Chapter 10 | Part 5

Balin brought Maris a cup of water. She held it without drinking while Xandor asked what she had seen first.

“The boat,” she said. “Then the water. Black enough that the hand shows up against it.”

She stared at her own hand around the cup. “It goes under. That’s where it ends.”

“No face?” Xandor asked.

“No.”

“No landmarks?”

“No.”

“Does the water move normally?”

Maris stared at him.

“No.”

Xandor wrote that down.

“How long have you seen this exact image?”

“Since this morning. Other things before. Not this.”

“And the pull toward Riverhold?”

“After I woke in the field.”

Xandor wrote down her words, leaving space between them and the passage about Sense.

Dulint leaned against the table.

“So the cube sensed her.”

“She found the cube,” Xandor said. “That much she has told us. We have not yet seen the cube follow her when she leaves.”

Maris pointed toward him.

“Him I dislike less.”

Balin smiled.

“The standard is low.”

One corner of Maris’s mouth lifted. She finally drank.

“The visions come whether I want them or not,” she said. “They leave me on the ground. People stop believing me after the third warning that sounds impossible.”

“I believe you,” Eldric said.

She looked at him.

He did not explain.

Balin broke the silence.

“What do we actually do?”

Eldric drew the road map out from under Xandor’s notes.

“We don’t take the northern roads tonight,” Eldric said. “They’re watched.”

“Agreed,” Dulint said.

“We don’t separate while we still don’t know who can follow the cube.”

Dulint nodded again.

Maris looked toward the door.

“How temporary is this arrangement?”

“Until morning,” Eldric said. “We choose a route in daylight.”

“Good.”

Xandor set his notes aside and cleared a place for Maris to put the cup.

“I will speak to the innkeeper about more lamps. We should keep one burning.”

Balin tapped the edge of the copied page.

“What do I call this if I have to wake someone? Sense phase?”

“Cube will do. Everyone here knows which one you mean.”

“And if it does something new?”

“Tell us what you see.”

“And you’ll tell us what it means?”

“I hope to surprise you one day.”

Balin sighed.

“Before breakfast would be good.”

“I will see what I can do.”

Eldric looked around the table.

Dulint had lowered himself carefully into a chair. Maris still held the empty cup, and Balin was trying to hide a yawn.

None of them looked fit for a night on the road. Eldric pulled a second chair toward the window.

“Nobody leaves alone,” he said. “Nobody carries the cube without a second person present. We set watches in pairs.”

Maris looked at him.

“That I can agree to.”

Dulint nodded.

“So can I.”

Balin shrugged. “Better than being chased alone.”

Xandor gathered his notes.

“Morning, then.”

Dulint joined him for the first watch, stretching his bad leg beneath the sill. Eldric moved over to give him room.

From here Eldric could see the stable entrance as well as the street. He waited until Dulint had settled before pointing out the blind spot beneath the eaves.

End of Chapter 10.5 —> 11.1: The Kind Man: The Savior