Chapter One

Beyond the marshlands the sun was a ruddy orb sinking into the trees. Clouds scudding across the pale indigo sky turned gilded bellies to the west, reflecting the last rays of sunlight toward the frozen ground.

At the close of afternoon lessons, a silent line of novices walked solemnly across the courtyard of Rieschelhold, famed school for the healing arts. The line of first-termers was led by an older, gawky boy in the long, medium blue robe of a disciple. Sauntering at the very end of the line, Caelan E’non cast a wary eye around for proctors and lagged back until he could step behind a stack of cider kegs near the wall.

No one seemed to notice his disappearance. Grinning to himself, Caelan crouched low in his hiding place and waited impatiently for the courtyard to clear. The stone blocks at his back were very cold, and he had no cloak or mittens. Sucking in his breath, he tucked his hands in the wide sleeves of his grubby novice robe and felt content. This was freedom, tiny moments stolen at every opportunity to escape the tedium of his life here.

Tonight the serfs seemed slower than usual in finishing their chores. Drumming his fingers on his knees, Caelan listened to the cadenced sounds coming from the road outside the walls and mentally urged the serfs to hurry.

Finally the cobbles were swept clean of straw, mud, and leaves. The women hastened to finish gathering the laundry, and the carts holding apple baskets from the harvest were rowed up neatly along a wall. Even the well rope had to be coiled neatly over the crossbar. Nothing could be left undone or untidy, lest it attract the mischief of the wind spirits that blew at night.

Already the breeze was picking up, sweeping down even into Caelan’s hiding place. Pine-scented and frosty, the air held a promise of snow.

He shivered and didn’t care. The serfs were gathering the last of their tools and heading for the hall. From the tower, the Quarl Bell began to toll the first of its nine solemn counts, calling all inhabitants of Rieschelhold indoors to safety.

The sound of the bell made Caelan crouch forward.

Everyone would hurry now to get inside. It was the best part of the day. Besides, if his absence hadn’t been noticed by now, it was unlikely to be. He had to stay after class so often for punishment drills that his fellow novices wouldn’t even notice his failure to show for washing up.

He’d be inside by darkfall, and at the table for supper. The proctors counted heads at supper and made a bed check at lights out. The rules here were strict, but the ironclad routine made it easy to dodge most of what he really wanted to avoid. He just had to pick the right moments.

Like now.

Scooting past the cider kegs, he dashed for the steps leading up to the ramparts of the wall. Bending double, he scuttled along below the crenellations until he reached the open-topped lookout turret near the main gates.

Inside the circle of brick, he could not be seen from the courtyard.

Grinning broadly, Caelan flung himself at the sloped tip of a crenellation and balanced there on his stomach with his toes barely touching the ground.

From up here he had sweeping views of the surrounding marshlands and forest. A place of evil mists said to shelter wind spirits and the evil spawn of the shadow gods, the marshlands were mysterious and forbidden. Even now, a dank fog could be seen rising above them, gilded on top by the sunset. The sky was tinted a muted gold, with streaks of coral and indigo. Winter geese flew overhead in a ragged V formation, calling plaintively. The wind nipped bitterly at his uncovered ears and blew his hair into his eyes, but he didn’t mind.

He was in time to see the soldiers.

All day he’d been obliged to do his chores and work at his lessons, while in the distance came a steady tramping of feet along the imperial road that passed beside Rieschelhold. Word had passed among all the boys—imperial troops were marching home from the border wars.

None of the masters would release classes even for a few minutes so the boys could see the army. Rieschelhold clung to its routine no matter what the rest of the world did. But alone of all the students, Caelan refused to miss this opportunity.

Now, at last, he saw them, and it was a sight worth the risk of lingering out here past the forbidden hour.

The fading sunlight reflected off the burnished spear tips of more men than Caelan could count.

His mouth dropped open at the sheer size of the army. They filled the road, as far as the eye could see in either direction, marching ten men abreast. Never in his life had he seen so many. And they had been marching by all day.

Caelan drew in a slow breath of wonder. It must be the entire eastern force—three legions at least, perhaps more. Eighteen thousand fighting men and their officers. A force larger than the town population of nearby Meunch. Staring at the sight, Caelan’s spirits slowly sank. Was the war over? As long as he could remember, his dream had been to join up and become a warrior in the service of the emperor. Right now the war involved fighting off the heathen Madruns who were overrunning the eastern borders of the empire.

Caelan’s fists clenched on the wall. The war just had to last until he could be a part of it.

But it couldn’t be over. The bells would be ringing if there had been victory. And the standard-bearers on horseback still carried banners and legion emblems, so there hadn’t been a defeat. These men must have been replaced with fresher troops, although none had marched east on this road.

Still, to see an entire army—even a small one—real and entire ... Caelan leaned out farther over the edge of the wall, absorbing every detail of these men who were his heroes.

Silent and grim, the veterans looked battle-worn and tired. They trudged along, crusted with mud and frost. Some of them wore bloody bandages, but not many. He knew army regulations separated wounded men from sound troops.

All the foot soldiers wore winter-rusted mail and tattered cloaks. Few were clean-shaven. Besides the long spears, they were armed with two standard army daggers each—barbed blades that were nearly as long as Caelan’s arm. A regiment of archers passed by next, clad in tunics of imperial red and winter fur leggings. These men were tall and mostly blond. Their longbows were slung over their shoulders, and each man carried four quivers.

Officers and cavalry, however, were the most flamboyant. They wore polished armor breastplates beneath their red cloaks and had leopard skin saddlecloths. Booted and spurred, with mail leggings and armored knee and elbow protectors fitted with wicked spikes, they wore mail cowls, and their helmets dangled on straps from their saddles. Their curved swords had crooked hilts for one-handed fighting. War axes and spiked clubs also hung from their belts. Their massive war chargers—also armored—made ordinary horses look like mere ponies.

The hoofbeats of the trotting chargers on the stone road rumbled like constant thunder, a glorious sound that made Caelan’s heart beat faster.

At that moment he would have given anything to go with them.

“Caelan! Here you are.”

Startled, Caelan slid off the wall and turned around.

For a split second he saw only the long robe of a disciple, and with disgust he knew he was in for more demerits. Then the boy stepped out of shadow.

Caelan let out his breath in relief. “Oh, it’s you. Well met, Cousin Agel.”

Black-haired and blue-eyed, Agel was a slim, handsome boy who always looked neat and well dressed. Unlike Caelan, he never slept in his robe. He never used it to dust his room. He never knotted up stolen apples and cheese in it, using it as a makeshift haversack on outings.

Agel was townbred, unlike Caelan who had grown up in a country hold. His father was a merchant and a wealthy man. As a result Agel possessed a level of sophistication Caelan had always envied. Agel was poised and well mannered around adults, who thought him incapable of the pranks he could think up. When he laughed, he had a pair of dimples and a charming twinkle in his eye. He could sweet- talk any cook into slipping him extra food for a growing boy.

But right now as he stood there with his fists on his hips, he wore a frown instead of a smile. “Are you deaf tonight?” he asked. “The Quarl Bell has rung.”

Disappointment crashed into Caelan. He thought Agel had come to share this moment with him like old times.

“Did you hear the bell?”

“Yes,” Caelan said with a shrug. “What of it?”

Agel blinked. “You know very well—”

“Careful! You’d better run for hall before you get a mark and spoil your perfect record.”

Agel’s frown deepened. “I was upstairs in the hall of studies when I saw you sneak off. I came to bring you in before you ruin yourself. You can’t risk another—”

“Never mind.” Caelan grinned and beckoned. “You’re in time. Come look.”

Agel shook his head, but Caelan caught him by the front of his robe and pulled him over to the wall.

“Look at them!” Caelan said. “Did you ever see anything like it?”

Agel gave the troops a quick glance and turned away immediately. “They’ll probably loot and burn Meunch on their way through.”

“No, they won’t!” Caelan said, disappointed in his reaction. “They’re heroes. I’ve dreamed of the chance to see a fighting force this large.”

“Well, now you have. Come, let’s go before the proctors catch us.”

Caelan sighed. His cousin used to be fun, always ready for mischief, eager to join in any adventure. But since coming here to study healing, Agel had turned into a dullard. It was as though he’d checked his sense of humor and fun at the gate when he took his matriculation oath. This term, he’d advanced a grade to disciple, and he was more pompous than ever before.

Hooking his elbows over the wall, Caelan turned his back to Agel. “Go on, then. Sit in hall and eat your stew while Master Umal delivers another boring lecture on philosophy. I’m staying out here until it’s too dark to see anything.”

“You’re mad!” Agel said angrily. “It’s too dangerous, especially in winter hours. The wind spirits—”

“Silly old superstitions,” Caelan said, keeping his gaze stubbornly on the troops.

Agel slapped his back, and Caelan flinched and whirled around. “Don’t!”

“You still have bruises from the last beating the proctors gave you,” Agel said, glaring at him. “Why don’t you ever learn?”

“Learn what?” Caelan retorted, angry now. “To fold my hands and practice severance until my eyes cross? To recite passages that are so dull I can’t say them without yawning? What’s the point of it?”

“You know,” Agel said in a low, disapproving voice. “Or maybe you don’t. You’ve acted like a child ever since you came here.”

“I hate it here!” Caelan cried. “Last term you complained as much as I did.”

“But I advanced, and you didn’t. You’re at the bottom of the novice class in ranking. For shame, cousin! You’re already on academic probation. If you fail again, that will be the end of your studies here.”

“Good,” Caelan said stubbornly, hating this lecture. “Then I’ll be free.”

“How can you talk so? Rieschelhold offers the best training in the empire. To be a healer with any kind of reputation, you—”

Caelan scowled. “I don’t want to be a healer.”

“Nonsense. Of course you do.”

“I don’t!”

“You have to be!”

“Why?” Caelan shot back. “Because my father’s one?”

“Of course.”

Caelan spat over the wall in the soldier’s way of insult, and Agel’s eyes narrowed with disapproval.

“You don’t mean any of this,” Agel said. “It’s time you grew up and started acting your age.”

Caelan sighed. He would be seventeen next month, which meant he was one year short of being able to legally defy his father, one year short of residing under a roof of his own choosing, one year short of breaking his apprenticeship, one year short of taking himself out of school, one year short of living as and how he chose.

“I get enough lectures from the masters,” Caelan said angrily. “I don’t need any from you.”

Agel glared back. “I’ve tried to let you walk your own path, but how can I call myself your friend and kinsman if I let you throw this away? This place is so pure, so special. It’s—”

“It’s smothering me!”

Consternation filled Agel’s face. “You’ve known since childhood you would train here as your father trained, following in his footsteps. Why didn’t you protest earlier if you really didn’t want this?”

“I did. You know that.”

Agel shook his head. “If you really want something else, you could have insisted. I did with my father, and he listened to me. Otherwise I’d be working in the counting house instead of studying here.”

Caelan couldn’t believe Agel was saying this. It was like he’d forgotten those summers when he’d visited E’nonhold. “You know Beva. He hears only what he wants to. Nothing I’d ever said has made the least difference to him.”

“Well, if you told him you wanted to be a soldier I’m not surprised he ignored you.”

Caelan bristled. “What’s wrong with soldiering?”

Agel threw him a scornful look. “Spend your life tramping hundreds of miles and being bullied, for what? For the chance to be speared by a heathen wearing tattoos and a breechclout?”

“I would see the world,” Caelan said, his dreams turning his gaze back to the ribbon of soldiers marching into the gloom. A trumpet sounded in the far distance, mournful and low. The sound made him shiver. “I would serve the emperor. I would have honor—”

“More honor in taking lives than in saving them?” Agel sounded genuinely horrified. “I thought you would grow out of this foolishness, but you’re worse than ever.” He threw out his arms, making his wide sleeves bell. “We are in the very place most devoted to the preservation of life, and all you can think about is killing. It’s a defilement—”

“Oh, shut up,” Caelan growled. “You sound like Master Hierst. It’s not like that. You’re twisting everything.”

“Am I? Or are you? How can you glorify a profession devoted to slaughter? Yes, in the name of the emperor,” he added scornfully as Caelan tried to protest. “And does that justify it?”

“Careful,” Caelan warned him stiffly. “You’re close to treason.”

Agel sniffed. “Your father has dedicated his life to helping people, to alleviating suffering, to saving lives whenever possible. He has honored the gods who gave him the gift of healing. What about you, Caelan? What are you going to honor? Bloodshed and pillage?”

Caelan’s face flamed hot. He had never heard Agel so cutting, so contemptuous. “You sound like you’d rather worship my father than the emperor.”

“Uncle Beva is worthy of everyone’s admiration,” Agel said. “Yours most of all.”

“I’m not like him!” Caelan cried. “I’m not ever going to be like him. I used to think you understood that. Now you sound just like everyone else.”

“I’ve grown up,” Agel said coldly. “You haven’t.”

His scorn hurt. Caelan glared at him, trying not to let it show. “You used to be on my side,” he said softly, struggling to hold his voice steady.

“I still am. If I didn’t care about you, I wouldn’t be out here now, risking a demerit to save you another beating.”

Caelan snorted to himself, almost wanting to laugh except it hurt too much. “There was a time when you wouldn’t have cared about demerits.”

“You’re right,” Agel said quietly, almost with pity. “I wouldn’t have cared. I would have probably raced you up here and we could have stayed out until we froze in the cold, daring each other to risk an attack of the wind spirits.

Caelan laughed. “That’s more like it.”

“But I have enough sense these days to know that’s stupid,” Agel went on, still in that same quiet voice. “I have my future to think about, and the way I want to spend my life. I’m an adult now, not a boy. I want to be a healer, because it is good work and helpful work. It gives something back to the world. I admire Uncle Beva more than anyone else I know, and I’m grateful to his kindness in seeing that I was allowed to enroll here. I’ve had to work hard and prove myself worthy of that admittance, while you—you have it as a birthright. That’s why it makes me so angry when I see you throwing your opportunity away.”

“And it makes me angry when you refuse to see my side of things,” Caelan answered. “I am not Beva. I will never be him, no matter how much everyone wants me to be. All my life I’ve had to follow around in his shadow, hearing about his skill, his gifts, his success, his fame. I’m sick of it!”

“Are you jealous of him?” Agel asked in astonishment.

“No! I’m just tired of being expected to measure up to what he is. As though anyone could ever come close to him.”

“But he’s the greatest healer in Trau.”

Caelan shut his eyes.

“More than that. His fame spreads beyond this province,” Agel said eagerly. “He could go all the way to Imperia if he chose. An appointment as court physician would be—”

“My father doesn’t want that. He’s only interested in living in severance,” Caelan said bitterly. “No fame. No fortune.”

“He is a good man.”

“He’s cold and unfeeling!” Caelan burst out. “Damn you, why have you started worshiping him like this? You used to think he was as strict as—”

“But since I started studying here, I understand severance.” Agel folded his hands in his wide sleeves and hunched himself against the cold. It was nearly dark now, and the soldiers could only be heard on the road. They marched in unnerving silence—the brutal force of the emperor evident and thrilling. “It is a total philosophy of life,” Agel said. “It is completion.”

Caelan rolled his eyes. Everything angry and rebellious in him rose up, roaring inwardly against hearing any of it again. “It’s not for me.”

“You must learn to accept it if you are to heal.”

“I don’t want to heal,” Caelan said in exasperation. “Why can’t you accept that?”

“Because it’s in you.”

“It’s in my father, not me!”

“But you have the gift. You are his blood. He tested you and said you could sever. I remember when he did it.”

“The ability to do something doesn’t mean it’s my destiny,” Caelan said. “I know they teach that here, but you don’t have to believe everything they say.”

“The ways that are taught here are good ways,” Agel said.

“But they aren’t the only ways,” Caelan argued. He saw no change in Agel’s expression and sighed. “What’s the use? You’ve turned to stone, just like the masters here. You’re becoming exactly like my father.”

A smile dawned across Agel’s face. “Really?” he asked in delight. “You really think so?”

Disgust filled Caelan. Without answering, he shouldered past Agel and headed down the steps to the courtyard.

Agel followed close on his heels, and in silence they hurried toward the hall.

In the gloom and quiet of evening, the courtyard had an eerie, deserted feel. Light glowed warm from the narrow window slits in the buildings, and the air smelled of peat smoke. The wind still blew sharp and bitterly cold, knocking old snow off the roofs in soft drifts of white.

No one was supposed to be abroad by the last stroke of the Quarl Bell. All residents of the hold had to be indoors before nightfall, safe within the warding keys and secured from the wind spirits that hunted during the long winter darkness. Which, Caelan thought to himself, was only an elaborate way of enforcing a strict curfew.

It seemed that everything at Rieschelhold was buried under an endless series of rules. Living here was like dying a slow death. Caelan hated the tall stone walls, hated the confinement, the serenity, the order, the iron routine that never varied. At home he could always find a way to escape his tutors. He lived for wild gallops across the glacier, his horse’s mane whipping his face, the icy wind whistling in his ears. The mountains, the sweeping views of the top of the world, the endless sky. And at night, the breathtaking display of colors from the light spirits.

That was living.

But here, in the marshy lowlands, the winters were bleak and rainy and the summers were hot and insect-riddled. Beautiful days were wasted cramped inside classrooms. The joy of life, the urge, the passion were all driven away in favor of severance, which meant to be cold, aloof, detached, emotionless, and dead as far as he was concerned.

Caelan tipped back his head to look at the starry sky. His heart ached for freedom. But even if he sent for the scrivener and wrote another letter to his father, begging for release, it would be a waste of time. Beva E’non wanted his only son to be a healer; therefore, the son would be a healer. Close of subject.

Accept it, Caelan told himself as he and Agel crunched across gravel, then reached the cobblestones. Grow up and do as you’re told.

But even when he forced himself to concentrate and really tried to do his lessons, his heart wasn’t in the work. He wasn’t a scholar, never had been. And always in the back of his heart gnawed the question of what kind of healer he would be. How could he cure anyone? How could he reach the depth of empathy necessary to sever illness and suffering from the lives of his father’s patients?

Ahead, from the side yard, a shadow suddenly emerged from the darkness. Long-robed and hooded in cerulean blue, it carried a long rod of yew carved with the faces of the four wind spirits. Its left hand was held aloft, and upon its palm glowed a pale blue flame not of fire. It saw the boys and paused, then headed toward them.

Dragging in a breath of exasperation, Caelan stopped so quickly Agel bumped into him from behind.

Agel’s breath hissed audibly. “Gault have mercy on us.”

Caelan turned his head. “Run,” he whispered. “Take the passage by the stables and slip into the hall of studies through the side door. It’s always open at this hour for Master Mygar.”

Beside him, Agel was tense with alarm. “But the proctor—”

“Shut up and go! I have so many demerits another won’t hurt me. Just go.”

As he spoke, Caelan gave Agel a shove. Ducking his head, Agel shuffled away; then abruptly he broke into a run and vanished from sight.

The proctor veered that way and lifted its staff, but Caelan stepped into its path.

“I have permission to be out after Quarl Bell,” he lied loudly.

Proctors did not split their attention well and tended to confront whatever was closest. Figuring this out had enabled Caelan to avoid them many times. But now he danced nervously across the path of the proctor a second time as it tried to look in the direction Agel had gone.

The proctor finally turned its hooded head back to Caelan and pointed its staff.

Caelan backed up warily. That staff could strike with lightning speed to enforce the hold’s many rules. He had the bruises to prove it.

“Master Mygar released me from late drills for an errand,” he said quickly. “I’m to report back to him after supper.”

The proctor, its face unseen within the depths of its hood, stared at Caelan in grim silence. Extending its left hand, it cast the truth-light at him.

His heart sank, but he knew better than to flinch.

The light flowed over him from the top of his head and spread slowly down. Caelan scarcely breathed and kept his lie uppermost in his mind, visualizing old Master Mygar with his food-stained robe and toothless gums.

The pale blue light flowed over him in a shimmering glow. At first its color did not alter, indicating the truth had been told. Caelan began to hope he might get away with this.

Then the light faded to sickly yellow.

Caelan gulped but resigned himself. All this meant was a couple of stout blows and no supper tonight. The black mark would go on his record, and tomorrow he’d have extra drills from Master Mygar for lying. Unpleasant, but easy enough to endure when he had to.

The proctor stretched forth its left hand again, and the light spread from Caelan’s feet, then gathered itself into a tight ball and returned to the proctor’s palm. The proctor swept its rod aside, gesturing for Caelan to pass.

Disbelieving, for an instant Caelan thought he was being allowed to go. He grinned and hurried past the proctor, but a faint whistle in the air warned him of his mistake.

The blow slammed across his back with a force that drove him to his knees. Streaks of black and red crossed his vision. He wheezed and could not draw in air. His back felt as though it had been broken in half. Wrapped in agony, Caelan sagged forward onto his palms.

The staff struck him again, knocking him flat. His cheek scraped on the cobblestones, a tiny flare of pain beneath the immense agony in his back. He coughed and choked, still unable to drag in any air.

Just when he began to panic, his lungs started working again. He drew in another breath, then another, although each one caused pain to stab through his back. It was too hard to get up so he lay there, fighting back tears, too angry and proud to let the proctor see how badly it had hurt him.

The proctor glided around him in a silent circle. From where he lay, Caelan could see that the proctor’s feet did not quite touch the ground. Instead it floated ever so slightly in the air. Caelan swallowed hard and closed his eyes. He and another novice had a bet on whether the proctors walked. Right now, winning Ojer’s quarterly allowance didn’t seem very important. Caelan felt too gray and clammy to care about anything except that it was over. In a moment he’d manage to get to his feet, then he’d be confined to his quarters without supper. No loss, the way he felt right now.

The tip of the proctor’s staff struck the ground a scant inch from the tip of his nose. Startled, Caelan jerked open his eyes.

The proctor bent over him. Truth-light rolled down the length of the staff, making it glow. Caelan thought he saw the carved faces of the wind spirits shift and grimace.

Gasping in alarm, he jerked himself up to a sitting position and winced with pain.

“You fear no wind spirits. You mock the rules of protection,” the proctor said, its voice hollow and not quite real. “You meet wind spirits.”

“No,” Caelan said in growing unease. He held up his hands and scrambled to his knees. “I’ve learned my lesson. Honest. Don’t—”

“More lies,” the proctor said sternly. It lifted the glowing staff over its head and swung it in a circle.

A gust of wind swirled around Caelan, dumping snow down his collar and making him shiver.

“Tonight you meet the wind. You learn.”

The proctor turned, but Caelan reached out in desperation and gripped the hem of its robe.

The cloth was scorching hot. With a cry, Caelan released it and shook his singed fingers.

“You can’t leave me outside all night,” he said in protest. “I’ll freeze to death.”

“Then lesson will be learned.” Without looking back, the proctor glided away and left him kneeling on the cold cobblestones.