The Hawkling

Book 2: Tales of the Edge

by Rebecca Zahabi

Genres: Fantasy action & adventure; Epic Fantasy

Synopsis

The rebels on the other side of the Shadowpass are massing, and refugees are flooding in to the city. Scared, penniless and not exactly welcome, they are desperate for the protection of the Nest, and the powerful mages who live there. But there is dissension in the Nest's ranks, and there is always someone willing to make money from the fearful.

The mages believe they have a secret weapon - a captured lightborn, kept prisoner by a magical slave collar and forced to do their bidding. But Tatters and Isha, tentative friends despite their suspicion of each other's motives, know something the mages do not.

The rebels are aware of the lightborn. They know how to deal with it. And they are ready for war...

Release date: May 11, 2023

Publisher: Orion

Print pages: 368

Sample

As with most trouble, it was unexpected. The evening began, as usual, when Isha went downtown, headed for the Coop.

She had grown to love the roaring fire of the tavern, the broth boiling in the fireplace, the apprentices clapping after a duel, slapping each other’s backs, encouraging the shyest member of the group to mindbrawl. She was used to the smell of cheap meat and stale beer. Although every surface was tacky, as if the tavern itself were sweating, there was comfort in the poor ramshackle building. It invited everyone in. When she was at the counter, watching Kilian’s impersonations of Lady Siobhan, Isha laughed and forgot that nowhere was safe, not even the tavern.

When she arrived that evening, Tatters was already mentoring apprentices. He acknowledged her with a nod from the back of his booth, but he didn’t have time to spare. With the threat of war on the horizon, even people who didn’t usually visit the tavern wanted some extra training. When it came to her day-to-day life, Isha had found that war involved a lot of paperwork.

She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting. Calls to arms, maybe. Drills in the Nest’s courtyard. The bell ringing with news from the Sunrisers every morning. As it was, apprentices were drafted to copy letters and maps, again and again, until their fingers cramped. The Duskdweller Edge and the Sunriser Edge were separated by the Ridge, after all, two countries split apart by a border of stone, so any war between them would be a slow one. An army had to cross the Ridge, through the Shadowpass weaving its way below the mountains, braving the soul-sucking shadows within. Peace had been maintained for centuries because the border was so hard to cross. The sun itself found it hard, rising on the Sunriser Edge, to drag the light-tide across the border to the Duskdweller side.

To prepare against the Renegades, the lawmages enlisted the ungifted’s help. There was always a huddle of ten or so ungifted in the courtyard these days, struggling to spell out their names and holding spears awkwardly against their chests. Sometimes an apprentice was required to help copy out name, age, family members, occupation, while the ungifted stood in front of them, stammering the answers and asking whether they thought there was much danger. It was a duty Isha tried to avoid. She didn’t know what to say to them, to the fear in their eyes.

The threat of the Renegades aside, life went on. Isha trained with Passerine at the Nest, with Tatters at the tavern. She enjoyed the variety. The Nest was beautiful, but cold. It wasn’t made for humans. Its only scents were dust and mites. At the Coop, she felt at home. Maybe it was, as its name suggested, a grimier, smaller, yet more welcoming version of the Nest.

At the counter, she chatted with the innkeeper. He wasn’t one to discourage a good drinker.

‘Sometimes I fancy I just need you and Tatters to keep this whole place afloat,’ he joked.

‘He’s busy at the moment, isn’t he?’ Isha said, indicating ­Tatters. He’d flung his cloak against the back of the bench and rolled up his sleeves. From here, she could only see the back of his head, a dash of red-brown hair, freckled skin. And the collar, of course.

She licked the foam off the top of her cup. The innkeeper had opened a new keg for her, which meant her drink was as much foam as beer.

‘He’ll only get busier,’ said the innkeeper, shaking his head. He turned to serve another apprentice, grabbing several tumblers in one hand, expertly unblocking the wooden tap with the other one. He tugged the tap closed with a grunt before turning to her. ‘No offence, kid, but everyone needs people to work their fields and serve their drinks. But if there’s one thing the Renegades don’t need, it’s a bunch of mages sitting on their arses collecting tax. When they get here, it’ll not be the city they’re after.’

Reading between the lines, that sort of talk could be seen as disloyal. Isha was rather flattered the innkeeper spoke so openly: it meant he trusted her.

‘Do you think you’d have a better time with the Renegades? Rather than the Nest? Maybe they’ll make you pay less tax.’ She drank to give him time to answer, and to hide her amusement at his shocked face.

The innkeeper rested his forearms on the counter. His fingers were glistening with spilt beer. As he pushed his weight into his arms, the fat and muscle swelled between the lines of his horn bracelet. He thought about what she’d said, then shook his head.

‘Nah. Forget it. It’s be ruled by the mages or be ruled by the khers. Bloodcows think they own the place already.’ He smiled. It wasn’t often that his grim face broke upwards, or that his lips showed his yellow teeth. ‘Not that I like you crazy bunch, but you do keep them off our backs, I’ll give you that.’

Isha was too stunned to answer. The innkeeper patted her hand, as if congratulating her on centuries of oppressing khers and ripping horns from their dead. His fingers were sticky.

‘Last thing I want is cattle pushing me around,’ he concluded.

It seemed like a good time to end the conversation.

Isha went to Tatters and pulled over a stool from a nearby table. She waited, watching the duels that were open to the public, downing the bitter beer. Kilian joined her two hours in. Now that she trained with Passerine, she didn’t see him as often – as one of Sir Daegan’s followers, he couldn’t mingle with her at the Nest. But the tavern was different. It was a neutral ground. She couldn’t help but smile at the familiar sight of his rumpled outfit, down to his green shoes, which clashed terribly with the gold of his belt and the grey of his robes. The green dye, though faded, had held up better than expected.

‘You’ve become worse than me,’ he said by way of greeting.

‘Shut up and get me another drink,’ she said. ‘Put it on my tab.’

‘You’ve even got a tab!’ He rolled his eyes. ‘What have I done? You were an innocent apprentice when you got here.’

I’ve got a tab because I win enough duels to wipe it, she thought. She was proud of her achievements in mindbrawl.

Tatters waved them both forward. He freed places on the bench next to him, pulling a platter of bread and cheese close. He invited them to eat and tell him the latest news. Isha took her knife out of the small sheath on her belt, cut a slice of cheese, and handed it to Kilian.

‘Look at what you’ve done to her,’ Kilian said, taking the cheese. ‘It’s terrible. She’s always mindbrawling and drinking now.’

‘The best way to live a life.’ Tatters smiled.

The cheese was hard and sour. This was a good trading period for Tatters; Isha hoped he wasn’t inviting too many apprentices out, but instead hoarding the money for later, the time that was bound to come when business would be slower.

‘How is Arushi?’ she asked.

‘Sulking, I think,’ Tatters said. His own knife, bone-handled and worn, lay on the table between them. ‘I don’t see much of her at the moment.’

‘But you’re not thinking of horn-humping, are you?’ asked Kilian.

Tatters and Isha exchanged a glance.

‘If you think I’m the first man to have the idea,’ Tatters said, ‘or the first kher, for that matter, you lack imagination.’

Tatters broke off a chunk of bread with dirty hands. Since she had been living at the Nest, Isha’s skin had lost the roughness she’d gained through farm work. Tatters’ hands reminded her of her foster father, and what her own hands would have looked like, had she stayed at home.

‘I always tell him he lacks imagination,’ she said. ‘That’s why his mindbrawl’s so poor.’

‘You’re one to brag!’ Kilian threw back his head, pretending to be offended. He flung his blond hair dangerously close to the torches.

‘She is, actually.’

Tatters turned to Isha, and her heartbeat picked up as she realised he was about to ask her to duel. But before he could, the door of the tavern was slammed open. Conversations across the room died down to a hush, as if words were candles that the cold wind blowing from the door had extinguished.

Isha spotted blue robes. Two ordained mages.

The innkeeper rushed to greet them. The men were draped in the night-sky blue of recently ordained mages – not high mages in control of the Nest, but not apprentices, either. Tatters’ mind shut down, although he sat poised, with the alertness of a dog sniffing the air. He pushed himself behind Isha and, intuitively, she sat on the edge of the bench, so she would be hiding him.

The innkeeper freed a table for the mages, chasing off a group of apprentices, who were then left stranded, holding their beers, scratching their noses, watching their feet. They looked uncomfortable but unwilling to run for it just yet. The mages talked to the innkeeper, who shook his head and spread out his hands. Unsatisfied, one of the men stood up.

‘I know you’re here, Tatters.’

The silence thickened. A few apprentices cleared their throats. A few others, conveniently placed close to the door, made a swift exit. Kilian seemed to long to be part of them, but he was wedged against the bench by the heavy table and the cheese platter. The mage spoke again:

‘I am not here to close this place down, but I could. Make yourself known.’

Isha’s heart was beating hard. She didn’t turn to Tatters, but she sensed that other apprentices were, or were about to. Tatters sighed, his shoulders sagging under his mismatched rags. He got up.

‘Long time no see, Ninian. It is Ninian, right?’

The mage turned to him. ‘Give the man some space,’ he ordered. As Tatters squeezed past Isha, he picked up his knife. She let him pass and didn’t follow. It wasn’t as if she could help.

The crowd cleared a way for Tatters, who took his time to reach the mage, making a show of sheathing his knife. The gold of his collar glowed.

‘You’ve been here before, haven’t you?’ Tatters asked in a performer’s voice, so everyone could hear. ‘You were an apprentice yourself, Ninian. I hope you haven’t forgotten.’

‘We are all friends here,’ said Ninian. ‘I didn’t come to cause trouble.’

Tatters touched wrists with both mages. He stood in sharp contrast: he was smaller, lankier, less well groomed, with messy hair, a messier beard, traces of age and wear across his features. They had chubby cheeks where he had only lines of hunger.

The innkeeper brought them three tumblers of amber-coloured mead, not the dregs of beer he sold the apprentices. Kilian would have used the opportunity to make himself scarce, Isha supposed, if she hadn’t picked up the cheese and changed tables.

‘What are you doing?’ Kilian hissed.

She didn’t answer. She placed herself behind Ninian and his friend, so that Tatters could see her but it would be more difficult for the two men to spot her. Kilian hesitated, then sat down next to her; they had to squeeze in, as the table was already full of apprentices.

‘You’re going to get in trouble,’ he whispered.

‘Or maybe I’ll get Tatters out of trouble,’ she answered.

She tugged her stool sideways, trying to find an angle from which she could study the ordained mages. When Ninian drank, he scrunched his nose and made a disparaging comment on the quality of the brew. Tatters didn’t drink. Sitting before the two intruders, he crossed his hands on the table.

‘What are you here for?’ asked Tatters.

‘You’re in a hurry,’ said Ninian.

Tatters shrugged. ‘I don’t know if you can feel it, but you’ve rather spoilt the mood.’

From where she was eavesdropping, Isha didn’t have a good view of Ninian, but she did have a good view of Kilian, who pulled a face to express how inappropriate Tatters’ behaviour was. There was a brief conversation between Tatters and Ninian, which Isha missed – they were speaking too low, and the apprentices, gathering courage, were talking again.

After downing his tumbler, Ninian handed it without a word to the innkeeper, who went to fill it again. The other mage, Ninian’s companion, was playing at running a finger along the wooden rim, staring across the room. Both mages were closely shaved, their hair washed and oiled, their clothes uncreased and cleaned.

‘I want to duel you,’ said Ninian, loud enough for the room to hear.

Someone gasped, earning themselves a glare from Ninian’s friend. This wasn’t what Isha had been expecting, but it didn’t mean it was better.

Even Tatters seemed taken aback. He picked up his tumbler and gulped down its contents. When he put it down, he smacked his lips before answering. ‘Are you sure about this? I’m always happy to mindbrawl apprentices, but an ordained mage is a different business.’

Ninian leant across the table. Isha didn’t hear the full sentence, but she thought he might have said: ‘I’ve always wanted to be you.’ Or maybe it was: ‘I’ve always wanted to beat you.’ Ninian lifted the rim of his blue robe, squeezing it between finger and thumb, and whispered something else, but she missed the words that matched the gesture.

The friend turned around to scan the room, so she pretended to be engrossed in her cheese. Beside her, Kilian was nervously tapping his fingers against the table.

‘Who’s the settler?’ Tatters asked. He caught Isha’s eye, as she’d placed herself in his line of sight, but didn’t smile. Caitlin, his usual settler, wasn’t in the tavern tonight.

Ninian pointed to his friend. ‘But you can pick a second settler, if you wish.’ Two settlers, one for each duellist, helped prevent cheating.

Again, Tatters’ gaze drifted to where Isha was sitting. Even though she might have misread his intention, even though her throat was knotted, she nodded. He hesitated, but in the end he said, ‘I’m fine with just the one.’

‘It will be an open duel.’ Ninian addressed the whole tavern. ‘You are welcome to place bets as you always do.’

Tatters crossed his hands behind his neck, stretching backwards.

‘All right.’

The bustle of the tavern picked up again as apprentices crowded around the counter. Tatters set up two chairs face-to-face, in the centre of the room. Isha pushed through the throng of people to join him, Kilian trailing behind. She helped prepare the reduced stage where they would battle.

‘I’ve never seen you lose,’ she said quietly. He had been beaten before, or so she’d heard, but she had yet to see it happen. Tatters kicked a tumbler aside, and it rolled under a bench.

‘Will you lose this one?’ asked Kilian.

Tatters smiled. ‘Of course. I’m not an ordained mage.’

Isha glanced at him. There was something about his cheeky, confident smile.

You think you can win, don’t you? she mindlinked.

I don’t think. It’s overrated.

Kilian must have sensed they were excluding him from their conversation. ‘Come on guys, it’s just insulting,’ he complained.

‘Get used to it, Isha’s too smart for the both of us,’ said Tatters. ‘She’ll always be hiding stuff from you.’

Isha would have echoed Tatters’ smile, if he hadn’t been so close to the truth. She felt uneasy knowing that, even when bantering, he always hit his mark. She followed the two men to the counter. Kilian placed bets on Ninian; she refused to bet.

‘Mindscrew the arrogant bastard,’ growled the innkeeper, as he took Kilian’s bet and jotted it down, scratching the numbers in his wax tablet.

‘You do realise it’s a crime if I attack a mage?’ asked Tatters.

The innkeeper mumbled something unintelligible, then said, ‘Yes. Right. But mindscrew his ass.’

‘That’s not how mindscrewing works,’ laughed Tatters. ‘But I’ll do my best.’

‘You’d better.’

The innkeeper dipped a glass in a bucket of soiled water with a layer of grease shining across its surface. He rubbed it with a soaked rag in an attempt to wash it. Isha tried to ignore the fact that this had probably already happened to the tumbler she’d been drinking out of.

‘Don’t bet any silver on me,’ Tatters warned.

The tavern was hot and packed with bodies, a slit of night visible through the half-open door. Ninian’s friend seated himself a few minutes before the duel was supposed to start. Isha spotted him squeezing Ninian’s fingers, planting a quick kiss on his lips. Because of the trust it required, it wasn’t uncommon for lovers to work as settlers for each other. The Nest didn’t much care who slept with whom, as long as it didn’t prevent people from serving the high mages.

The Temple had taught her, at the farm, that Raudaz, the lightborn of war, and Byluk, the lightborn of death, were two male lightborns who lived a married couple’s life. Unfortunately, their union was sterile, breeding only battlefields.

Eyes closed, Ninian’s lover was preparing the arena. His breathing slowed, until he could be dozing or dying.

Ninian and Tatters positioned themselves face-to-face. Tatters let himself drop back into his chair, but Ninian didn’t.

‘Ordained mages fight standing,’ said Ninian.

Tatters shrugged, as if he couldn’t care less. ‘Let’s do that, then.’ He got to his feet, legs apart, arms crossed before him. He closed his eyes.

Isha didn’t join the mindbrawl immediately. The background sound of conversation died down. The apprentices closed their eyes, grew still. Only the innkeeper stayed wide awake, leaning on his counter, frowning at the silent figures, trying to second-guess what could be happening. It must be alien for the ungifted, Isha realised. A whole room of people standing eyes closed, doing nothing, until one of them collapses.

She tucked her legs under the hewn bench. Resting her head against a beam, she mindlinked to the arena.

The mind of Ninian’s lover was crowded, but accommodated everyone easily by creating a fake amphitheatre in which they could sit. Isha naturally drifted next to Kilian, known minds recognising and attracting each other. They were sitting together at the front of the coliseum. Everyone, Isha suspected, perceived themselves in the best seats, while perceiving the others around the top of the arena.

‘It’s good settler work,’ said Kilian approvingly.

‘If you could do stuff like this, you could become an official duel settler,’ she said.

‘Always better than fighting the damn things.’

The warmth of the tavern, the scent of spilt beer faded. The circle of white sand where Ninian was standing grew more tangible. His blue robes billowed around him. His pale skin seemed cut out of the azure background, as if his hands and head were floating, detached from his body. The long thin fingers were still; his face was like marble. His hair was a dusty brown, which he polished in mindlink until it glowed like copper.

Tatters was still in rags, still collarbound. There was something humbling about the simplicity of his outfit.

Isha knew the tricks of the trade. Mindbrawl was a balancing act between looking shabby and overworked. If you changed yourself too much, you seemed more fragile, as if you were overcompensating. What did it reveal of your weakness if you couldn’t even show yourself as you were?

‘This is going to be good,’ said Kilian.

‘It is,’ agreed a young female voice.

Isha and Kilian both turned. Lal was sitting next to them.

She was a young girl shaped from mist, with a see-through quality to her, but dressed like a young man, with a shirt and a shoulder-cape. Before Isha could say anything, she interrupted, ‘Don’t worry, I don’t think the settler has noticed me.’

Isha opened her mouth and closed it again. In the end she said: ‘Isn’t it a bit risky talking to us and getting ready to fight at the same time?’

Lal shrugged. ‘Almost makes you think I’m not a projection but a real person, doesn’t it?’ Her tone wasn’t entirely friendly. Isha was surprised by Lal’s admission. She knew Lal was Tatters’ younger sister but, as far as she was aware, Kilian simply thought she was a mental double created by Tatters. It was risky to be so open in his presence. Or maybe Lal didn’t think enough of Kilian to care.

Kilian focused his attention on Tatters and Ninian – because of how mindlink worked, although he didn’t move, he disappeared from their conversation. Isha supposed he was trying to understand what Lal was for; he would return soon.

Lal was on the cusp of outgrowing childhood, with long limbs, an easy smile. Tatters’ red hair, dishevelled but longer. His sister. Isha had to force herself to remember it. The ghost of his sister. Was this what she looked like when she died? Or what she would have looked like, had she lived?

‘We need to talk,’ said Lal. ‘You’ve been keeping secrets from us.’

Isha wondered if Tatters could hear this conversation or if he was too focused.

‘You’ve been keeping secrets from me,’ Isha answered. She thought she was only being fair, but Lal had a wicked little leer on her wicked little features. The worst was her voice, soft and childlike and threatening.

‘I’ll get the truth out of you,’ said Lal.

Isha gritted her teeth. She had been training hard for a reason – she had been preparing so that, when her enemies made themselves known, she wouldn’t back down. She would fight.

She glared at Lal’s hazel eyes.

‘You can try,’ she said.

To her surprise, Lal smiled. ‘Tatters and I are always here. The invitation to duel is always here. What are you waiting for?’

Kilian reappeared beside them, brimming with excitement. ‘It’s starting!’

Ninian’s first attack hit before anyone noticed he had crafted it. Suddenly Tatters’ collar grew to encompass his shoulders, then shrank slowly. Isha watched, a sickly feeling in the pit of her stomach; Ninian must have prepared for this fight by studying exactly how collars manifested during their first use. The circle grew smaller and smaller, but when it reached Tatters’ neck, he didn’t seem worried. He let the crushing reality of becoming a collarbound encircle his throat and settle there.

‘Seen it all before,’ he joked.

Ninian reacted with a wealth of images which, even from her distance as a witness, burnt across Isha’s retina. They were discordant, incoherent, as effective as a nightmare. Someone’s wet kiss crushing your lips, and the lick of blood as their mouth was shattered by a bolt fired from a crossbow, and gore and teeth and skin splashed your face, and the only person you ever loved died. The realisation that the crossbow was in your hands.

The searing pain as you planted the knife through your hand and then, methodically, carved out the ligaments. Moving the torn hand towards your eye, pushing the fingers underneath the eyelid. The rubbery texture of the eyeball as you tugged it out of its socket. The blurred vision as you ripped it out of your face. The touch of clear, cold goo running down your cheek.

Next to her, Kilian made a sound as if the air had been knocked out of his lungs.

‘This is good,’ he whispered.

Lal was gone. Maybe she had decided the fight was worthy of her attention after all.

Isha nodded. Almost everything was contained in the sense of touch, and the deep, gut-wrenching dread Ninian threaded inside his visions. It was powerful enough that people observing the duel could taste blood in their mouths.

Ninian stopped. Tatters was still standing, head cocked to one side.

‘To be fair, I never did any of that before,’ he admitted. ‘Now I know what it would feel like.’

Ninian waited, on the defensive, but nothing happened. As far as Isha could tell, Tatters wasn’t doing anything. Tapping his toes against the settler’s floor, he gave the crowd a derisive smile.

‘Why won’t you fight?’ snarled Ninian.

‘Oh, I wouldn’t dare,’ said Tatters.

The ripple of the blow went through Isha. Figures huddled below the gates of the Nest. The empty glaze across their eyes. And there, amongst the wan faces, someone you recognised, someone lost but loved. You knelt before them before realising who they were.

It was you. You were the lacunant begging before the gates.

This was the fate all mages feared – this was what they would all become, from the bushy-tailed apprentices to the hardened mindbrawlers. They would die empty husks.

Yet Tatters remained unfazed. Maybe because Isha was focusing on the duel once more, maybe because he had been searching for her, Kilian manifested beside her. Isha knew spacing was an illusion when they were in someone’s mind, but she had never met a settler who could accommodate this illusion like Ninian’s lover – sense of perspective and the layout of the arena remained, but people’s places inside it shifted at will.

‘You’re very good,’ said Tatters, in his tutoring voice.

When he took a step forwards, Ninian raised his mental defences immediately. Tatters drew a flower on the floor, imagining precise veins down the leaves, pistils within the centre.

‘You think like a swordsman. When you’re fighting, get your hardest hit out there first. You want to kill the opponent as fast as possible, not make a good show.’

‘Why aren’t you following your own advice, then?’ Ninian sounded more startled than angry; more exhausted than challenging. Even from her removed position, Isha could tell how trying his visions had been both to make and maintain.

Tatters went on, ignoring Ninian’s intervention, ‘But if you notice you’re tiring yourself and your hits are more effort to you than pain to the other guy, then maybe you should change tactics.’

They waited in silence. Isha could taste the strain on Ninian’s mind in the air. If Tatters was tired, he was concealing it well.

Now that the intensity of the fight had dulled somewhat, Lal returned. Kilian nudged her with his elbow.

‘Are you the big finale?’ he asked.

Lal shook her head. ‘I’m not getting involved.’

Ninian pounced on Tatters again. The imaginings were achingly precise, with the patterned details of a spiderweb. Isha could taste and breathe and touch them. But Tatters didn’t seem affected. It wasn’t like anything she had seen him do before – rather than try to avoid or deflect what was thrown at him, he allowed it to reach him. It was as if he couldn’t feel what Ninian had created, like a poorly-made imagining from an apprentice, badly executed. But the visions were precise enough that they should hit their mark.

‘If he did this all the time, no-one would ever touch him.’ She was thinking out loud, but in mindlink, the difference between thinking and talking was flimsy at best.

‘He won’t use it with you,’ said Lal. ‘He shouldn’t use it now. Do it too often, and people will work out what the trick is.’

Kilian watched Lal with interest, still expectant. ‘Why do you talk about yourself using “he”?’ he asked. ‘Does it help?’

Lal smiled. ‘Keep telling yourself that.’

In the arena, Ninian backed down. He spat on the floor in rage. His mind was at the end of its tether. It shivered like a sheet of fabric being pulled at both ends, fraying down the centre.

‘What now?’ he shouted, and Isha could hear the fear in his voice. ‘Shall we get down to punches?’

‘How about we call it a draw?’ asked Tatters.

Ninian didn’t acknowledge the end of the fight. He left the arena.

‘What an idiot.’ The harshness in Lal’s tone surprised Isha.

Although she wasn’t on Ninian’s side, Isha felt the need to say, ‘He was pretty good.’

‘I’m talking about Tatters,’ said Lal. ‘Now he’s shown everyone he’s dangerous.’

The child shook her head and vanished. Troubled, Isha left the settled mind. Inside the tavern, the air felt heavy, as if there were particles of fat floating around, sticking to her lungs, making it difficult to breathe. She swallowed stale saliva.

Ninian was nowhere to be found. He must have gone outside. The apprentices, rubbing their swollen eyes, were emerging from mindlink. She sipped her beer, focusing on its taste to bring herself back to the present. She had pins and needles down her arms and legs; she tapped her feet on the ground to bring some sensation back into them.

Tatters stepped out from mindlink and went to lounge on the seat prepared beforehand. He didn’t brag, and his mind was closed. The audience crowded around the bar area, discussing the duel which had just taken place, expressing frustration at the lost bets. Isha waited for Kilian to join her in the real world. His face was surprisingly serious, a tense expression across his round features.

When he opened his eyes, she handed him his beer.

‘That was … something,’ he said, shaking his head from side to side.

At first Isha thought he was shaking it to help himself leave mindlink; then she realised he was shaking it in disbelief, staring at Tatters.

‘By all the underworlds, who is this guy?’ he whispered.

It’s only now that you think of asking? She’d put the question to Kilian a thousand times, and he’d brushed it away, saying people came from everywhere, that Tatters could be a Sunriser despite the pale skin, or maybe a village mage with parlour tricks. Obviously the parlour trick theory was null.

Isha observed the settler as he collapsed his mind. He was the last to do so, as his role required. When he surfaced, he stretched, ignoring his lover’s absence. Rather formally, he cracked his wrists, his ankles and his neck. He turned to Tatters and said something, but Isha couldn’t make out the words.

‘Let’s talk to him.’ She was about to get up when Kilian placed a hand on her forearm.

‘I know y