Well of Sorrows (32 page)

And suddenly the wagons were whole, the bodies complete. White lights flared from the forest and then vanished, and with another gasp Colin stopped shoving against the tides of time, letting his head drop.

The world settled, shuddering as it did so. The moaning halted, and normal sounds returned, normal textures and scents. Pine, trampled grass, upturned earth. Horse musk and the stench of fear. The sun beat down on his back, warming his skin from the chill of the passage, and wind tugged at his robes, drying his sweat. Far off, the sounds of a battle raged on the plains, a battle they’d attempted to flee.

Colin closed his eyes, drew in a deep breath, steadied himself . . . And looked up.

Karen’s father lay where he’d fallen, where the Shadows had taken him, the sword he’d tried to use lying useless in the grass beside him. Other bodies lay scattered around the wagon where he and Karen had stood last, and Colin knew there were more behind him. Many more, including his mother and father, both of them on the far side of the wagons, as if they’d been caught trying to flee to the plains. He’d come here, like this, many times, had searched out everyone. Not all of those who had made it this far from Portstown had died here. Some had managed to run outside the Shadow’s reach; some, like Walter, had been chased into the forest; some he’d never been able to find. But everyone of significance was here. His family, his friends.

His chosen.

He pulled himself up,
dragged
himself upright with the staff, adjusting the satchel, and moved to the edge of the wagon, so that he stood over his own crumpled form. He watched as his younger self stared out over the plains, face smeared with tears and dirt and snot, eyes vacant. Empty of everything, body and soul. Karen lay slack in his arms, her dead body across his chest, her head rolled back, throat exposed. Her skin glowed a pale white in the sunlight, the freckles across her nose dark in contrast, her mouth slightly open, her green eyes eerily vivid.

Colin knelt down beside himself, the position awkward with his deadened leg. He reached out a hand, wanting to touch her, to close her eyes, her mouth, to trace the line of her jaw and brush the wild brown hair from her brow one more time. And he
could
touch her, could press his hands against her flesh. He was present—it wasn’t simply a dream; Osserin had assured him of that—but it wasn’t the same. It was a strange half-presence. He wasn’t really there, no matter how much he felt the wind gust against his face, or how visceral the scent of grass or the sounds of the far-off battle. He could feel everything, could sense it, but he couldn’t change any of it. As soon as he thrust himself past that barrier to come here, nothing could be changed.

And yet every time he came, he tried. Partly because Osserin had said that there were some who could touch the past, could manipulate it. But mostly because he couldn’t help himself.

His past self ’s chest hitched, his gaze drifting from the plains upward to the sky, and he withdrew his hand where it hovered over Karen’s face. He watched himself. But unlike all the times before this, the ache in his chest—beneath where the pendant burned against his skin beneath his robes, the blood vow still empty, never claimed—that ache didn’t crush him. It didn’t rise into his throat and cut off his breath, didn’t fill his chest and suffocate him. He felt it, a fist of pain, hard and unforgiving, but it remained contained.

He stood and stepped back from himself, from Karen, a moment before the Faelehgre sped from the forest and began their first frenzied searching of the bodies around the wagons. They flitted from one lifeless figure to the next, their agitation growing. He could hear them clearly now, unlike the echoing half-voices he’d heard back then—another consequence of drinking the Lifeblood according to Osserin. They hovered over Lyda’s body, over the womb that would never bear a child, and Colin swallowed back the same sick nausea he’d felt back then over the Shadow’s gluttonous feeding. They slipped inside the backs of the wagons, where Colin knew they’d find Tobin’s body. He’d never had a chance to escape with his broken legs. They hovered longest over the children—Lissa and her brother, Ron, all the rest—their despair palpable.

And then they discovered that he was still alive.

As the argument over whether or not to save him erupted, Colin wandered away from himself, from Karen, and knelt beside Sam’s body. The mason had died attempting to protect a group of women, had fallen facedown into the grass, his sword beneath him. He desperately wanted to turn Sam’s body over so that he could see the sun, look at the sky, but he couldn’t.

Instead, he stood and wandered among the rest of the fallen: Miriam, the burns from when the dwarren fired the wagons still etched on her skin; Brant, his shoulder bound from where the dwarren arrow had been removed; Barte, the wagon driver; Domonic; and Jackson, the West Wind Trading Company’s representative. Walter had escaped the wagons, but the sukrael had caught him in the forest. Colin had gone back once and watched as they fell on Walter, as they smothered him. They’d been sated by then, had tortured Walter as they’d started torturing Colin, but the Faelehgre had not arrived to save him as they had Colin.

Last, he found his parents. Arten, the Armor y guardsman, lay a short distance away. Arten had tried to hold the Shadows off as Colin’s parents and a few others fled, but the gesture had been useless. The sukrael had cut him down and sped onward without pausing.

His father lay on his side. He’d stumbled when the sukrael took out his leg, had reached for Colin’s mother as they fell on him. His arm was still outstretched. Colin’s mother had made it another few steps, had crumpled to the ground, half curled, her own arm reaching back, her other hand clutching at Diermani’s tilted cross and the vow beneath her shirt.

Crouching down, Colin laid his hand on his mother’s shoulder. The hard fist of pressure in his chest throbbed once, twice, then stilled.

Closing his eyes, Colin crossed himself—head, chest, shoulder, side—and murmured a half-remembered prayer to Holy Diermani, then kissed the back of her hand.

You’ve never done that before.

Colin hadn’t felt Osserin join him in the past, but he didn’t start in surprise. He didn’t even flinch. Instead, he twisted where he crouched and repeated the gesture and prayer for his father, even though his father hadn’t believed in Diermani as devoutly as his mother had. Then he stood.

Why now?
Osserin asked.

“Because . . .” he began. Fumbling, he said, “Because it felt right. My mother deserved it. My father . . . because of her. And because I’m leaving.”

You’ve never been particularly religious.

Colin smiled, his expression wry. “I wasn’t back then either, to my mother’s dismay.” The smile faded. “But it had its place. It still has its place.”

Osserin said nothing, and after a moment, both of them turned to where the dwarren still fought on the plains before the wagons. The battle had shifted, ranging farther to the south and east, leaving only dead and wounded behind. Carrion birds were already gathering.

The birds reminded Colin of the battle he had yet to investigate in the present.

Always, there are battles on these plains. Always, there is blood.

Colin watched the battle that had trapped the wagon train play out before him. “Why?”

Osserin stirred, shifted forward as if to get a closer look
. We don’t know. It’s been this way for hundreds of years, since the dwarren came. And now, with the introduction of the Alvritshai and of man, it’s become worse. Much worse. You’ve seen them. Alvritshai fighting dwarren. Dwarren fighting men. Men fighting Alvritshai. Even dwarren against dwarre, men against men.

On the plains, the dwarren battle shifted, edging farther from the forest, from the wagons and the Faelehgre.

“It’s senseless. Useless.”

It’s the way of man. And dwarren and, to a lesser extent, Alvritshai. It was the way of the Faelehgre once. It still is.

As Colin turned away, troubled, he caught sight of the swirling black spot on his forearm and shuddered.

Are you finished here
? Osserin asked.

Colin considered, then nodded. “Yes. I’m done.”

And with that, he let the pressure of time still pushing against him carry him forward, felt Osserin traveling with him. The plain blurred, time slipping away so fast he couldn’t distinguish anything in its passage, and then it slowed, settling him back into the present. The wagons had vanished, long gone, the bodies with them, including the bodies of the dwarren and their gaezels. They were replaced with the columns of smoke he’d seen when he first emerged from the forest and the clouds of birds rising and settling like a black fog. The battle itself had played out beyond the nearest ridgeline.

Colin watched the smoke a long moment, frowning, thinking of the dwarren battle in the past, of what Osserin had said.

Always, there is battle on these plains. Always, there is blood. “I’ll be back shortly,” he said. Without waiting for a response, he trudged forward, through wet grass, the stalks brushing past his knees. By the time he’d reached the top of the hill, his robes were soaked and cumbersome, tangling with his legs.

But the battlefield beyond pushed all of those petty concerns aside.

“Holy Diermani, save us all,” he whispered, and unconsciously crossed himself again.

The field of dead encompassed the breadth of the plains in sight, bodies fallen near and far, horses and gaezels, men and dwarren. Hundreds of them, thousands, impaled on pikes, pierced by spears, riddled with arrows. Armor glinted in the sunlight, much more extensive armor than he remembered any of the Armory guardsmen using in Portstown, heavier, and more protective. The columns of smoke rose from burning supply wagons. Everywhere he looked the carrion birds flocked, their black feathers glistening in the sunlight, their harsh cries echoing across the distance. They hovered close, dozens trying to settle, disturbing those already gorging themselves, others rising as they were shoved out of the way.

And then the wind shifted, blew toward Colin, and the stench of death—of blood and smoke and scorched earth—doubled him over. He gagged, fell to his knees, and retched into the grass, heaving even when there was nothing left to purge.

When it ended, he rose slowly, wiped his mouth as clean as possible with his sleeve and spat to one side. His stomach continued to roil as he climbed back to his feet. Leaning heavily on his staff, he pushed forward, down the edge of the hill. Carrion crows took reluctant flight as he approached, their protests raucous, only to settle back again as he passed, watching him warily. He ignored them all, focused on the bodies, on the death.

He saw men and dwarren both, covered in blood, the earth soaked in it, churned to mud by the passage of the horses and the army. A man with blond hair—his eyes wide and empty, staring up at the sun—lay alone, his chest gaping where a spear had punched into his heart. A few paces beyond, bodies were stacked one on top of the other, thrown there haphazardly, arms and legs askew. An arrow had taken an older man in the throat, one hand still clutching the shaft loosely; another had been slashed as if with a dagger. A few had been trampled into the earth, their faces squashed into the mud, already half buried. Row after row, body after body, arms severed, legs crushed, heads caved in on one side.

And scattered among the men were the bodies of the dwarren. Like the dwarren Colin remembered, they wore long tangled beards, braided with beads in complex patterns. Most had pierced noses and ears with fine chains running from nostril to lobe, a sign of their status in the tribe and their standing in the army. They wore armor, heavier than Colin remembered, like the men, but some of them carried swords and axes; they’d used only spears and arrows when they’d attacked the wagons. He recognized a few of the tribes by the bands of iron around their wrists or farther up on their forearms: Thousand Springs Clan . . . and Silver Grass.

Colin continued deeper into the field, trying to breathe through his mouth, the stench increasing, the bodies growing denser. Horses and gaezels, men and dwarren. They grew thicker, until he was forced to halt because moving forward meant he’d have to step on the dead.

He scanned the near distance, the carrion crows still flocking, their shadow passing over him now, blotting out the sun. “Bold bastards,” he murmured to himself.

Not ten paces away, one dropped from the sky next to another. The one already on the ground flapped its wings and gave a harsh cry of protest, but the other advanced, hopping over the bodies. With a last squawk, the first retreated, taking sudden wing, and the victor settled in to feast. It turned its black gaze on Colin a moment. Then its head darted downward, and after two quick stabs of its beak, it rose, something clutched in its mouth.

An eye.

Colin cried out in outrage, stumbled forward, slipped on the dead and fell as the crow lurched into the sky, wings flapping, its prize held tight. Struggling where he’d fallen, Colin spat a useless curse, his stomach churning again, the taste of vomit still fresh.

And then he looked down.

He’d landed on the bodies of men, their clothes still damp with blood, their flesh soft beneath his hands, the armor chill. But the man he’d fallen on wasn’t really a man. He was just a boy, twelve, with dark hair, a few lighter strands catching the occasional sunlight. His mouth was set in a determined look, gone slack with death, his eyes empty, face rounded. His nose had been broken sometime in the past, but other than that . . .

Other than that, it could have been Colin himself. The Colin he had just seen clutching Karen’s body to his chest.

A shudder passed through Colin’s body, and something gripped his throat. He didn’t lurch upward, didn’t scramble back. The boy’s face, so like his own, held him transfixed, breath caught.

And in that still moment, he realized he’d been asleep, that he’d forced himself into an unnatural slumber in the forest. He’d hidden there from the world, from his parents’ deaths, from Karen’s. He’d willed himself into nonexistence, living off the Well, off the Lifeblood, smothering himself in his grief, just as Osserin and the other Faelehgre had said.