With a click of his tongue, the Arcanist goaded the horse forward. Rolan grabbed hold of the man’s cloak, his stomach lurching with every step the animal took. The cut on his head blazed like fire, as sharply as if the Cryptic had just torn it open.
But after a few minutes, he started to ease into the motion, finding his balance. It wasn’tsobad. He liked how high up he was, and that he could look down on the people they passed with his nose in the air. Most people, when they saw the big horse coming their way, gasped and scrambled for cover. He liked that too.
“Peasants,” Rolan sniffed. “Commonpeople. Yes, yes, get a good look. Rolan Strider on a horse, that’s right! Out of the way, riffraff!”
“Shut up,” said the Arcanist.
Rolan leaned around him, to get a better look at his face. “Do you have a name, or is it justthe Arcanist.” He drew the word out for full dramatic effect. “Did your ma hold you up on the day you was born and say, ‘Oh me, oh my, a lovely darling boy! I shall call him the Arcanist!’?”
The Arcanist only grunted.
“So is it a first name, last name thing, then?” Rolan went on. “Is your first nameThe, last nameArcanist? I could call youThe, I suppose, but it sounds ridiculous. No offense to your ma, but it does. What aboutMr. Arcanist? That sounds better.”
“Luc,” said the Arcanist. “My name is Luc.”
“Ah! Luc. Boring, but better. Let’s go with that,Luc. My name’s Rolan. Rolan Strider. Not that you asked, which was rude of you, by the way.”
The Arcanist grunted again.
Rolan pressed a hand to his stomach. He was starting to feel oddly queasy. Maybe it was the motion of the horse, like some kind of seasickness.Horse-sickness? “Is it true you chop up kids and sprinkle their bits in the woods to lure Cryptics?”
“No,” the Arcanist replied. “Cryptics prefer their dinners alive and screaming.”
“R-really?”
The Arcanist craned his neck just enough for one cold blue eye to glint at Rolan. “I don’t feed children to monsters, boy.” Turning back around, he muttered under his breath, “But I find myself suddenly considering it.”
“Oh, you’re afunnyArcanist, are you? That’s unfortunate. You shouldn’t tell jokes. You don’t have the face for it.” Rolan’s head spun. He was starting to feel a bit delirious. Horse-sickness seemed to be a more serious malady than he’d thought. “You never did say whether I’ll get a sword. Will I have to eat Cryptics? I don’t really want to, if I’m honest. Do you eat them raw, or do you cook them first? What does a Cryptic taste like?”
A muscle twitched in the Arcanist’s neck. “Do youeverstop talking?”
“You should know, I have fought Cryptics before.” Rolan massaged the cut on his head. The bleeding had stopped but the stinging just wouldn’t go away. In fact, it might be getting worse. And why did he feel socold? “Just this morning, in fact. Big, nasty one, with about a million legs. It cut my head—”
He yelped as the Arcanist suddenly turned, his eyes narrowing. “You were cut by a Cryptic?”
“Just a scratch.” Rolan pointed to his forehead. “Rude of Hoff not to patch me up, don’t you think? It hurts a lot. Like,a lota lot. Is that normal? I’m a little dizzy too. Maybe got a fever. In fact, now that I think about it, my… my stomach…”
With a groan, Rolan pitched sideways, his body suddenly going numb all over. The last thing he remembered before everything went black was the Arcanist’s huge, scarred hand reaching for him, closing on his collar just moments before his head would have struck the ground.
- CHAPTER 6 -GOAT BREATH AND BLUEBERRIES
When Rolan came to, he was pleasantly warm. The world was soft and fuzzy all around him, and he wondered if he might be dead. Maybe this was the afterlife, the goddess’s realm of truth people said existed in the sky, where you took naps in clouds all day and twinkled like a star at night. If so, he thought he didn’t mind so much. It wasverycozy.
Then something rough and wet slapped his face, and Rolan’s eyes popped open. With a gasp, he sat up, pushing away the fuzzy lump that was sitting on his chest, licking his nose.
“Goat!” Rolan gasped. “Help! A goat is murdering me!”
The goatbaaed in his face, blasting him with hot, smelly breath, before clambering down. It flicked its tail reproachfully at Rolan and skipped away, its hooves clicking on the wood plank floor.
Rolan looked around. He was in a small room with piled sheepskins and hides and a flickering oil lamp hanging on a peg. A flash of lightning through the narrow window made Rolan shudder. He peered out to see rain lashing the glass. Thunder groaned through the wooden walls, shivering in his rib cage. It was night, and the sky had a temper to rival his pa’s.
Beneath Rolan was a rickety cot made soft by an abundance of more sheepskins. They were cozy, all right, but he was beginning to notice the smell, which was not pleasant. They stank of barnyard and mud and sheepy sweat. If the afterlife smelled likethat, he hoped there wasn’t one.
The goat now stood in the corner, chewing something. Rolan realized it was his boot and growled, looking around for something to throw at the animal. He hurled his other boot and missed. With a bleat of gratitude, the goat dropped his snack and started feasting on its mate.
“Could you stop that?” Rolan begged. “I only got the one pair.”
With a grimace, Rolan felt his forehead and found it tightly bandaged. The day’s events came back to him in a rush—the Cryptic in his cell, Hoff dragging him to prison.
