yourself that Lady Vagrat has come to Triune.”
Aron actually stood straight in the box and opened his eyes wide. Behind High Master Falconer, the Shrine of the Mother seemed dull and peaceful, and Endurance House was nothing but a building beside the byway.
“Lady—are you—Lady Vagrat?” Falconer’s voice climbed an entire octave. “Rakel Seadaughter has come here?”
“Yes, sir,” the forge master said, but he need not have bothered.
Aron heard no more from the First High Master of Thorn, and was aware only of the man’s cardinal robes as he swept back past the box, heading toward the main gate and keep.
“You.” The forge master’s dark black eyes peered through the slit in the box. “You’ve got quite a bit of energy. Let’s see if we can put it to good use.”
Aron scarcely had time to brace himself before the box gave its mightiest spin yet.
• • •
When the door to the box opened the next morning, Aron fell straight out on the ground, but managed to wheeze out his report of what he had seen and heard in the night, including the slow, sad tolling of the battlement bells as dawn broke. Once more, it was a pattern Aron had never heard before, so he could do little save for describing it.
The forge master pulled him to his feet, pounded him on the back twice, hard enough to make him wheeze all over again, and said, “Well done,” as he pushed Aron toward a boy standing off to Aron’s right. “You there. Feed him, and see that he gets more water.”
It was Zed who caught Aron and held him upright, and Raaf who helped Zed steady Aron as he tried to shake the stiffness out of his legs and arms. He grinned at Zed, then felt a rush of concern when Zed didn’t return his joy. The blond boy was more tan than Aron remembered, and taller still, with a man’s bulky muscles now. And he looked beyond grim as he nodded his greeting, turned Aron loose, and handed him some hardtack and a wineskin.
Aron drank half the skin, then crammed the bits of dried meat into his mouth. He glanced at Raaf as he chewed, and noted that the younger boy, too, looked unhappy.
“What?” Aron asked after he swallowed, his aching body growing stiff all over again. “Is Windblown—”
“Herder didn’t make it,” Zed said, avoiding Aron’s gaze.
When Aron could only stand mute and gape at him, Zed added, “His trial. When we returned yesterday, Master Windblown granted Herder permission to go to the Ruined Keep for his trial. He didn’t survive.”
Aron rubbed his wrists, trying to understand what Zed was telling him. “Galvin Herder … trial? Last night? He went last night?”
Aron couldn’t believe it. If he had known, he would have—
What? Gone to the battlements to cheer on the manes and mockers?
Of course not.
Zed pointed to the battlements. “The bells rang for him this morning, when they found him. Dari dispatched his essence—though there was scarcely enough left of him to hold to his cheville.”
Aron realized he had only heard joyous bells after trials since his arrival, never the dolorous tolling he had marked this morning, after his night in the box. He had seen apprentices bruised and bloodied, even scarred—but he had not known a death at trial since he came to Triune. And now Galvin Herder…
Galvin Herder was dead.
The news simply wouldn’t sink from his mind to his heart, and when it did, Aron fought to understand his own sudden grief and horror. Galvin had always been a trial in his own fashion, a daily struggle for Aron. Aron had always figured that defeating Galvin more regularly, or finding some way to make a true peace with him, would be part of what let Aron know that he, himself, might be ready for his own trial—and now Herder was… gone.
Just gone.
It was a strange sensation, as if a bit of his own identity had been stripped completely away, leaving him less than he had been only moments before.
Aron shook his head again, trying to deny his own confusion.
This was his enemy Zed was talking about, a boy who had had pounded on him and worked to humiliate him since the very night he arrived at the stronghold—but Aron couldn’t help remembering the report Galvin gave to Lord Baldric upon their return from the Ruined Keep.
A shadow fell across Aron’s path, but he didn’t react, recognizing the presence of Iko, which had become as familiar as the companionship