The Warded Man

Soon after, Elissa joined them in the dining room. Ragen’s servants set a grand table, with bacon and ham and bread smeared with honey, eggs and potatoes and big baked apples. Arlen wolfed the meal down, eager to be out in the city. When he finished, he sat staring at Ragen as he ate. Ragen ignored him, eating with maddening slowness as Arlen fidgeted.

Finally, the Messenger put down his fork and wiped his mouth. “Oh, very well,” he said, rising. “We can go.” Arlen beamed and jumped from his seat.

“Not so fast,” Elissa called, stopping both men short. Arlen was unprepared for the chord the words struck in him, an echo of his mother, and bit back a rush of emotion.

“You’re not going anywhere until the tailor comes for Arlen’s measurements,” she said.

“What for?” Arlen asked. “Margrit cleaned my clothes and sewed up all the rips.”

“I appreciate the sentiment, love,” Ragen said in Arlen’s defense, “but there’s hardly a rush for new clothes now that the interview with the duke is past.”

“This isn’t open to debate,” Elissa informed them, drawing herself up. “I won’t have a guest in our house walking around looking like a pauper.”

The Messenger looked at the set of his wife’s brow, and sighed. “Let it go, Arlen,” he advised quietly. “We’re not going anywhere until she’s satisfied.”

The tailor arrived soon after, a small man with nimble fingers who inspected every inch of Arlen with his knotted strings, carefully marking the information with chalk on a slate. When he was finished, he had a rather animated conversation with Lady Elissa, bowed, and left.

Elissa glided over to Arlen, bending to face him. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?” she asked, straightening his shirt and brushing the hair from his face. “Now you can run along with Ragen to meet Master Cob.” She caressed his cheek, her hand cool and soft, and for a moment he leaned into the familiar touch, but then pulled back sharply, his eyes wide.

Ragen caught the look, and noted the wounded expression on his wife’s face as Arlen backed slowly away from her as if she were a demon.

“I think you hurt Elissa’s feelings back there, Arlen,” Ragen said as they left his grounds. “She’s not my mam,” Arlen said, suppressing his guilt. “Do you miss her?” Ragen asked. “Your mother, I mean.” “Yes,” Arlen answered quietly.

Ragen nodded, and said no more, for which Arlen was thankful. They walked on in silence, and the strangeness of Miln quickly took his mind off the incident. The smell of the dung carts was everywhere, as collectors went from building to building, gathering the night’s waste.

“Gah!” Arlen said, holding his nose. “The whole city smells worse than a barn stall! How do you stand it?”

“It’s mostly just in the morning, as the collectors go by,” Ragen replied. “You get used to it. We had sewers once, tunnels that ran under every home, carrying the waste away, but they were sealed centuries ago, when the corelings used them to get into the city.”

“Couldn’t you just dig privy pits?” Arlen asked.

“Milnese soil is stony,” Ragen said. “Those who don’t have private gardens to fertilize are required to put their waste out for collection to use in the Duke’s Gardens. It’s the law.”

“It’s a smelly law,” Arlen said.

Ragen laughed. “Maybe,” he replied. “But it keeps us fed, and drives the economy. The collection guildmaster’s manse makes mine look like a hovel.”

“I’m sure yours smells better,” Arlen said, and Ragen laughed again.

At last they turned a corner and came to a small but sturdy shop, with wards delicately etched around the windows and into the lintel and jamb of the door. Arlen could appreciate the detail of those wards. Whoever made them had a skilled hand.

They entered to a chime of bells, and Arlen’s eyes widened at the contents of the shop. Wards of every shape and size, made in every medium, filled the room.

“Wait here,” Ragen said, moving across the room to speak with a man sitting on a workbench. Arlen barely noticed him go, wandering around the room. He ran his fingers reverently over wards woven into tapestry, etched into smooth river stones, and molded from metal. There were carved posts for farmers’ fields, and a portable circle like Ragen’s. He tried to memorize the wards he saw, but there were just too many.

“Arlen, come here!” Ragen called after a few minutes. Arlen started, and rushed over.

“This is Master Cob,” Ragen introduced, gesturing to a man who was perhaps sixty. Short for a Milnese, he had the look of a strong man gone to fat. A thick gray beard, shot through with signs of its former black, covered his face, and his close-cropped hair was thin atop his head. His skin was lined and leathern, and his grip swallowed Arlen’s hand.

“Ragen tells me you want to be a Warder,” Cob said, sitting back heavily on the bench.

“No, sir,” Arlen replied. “I want to be a Messenger.”

“So does every boy your age,” Cob said. “The smart ones wise up before they get themselves killed.”

“Weren’t you a Messenger once?” Arlen asked, confused at the man’s attitude.

“I was,” Cob agreed, lifting his sleeve to show a tattoo similar to Ragen’s. “I traveled to the five Free Cities and a dozen hamlets, and earned more money than I thought I could ever spend.” He paused, letting Arlen’s confusion grow. “I also earned this,” he said, lifting his shirt to show thick scars running across his stomach, “and this.” He slipped a foot from his shoe. A crescent of scarred flesh, long healed, showed where four of his toes had been.

“To this day,” Cob said, “I can’t sleep more than an hour without starting awake, reaching for my spear. Yes, I was a Messen ger. A damned good one and luckier than most, but I still would not wish it on anyone. Messaging may seem glorious, but for every man who lives in a manse and commands respect like Ragen here, there are two dozen rotting on the road.”

“I don’t care,” Arlen said. “It’s what I want.”

“Then I’ll make a deal with you,” Cob sighed. “A Messenger must be, above all, a Warder, so I’ll apprentice you and teach you to be one. When we have time, I’ll teach you what I know of surviving the road. An apprenticeship lasts seven years. If you still wish to be a Messenger then … well, you’re your own man.”

“Seven years?” Arlen gawked.

Cob snorted. “You don’t pick up warding in a day, boy.”

“I can ward now,” Arlen said defiantly.

“So Ragen tells me,” Cob said. “He also tells me you do it with no knowledge of geometry or wardtheory. Eyeballing your wards may not get you killed tomorrow, boy, or next week, but it will get you killed.”

Arlen stomped a foot. Seven years seemed like an eternity, but deep down he knew the master was right. The pain in his back was a constant reminder that he wasn’t ready to face the corelings again. He needed the skills this man could teach him. He didn’t doubt that there were dozens of Messengers who fell to the demons, and he vowed not to become one of them because he was too stubborn to learn from his mistakes.