Marduk's idea of adequate preparation involved a quarry, three sacks of equipment, freezing rain and a breakfast so badly burned that death suddenly seemed less threatening.
I held up the bread.
It was black along one side.
"Was this intentional?"
Marduk tightened the strap on his pack.
"Eat."
"I'd prefer to know whether I'm consuming food or evidence."
"Then starve."
"Very paternal."
He stopped.
Only for a moment.
The word had slipped out casually.
Neither of us looked at the other.
Then he took the bread from my hand, scraped the worst of the charcoal off with his knife and gave it back.
"Better?"
"Immensely. Now the poisoning will be gradual."
He walked outside.
That was as close as we came to tenderness before sunrise.
I followed.
The abandoned quarry lay inland, beyond the southern ridge, where grey limestone cut through the island's darker volcanic rock.
Marduk had taken me there before.
Never with this much equipment.
Two canvas bags contained food and water.
One held alchemical materials wrapped separately in waxed cloth.
Another contained bandages, measuring cord, chalk, three metal weights and enough medical supplies to confirm that the old man expected something to go wrong.
The final bundle was his.
He wouldn't let me touch it.
Naturally, I wanted to know what was inside.
Naturally, he knew.
"Don't."
"I haven't done anything."
"Your face has."
"My face is merely curious."
"Your face is planning theft."
"An ugly accusation."
"Accurate."
We continued uphill.
Marduk moved slowly.
Not enough that anyone unfamiliar with him would notice.
I noticed.
His breathing remained controlled, but he took shorter steps on steep ground. Twice he paused to adjust his pack when there was absolutely nothing wrong with the straps.
I said nothing.
I had begun learning that constant concern could become another kind of surveillance.
He already knew I counted his coughs.
There was no need to count his footsteps in front of him.
The quarry smelled of wet stone.
Rainwater had accumulated in the lowest pit, turning the floor into pale mud. Old cut faces rose around us in steps where workers had once removed slabs from the hillside.
At the center of the lowest level sat the millstone.
Calling it a stone felt inadequate.
It was a circular slab of granite almost as wide as I was tall, half-sunk into the mud, with moss along one edge and a square hole through its center.
I stared at it.
Then at Marduk.
"No."
He placed his pack beneath an overhang.
"I haven't asked anything."
"You brought me to a quarry and positioned me next to a stone large enough to flatten a horse."
"Observant."
"I am not lifting that."
"Correct."
That surprised me.
I looked at him carefully.
"Say it again."
"No."
"You agree that I cannot lift it."
"Obviously."
"Good. I was beginning to worry illness had affected your judgment."
He handed me a length of rope.
"Clean the edge."
"Why?"
"So we can measure."
That answer I liked.
Measurement meant the day might contain something resembling sanity.
I cleared mud from one side of the stone and threaded the rope through its center.
Marduk fixed the other end to a wooden frame he'd apparently built here years earlier.
The frame held a simple scale.
Not for weighing the entire millstone.
For measuring how much force was required to tilt one edge by a fixed distance.
Clever.
Annoying.
Very Marduk.
He marked a line on the stone with chalk.
"Your objective is this."
One finger's width.
I looked at the mark.
"That is all?"
"Do it first."
I took position.
"No Alchemia."
"Fine."
"No changing your own weight."
"That removes half my options."
"It removes the option you abuse."
I frowned.
"I've used personal gravity correction successfully."
"You've used it three times."
"Four."
"The fourth time you walked into a door."
"The door moved."
Marduk stared at me.
"Very subtly."
He pointed at the millstone.
"Stone only."
I placed both hands against its edge.
The granite was cold and slick.
I did not push.
Not yet.
First, information.
Weight transmitted through ground.
Contact surface uneven.
Mud beneath the southern edge.
Northern edge lodged deeper.
Moving the whole slab was absurd.
But that wasn't the test.
One edge.
One finger's width.
For a few seconds.
I closed my eyes.
The sensation of weight no longer appeared as one simple downward pull.
The last weeks had taught me better.
There was the stone.
The ground supporting it.
My body pushing against it.
The earth pushing back.
Gravity was present everywhere in that relationship, but my influence remained tiny.
Six percent under controlled conditions with the iron sphere.
Less when tired.
Much less when distracted.
I let mana move.
Slow.
No surge.
No forcing it through my forearms.
The channels near my ribs warmed first.
Then shoulder.
Then palm.
Wrong.
I stopped.
Marduk said nothing.
Again.
This time I let the sensation settle before directing anything.
The stone remained brutally heavy.
Good.
Reality had not become sentimental.
I searched for the same mismatch I'd learned with the sphere.
There.
Faint.
A pressure I could alter without understanding entirely why.
I changed it.
The stone did not move.
I pushed physically.
Nothing.
Mana drain increased.
Still nothing.
Then my left forearm began to tingle.
I released everything.
Marduk looked at the sun's position.
"Thirty seconds."
"Useful?"
"No."
"Encouraging."
"No."
"You're becoming repetitive."
"You're still failing."
I smiled.
"Consistency is the foundation of education."
He threw a rag at my face.
I wiped my hands.
Second attempt.
Nothing.
Third.
The edge moved.
Perhaps the width of a fingernail.
Then settled again.
I exhaled.
Marduk crouched beside the scale.
"Four percent."
"I felt more."
"Your feelings are liars."
"We've discussed this."
"Apparently not enough."
I rolled my shoulders.
The channels along my arms were beginning to itch.
Not pain.
Warning.
"Again."
"No."
I looked at him.
"Three attempts."
"Yes."
"I can do at least six."
"You can do six bad attempts."
"I need repetition."
"You need control."
"I have control."
Marduk pointed toward my right hand.
My thumb was trembling.
Very slightly.
Traitor.
He reached into his pack and pulled out a strip of cloth.
"Wrap it."
"It's nothing."
"Wrap it."
"That won't change the channel irritation."
"No. It'll keep you from pretending your grip is normal."
I took the cloth.
A clever little humiliation.
Once wrapped, the hand felt bulkier.
Fine manipulation became harder.
Exactly his point.
He sat beneath the overhang and opened his own medicine pouch.
I watched.
One powder.
Half a cup of water.
He drank.
No cough.
No visible pain.
Still, he closed his eyes for several seconds afterward.
I pretended to inspect my bandage.
He pretended not to notice.
We rested for twenty minutes.
Marduk had brought a sand timer.
I hated it immediately.
"Twenty minutes?"
"Yes."
"Why not fifteen?"
"Because yesterday it took eighteen for your tremor to stop."
I looked at him.
"You measured?"
"You've been measuring me for weeks."
Fair.
Disturbing.
Almost funny.
I leaned back against the quarry wall.
Cold seeped through my shirt.
The rain had stopped, but water continued dripping from the ledges.
"You said Alchemia today."
"Later."
"When?"
"When your channels settle."
"They're settled."
"No."
"How do you know?"
"You're asking when you can continue."
"That proves enthusiasm."
"It proves you're still irritated."
I considered throwing something at him.
Instead, I ate.
Food had become part of training in a way I once found insulting.
It turned out muscle required material.
Mana recovery required material.
Even this world's magic retained the irritating habit of making the body pay its bills.
I ate dried meat, boiled roots and half of the surviving bread.
Marduk ate less.
Too little.
I noticed.
Said nothing.
He caught me looking and tore another piece from the meat strip.
Then ate it very slowly while maintaining eye contact.
Petty old bastard.
The timer emptied.
He checked my hand.
Tremor gone.
"Again."
This time I moved the edge slightly farther.
Not because I used more mana.
Because I stopped trying to reduce all of the stone's weight.
That was impossible.
Instead, I focused on the portion currently transferring force through the edge I intended to move.
Local effect.
Smaller target.
Chessmaster reorganized what I already knew.
Contact.
Angle.
Lever.
Mud.
The stone's own irregular surface.
I changed one relationship.
Then pushed.
The edge rose.
A finger's width.
For one heartbeat.
Then two.
My legs shook.
Three.
My focus broke.
The slab dropped back into the mud.
The impact splashed my trousers.
I stepped away, breathing harder than the effort should have required.
Marduk looked at the scale.
"Eight."
I wiped mud from my face.
"Eight percent?"
"Approximately."
That was the highest measurable effect I'd produced on anything heavier than the iron sphere.
I smiled.
Then my vision blurred.
Only once.
A brief doubling along the quarry wall.
I blinked.
Normal.
Marduk was already standing.
"Done."
"No."
"Done."
"That was useful."
"Yes."
"So we repeat it."
"Tomorrow."
"We don't have tomorrow to waste."
His expression changed.
The words had landed where I intended.
Cheap move.
I knew it while making it.
Marduk's illness.
The Heart.
Time.
Use the thing he feared losing to force agreement.
Old skill.
Reliable.
Ugly.
He walked toward me.
"Say it again."
I didn't.
"Go on."
Silence.
He nodded once.
"That's what I thought."
He started packing the measuring equipment.
I felt irritation rise.
"Old Man."
"No."
"I finally found the efficient application."
"And you'll destroy it by chasing the feeling."
"I know my limits."
He laughed.
Not warmly.
"Your entire problem is that you know them five minutes after crossing them."
I reached for the rope.
He slapped my hand away.
"Sit."
"I'm not five."
"Then stop behaving like you're immortal."
"I don't believe I'm immortal."
"No. You believe consequences negotiate."
That stopped me.
Marduk continued dismantling the frame.
"You think every cost has a price you can pay afterward."
"Most do."
"Channel scars?"
I said nothing.
"Damaged nerves?"
Nothing.
"A hand that never stops shaking?"
I looked at the wrapped thumb.
He pointed toward the millstone.
"You need that hand tomorrow more than you need another number today."
Tomorrow.
Interesting.
I caught the word.
Marduk caught me catching it.
He swore quietly.
"What happens tomorrow?"
"Nothing."
"Poor lie."
"Sit."
"The Heart?"
No answer.
I stepped closer.
"Is it ripening?"
His face closed.
That was enough.
My pulse changed.
"When?"
"Raymond."
"When?"
"Sit down."
"Marduk."
He coughed.
One hand came up.
The sound was deep enough to end the argument.
He turned aside.
I saw the cloth.
A small dark stain.
Less than the previous episode.
Still there.
The urgency in me sharpened.
I hated him for being ill.
A ridiculous emotion.
His body had not consulted him either.
But anger requires a target, and mortality is terribly difficult to punch.
"Fine."
I sat.
Marduk took several controlled breaths.
Then came over and dropped the folded blanket he'd been carrying onto my shoulders.
I looked up.
"I'm not cold."
"You're shivering."
"From mana depletion."
"Still shivering."
I pulled the blanket around myself.
Neither of us thanked the other.
That was our arrangement.
After an hour, the next lesson began.
Not gravity.
Alchemia.
Marduk removed three wrapped packets from the waxed bag.
He placed them on the stone bench.
The first contained powdered shell from a reef creature.
The second held dark tree resin.
The third contained a small amount of pale mineral dust.
I inspected them.
"Purpose?"
"You wanted to strengthen your body."
"I want to improve load tolerance."
"Different words. Same arrogance."
He pointed at the packets.
"These are materials your body can probably tolerate."
"Probably."
"That's why we're testing."
No instant transformation.
No mana pushed into bone until bone became stronger because I wanted it badly enough.
Materials first.
Compatibility second.
Integration last.
A much more irritating discipline.
Marduk mixed only enough for a test patch.
He refused to let me touch the proportions.
"Why?"
"Because you always improve recipes."
"That is generally the point."
"Not when the recipe is entering your body."
He applied a trace of the prepared compound against the skin of my forearm, then guided a thread of mana through it.
Heat spread beneath the surface.
Nothing dramatic.
A deep warmth.
Then itching.
Then pressure.
I waited.
"Pain?"
"Two."
"Out of?"
"Ten."
"You use ten too casually."
"Fine. Out of Marduk."
He looked unimpressed.
"Two out of Marduk."
"What does ten mean?"
"You cooking."
He almost laughed.
The warmth increased.
Three.
Then four.
Muscle tightened involuntarily.
"Stop."
"I can continue."
Marduk severed the mana flow himself.
The warmth faded slowly.
I frowned.
"Why?"
"Your flexors seized."
"They tightened."
"Seized."
"Temporarily."
"That's why we test."
We waited.
The skin remained slightly red.
Movement normal after ten minutes.
Grip reduced.
Interesting.
"Material rejection?"
"Too early."
"Mana incompatibility?"
"Maybe."
"Concentration?"
"Maybe."
He cleaned the area.
No certainty.
Exactly as promised.
The second formulation used less mineral dust.
Better.
Heat.
Pressure.
No seizure.
After thirty seconds, my forearm felt unusually dense.
Not stronger.
Different.
When I lifted one of the metal weights, the muscle fatigued slightly more slowly.
Then, twenty minutes later, fatigue arrived all at once.
My grip opened unexpectedly.
The weight dropped into the mud.
Marduk caught it with his staff before it landed on my foot.
Again.
"Delayed cost," I said.
"Yes."
I rubbed the forearm.
Heavy now.
"Useful in a short fight."
"Maybe."
"Terrible for prolonged work."
"Yes."
"Could adjust concentration."
"Later."
"I know what you're going to say."
"Good."
"Recovery."
"You're learning."
I hated how pleased he looked.
The third version was different.
No mineral dust.
Resin and shell only.
The effect was weaker.
Much weaker.
But the muscle remained responsive.
Less stiffness.
No sudden collapse.
I flexed my hand.
"That."
Marduk nodded.
"For now."
"For now."
A phrase I was beginning to appreciate.
Alchemia Morphica was not a destination.
It was a negotiation with tissue.
Push too hard and the body rejected the terms.
Offer too little and nothing changed.
And every body negotiated differently.
I made notes.
Marduk watched.
"You enjoy this."
"Of course."
"It hurts."
"So does politics."
"That's not an answer."
"It is for me."
He sat beside me.
We waited through the required recovery interval.
Rain started again.
The quarry water trembled beneath it.
Marduk pulled his cloak tighter.
I watched him discreetly.
He noticed.
"Stop."
"I didn't say anything."
"You're thinking loudly."
"Medical concern."
"Obnoxious concern."
"Still concern."
That slipped out too.
He looked at me.
I looked at the rain.
Neither of us improved the conversation.
After a moment, Marduk reached into the food bag and handed me the last strip of dried fruit.
"You need it."
"You need it more."
"No."
"Your appetite—"
"Raymond."
There are times negotiation is useful.
There are others when accepting a piece of fruit prevents an argument neither person wants.
I ate it.
He pretended to be satisfied by the rain.
The next three days followed the same pattern.
Work.
Measurement.
Recovery.
No heroic montage.
No magic repairing every mistake overnight.
On the first morning, my modified forearm remained stiff enough that I couldn't hold a writing needle cleanly.
Marduk banned Alchemia for the entire day.
I called the decision excessive.
He handed me my own handwriting.
It looked as though a drunk spider had fallen into ink.
I stopped arguing.
The second day, gravity training improved by less than one percent.
Infuriating.
The third, it became worse.
I could barely produce six.
My body was recovered.
My reserve was full.
My technique felt correct.
And still—
Worse.
I spent an hour looking for the cause.
Marduk eventually pointed at my boots.
The quarry floor had dried.
More friction.
Different angle.
I had unconsciously changed my stance to compensate.
My model was correct.
The input had changed.
Chessmaster had organized the wrong assumptions beautifully.
That was useful.
Humiliating.
But useful.
We adjusted.
Eight percent returned.
Then nine.
Not by force.
By reducing wasted effort.
Marduk made me walk the quarry slopes carrying ordinary sacks.
Not enormous weights.
One moderate load.
Enough to force my body to maintain posture under fatigue.
The first day I hated the simplicity.
Then I understood.
My gravity control degraded when breathing became irregular.
It degraded further when one leg fatigued more than the other.
My best technique in stillness meant very little if movement dismantled it.
So we worked on movement.
Walk.
Stop.
Alter weight briefly.
Release.
Walk again.
Never maintain the effect long enough to drain the reserve.
Never use it to compensate for poor footing.
If my ankle rolled, I corrected my ankle.
Magic came after mechanics.
Marduk was uncompromising on that point.
"Mana hides bad habits."
"Mana also solves problems."
"Until it's gone."
He would make an excellent accountant.
A cruel one.
Then came the cold.
The original plan, apparently, had involved the quarry pool.
I stared at the dark water.
"No."
Marduk looked offended.
"You don't even know the exercise."
"I know water is cold."
"Good."
"And your medical judgment is occasionally criminal."
"Take off your boots."
I did.
Reluctantly.
The exercise was not to sit neck-deep until hypothermia taught me wisdom.
Thank God.
I stood ankle-deep.
The water was viciously cold.
My feet immediately tightened.
"Feel your stance."
"I feel regret."
"Where?"
"Mostly my feet."
"Useful."
The cold changed muscle response.
Reduced sensation.
Slowed correction.
We trained only minutes at a time.
Out.
Dry.
Warm.
Again.
By the third interval I could maintain the gravity effect for two heartbeats despite the numbness.
Then Marduk ended the session.
I protested.
He pointed toward my toes.
Pale.
Enough.
We went home.
That night he made soup.
Actual soup.
Not burnt.
Not raw.
Suspiciously edible.
I stared at him.
"What did you do?"
"Cooked."
"No."
He frowned.
"Who cooked this?"
"I did."
I tasted it again.
"Impossible."
"Go hungry."
I protected the bowl with both arms.
"Let's not behave irrationally."
He smiled.
A real one.
Small.
Then coughed into the cloth.
The smile disappeared first.
That was how the days went.
A good moment.
A cough.
An argument.
Work.
Neither of us said what the training was really for.
We didn't need to.
The Aurelian Heart waited somewhere beyond the parts of the island Marduk had allowed me to map.
If it ripened.
If no predator reached it first.
If the old case reports were even relevant.
If I returned.
If it helped.
A tower of uncertainty.
I responded the only way I knew.
Reduce the uncertainties I could.
On the sixth morning, Marduk took me back to the millstone.
No sacks.
No Alchemia.
No walking drills.
Only the stone.
"One attempt."
I stared.
"One?"
"Yes."
"You're becoming merciful."
"No."
"Good. I was worried."
I placed my hands beneath the accessible edge.
The mud had been cleared away.
Marduk had done that before I arrived.
He'd also repositioned the measuring frame.
Prepared without telling me.
Again.
I looked toward him.
"When?"
"This morning."
"You should be resting."
"You should be working."
Deflection.
I allowed it.
For now.
I set my feet.
Breath.
Stone.
Ground.
Hands.
No rush.
Chessmaster arranged only known relationships.
Angle.
Contact.
Fatigue: low.
Channels: recovered.
Reserve: full.
Alchemia residue: none.
I let the world become simple.
Not empty.
Simple.
The millstone did not need to become light.
I didn't need to lift it.
I needed one edge to rise.
A fraction.
For seconds.
Nothing more.
Mana moved.
The familiar pressure answered.
I narrowed the effect.
Not the entire stone.
The local load.
Then I pushed with my legs.
The edge moved.
One finger.
Two.
Marduk watched the scale.
My forearms tightened.
I breathed out.
Held.
One heartbeat.
Two.
Three.
Four.
The mana began scratching along the channels near my shoulders.
Warning.
Five.
My right thumb trembled.
Enough.
I released.
The stone settled.
No crash.
No dramatic quake.
Just granite returning to mud.
I remained crouched for several seconds.
Breathing.
Then stood.
Marduk examined the scale.
"Eleven."
I wiped my palms on my trousers.
"That all?"
"Approximately eleven percent."
"Very disappointing."
"You're smiling."
I stopped.
Apparently I was.
Annoying.
"Measurement error."
"Of your face?"
"Substantial."
Marduk sat on the stone.
For once, he looked tired enough not to hide it.
I offered him water.
He took it.
No argument.
That frightened me more than refusal would have.
He drank.
Then reached inside his coat.
A folded piece of parchment came out.
My attention fixed on it.
He held it.
Didn't give it to me.
"The western cove."
I waited.
"You follow the stream inland until the rock turns yellow."
A route.
The Heart.
My pulse accelerated.
"Then?"
"North through the cedar break."
He unfolded the paper.
A rough map.
Not one of the charts beneath the forge.
Hand-drawn.
Recent.
His handwriting.
He had been preparing it.
"There are two ravines."
He pointed.
"Take the upper one."
"Why?"
"Lower floods after rain."
I looked outside.
Rain.
Of course.
"Predators?"
"Several."
"Several is not a species."
"It changes."
"Wonderful."
He continued.
"At the end, limestone basin. The Heart grows in the western wall where runoff crosses the old mana seam."
I studied the drawing.
Distances.
Water points.
Shelter.
Fallback route.
He had marked them all.
This wasn't something he'd decided that morning.
"How long have you been making this?"
Marduk refolded the map.
"Long enough."
"For me."
"No."
Lie.
Not a convincing one.
"For whoever had to go."
He corrected himself.
That was closer.
I took the map.
"When?"
"Tomorrow."
The word went through me cleanly.
"You're certain?"
"No."
"Of course not."
"The signs started this morning."
"What signs?"
He pointed toward the quarry wall.
At first I saw nothing.
Then movement.
Tiny pale insects crawling from cracks in the stone.
Each carried a dusting of gold along its back.
I'd seen them before.
Never here.
"They feed near concentrated blooms," Marduk said.
"Heart?"
"Could be something else."
"So tomorrow is an estimate."
"Yes."
"How long after ripening before predators notice?"
"They've probably already noticed."
Excellent.
Every good opportunity apparently came with teeth.
I studied the map again.
"You're coming."
"No."
I looked up.
"No."
"My condition—"
"No."
He didn't argue.
That was worse.
"Marduk."
"I slow you down."
"I can compensate."
His eyes sharpened.
There it was.
My favorite sin.
Compensate.
Control.
Design around weakness.
He pointed at his chest.
"You can't compensate for this."
"I can alter load."
"For seconds."
"I can manage the pace."
"You'd manage me instead of the terrain."
I opened my mouth.
Stopped.
He was right.
Again.
I hated this week.
"If something happens here while I'm gone?"
"I've lived here longer than you."
"That wasn't my question."
"It's my answer."
I folded the map.
Carefully.
"How many days?"
"Two if everything goes well."
"And if it doesn't?"
"Three."
"After that?"
Marduk looked at me.
"You turn back."
"Without the Heart?"
"Yes."
"No."
His face hardened.
"Raymond."
"If I'm there—"
"Three days."
"If the Heart is within reach—"
"Three."
"We don't know when another will mature."
"No."
"We don't know whether you have another month."
"No."
"So asking me to turn back—"
"Is asking you to live."
Silence.
The quarry suddenly felt colder.
I looked down at the map.
He was giving me the route to the thing that might extend his life and simultaneously ordering me to abandon it if retrieving it became too costly.
Absurd.
Emotionally offensive.
Strategically sound.
I despised all three qualities.
"Three days," I said.
Marduk watched me.
"You mean it?"
"I said it."
"Those are different."
He knew me too well.
I looked him in the eye.
"Three days."
He nodded.
Then reached behind the millstone and pulled out a prepared travel pack.
Already filled.
Of course.
I opened it.
Food.
Water treatment.
Bandages.
Dry cloth.
Two alchemical salves.
A coil of rope.
Small containers for samples.
A padded case.
"For the Heart?"
"If you find it."
"Temperature?"
"Keep it cool."
"Mana containment?"
"The case helps. Doesn't solve it."
"How long?"
"Unknown."
There were those wonderful words again.
Unknown.
Maybe.
Possibly.
This world had an alarming addiction to uncertainty.
At the bottom of the pack sat a pair of dry socks.
I looked at Marduk.
He looked away.
"The ravines flood."
"You packed socks."
"People lose toes."
"Very moving."
"Shut up."
I smiled.
He did not.
But I saw the corner of his mouth move.
We returned home before dark.
No more training.
Marduk insisted.
I spent the evening checking equipment instead.
Twice.
Then a third time.
Marduk removed half of what I added.
"You don't need four knives."
"Redundancy."
"You need food."
"Knives acquire food."
"Food is already food."
I replaced one knife with another ration.
He removed the second water flask.
"Weight."
"I can reduce weight."
His look ended that argument.
For seconds.
Eleven percent.
Point taken.
Near midnight, I found him awake beside the fire.
The map lay on the table between us.
He had added one mark.
A cross near the upper ravine.
"What's that?"
"Overhang."
"Shelter?"
"If weather turns."
I memorized it.
Then folded the parchment.
Marduk coughed.
I waited.
No blood this time.
He leaned back.
"You should sleep."
"So should you."
"I'm old."
"That is not a medical exemption."
"It should be."
I stood.
At the doorway, I stopped.
There were many things one might say before leaving to retrieve the only known treatment for a dying man.
Most were terrible.
Promises especially.
Promises pretend the world signed the agreement too.
So I chose something simpler.
"Don't die while I'm gone."
Marduk looked into the fire.
"I'll check my schedule."
"Very considerate."
"And Raymond?"
I turned.
He hesitated.
That was rare enough to command my full attention.
Then he pointed toward the travel pack.
"Eat the food."
I stared at him.
"That was your profound final wisdom?"
"You forget when you're thinking."
"I do not."
"You do."
"I categorically—"
"Last week you left dinner in the forge."
"I was occupied."
"Eat."
I laughed quietly.
"Fine."
I went to bed.
Sleep came slowly.
The island had changed shape in my mind.
For fourteen years it had been home, prison, training ground and graveyard.
Tomorrow it would become distance.
Terrain between me and a fruit that might help.
Might.
I had spent the last days learning that my body contained real limits.
That mana ended.
That muscles tired.
That Alchemia demanded materials and recovery.
That cleverness could reduce cost but never abolish it.
Useful lessons.
I would have preferred learning them during a less inconvenient week.
Before closing my eyes, I reviewed the route once.
Western cove.
Stream.
Yellow rock.
Cedar break.
Upper ravine.
Limestone basin.
Three days.
Turn back.
The last condition remained the hardest.
Not because I doubted I could obey Marduk.
Because I understood exactly why he had imposed it.
He was trying to control one variable too.
Me.
And the irritating part was that, for once, I couldn't prove he was wrong.
At dawn, I would leave for the Aurelian Heart.