normoyle, David J.

  “We should make them pay,” Sorani said.

  “No.” Frodan sat up on the bed. “They didn’t mean to hurt me. It was meant to be a joke.”

  “They must have spent days planning this. All of them were in on it.” Sorani’s voice trembled. “We did nothing to them, and they made us choose which of us to die. I don’t believe they didn’t know about the poison.” He thumped his fist against the headboard, rattling it hard.

  I saw Sorani differently that day. He’d always been little Sorani, the baby among us. I didn’t expect to see so much anger and forcefulness inside someone so young.

  “Sorani’s right.” I didn’t think Grayer knew about the poison; I could still clearly remember his reaction when Frodan had stumbled, but he should have made sure the Paradise Giver was clean, at the very least. And Arion I wasn’t sure about—he could have known.

  “No,” Frodan insisted. “I’m the one who was poisoned, and I say no.” He raised his hand to forestall an objection from Sorani. “Hear me out. We have many more years before we start the Green Path proper. No point in beginning it early.”

  “We can’t just let this stand,” Sorani insisted.

  “This is what we’ll do,” I said. If there were no repercussions, what was to stop Grayer and the other boys from doing something like this again? “We’ll tell them that we’ll forget what happened this once. But if any of us gets harmed again, they’ll have all three of us to deal with next time.”

  “Sounds good.” Frodan held out his hand. I gripped it and Sorani put his hand on top of our two.

  “And next time this happens, I’ll call out my name to save you,” Sorani said. “I swear it.”

  Frodan laughed. “There won’t be a next time.”

  “Nevertheless,” I said, “you put yourself at risk for us and we won’t forget it. If anything like this happens again, it’ll be Sorani’s turn, or my turn, to step forward and save you.”

  We gripped each other’s hands tighter. I think that image will be the last one I see before I die. The three of us, clasping hands and swearing to die for each other. We were young and innocent.

  Chapter 3

  If that incident forged us together, it was a different one that shaped and directed us. The ascor don’t generally help those who walk the Path, before or after, so we were lucky. Our usual wandering had brought us to the rooftop that day, and mischief made us interrupt the old ascor called Ernard.

  “I dare you,” I said to Sorani.

  He hesitated then began to creep forward. It was a game we sometimes played, to try and touch one of the servants without being noticed. We generally stayed away from ascor, so I was surprised that Sorani even accepted my dare. But Ernard was sleeping in a chair with his tea going cold beside him, so there didn’t seem much risk. Frodan, beside me, watched with wide eyes.

  Sorani reached the old man without incident, brushed his fingers against the ascor’s robe, and turned to give a smile of triumph.

  Then there was a blur of motion and the next thing I knew, Sorani was lying on the ground with the ascor’s hand around his throat.

  “Don’t expect to catch an ascor unawares,” he said to Sorani. “Might as well tell the other two to come out.”

  I had no idea how he knew Sorani was there, never mind us, but Frodan and I stepped from our hiding place.

  “Let my brother go,” I demanded.

  “Brother, eh? So you are the three who have declared yourselves brothers.” Ernard released Sorani, who scrambled away. “Come, come, let me see you. I came up here to contemplate the setting of the sun, but I never had much time for scenery-gazing before, and it appears that my recent decision hasn’t changed that.”

  We went to stand in front of Ernard. His white beard had grown long and scruffy and the lines of his skin showed both age and a deep weariness. But Sorani could testify to there being both vitality and speed left in the old body.

  “Did you watch the Greens march out of Lessard Mansion for the start of the Path a few days ago?” Then, before we could answer, he continued: “Of course you did. You are lucky—another six years before your Path; you’ll be older then. It’s the thirteen- and fourteen-year-old Greens that have no chance. Sometimes...” He shook his head. “It is what it is. Tell me something—are you smart?”

  “I am,” I said without hesitation. I was always one of the smartest in my class when we did schooling.

  “That’s good,” he said. “Good to think you’re smart when younger, so you only get to recognize your stupidity when you are as old as me. You understand the Green Path, right? Why does it exist?”

  “Every six years Helion comes,” I said, pointing up into the sky where the giant purple moon was brightening as the sun fell below the horizon. “It pushes the planet closer to the sun, causing the Infernam, when everyone must retreat to the Refuge or die. With limited room in the Refuge, the teenage sons of the ascor have to walk the Green Path. Fifty days before the Infernam, the Greens are sent from their mansions with nothing but the clothes on their backs. They come from each of the four families: the Lessards, the Raines, the Bellangers, the Greniers. At the end of the fifty days, four of them will be selected by the leaders of the families, the four Guardians. Each of the Selects—”

  “Yes, yes, each of the Selects will choose one more. Only eight will survive out of the hundred and fifty or so,” Ernard said. “I didn’t ask what the Green Path was; I asked why it existed.”

  That left me stumped. The Green Path just was, there was no reason for it any more than there was a reason for the sun to come up.

  “As I thought,” Ernard said. “You’re smart enough to know things, but not enough to think for yourself.”

  “The Green Path is a test,” Frodan said.

  Ernard smiled. “That’s closer. Go on.”

  “We have to prove ourselves worthy,” Frodan said.

  “Pssh.” Ernard waved a hand dismissively. “Worthy—what does that mean? You have to prove yourselves valuable. You have to prove yourselves remarkable.”

  “Why are you asking us these questions?” Sorani demanded. “You already know the answers.”

  “What good is me knowing?” Ernard poked a finger in Sorani’s chest and Sorani took a step back and glared at the old ascor. “I don’t need to walk the Path again. You might think you know something—I bet if I first had asked if you understood the Green Path you’d all say you did. But you don’t. Only if you can explain it fully do you really understand it.”

  “Then just tell us,” Sorani said.

  “How does that help you think for yourselves?” Ernard asked. “You thought you could sneak up on me like you sneak up on the servants. What didn’t you think of?”

  I began to see what Ernard was getting at. “You survived the Green Path.”

  “Aha, maybe some potential to think for yourself after all. Go on.”

  “Only the best survive the Green Path,” I said. “The Path exists to ensure that the ascor are the smartest and best out of all the Greens.”

  “Exactly.” Ernard settled back into his chair with a satisfied look on his face. “Arcandis doesn’t need many ascor, but it does need them to be exceptional. Now go, leave me be. The sun is about to set.”

  The last of the sun’s rays were disappearing behind the rooftops and a deep purple gloom was settling down upon them.

  “Could you tell us more?” Frodan asked him. “Give us some help, some guidance.”

  Ernard snorted, then muttered, “I’m getting soft. I can’t bear the thought of putting up with the upcoming heat for the next several weeks. And, for no reason, I felt an urge to help the Greens when they marched out of the mansion a few days ago.”

  He had picked up his tea but he put it down again and looked up at us. “Okay, another few minutes. Tell me of your plans to survive: Wolfling, Shadow, Elect, or Defender?”

  Once again I had no answer for him. I knew what each of them were: Greens who fought to the death in the Eye were
called Wolflings; those who assassinated other Greens were Shadows; Elects were the leaders among the Greens, such as Grayer; and Defenders were those who followed the Elects.

  But it was over six years until my brothers and I had to face the Path—it wasn’t something we needed to think about yet.

  But Ernard’s shake of his head said differently. “It might not be too late if you start now. Could you be Wolflings? Are any of you outstanding in weapon practice? One of the best?”

  We looked at each other. “Well, maybe not the best—” I began.

  “Then the Wolfling’s Path is not for you.” Ernard’s voice was firm. “Only the strongest, fastest, and most skilled have any chance to beat experienced Eye fighters. Could you be Shadows? Could you plan and execute the assassination of a fellow Green? Do you have the stomach for that kind of killing?”

  I had to believe I did. The Path was not for the squeamish. But how could I know until the moment came?

  Ernard laughed. “Look at you.” He pointed at Frodan. “From the sick look on your face, I know you couldn’t be a Shadow. And I have my doubts about the other two. An Elect, then? A Defender?”

  “We are going to work together,” Frodan said.

  That much was true, at least. I put one hand on Frodan’s shoulder and the other one on Sorani’s.

  Ernard looked at us with an amused expression. “I’m not sure that brotherhood is an appreciated value when the Guardians make a selection. Leadership is—that’s why the Selects are allowed to choose a companion, rather than having the Guardians pick two Selects each. But brotherhood...” Ernard shrugged. “Do you understand the ascorim?”

  I was about to say I did when Ernard waved his hand in front of his face. “No, of course you don’t. I’m not sure I fully understand it myself, and I have breathed it for decades. It’s been called the maneuvering for power among the ascor, but it is so much more. The first step to begin to understand it is to wonder at the reason behind every action and every word of an ascor. You haven’t even asked yourselves why I’m helping you, have you? The answer is in that cup of tea.”

  I looked down at the tea in confusion. It was full, and surely cold by now. What could be in there that would induce him to help us?

  “So you want to form a group, just the three of you,” Ernard continued. “Elect and two Defenders, you can figure out who’s who later on. What’s your plan then?”

  I looked to either side, but received blank stares from both Frodan and Sorani. I shrugged my shoulders.

  “Having no idea of how to win comes from not understanding the Path.” Ernard glanced around. The sun was now fully set. “My time is nearly done. You have to focus on something and make a success of it.” He picked up his tea, took a sip, and made a face. “Even with honey, it tastes horrible. I guess that’s why no one does it this way. But I don’t want to go out like everyone else.” He took another sip. “Think about how to prove yourselves valuable. For example, the Lessards concentrate on trading, so one way to impress the Lessard Guardian is to find some profitable trades, make some bargains, do some deals. And start your preparations immediately. You’ll only get one chance at the Path, and the odds are against you.” He took one final long sip of tea, then put down the cup and flapped his hand at us. “Now go, tell one of the servants to come and collect my body in a while.”

  “Thank you,” Frodan said as we left, but I’m not sure he heard us.

  Chapter 4

  Without Ernard’s advice, we wouldn’t have stood a chance. It was probably just a dying whim to him—imparting that information—but for us it was a lifesaver. No one else had taught us what we needed to do.

  For the next six years, we focused on preparing for the Path. We didn’t change our behavior all that much; we still got into trouble for being where we weren’t supposed to be. But now we also listened to what we weren’t supposed to hear, and recorded it all in ledgers. We planned on making money from trading, like Ernard had suggested.

  I wrote about the price of wheat, why stormy seas meant that gemstones increased in value, and what made coffee more valuable per ounce than gold. I wrote about who traded with whom, and which ship captains were reliable and which were drunkards. We recorded everything my brothers and I could learn from snooping around and eavesdropping when the ascor thought they were alone.

  Not everything we learned could be trusted. The ascorim swirled beneath everything, and lies were as common as truth. If Cenarro was telling another ascor that the vegetable crop in the country was poor this year, we had to figure out if he was helping him with the knowledge, if he was lying to set up some kind of trap, or whether there was a deeper motive. The shifting of alliances, the subtle cut and thrust of wordplay, the tactics and stratagems of each ascor had to be taken into account. Who said it and to whom was often more important than the information itself. Sometimes there was more to be learned from a lie than from the truth. As Ernard had warned us, without understanding the ascorim, all we knew was worthless.

  So we collected knowledge, tried to understand it, then burned the records after we had learned all we could. In the days leading up to the start of the Path, we were on double alert to hear as much as possible. The newer the information, the more useful it could be to us. And two days before the start of the Path, we discovered a valuable nugget. We learned that Black Lightning, an aphrodisiac recently popular among the ascor and richer marshals, was made up of simply two parts black pepper and one part nutmeg.

  We investigated further. One small barrel of black pepper could be bought on the wholesale market for two golds, one small barrel of nutmeg for three golds. Three small barrels of Black Lightning cost fifteen golds. We could make our own Black Lightning, undercut the price, and still make a great profit. But we had no hope of getting the initial seven golds to buy the black pepper and nutmeg. The Raine bankers might lend a gold or two to Greens at ridiculous interest rates, but we needed more to buy the spices at wholesale rates. We spent days discussing various options, coming up with schemes. Eventually we hit on a plan. It required timing, nerve, and daring. The most ingenious—but also riskiest—part involved stealing the money from the Black Lightning seller without him ever realizing it. But what better way to get the heart racing and the blood pumping? To walk the Green Path meant to embrace risk.

  Any overall strategy we attempted would have one large flaw. If we succeeded, one of us would be a Select, and one a Chosen. There was no possible way for all three of us to win a place in the Refuge. But at the start of the Path, the chances of even two of us surviving were so small that it wasn’t worth talking about that scenario. We concentrated on what was directly in front of us.

  So when the Path began, we had a clear purpose and began to implement our plan. We’d accumulated small sums of money over the years, and had hidden it in a few cubbyholes around the city, ready for the Path. One of the cubbyholes had been plundered and was empty, but the other two contained several silvers each. This was enough to buy the few small things we needed to get started.

  We found an abandoned house not far from the merchant quarter. Empty houses are common in Arcandis, so finding a suitable place was not difficult. It was a mess, though, so it took several days to clean it and set it up the way we wanted. But with three brothers working side by side, laughing and joking with each other, the hard work was enjoyable.

  The place we chose had three rooms. The front room faced a busy road, and the back room opened out onto a narrow alleyway, and we outfitted both of them like the shops of successful merchants. Or as close as possible without having any money to buy merchandise or furnishings. A third room, between our separate shopfronts, was to be used as our warehouse and was key to our plan.

  We drew straws for which room and role to take in our scheme, and I drew the middle room. So I waited in the dim light while Sorani and Frodan went out to persuade the buyer and seller to come to us. My thoughts raced, trying to plan for everything that could go wrong. Unfortunately, there we
re too many things that were out of control. Even getting the buyer and seller to our store was uncertain. So when I heard voices in the front room, I rushed to the adjoining door to listen. Frodan’s job was to bring Greft, a spice wholesale seller, with his nutmeg and black pepper.

  “Welcome to the new store,” came Frodan’s voice. “It’s not much now, but we have great hopes. Thanks so much for coming to me.”

  “Well, you didn’t give me much choice,” Greft said. “You offered me generous terms then insisted I come all the way over to your store.” He looked around. “Though you were being charitable calling this a store. This better not be some trick.”

  I kept my ears strained for the sound of voices from the back room. Sorani and the Black Lightning buyer were late. We needed to do simultaneous deals—that was at the heart of our plan.

  “No trick,” Frodan assured him. “We need to run a small test on your spices to be sure it’s what we need. I have two vials, so if I could just get samples from you...”

  I almost stepped in to try and delay Frodan. If we took a sample and the buyer didn’t come, then this was all for nothing and Greft would never agree to another trade with us.

  “You can have your samples, but I don’t have all day,” Greft said.

  “My brother should be here in a moment. I apologize for the lack of tea,” Frodan said. “We are new to business, but that’s no excuse. I asked for tea to be ready for you.”

  Frodan was clearly trying to delay Greft. I rushed over to the door of the back room to make sure there was no one there, then returned to listen to Frodan, twisting my fingers together.

  “I don’t care about the Helion-cursed tea,” Greft said. “Do you want to test the samples or not?”

  I heard a noise from the direction of the back room. There wasn’t time to be sure that Sorani had brought the Black Lightning buyer, so I strode into the front room just as Greft was turning away.