Chapters 15 and 16

(In which Elizabeth discovers the cost of a flimsy disguise, becomes a pariah, and witnesses a battle of giants)

Fifteenth

"What did you tell Katrina about her play?" Flint had gone back to caring for the horses, and Elizabeth joined him, ostensibly to check on her belongings in the carriage. She had left Grim deep in conversation with Katrina and Dorveille, the actress who had played Penumbra, about details of Shade society. Grim looked as if he might have needed a rescue; it was too bright for him to slip away into the shadows.

"I should have warned you, she can be a bit defensive when it comes to her writing. I mean, she's like a mother to us all, but when it comes to her artistic endeavors, you'd best tread lightly. She may ask for honesty, but even the truest statement goes down smoother when it's sweetened with a bit of flattery."

"I was honest. I thought it was a very interesting fable about the costs we pay for revenge, and that it whetted my appetite to learn more about Eliza and her companions. I thought the puppetry was amazing and that the acting was very good, but that the actors needed to speak more slowly and clearly."

"Oh, so you got in a jab at me, did you? She probably loved that. She's always yelling at us if we mumble or drop lines. Every pounding word is her gift to the audience, each syllable dripping with gold."

"I had to give her something. She gave me paper and inkroot and everything, I couldn't just--whoa!" Elizabeth’s foot slipped on something unseen in the grass, and she plunged headlong into the field.

Flint was at her side instantly, hand out to help her up. "Are you okay? What happened?"

"I’m fine," she said distractedly. She had flung her hands out to break her fall, and the fingers of her left hand, pointy-side down, had plunged into the soil. As she pulled her hand out, she could see that her three longest fingers had punctured the glove, revealing metal underneath, easily seen through the gaps in the fabric.

She shifted her body, spurning Flint's outstretched arm to block the damage from his line of sight. "Slipped in some...ugh. Horse apple. I just need to clean up."

Flint stepped back, and she tugged at the ends of the fabric, folding them between her fingers so the holes were less obvious. She hoped it held; she would have to find a needle and thread somewhere. Her fingers only maintained their dull edge for as long as she concentrated; she had been practicing her focus to keep them in their benign form for longer periods of time, but it was hard when she was distracted.

Elizabeth stood up. "I'm fine. Nothing hurt but my pride. So," she continued, dusting herself off and shifting the subject in what she hoped was a casual tone, "what can you tell me about this Eliza character? All Grim has said is that everyone in Edge knows her stories, and that she's Silas' sister?"

"Well," Flint said, clearing his throat. "That's a good start, I suppose." He eyed her suspiciously. "You really don't have Eliza and Silas stories in Central? I mean, I've heard that most of your people don't know that Edge exists, but I supposed some of the stories would cross over."

"Maybe they did," she allowed, "And I just know them by a different name. Would that be possible?"

He shrugged. "It's your world. Let me know if any of this sounds familiar. But...I should warn you, all this happened so long ago that the true tale has likely been lost among the legends. There are so many conflicting details, it's hard to know which if any of them are historically accurate.

"Eliza and Silas were born in Central and migrated to Edge when they were children; all the stories agree on that. Some say they accidentally wandered in together, others that Silas found a door and somehow recognized it for what it was, and then Eliza followed to try to bring him back to Central. Others say that someone brought them to Edge, lured here for one reason or another...The Watchmaker, or one of the Weavers, or ghosts trying to possess their bodies for their own.

"Not knowing about the rules of passage, Eliza crossed over while holding either a knife or scissors--some sort of blade. And that turned her hand into a sort of flesh-metal mix, with five fingers pointed at the ends and sharp as steel along the palm." Elizabeth fought the urge to hide her own hand behind her back.

"They wandered through Edge for many years, eventually falling in with The Watchmaker, whom Silas would aid in the war against The Triumvirate--"

"Okay, I've got to stop you. I already have a bunch of questions." He tilted his head, waiting for her to go on. "You said this happened 'so long ago.' Like, how long ago? And if it was really, really long ago, then how is Silas still alive and ruling?"

"My grandfather heard these stories when he was a child, and it was old news even then. Centuries ago, at least. Some say it's magic that keeps Silas alive, others say that 'Silas' is really only a title that's handed down from one ruler to another, who somehow manage to look enough alike to keep the myth of one 'Silas' unbroken through the years." He rubbed at his crooked nose, absent-mindedly. "I can't say for sure. I want to say magic, but there's not as much of that in Edge as there used to be."

"What about this triumvirate?"

"Ah. Now we're getting deep into the religion of Edge. Dangerous, heretical stuff, if it wasn't so historically pertinent. The Triumvirate were the three Gods of Edge...not the only three Gods, but the three major ones. They were three and one all at the same time. Inseparable, indivisible, and yet often jealous and warring with one another."

He took a deep breath and in a sonorous voice sang with a child's skipping-rope cadence:

Eagle fierce, and Stallion brave

Lion's in the garden maze

Edge’s guards 'til end of days

Kings of all the lands they've made

Elizabeth raised an eyebrow. "That was very nice, but it didn't really explain very much."

He looked sheepish. "Ahem. Yes, well, anyway, the three were the caretakers of Edge, and some say its creators as well, though there's no consensus on that. In the days before the fracturing of this land, it was divided into three sections: the garden mazes, the fiery wastes, and the lofty crags, controlled by the Lion, the Stallion, and the Eagle, respectively, and populated with the people and animals that worshiped and were nourished by them. There were some unclaimed areas, and some neutral ones as well...many of the human cities couldn't have functioned if they were under the sway of just one god, and there were some regions that remained wild and godless. The homeland of the Shades, for example, was traditionally not under the protection of any one god, nor the islands of the Obscure Sea, like the one Kat's play took place on, nor the sea itself."

Elizabeth took a deep breath. "So, these three immensely powerful magical beings--"

"Gods."

"Okay, these Gods, then. They held Edge together, and Silas made war on them?"

"Not Silas by himself, but The Watchmaker, who was really the impetus behind the whole uprising. He was a man, a Weaver...the most powerful magician that Edge had ever known, before Silas. He traveled across the land recruiting an army of men and other beings to fight against the Gods, saying it was time for Edge’s own to become masters of their own destiny, that our Gods were holding us back." Flint shook his head. "The audacity of it still boggles my mind. The courage, and some would say, the foolishness. But he was a very powerful magician and had an apt pupil in Silas. Together, they became unstoppable.

"The population of Edge became divided, and the civil war went on, intermittently, for years...periods of fighting interspersed with years of uneasy truce. Great battles were waged on land and sea both, the tide shifting from one faction to the other. But, eventually, Silas and The Watchmaker won, and won decisively enough that The Triumverate left Edge, never to be heard from again."

"What happened then? Was that the end of the war?"

"Well, nothing, for a while. Edge was at peace. The sun still rose every morning and set every night, the seasons still changed. All the dire predictions people said would occur if The Three were forced out of Edge failed to come true. The fracturing of the lands had started years before, but at this time affected only the hinterlands, and occurred so rarely that it was thought of mostly as a curiosity. I don't think many in the central portions of Edge even believed it was really occurring, thinking it peasants’ folk tales or superstitions.

"Then things changed. The Black Guard, the personal police of The Watchmaker, took on more and more power over the citizens of Edge. Minor infractions were punished with imprisonment. Many...most of those taken never returned. Promises made in the first war were broken, alliances were ignored. There were still some holdout areas, lands that remained loyal to their old God, and as people became unhappy with their new leaders, these lands grew in influence. These were places where the priesthood had fled, those men who had held the true power in the days before the wars. Guerilla wars were fought in the outlands, skirmishes between The Watchmaker’s army and the rebels, and grand acts of violence and vandalism were perpetrated against the new regime under cover of darkness.

"The Watchmaker grew tired of this underground war, and gave the rebels an ultimatum: unless they surrendered, peacefully, he would unleash a weapon of unimaginable power against the holdout lands. He set a date at which time the leaders were to present themselves to his court for peaceful surrender, to discuss terms of the disarmament and post-rebellion governing of their homelands.

"Well, the leaders had seen what the Watchmaker's promises were worth; some of their armies were made up of those who had deserted after being betrayed. So, having no desire to see their own heads on pikes, they spurned the demands and called the tyrant's bluff."

Flint fell silent. Elizabeth knew it was an overly dramatic pause, that the man was playing her like he would any other audience. She didn't care. "Did he have the weapon? Did he use it?" she demanded.

Flint smirked, resuming his tale. "Not at first. He withdrew all but a handful of his soldiers from the holdout lands. The rebellious armies thought they had called his bluff, that The Watchmaker had backed down. They hoped he might leave them to govern their own lands, leaving Edge a divided but peaceful state. Some even went so far as to talk of trying to find the old Gods, helping them to return somehow. The cease-fire went on for months, I think...long enough to lull the rebel states into a sense of security."

Flint turned to look her in the eye. His voice darkened for dramatic effect. "Then the holdout cities started disappearing."

"Wait--what? Whole cities? Destroyed?"

He shook his head. "Not destroyed, no rubble or corpses or anything like that. Just...disappeared. All the buildings, and everyone in them. Tens or hundreds of thousands of people, all gone. Where the cities once stood, only broad, grassless plains remained.

"I've been to one of them, the site where the city of Vyllig once stood. It's eerie...the plants have come back, but only small, stunted ones. No one has rebuilt on the sites, saying it's bad luck and they fear the ghosts that may have stayed behind, though I don't think a ghost has ever been seen at any of these places."

"How many cities?"

"Four, in all...one every week for four weeks. Hounds' Tooth was first, then Vyllig, then the mountain town of Nest--that was a big one, that was the old capitol of the Eagle's lands--then, finally, William's Keep. Losing the Keep was the pack that stumbled the horse...much of the leadership of the rebellion had gathered there for a summit. Without them, the uprising had effectively been beheaded."

"Wow." She was stunned. Four cities? She pictured New York, Chicago, London, wiped off the map. "That's...quite a weapon. Did they ever use it again?"

"They never had to. The remnants of the armies surrendered, and Edge became united, ruled by The Watchmaker and Silas."

"Where was Eliza during all of this? Did she explore the islands with Jonathan and Penumbra the whole time?"

"Not the whole time...I don't think she had any interest in ruling Edge and distanced herself from it for the first portion of the war, preferring not to choose sides. There doesn't seem to have been any bad blood between her and The Watchmaker over this decision. He gave her a ship for her travels, The Feather'd Arrow, and welcomed her back when she returned.

"And, eventually, she did return, and became involved in the war, joining with her brother against the Three as a general and a battlefield commander...many say it was Eliza's involvement, her aptitude for strategy, that turned the tide in the war against The Triumvirate. After Eliza joined them, Silas and The Watchmaker's forces lost no further battles.

"But, sometime after the hinterland uprising was ended, Eliza decided that Silas and The Watchmaker had grown too powerful, and she started her own rebellion against their rule. She gathered her own underground army, The Debris, and led a series of attacks against the new capitol city of Pendulum."

Elizabeth blurted out excitedly, "Did she win?" She blushed; she hadn’t intended to get so emotionally involved in his story. "I mean, of course she didn't, in the end. Silas is still ruling, right? What happened with Eliza's war?"

Flint grinned. "She did well enough. At first, The Watchmaker thought her little more than an annoyance. He underestimated her sway over his people...she was always more a folk hero than either he or Silas to the people of Edge. Moreover, her army was surreptitious...they couldn't destroy her city because she had no city. Or, to be clearer, her city was their city. Destroying it meant abandoning Pendulum and admitting defeat.

"The Debris' final attack was against the High Keep of Pendulum, led by Eliza herself with her close cadre of soldiers, a cast of characters who themselves are the subject of much of the folklore of Edge...Haverford the giant, Amanita the driver, Gingroth and Javier of the animal-men, Joseph the Re-animated. Much of her army was killed, but she and a few of her compatriots penetrated the High Keep's inner sanctum." Flint picked a flattened stone off the ground, side-arming it into the field as though trying to skip it off of the surface of a lake.

"Flint!" His repeated pauses were becoming beyond annoying. "Finish the story!"

"I did. That's all anyone really knows, for sure. The information about the end of the attack is contradictory. There was some sort of skirmish on the outer walls of the stronghold, lightning and strange colors illuminating the cloudy night sky, but at the end of it, a woman resembling Eliza appeared on a rampart above the castle's main gate, asking her army to disperse. She was high enough above the crowd to leave a lot of doubters, but the general consensus was that she had either changed sides or had been killed. Either way, the rebellion of the Debris was over.

"The woman who may-or-may-not-have-been Eliza made a few more appearances, always at a distance, and then was never seen again. The story spread that she had returned to Central, and there are many who believe it, though traveling back and forth between the two is extremely difficult and dangerous, as I'm sure you know."

"Wait, what are you--"

"Flint! Hey, Flint!" a cry came from across the field. The actress who had played Eliza walked toward them. She was taller than Elizabeth and quite pretty in an elfin way, her blonde hair woven into a braid that bounced as she walked. She looked absolutely nothing like Elizabeth. "I need to talk with you."

"Hello, Miranda. Have you met Elizabeth?"

Miranda extended her hand. "Oh, yes, the girl from Central. The one who told Kat I mumbled as though I had a mouth full of stones."

"I don't think I--"

"Actors love it when untrained peasants give them unwanted advice. Please--," her tone was so icy, Elizabeth was surprised she couldn't see the girl's breath, "--keep your critiques coming. It's a minor miracle this troupe has been successful without them."

Miranda turned back to Flint. "Port wants you back at the stage. One of the gears in the folding mechanism is stuck, and he needs you to help lift it so he can get under it.”

"Is Camden back yet? With the replacement wheel?"

"No, not yet. But most everything is ready for him, and the troupe is mostly packed up and ready to go once the wheel and stage are fixed. So you should probably be getting the horses ready, as well."

"Okay. Thank you. I'll be along."

"Are you two done with your talk?" The way she said this last word implied they had been doing more than just speaking. Miranda's hands were at her braid, alternatingly stroking and pinching at its strands. Her tone changed, becoming softer and supplicative. "I'd like to read through our lines from The Pivoting Stick. Maybe on the ride to Eisen?" She batted her eyelashes playfully.

"All right. I just have to find my script."

"It's on the shelves in the larger stage-cart. I saw it when..." Miranda trailed off, growing wide-eyed, her gaze fixed on Elizabeth's hand. Her left hand. "What in the Gods is that?"

In a flash, Miranda had Elizabeth's left wrist gripped in a surprisingly strong hold, pulling it to her for a closer look. "Take this glove off. Take it off this instant. Flint, make her take it off." Elizabeth saw what had happened: the fingers of her glove had slipped from their folded position. The metal beneath was clearly visible through the slashed fabric.

Flint gave her a penetrating look. "Elizabeth...? What's going on here?"

She didn't know what to do. She wished Grim were here. He hadn't forbidden her from showing her hand, but what if they knew about what had happened in Foursmith? What if they turned her in? "I...I don't..."

"Aha!" Miranda took advantage of Elizabeth's confusion and snatched the glove almost completely off, enough to reveal where the flesh ended and the metal began. She took Elizabeth's wrist and shook it in front of her face. "I know exactly what this is." She spoke through gritted teeth, her eyes afire. "And I won't stand for it."

"It's just...it happened when I came here...I didn't mean any..."

Miranda threw her wrist down so it struck Elizabeth in the thigh with its momentum. "I'll speak to Port about this. I won't be recruited over, you hear me? I could get an offer from any troupe in Edge, any time I wanted to. I don't have to suffer this...this...amateur." She spat the word out as if it was poison. "Besides, that looks merged. You know that's forbidden, Flint. This girl could get the entire troupe in trouble with the Black Guard. That's all we need." She stomped away through the tall grass.

Flint and Elizabeth stared at each other, neither wanting to be the first to speak. "We should go after her. You'll have to speak to Port and Kat about this," Flint ventured.

"I didn't do anything," she protested.

"Well, Miranda thinks you did, and she has a way of making trouble when she's not happy." He swallowed. "Also, she's right. You can't have that hand and not expect to call down the thunder. Silas's Black will be all over you if you don't keep it under wraps." He started toward the caravan.

Elizabeth followed, pulling her glove back on as she strode through the field. "Why? I didn't do it on purpose, it just happened! When I traveled here! I was holding--"

"I don't think they'll care. They'll think you were trying to follow the prophecy, and they'll throw you into a cell so deep, you'll never be heard from again."

"What are you talking about? What prophecy?"

Flint looked exasperated. "The one that says only the hand of Eliza can end of Silas’s rule. Not many people think that soothsaying is true, but any attempt to recreate the knife-fingers of Eliza has been forbidden for centuries. Miranda uses a prop-glove, and even that is risky. Most actresses just paint their hands silver."

He stopped walking, turned and faced her. "For what it's worth, I believe you. You're a stranger here, and I don't think you're trying to overthrow the government. But I doubt the Black Guard will see it that way. Proof of guilt has never been necessary as far as they're concerned. Only suspicion."

An undercurrent of noise erupted from the caravan, a cacophony of many excited voices talking all at once. Elizabeth felt her heart sink. "I guess Miranda wasted no time telling the Manteaus."

Flint held his hand up warily. "No...this is different. Something else is going on. Come on."

The troupe had crowded around a thick, middle-aged man speaking with Kat and Port. Questions were being shouted in rapid-fire succession. Elizabeth couldn't make any sense of it. A few of the men had broken away from the throng and hurried to the wagons, closing them up. Miranda stood at the edge of the ring, her complaint forgotten for the moment.

Elizabeth pieced together some words: ”Town...destruction...monster...blue...in-between.” I wasn't enough to cobble together a narrative, but the troupe clearly was agitated. She elbowed Flint. "What do you think is going on?"

He stood on his tiptoes, straining to hear the man's raspy words. "It sounds as though Foursmith has been attacked."

Her stomach sank. Was this about the minotaur? "By bandits?"

"No, by something else...it sounds like...” He swallowed, gulping audibly. He had paled significantly. “It sounds like one of the Servants of the In-Between."

Elizabeth looked around for Grim, but he was not among the troupe. "Look, I don't know what that means. Are we in danger?" More people had begun making ready for travel, gathering up miscellaneous items that had been scattered during their encampment.

"Someone must have broken the rules of passage. Recently, and nearby. The Servant will tear through Edge until it tracks them down." He swallowed, hard. "I've never seen one, only heard the stories. They're supposed to be as tall as a building. Horrible, relentless creatures that can tear down hills. And they don't stop until they find what they're looking for."

Her heart sunk even further. "You mentioned these rules before--"

"The Gods that guard the passage between Edge and Central do not take trespass through their lands lightly. The wisdom is that they will allow but one passage, in one direction. Any more than that and they may send a Servant to track down the transgressor, to pull them back to the In-Between itself. For Gods-only-know what punishment."

     Elizabeth felt like she'd been struck by lightning. "Wait...what?" Her head was swimming. "You mean I can't go back home? I can't ever go back home?"

Sixteenth

Elizabeth's head felt like it was vibrating, her emotions oscillating between shock and anger. She had to find Grim. She had to find him right now.

Flint was still speaking to her; she could sense his voice buzzing within the far reaches of her attention, could see one of his hands making adamant gestures, could feel his grip at her upper arm, but she shook him off. She heard herself calling Grim's name as she moved crossways against the tide of the members of the troupe. There was panic in their eyes, the faces of people hurrying to get a half-step ahead of a coming storm.

She found herself face-to-face with Port, his hands at her shoulders, shaking her gently. Katrina was behind him, her gentle features arranged into concern and...something else. Something harder, sterner. Elizabeth had seen that look before, on her mother's face. Readying herself for a tough decision.


    Port's words penetrated the fog of her mind. "...passage?"

"What?"

"I said, how many times have you completed the passage? We're needin' to know, right now. Honestly."

Over his shoulder, Kat piped in. "This troupe is our family. While you travel with us, you're family, too...but we need to know if we're in danger, girl."

"I've...just traveled once, as far as I know." That was true, and also not true...but the details were so complicated. What if the creature was hunting her? Was it the same manner of thing that had attacked her house, had propelled her into making the passage in the first place? Had Grim somehow lured it to her, so long after she had returned to Central?

"What about your friend? Has he made the passage more than that?"

He certainly had...at least twice, and he had said that he had gone back and forth through an additional two gates. But did those other two times count? And did it matter?


    She finally settled on hedging. "You'll have to ask him." She felt a stab of guilt for being so dishonest with these people who had been kind enough to take her in.

"We have to leave them behind!" The shrill voice behind her was Miranda's. Elizabeth whirled to face her. Flint followed close behind the actress, with the dark-eyed Dorveille behind him. "She's making us a target! Show them your hand, Elizabeth!"

"Miranda, we do have to talk about this," Flint interjected, "but now is not the time. We have to get the troupe moving." 

"We have to talk about this now! This is about our safety!"


    Port looked questioningly at Miranda, then Elizabeth, then back at Miranda. "Make it quick. And Dorveille, go find that Shade. If he's still in our camp, I need to talk to him, now. Check all the dark corners. Leave your shell if you have to, get someone to keep an eye on it while you wander." He turned to address Elizabeth. "Alright. Show me your hand, girl."

She started to protest. But if they really wanted to see the hand, they could have Flint or one of the others hold her so they could look. Outside of attacking them all, she couldn’t do much about it. Elizabeth held up her left arm and pulled off the glove.

The four of them stood slack-jawed and entranced. Even Flint and Miranda, who had gotten glimpses before, stared in awe. Tears welled up and shone at the corners of Katrina's eyes. Port spoke first, his voice a hoarse, weary croaking. "How did you...Gods, it's the best I've ever seen. There aren't even any seams. Does it move?"

He gave a cry of astonished joy as she wiggled her fingers and rotated her wrist. The sunlight glinted and danced across the smooth metal, bending at the sharp incline as it led to the blades' edges on the palm-side of the fingers. A sharp intake of breath escaped one of the troupe.

Port looked away and composed himself, shaking his head. "I'm...I'm sorry, Elizabeth, but this does complicate matters. We've got enough trouble with the Guard without harborin' someone like you. Gods! A Servant and a prophecy-chaser, all in the span o' ten minutes. The troupe will be tested today."

"I didn't do it on purpose! It's not my fault! Grim didn't warn me about the metal in my hand--"

Miranda stepped forward, whipping her braid over her shoulder. "That Shade was in Central? So he has made the passage more than once! Port, Kat, we have to leave them." She paused, a wicked half-grin playing across her lips. "Or turn them into the authorities." The smile widened. "Or tie them up and leave them for the Servant."

"Hush, girl! How could you even say such a thing!" Kat looked like she was one twitch away from slapping Miranda. She turned back to Elizabeth. "You two aren't evil, girl. I would bet my remaining teeth on that. But you've got to be on your own. It's just too dangerous." Kat drew a deep breath. "It was certainly nice knowing you, but I would ask that you go a different direction when you and your friend leave this field. Do not try to follow us. I would hate for things to get...ugly." She looked ashamed but resolute.

Dorveille ran back to the group, calling out to Katrina and Portland in a high, breathy voice that reminded Elizabeth of a fortune teller she had seen once in an old movie on television. "I found the Shade! He is helping with the fore carriage!"

"Good girl. We will go to meet him. Help Flint make sure all the packs are tied tight on the roofs. Elizabeth, come with us."

Flint shot her a regretful look. "It was nice meeting you, Elizabeth. I would've liked to know you better. Best of luck on your travels." He offered her a shy, sad smile and reached his hand out to squeeze her shoulder. She felt a not-unpleasant chill erupt from where he touched her. Then he turned and followed Dorveille into the frenzy of actors and stagehands.

Portland steered Elizabeth to the largest of the carriages; Grim was one of many men helping to lift the carriage off the ground while two others lay underneath attaching the new wheel. Port motioned for a nearby man to take Grim's place, then led the two of them away from the rest of the crew.

"Shade, it pains me to do this, but you have got t' go." Grim started to protest, but Portland cut him off. "You heard what Camden said when he came back from town; the thing that was doin' the damage sounds like a Servant. And Elizabeth," she felt her cheeks flush hot, "let slip that you've been t'Central and back. No, don't be angry with her, she didn't give you up on purpose. I don't think she even knew about the rules o' passage."

 Port slung an arm over Grim's shoulders, a comforting gesture that made the Shade look oddly boyish. "It's nothin' personal...I got my own to consider, and if that thing's huntin', then we got to put some miles between us and the quarry. You can understand that."

Grim waited to be sure Port had finished, then spoke. "I will leave. If the Servant is pursuing me, it will have to cut across country and slip through the darkness to catch me." He turned to Elizabeth. "Then this is goodbye. I hope these good people will--"

Elizabeth started to interrupt, but Port did it for her, clearing his throat loudly before she could get a word out. "Actually, with her hand bein' what it is, it's not really safe for us t'be harborin' her, either. If The Guard were t'find her with us, we could be shut down. At worst, we could all of us be thrown into prison. Every last one of us. No, the girl has t' go with you."


    Grim stared blankly at Portland. "If I take Elizabeth with me, then I cannot slip to safety. You may not realize it, but you may have just given us a death sentence."

Port threw up his hands. "Again, I'm real sorry. The two of you seem awful nice. But I got my own crew to think about. We're just simple travelers, we can't be fightin' against The Guard, or a Gods-damned Servant. Be sure to look us up if you get outta this scrape."

He backed toward the caravan. "And you best be straight with that girl, Shade. Sounds like you haven't told her near half o' what she'll need to survive in Edge." Port disappeared around the corner of a carriage just as the horses pulled the first in line back onto the road.

The other carriages followed soon after. Katrina, Flint, and Dorveille waved as they rode by. Even Miranda, now that Elizabeth wasn't a threat to her, managed a cordial good-bye, called from the rooftop of a carriage.

Elizabeth watched the caravan shrink into the distance, acutely aware of an emptiness swelling inside her. She had let her guard down among the actors and the crew, had actually lost herself in the play, and had allowed herself a bit of fun for the first time since coming to this forsaken land. She had even had fleeting thoughts of traveling with them for a while longer... riding along with the Longshadow troupe would have brought her to new towns, and one of them would be bound to have a guide who would be able to lead her home. It wasn't until now that her mind had fully articulated this plan, and now, of course, it was too late.

In fact, it might already be too late for her to go home at all. Ever.

She twisted away from the road, facing Grim. "Is there anything you need to say to me, Grim? Before we get hunted down by a gigantic monster? Anything, say, about 'rules of passage'?" Her tone was as cold as she knew how to make it.

He set his jaw. "Now is not the time. We have to get out of here."

"Because you're getting chased, or because I am? Dammit, I need some answers, or so help me, I will cut your hamstrings and leave you hobbled on the ground for the Servant to find." Elizabeth knew she couldn't follow through on this threat, but the words felt right coming out of her mouth. Just saying them set steel into her spine.

Grim’s eyes flickered left and then right...looking for shadows, searching for a means of escape? He sighed. "Fine. Let us talk while we make haste. If there is truly a Servant in Foursmith, we are best leaving the road. If we make for the mountains--", he pointed to a chain in the distance, toward the north-west, "--we may be able to lose the creature in the caverns."

"Okay," she acquiesced, "but I don't want any lies, and I don't want any omissions. I just want the truth." 

She tightened the shoulder strap of the bag around her, and they started through the field north of the road, going up and down the gentle slopes. At the peak of each, they would stare down the Grand Road, in the direction of Foursmith, looking for any sign of the creature's pursuit.

Grim kept a steady pace, matching her own without any of his previous fatigue. He took a turn carrying the provisions and managed to keep up his end of the conversation, though not without frequent pauses.

"How long have you known I wouldn't be able to return home? Did you know when you came to Central?"

He shook his head. "I still do not know for sure that your way is blocked. It is not that one cannot make the passage through the In-Between twice, it is that each time after the first migration becomes...more dangerous. Each subsequent crossing makes the traveler more clear to the creatures that live between Edge and Central...the Gods of the In-Between. I myself have made several journeys, and, if it is truly tracking us, this would be the first time anything was wakened."

"But you knew about the risk. And failed to tell me."

He rounded on her. "Elizabeth, I am growing weary of your disapproval. Maybe you have forgotten, but your home was under attack. We were being pursued. I did not have time to explain all of the finer points before we went through the gate."


    "There was plenty of time before that. You were in Central for weeks before that night. What were you doing all that time, anyway?"

He shrugged away her last question. "I thought we would have more time when the gate appeared. I did not even know if I would ask you to leave Central. Why would I have bothered you with the details of the passage? You were still digesting the fact of Silas’s existence. Of Edge’s existence."

"Well, what about the plan you told me about? What about this 'guide' we're supposed to be finding? Do they even exist?"

"The guides exist. They are secretive and few in number, but they do exist."

"Well, how do they survive the passage? How do they steal from Central without getting noticed?"

He stopped suddenly, the bag clinking with the abrupt change in momentum. He flashed her one of his uncommon grins. "I do not know. I never thought to question that. Maybe your case is not nearly so hopeless as you may think."

"So, we still try to find a guide, then?" 

"Until we find a better plan. We should also focus on surviving." She thought this may have been a joke...but to hope for a smile and a joke from Grim in the same day would be like winning the lottery and getting struck by lightning.


    They traveled the rest of the afternoon and into the evening, eating biscuits Grim had taken from the troupe, dried fruits from their supplies, and picking wild berries from bushes they passed. The fruit was waxy on the outside, dry and crumbly on the inside, and it tasted like chalk. But, unpalatable as it was, it did quell the rumbles in Elizabeth's stomach.

Grim motioned for them to stop for the night at the crest of a hill. From here they could watch the Grand Road in the distance without themselves being easily observed. The size of the mountains in the distance had not changed perceptibly; they would still have a few days' walk before they reached the foothills. 

Taking the first watch, Elizabeth stared alternately at the road and the darkening sky, watching the stars emerge into view. Unfamiliar constellations in an unfamiliar sky. She scanned the hills through the breaks in the bushes. Not much was visible by starlight, but what could be seen seemed harmless enough. The Grand Road provided the only additional light; Elizabeth had noted the lamp-posts that lined it during their time with the troupe but hadn't fully appreciated what an undertaking it would have been to string the road with them this far from any settlement, and to light them every evening. Their regular spacing, stretching across her visible world from east to west, injected a sense of order into the chaos of the wilderness. She felt a twinge of homesickness for late evening drives down deserted highways, half-asleep in the backseat with an AM radio station mingling with her parents' murmured conversation.

After Grim woke to end her shift, she nestled into a rock-free band of earth. Her dreams came immediately, unsettling ones in which faceless blue and black figures hunted her through a dilapidated, enlarged version of her father's house where all of the windows had been bricked shut and the doorways toothed with shards of glass. She ran in an endless Möbius strip of a racecourse, feeling the pursuers snapping at her heels but never getting caught, nor escaping to safety. Finally, the house began to quake, vibrating dust and plaster as cracks appeared in the walls and the floor.

Her eyes snapped open to find Grim shaking her, one hand clasped over her mouth. He did not speak, but his eyes, wide with panic, told her all she had to know: they had to get moving. They set out among the dew and the hint of pre-dawn light, among the morning calls of cardinals and bluebirds.

The attack happened quickly. She had turned to ask Grim something when a shadow caught her eye, one that failed to harmonize with the rest of the landscape; it didn't belong to any of the trees or bushes, and seemed to move down the hill of its own accord. She made a noise of alarm, not quite a word, and pointed. The darkness was a different hue than the other shadows, a deep blue marbled with white streaks. It moved like water, if water had intent and purpose; it flowed around tree trunks and rocks, sending shoots as scouts to lap at their bases.

Elizabeth didn't wait for Grim's response. She ran.

Her joints complained with the stiffness of early morning; she ignored them. Her sneakers split twigs and stomped anthills as she sprinted up the next hill with Grim right behind her. The blue mass was consolidating its size, starting to resemble a wave...it had been a broad flood sampling the landscape, but now became a narrow, irregular road of motion, snaking closer and closer. It was closing the distance between them with alarming speed.

"Can we," she wheezed, "can we shake it? Can we climb a tree? Should we split up?"

Grim glanced back, then shook his head. "It does not seem to do as well going downhill. It may have difficulty--", he paused to leap a fallen log, "--controlling its momentum.  If we can find a steep grade, that might help us."

Elizabeth searched the landscape; the hills were gentle slopes, no sharp drop-offs that she could see. As they dodged a copse of densely-spaced trees, a surprised pair of rabbits burst out and took off across the hill, bounding for the safety of an underground warren. From the corner of her eye, Elizabeth saw arms of blue break from the main stream, sending smaller tributaries to pursue the rabbits. "Grim! We can make it divide!" She wished she knew if the tendrils were breaking off for good, or if they re-joined the main bulk afterward.

As they reached a nadir between hills, Grim sprinted left, and she turned right to traverse the hill diagonally. The blue form split into two smaller streams. She saw it ignore a skittering chipmunk that had emerged from its den. The mass was becoming more intent.

Elizabeth met back up with Grim, and they panted greetings. "It's not chasing animals anymore," she reported.

"I fear we cannot outrun it." He swallowed hard. "We will have to fight."

"Where? When?"

"Top of the next hill." The rises were more spaced out, with perhaps fifty yards between them and the start of the next, a clear field of yellow grass, sorrel, and dandelions in between. Elizabeth put out one last burst of speed and reached the apex a few steps ahead of Grim. She stopped and turned to face the relentless blue mass.

The river of marbled blue had regained its full size and slowed down as it neared them. It swelled to a single round, boulder-like mass, wobbling like Jell-O as the momentum of its tail caught up with it. Elizabeth held her left hand up in what she hoped was a threatening position; Grim stood like a boxer, crouched and ready to spring.

Small projections poked from the front of the blue sphere. They wavered in the air, tasting it with the back-and-forth motion of insect antennae. Elizabeth had to remind herself to breathe; her heartbeats were thunderclaps in the blood of her ears. She glanced at Grim, looking for some indication as to their next move.

The stalemate continued for what felt like a lifetime; civilizations grew and winked out of existence while they stood on the pinnacle of that hill, awaiting their fate. The white marbling moved through the darker background, speeding and slowing and occasionally forming patterns, like birds moving in and out of a murmuration.

Then the motion developed purpose; the projections on the anterior of the mass merged together, swelling and retreating until they formed the approximation of a head and a neck, as though someone within was pushing out, face first. The jaw opened. From the mouth, quiet and uninterpretable at first, a single word repeated over and over again, growing in volume until it became loud enough to recognize.

"Trespass."

It was not an accusation, nor an expulsion in anger; it was a statement. Its steady repetition was robotic, but the inflection changed with every utterance, sometimes rising at the end like a question, other times falling in pitch on the second syllable in almost comforting tone. Finally, the voice grew silent. The silence was worse than the noise.

As though an incendiary had been lit deep within the Servant, four thick vines exploded out of it. Elizabeth shielded her face, involuntarily flinching against fragments that never came. When she looked up, the extensions had solidified into approximations of limbs, but they were too long and jointed in odd places, and the uppermost ones ended in a starburst-shape of too-many digits, as though the creature based its blueprint on a child's drawing.

The Servant hoisted itself onto its legs, standing to a height of a medium-sized tree. It threw back its head; Elizabeth expected a roar, but the noise was more like a rushing of wind.

Before she knew what happened, it flung one of its limbs in her direction, and a solid impact struck her chest, knocking her to the ground. The limb did not retract but remained stuck to her torso, its fingers stretching around to her back and tightening in a compressive grip.

Fortunately, her arms remained free. She poked and then slashed at the tendril with both hands, sending little slices of blue material to the ground. Finally, she transected the thickest part. The seperated portion lost its strength, and she peeled it from her chest. It writhed and squirmed in the soil.

Grim had been similarly incapacitated but had lost the use of one of his arms, now completely engulfed in the blue. He sawed unsuccessfully at the Servant with his black knife, and Elizabeth watched as a shoot of the creature wrapped itself around the blade's handle, casually disarming the Shade and tossing his weapon into the weeds. Two other projections wound around his index and middle finger and bent them back until they reached an unnatural angle. A sickening snap emanated from his hand. He cried out in pain.

Elizabeth launched herself toward the limb that bound Grim, metal claws outstretched. She cut through half of the arm's diameter before she was yanked backward, her ankles stuck together as another projection wound around her legs. Her feet were pulled from under her, and she hit the ground hard.

Twisting, Grim snapped the limb that had trussed him, breaking it where Elizabeth had cut. He unwound it from his body, dove to the ground, and picked up his obsidian knife. Rolling over to where Elizabeth lay, he began sawing at the bindings on her legs.

"Are we winning?" she asked, standing as she was freed. The pieces that had been cut from Servant remained on the ground, but moved only in twitches. The main mass of the Servant was not appreciably smaller.

"We are still alive. That is something. But this--", he held up his injured hand, the two affected fingers already starting to swell, "--is a problem. Without my fingers, I cannot slip."

The figure of the Servant remained in its humanoid shape. It held still--the waves across its surface had ceased, and the white within the blue had stopped roiling. Although it had no discernible eyes or analogous organs, it seemed to be staring at its hands, held outstretched.

Elizabeth pointed to its limbs. "Wait,it's--what's happening?"

The arms had begun to shrink, consolidating into a denser mass. The sheen on the creature's outer layer changed, and Elizabeth sensed what was happening. "It's making its arms more solid. It's going to..." She trailed off as the hands started to flow into a different shape, the many fingers fusing into a broad, flat surface. "Oh, no. You've got to be kidding me. It's making its hands into knives."

The Servant stepped forward, swinging its arm in a wide arc toward Grim. The attack was slow and predictable, and the Shade sidestepped it without difficulty. But the second blow came more swiftly, slicing through his shirt as he danced backward. "Elizabeth," Grim called to her, "you should run. I can keep it distracted. We will meet up soon. Just get out of--" The last word was clipped short as he bent back at an almost impossible angle, the Servant's hand slicing through the space where his head had been only a moment before.

The momentum of the blade’s force carried it into the trunk of a nearby tree, gouging a slice out of its trunk, and the tree toppled toward Grim. He had no time to dodge; the upper boughs crashed down around him, striking him hard on the neck and shoulder. Elizabeth saw the impact, but then lost sight of him among the density of falling greenery.

The Servant advanced. The wind-noise she had heard earlier picked up, rising through a rapid crescendo until it reached an intolerable volume. Elizabeth headed back to the fray, intending to place herself between her friend and the beast, when the cacophony suddenly halted. She looked up and froze in her tracks. Something was battling the Servant. Something big.

It looked like...no, it was the shadowy creature that had attacked her home in Central, propelling her into Edge. The two figures grappled and fell to the ground in a rolling mass of blue and black. The shadowy creature gripped the Servant's forearms and forced it away from Grim and the fallen tree. But the Servant was forming new projections that extended from the sides of its torso, twining them around its opponent's legs.

 While the two giants were distracted by their mêlée, Elizabeth ran to the tree to extricate Grim from the branches. But, when she got there, she saw he already had a clear path out of the brush...he just wasn't using it.

He was unhurt, or at least not gravely injured in any way she could see. Grim stared at the two figures, face frozen in a look of intense concentration, sweat forming and dripping down his forehead. She saw his jaw clench and his neck inch forward as the shadow giant struck a blow to the Servant's chest, pushing it back. He wore the look of a passionately involved spectator, someone who believed his life depended on the outcome of a sporting event.

But he was wasting time they could be using to escape, to get to the mountain caverns and lose the Servant for good. Elizabeth grabbed his shoulder, but Grim didn't respond. She gripped him harder and began shaking him, but he remained fixated on the fraças, his jaw set and clenched. Finally, she slapped him hard across the face with a crack! that rent the air.

Grim stumbled back, tripped on a tree limb, and sprawled on the ground. As if on cue, the Servant's howling began anew, and its tentacles engulfed the shadow creature, binding it firmly before forcing it to contort into smaller and smaller shapes. Grim looked up at her, then bounced back to his feet. "No!" he screamed. The Servant's advantage over the shadow continued; the darker figure appeared as though it was being shoved through a tight hole, with parts of it gradually disappearing from view, until it was at last swallowed by...nothing.

Grim howled in pain. Elizabeth gripped his arm and started tugging him away. If they didn't start running now, they would be consumed within moments, devoured and sent to wherever Silas' shadow creature had gone.

But he was confused, unfocused. He fought her efforts, slapped at the hand that was yanking him. He was speaking, but the words were unintelligible. She started screaming at him, ordering him, insisting he get away from here.

Elizabeth didn't see the blow that knocked her sideways; the Servant's limb must have slithered in under the branches, beneath her line of sight. Unbraced, she fell fast, and her temple slammed against the trunk of the tree. Her vision grew grey and misty, and she felt lightheaded. Somehow, she got to her feet and stumbled back over to Grim.

He was doing badly; the tendrils of the Servant were strung across his body, leaving him almost entirely encapsulated. His head and neck remained free, and, in a final act of desperation, he was trying to bite at the blue that was winding around his upper chest. His gaze met hers, and he stopped snapping his jaws.

His eyes had lost the ferocity of a few moments ago, and he was once again lucid. His eyes brimmed with tears. "Elizabeth...I am so sorry."

"Grim. Don't--" A wave of vertigo and nausea hit her. She brought her hand to her forehead, feeling the bump forming there.

"Priest...the price he asked of me..."

She looked at him, trying to keep him in focus. I've got a concussion, she realized, I've got to-- Her thought died as she realized Grim’s dire position. The blue had wound around the top of his head, leaving only his face exposed. His breaths were shallow and labored.

"He said he...would not let me migrate...unless I brought you with me...said he would...leave me to die...in Cent--"

The black of Grim's irises shifted suddenly, becoming bright blue. His jaw fell open mechanically, and the Servant's skin spread across his cheeks, into his nostrils and mouth, and covered his face entire. Elizabeth swayed as the outline of Grim’s body first shrank, and then, with an outward rush of wind that blew her hair back from her forehead, disappeared.

She turned to face the creature. Several of its tendrils hovered in front of her but did not strike. She was unsure how many; with her swimming vision, she thought there was a good chance her eyes were doubling the number. They seemed to be waiting for her to do something. To run, or to attack.

But the dizziness would not allow her to do either. The projections started to advance, and Elizabeth stood awaiting whatever punishment the Gods of the In-Between would deliver.