Bearers of the Black Staff

THE SUNSET LACED THE WESTERN SKYLINE WITH streaks of crimson against a backdrop of cobalt, a vast and awesome stretch of stark color turned ragged where it brushed against the mountains. Sider thought that for all of his years of wandering the valley steeps, where his vistas frequently extended from wall to mountain wall, he had never seen anything so beautiful. He mentioned it to Deladion Inch, the big man sitting next to him on the parapets of the fortress ruins, both of them propped up on blankets laid out over stone blocks, sipping glasses of ale and watching the day come to a spectacular end.

“I’m told by those who might know that it’s only the chemicals in the air, the pollution of the wars, that gives that color,” he said. “The silver lining you find in every dark cloud.”

Sider said nothing, his eyes shifting north to where the storm that had missed them earlier was backed up against the range of peaks fronting his valley, thunder a distant booming. Lightning formed quick, intricate patterns, there and then gone again in an instant, each jagged flash more spectacular than the ones before. The storm was huge and walled away the northern horizon as if to forbid all entry.

“We get these storms all the time,” Inch observed.

“Much bigger than what we see in the valley,” Sider said. “More impressive.”

He was feeling more at ease than he had when the big man had brought him here. Sider didn’t like being shut away, no matter what claims of safety were offered. He knew the history of the compounds during the Great Wars, where being shut away was a death sentence. He preferred open spaces that offered several routes of escape. But Inch had assured him that the ruins possessed as many bolt-holes as anything they would find out in the open. The ruins, he advised, were filled with tunnels and passages that honeycombed the walls from one end to the other. If anything invaded that they were not able to stand against, it was a simple matter to find a way out before they could be trapped.

It didn’t hurt Sider’s sense of confidence, either, that the staff’s magic was working away at healing his wounds, and that even now he was feeling much stronger.

The two men sat side by side as the last of the light faded from the western sky and the night descended like a shroud. Overhead, clouds that hung on the fringes of the storm north hid stars and moon, and the night’s blackness was thick and impenetrable. Inch still wore his black leather armor, the stays and fastenings undone here and there to allow for comfort. Sider was wrapped in the remains of his tattered cloak and soft tunic and pants, all of them torn and shredded and in places cut away entirely to allow for the bandages. They had eaten and drunk and were now settled as comfortably as conditions would allow on a broad section of battlements that faced out to the west.

“I found this place maybe five years ago,” Deladion Inch said. “I had kept myself mostly west of here, just above the hardpan and toward the forests where there were communities that needed my services. But I was looking to keep moving east, to find what else was out there. This was what I found, maybe the last of its kind in this part of the world. Or anywhere. There are other ruins when you travel farther west, cities mostly, but those have collapsed into rubble and are overgrown to a point where you can hardly tell what they were. If I didn’t know something of the history, I wouldn’t be able to put a name to them.”

“You have any one place you call home?” Sider asked.

The big man’s smile was barely visible in the darkness. “Don’t stay anywhere long enough for that. You should know, Sider. What you do, I imagine you don’t have a home, either, do you?”

The Gray Man shook his head, wondering what it was that Inch thought he did. “Not since I was a boy. My parents had a small farm up in the high country. I left when I was sixteen.”

He shifted positions on the blankets, searching for a more comfortable one. “We haven’t really talked about what it is we do, you and I. You seem to think we do the same thing. But I’m not so sure.”

“No?”

“Let me try this out on you. You’re what they used to call a mercenary. You hire out for a price—maybe the highest price, maybe not. But you’ve got skills everyone needs, so you’re in demand. Have I got that much right?”

He could hear Inch chuckle softly. “Partly. I do have skills and everyone wants them, so finding work is easy. But I have a lot of different skills, ones that no one else has. That makes what I can do unique. So sometimes I don’t work for anyone; sometimes, I’m my own employer. Sometimes the price is coin or goods, and sometimes it’s just what I feel like doing. It’s a harsh world, Sider, and I stay sane in it by making sure all the choices are mine and not someone else’s.”