Chapter 1

He couldn't help but yawn.

Kyven was bored. Desperately bored.

The workshop's schoolroom was quiet at the moment, all the apprentices huddled over their workbenches with their tools arrayed before them, the only sound the tink of hammer striking chisel or probe striking crystal. Kyven sat at the master apprentice table watching them, as they were all arrayed in a terrace so he could see each workbench and watch them cutting crystals. Master Holm was out talking to a miner, leaving Kyven to watch over this lot, nine twelve year olds, which was, what was for them, one of the most nervewracking days of their lives. The nine boys were taking the cutting test to see which of them would be taken on as an indentured apprentice, to learn the art of crystalcutting. Each of them had been apprenticed here for a year, in one of the largest and most prestigious crystalcutting shops in Atan, which was a village known for crystalcutters and alchemists. With the mines so close, many crystalcutters moved here, where they could get crystals right out of the mines, cut them, and sell them at a profit without paying for the crystals changing hands many times on their way out into the world. The alchemists followed the crystalcutters, which turned Atan from a rough and tumble mining camp to a prosperous village, very nearly a town, with nearly five hundred permanent residents, quite a few buildings, and farms and a large cattle ranch out on the plateau east and south of the village that kept the village fed.

Kyven remembered when he was sitting in one of those chairs, nine years ago. A year of learning the basics, practicing on pieces of glass and crystal chips, the hand exercises, the hours of study at the feet of the senior apprentices as they taught them about the crystals and how to analyze them to determine how to cut them to make them reach their full potential. It was intense for them now. All that work all coming down to one moment, where you had to successfully diamond cut a crystal without shattering it, after picking a suitable crystal out of a bin that would accept a diamond cut and would enhance its natural potential. It was a simple test, virtually no one ever cracked the crystal, and the two that did the best cuts would be apprentices to Master Holm, the most prestigious crystalcutter in Atan. The others would probably try to apprentice to one of the less prestigious cutters, using their year of training at Holm's shop as a bargaining chip. Most of them succeeded in getting apprenticed elsewhere, since Master Holm didn't even accept first years that wouldn't be acceptable cutters.

He'd be an apprentice for one more year.

In one more year, Kyven would be freed of his indentured service and would be free to start his own shop, and he meant to do just that. Kyv had taken up prospecting in his free time to start saving money towards opening his own shop, and had managed to find a few decent crystals by following the tips gleaned out of miners in the taverns at night. Not all crystals were buried, and some miners were quite adept at tracking them down. They were usually small and not worth much, but Kyven had an advantage there, because he could cut them himself and sell them at a much higher price than a raw crystal.

Kyven was very good at what he did. He was easily better at cutting crystals than Holm, and Holm knew it. Holm had known he had a natural among his prospective apprentices when Kyven was placed with him by his miner father, for Kyven had agile, sensitive hands and exceptional hand-eye coordination. Kyven had the hands of a master cutter, but Kyven's true advantage was an innate instinct for crystal cutting. When Kyven picked up a crystal, he just knew exactly which cut would release all the potential of the crystal, making it as potent as possible. Holm could do the same thing, but Kyven knew instinctively with just a touch, just a tertiary inspection of the crystal, where Holm had to examine a crystal extensively using a cutter's glass to study its internal structure. Crystals cut by Holm and Kyven were some of the most sought-after crystals in Atan. Holm often called Kyven a born crystalcutter, and had taken Kyven aside and trained him personally, where most apprentices were trained by senior apprentices until they reached a certain level, where they took lessons from the master craftsman. Holm knew that if Kyven managed to open his own crystalcutting shop, Kyven would be instant competition. But then again, Holm was old. When Kyven was free, there was the off chance that Holm might actually sell Kyven the shop, rather than try to compete with him.

Holm was no fool.

He blinked and looked at the nine boys. They seemed to shimmer to his eyes, and then he saw a tiny little cat sitting on the workbench in front of one of them, staring up at the boy with curious eyes. The cat had long, silky white fur, and was surrounded by a soft blue nimbus. It reached out and put its paw on the boy's wrist, and the boy seemed to calm down a little, his shaking hands becoming still.

He shook his head. Not that again. He stood up and lightly slapped his cheeks. Kyven sometimes… saw things. It was a very rare occurrence, happening usually when he was either sleepy or drunk. Things that weren't there. But they were consistent. Since he saw that little cat, he knew it was there, watching him. He turned his head, and saw it. Watching him. It was always watching him. A large dark-furred fox, with a silver ruff and charcoal gray fur, and glowing green eyes with no pupils. He'd been seeing that hallucination almost all his life, always the same, always watching him, always near but never close. And it was always sitting. Whenever he saw it, it was sitting, and it never stood. It remained where it was until he got out of its sight, and once he couldn't see it anymore, it would simply be there the next time he turned his head, sitting, watching him with those glowing eyes.

It was his great secret. If people knew that he saw things like that, they'd call him crazy, or even worse, Touched. It could get him killed, so he kept it absolutely silent. He'd been seeing these strange hallucinations for a very long time, the first time the night his mother died. While his father held him in his arms, he saw the fox sitting in the window, just looking at him. It was the only time he ever told anyone of it. When he described what he saw to his father, his father explained just how dangerous it could be if people knew what he'd seen. People would say he was crazy, or might whisper that he'd been Touched. The Loremasters might even come for him, and he'd never see his father again. So he'd never told another living soul about the vision.

It was more than just seeing the fox. Usually he saw other animals, like that little cat, or little flashes of light that surrounded people or mana crystals. Rarely he saw entire scenes, like a stage play at the festhall, playing out a scene. He saw things that sometimes made him laugh, sometimes scared the hell out of him, sometimes made him sad or angry. But those kinds of visions were very rare, thank the Trinity. They were terrifying after they were over, because they reminded him that he was different from other people, maybe a little crazy… maybe even Touched.

And because of the visions, he was very withdrawn from other people. He didn't want to risk them finding out his secret, so he kept quiet around people, and wasn't very forthcoming. He kept to himself, didn't associate much outside of the occasional drink in the tavern with the miners to learn more about prospecting, and was cordially distant with the other apprentices. The only person that came close to being his friends were Master Holm and Aven, a rather well-known independent mountain man, prospector, and lone miner who had a nose for finding quality crystals, who lived by his own wits and roamed the mountains without fear, despite the threat of monsters or wild Arcans. The other apprentices thought he was arrogant, too good to associate with them. Holm thought he was just too shy. Kyven was what most would call a ruggedly handsome young man, tall, very sleek and healthy because of his frequent trips out to prospect for crystals, with thick black hair and piercing green eyes. And unlike many crystalcutters, Kyven was enormously strong, almost as strong as an alchemist, but it just seemed to be a natural strength. Kyven didn't swing a pick or shovel, didn't hammer metals, didn't push a plow or hoe crops. He sat at a workbench and delicately cut and shaped crystals all day, and yet he was easily as strong as the alchemist apprentices, who spent long hours pounding hot metal and mixing liquid metals to produce alloys.

He blinked as the cat faded from his vision, and sighed in relief. I didn't pique his curiosity a little, though. He came around the bench and stepped up onto the row and peered down at the boy's work. He was about half done, having chipped out the excess and found the proper alignments in the crystal lattice to make the major cuts. The milk crystal, a ruddy pink one that looked almost useless to him, would take good cuts along his planned cut lines, and would do fairly well to bring out the inner power of the crystal. He'd get a little better results cutting along a different plane, but for a first year taking his apprenticeship test, it was pretty good. He was doing much better than the boy beside him, who had chosen totally wrong plane lines to make his cuts, which wouldn't bring out any power in the crystal at all.

"Kyv!" Holm called from the door. "No helping!" Master Holm was a gray-haired, wrinkled, nearly toothless man, nearly seventy years old, and looking at retirement from active cutting. His hands weren't as steady as they used to be, and he left the cutting of the most valuable crystals to his two senior apprentices, Kyven and Timble, while he focused on appraising crystals and directing cutting. Both of them were in their last year of indentured service, having survived being turned out or sold to other cutters to be the premier, the best of Master Holm's apprentices and the next generation of crystalcutters that would give Atan a continuing reputation for excellent crystalcutters.

"I haven't said a word, Master Holm," he answered. "Just inspecting their work so far."

"Well, let's take a look, then," he said, hobbling up to the rows with his cane rapping on the wooden floor. He said not a word to them, just looked at each crystal for about a second before moving on. Holm could take in the entire skill of the apprentice in that one glance, even with them not being halfway done. Some of them had planed their crystals the right way to prepare them for the final cuts, some had not. Some had chosen crystals which were suited to the diamond cut, some had not. Odds were, Kyven supposed, Holm would choose his two advancers before they were done by seeing how they'd done to this point.

"Take the crystal bin back to the shop, Kyv," Holm told him. "Dump it in the box."

"Aye sir," he said with a nod. Holm didn't play favorites. Kyven may be his most senior and best apprentice, but he still swept the shop with the other apprentices after every day's work, picked chips off the floor, and did other manual labor. He didn't do as much as other apprentices, but he did. Holm himself still swept his personal work area and policed his own chips, for he was a firm believer in the moral character gained by manual labor. Kyven picked up the small box of assorted milk crystals, crystals tainted by other crystal types and less useful, and carried it into the main shop.

It was busy. The main shop was a large room filled with nearly thirty workbenches, where crystal-powered lights hung over benches with tool racks and small shelves and bins, soft cloths to sweep up every tiny crystal chip, and magnifying glasses and cutter's eyepieces for inspecting crystals. On the far side, behind a crystal-inset door that was all but impossible to open or break, were the stocks of raw crystals waiting to be cut, crystals sold to Holm by the miners, and Holm would sell to the merchants and alchemists when they were cut. Kyven put his palm on the vault door, and it shuddered and opened of its own volition. Kyven, Holm and Timble were the only people in the shop who had the authority to open the vault. He stepped in as the door closed behind him, and dumped the small bin of milk crystals into a larger bin holding more, of various sizes and colors. He ran his hand through it, feeling the tingles in touching them, the sense of power lurking in them.

There were six kinds of crystal, separated by color, and each one contained within it a magical power. Red crystals were the basic crystal, with a simple power that could be adapted to many uses. Red crystal were the most common, and since they were so generic, the vast majority of all crystal-powered devices used red crystals. A red crystal could literally do anything, but the drawback was that for a red crystal to mimic the function of another type of crystal, it had to be much larger, have much more power. Most red crystals just weren't large enough to mimic the ability of another crystal. Blue crystals seemed attuned to light and sound, and were in demand among theater troops for props and set illusions. Yellow crystals were attuned to nature, and were heavily in demand by farmers to make tools that enhanced the production of their crops. Green crystals were rare, and were attuned to the living being. They were used by doctors to heal, and always fetched a high price. Black crystals were for war, full of negative energy that created injuries that almost always killed. They were fairly rare, and any miner that found one would have a hard time smuggling it past the Loremasters to sell to anyone other than the army. White crystals were the rarest of them all, as versatile as a red crystal, but they were reusable. A white crystal didn't bond to its setting the way other crystals did, could be placed in any setting and power any device. In his whole life, Kyven had only seen one white crystal. Holm had cut it himself some three years ago, spending an entire month to do so, and then sold it for an absolutely obscene amount of chits. Milk crystals, like the ones that the first years were using, were mixed crystals that were combinations of other colors. They tended to be almost powerless, good only for practice, crushing to make chit coins, the standard currency of Noraam, or for feeding tame monsters that ate crystals for sustenance, but they had the same lattice structure and energy patterns as normal crystals, so they were excellent practice crystals for apprentice crystalcutters. Kyven had cut nothing but milk crystals for the first three years of his apprenticeship. Holm certainly didn't lose anything. All the milk crystals his apprentices worked on were just sold to the Loremasters so they could crush them and make chit coins. It didn't matter if they were cut or not, it only mattered that they kept all the pieces, as the Loremasters bought milk crystals based on the weight.

That power was enhanced by cutting, aligning the internal energies and focusing them to their maximum at the hands of a skilled cutter. Each one was like a reserve of magic, like those electricity batteries the inventors had been experimenting with over on Stoat Street. That was the job of a crystalcutter, to examine a crystal, determine how best to cut it to make it as powerful as possible, and then perform that cut. Once a crystal was cut, it usually went to an alchemist. Alchemists built settings and devices for the crystals that used that power, channeled it, brought it out, but the drawback was that once a crystal was mounted, it bonded to the device and couldn't be used in anything other than that specific kind of device. What a setting did depended entirely on how it was made, what metals and other materials it was made of, and how it was cured, bathed in the radiance of yellow crystals which were cut in a specific manner that caused them to radiate their power like a candle radiating light. The crystal lights over the workbenches were an example of an alchemist's work. They had taken spiral cut red crystals and placed them in a setting of tin, copper, iron, and carbon in specific amounts, placed the crystal within its setting, then cured it for a specific amount of time. The result was a common crystal lamp, which radiated a light that could be controlled by a small sliding lever on the side.

Being an alchemist was hard. They had to apprentice to an alchemist for three years as a kid, and after those three years, the alchemist had to recommend them to an alchemy academy in a city, like Avannar. They attended the academy for years and years, learning all about metallurgy and chemistry, how to design housings from scratch to perform tasks, build them, and then they came back out to apprentice again for another two years. After all that, they had to take a test. If they passed, they were certified alchemists, and were allowed to open their own shops to build devices to sell to the public.

It was the second most prestigious job in the world, but it wasn't for everyone. Four of the nine kids taking the first year test had been alchemy apprentices, but hadn't made the cut. But at least they'd washed out before they were too old to apprentice elsewhere, or they'd be looking at a life as a manual laborer or going back to their family farms to be farmers. In a way, Kyven could see the use of either being really good or really bad at alchemy. If you were really good, you made it. If you were really bad, you found out early enough so it didn't interfere with finding another pursuit. But if one was just pretty good at it, they spent all that time learning, then they washed out and were left in a bad position. Too old to apprentice, too young to strike out alone as a miner or hunter or join the army. All they could do was drift from odd job to odd job until they were old enough to try their hand at making it in the real world.

There was a fortune in the vault. Thousands of crystals of various sizes and colors, though most of them were red, and several sitting on stands that were quite large, waiting to be cut. But strangely enough, Kyven had never once thought of stealing a single thing out of the vault. He didn't need to. He was a good crystalcutter. As soon as he was free of his indentured service, he could open his own shop and make good money.

He left the vault and returned to his workbench. He had a half-done crystal on his stand, held in place by a delicate bronze device that looked like an overturned spider. It was a medium sized yellow crystal, being shaped into the double trapezoid cut, which was the optimum cut for this crystal. The chips and pieces were saved, since some devices could use something as small as a chip the size of a grain of sand for power, if it was small or did something minor, like a child's toy. Though these chips probably wouldn't be. This was a yellow crystal, and its crystal chips and dust were too valuable to go into a toy. The chips would be fused into an amalgam and used in common farm implements, like hoes and shovels, so they could nurture the soil in which they worked. Only Kyven or Timble would be cutting a crystal this valuable, but he also wasn't alone. When he returned, the other apprentices came over to his bench to continue their lesson. It was his job to instruct the other apprentices, and he did so in his customary quiet, direct manner, not speaking more than was necessary. He'd already explained why he chose the double trapezoid cut for the crystal, and had been explaining how it was done when Holm had him watch over the test while he talked business with the miner. The double trapezoid was an advanced cut, and they didn't often get the chance to demonstrate it to the apprentices, since few crystals were amenable to it. He explained the methodology behind the next step, then turned the crystal, selected his tools, showed them the plane he would use in the magnifying glass, and then executed the cut with a delicate tap of his soft-wooded hammer. The wide-bladed, razor sharp chisel sheared off a flat sheet of yellow crystal and left behind a perfectly smooth surface that shone in the light of the lamp.

"Remember, a good cut isn't about hitting it hard, it's about using the lattice of the crystal to your advantage," he told them, something he said about fifty times a day to bore it into the younger apprentices. "A good cut leaves behind a smooth surface. You know what a bad cut leaves, we've all seen it often enough."

"I doubt you ever had a bad cut, Kyv," one of the middle-tenured apprentices laughed.

"I was just as clumsy as anyone when I started," he said, taking out what looked like a raw red crystal that had been cut in half, the size of a peanut. "This was my first cut of anything but a milk crystal," he told them. "See how bad that is? Holm was so mad he made me buy it, and I keep it right here to remind me."

"Well, I feel better now," the apprentice laughed. "Mine was about that bad too."

Kyven completed cutting the crystal, and then polished the cut crystal with a buffing blanket to remove any residual dust, which would be carefully collected out of the soft cloth and sold. "And there we are, boys, a double trapezoid," he said, holding the oblong, blocky yellow crystal up for them to see. "I hope you learned something, because you won't see this cut again for a while."

"Nice, Kyv, nice," one of them said, and Kyven wrapped he crystal in a soft cloth, put it in a pouch, then put the pouch in a backpack and slung it over his shoulder. That crystal was already paid for by Virren, one of the better alchemists of Atan, and now it was just a matter of delivering it. Virren's alchemy workshop was only two doors down, and Kyven had made the run from one to the other to deliver crystals many times. He poked his head into the study room and waved to get Holm's attention, who then hobbled over to him.

"I finished the yellow for Master Virren, Master Holm, I'll walk it over to him."

"Be careful," he said with a nod.

"Always."

He went out the side door of the shop, which was a narrow alley that ran to the end of the block in one direction and ended at the door to Virren's alchemy shop on the other. This alley was the common delivery route for their two shops, and they kept the alley clean and free of debris so the courier could see and ensure that it was safe to make the quick journey from one to the other. It was empty, as always, and it only took him about ten seconds to scurry down to Virren's door. He knocked once, and almost immediately a burly fellow wearing a chain jack and carrying a musket in his free hand opened the door. He had a rough, wide face, small eyes set wide apart, and a shaved head. His name was Bragga, and he was a pretty decent fellow despite his rough appearance. "Hey Kyv," he said with a nod, and let him in.

"I have a crystal for Master Virren," he said.

"He's in the foundry."

Kyven was over here so much he was almost an apprentice himself. He knew his way around the large compound, moving from the stockroom where the alley door was into the secondary forge, where two apprentices were stoking a coal fire, then through an open-air courtyard and to the main foundry. A huge blast furnace dominated the large chamber, dim and smelling of soot and smoke, so hot it made Kyven's face tighten, and he took in the room. Three first stage apprentices helped a second stage apprentice and Virren pour molten metal into an ingot mold, as an Arcan stood by with a pair of heavy tongs, waiting.

Kyven gave this Arcan a second look. He'd never seen this one before. He was tall, but most Arcans were tall. He looked canine, with a broad, wolf-like muzzle, brown eyes, and a pelt that was a thick, shaggy brown, a little bristly and ragged. His chin was a tan color instead of brown, diving down his neck and disappearing under the only thing he was wearing, a leather smock to protect against beads of molten metal. A pair of heavy leather gloves for holding the tongs was in his other big, clawed hand. His hybrid feet, more animal than humanoid, held him up steadily, and his tail swished behind him.

Arcans. Kyven really didn't pay them much mind. They were animal-humanoid hybrids, mutants some would call them, which history said had been created by the Great Ancients at the height of the old empire to serve humanity as labor. There were many different kinds of Arcans, but they fell into three basic types. There were the huge, powerful, physical Arcans, who were often used for the most demanding labor. Most of those Arcans were ursine, equine, bovine, or canine, powerful breeds built for heavy work. There were Arcans like this one, the medium sized Arcans, who excelled at moderate labor because they were very strong. Most of them were canine, feline, vulpine, deer, badgers and the like. The third type were the servant Arcans, small, weak breeds who served most often in domestic capacities. Some breeds of felines and vulpines, and most rodents were among those. Breeds weren't absolutes, that was for sure. Some rodents worked the mines because they were powerful specimens, while some bovines served as cooks or maids because they were small or had a very placid nature. It was just a generality.

Arcans were, on the average, stronger and faster than humans, but they weren't supposed to be very smart. That was the great equalizer, and why humans maintained them as servants and labor. Because humans were smarter than Arcans, they kept control over them, were able to make the collars that almost all tame Arcans wore that kept them from becoming dangerous. Kyven didn't know if that was true or not, because there were lots of conflicting stories.

And then there were the Shaman.

Kyven shivered just at the thought of that, and it blew a lot of the Loremasters' stories about Arcans out of the water. If they were so dumb, then how did they explain the Shaman? Shaman were Arcans who could perform magical feats similar to what mana crystals could do, but they didn't use crystals. They could do the magic on their own, with no help from crystals at all! And what was worse, they could also use crystals like magical batteries, producing magic by draining the crystal instead of doing it themselves. Just the word Shaman made grown men shiver and kids squeal in fright. Since the Shaman appeared two hundred years ago, it had caused humans to fear wild, uncollared Arcans, even caused the Loremasters to institute a bounty on Arcans by buying Arcan pelts for twenty chits a piece in hopes that the hunters would kill Shaman, or kill Arcans that might become Shaman. Right now, Kyven supposed, there were hunters lurking in the forest outside of the village, hunting for wild Arcans to make a few extra chits by turning in Arcan pelts for the bounty. They did come to Atan to look for food or steal, and the cattle ranch to the south had to keep armed guards, armed with muskets and crossbows, to protect the herds from them.

In what to Kyven was a bit of grisly economic opportunism, some leatherworkers now bought the pelts from the Loremasters to make a soft form or leather or fur-lined clothing. Kyven thought it was a rather disgusting idea, himself. Not that he considered Arcans that highly, but because it would make his skin crawl to think that fur that had been on such a human-like creature, capable of speaking, was now up against his skin. It would be like wearing tanned human skin aprons.

Humans hunted wild Arcans to kill them or capture them for slaves, but they never seemed to make a dent in the wild Arcan population. Arcans bred like rabbits, it seemed. Every day he heard stories from the miners in the taverns about brushes with wild Arcans, but there was a good chance that quite a few of those tales were just embellishments, or a retelling of something that happened months ago. If he believed the miners, there was an Arcan hiding behind every tree, trying to steal any tool or lunchbox left unattended. In all the times he'd been prospecting both alone and with Aven, he'd never seen a single wild Arcan.

"Kyv," Virren called, wiping his hands on his smock and stepping away as his apprentices poured the metal. "Bring something for me?"

Kyven took off his backpack, and took out the pouch. He pulled the crystal from it and unwrapped it. "Double trapezoid cut, Master Virren," he said, a little apologetically. "Sorry, I know it's a non-standard cut, but it's what the crystal wanted."

"I understand, my boy," he said easily. "Not to worry, I can adapt my usual setting to the cut. It's always best to adapt the setting to the crystal, not try to adapt the crystal to the setting. All that gets you is a weaker result."

"True," he said, carefully handing the cloth to the alchemist. "You there, take this to the vault," Virren said, looking at the Arcan. The Arcan set his tongs and gloves on a table near the foundry, then took the cloth-wrapped crystal and hurried out into the courtyard.

"A new one, eh?"

"Yah, just got him this morning," he answered. "Seems to work out so far. He does what he's told and seems to understand the need for speed. Was hard to replace Old Gray."

"What happened?"

"Broke his arm yesterday. I took him down to the vet, they say he should heal up. He's back in his room right now, resting. The old fool keeps trying to come out and sweep the floor," he chuckled. "Old Gray knows our business and he really works hard. I'll feel like we're short-handed until he's back on the job."

"I'm surprised you didn't just sell him, or have him put down. That's what most people do."

"You don't sell an Arcan like Old Gray, Kyv," he snorted. "And I could never put one down. I don't buy into that 'they're just animals' bullhockey. Anyone who can answer me in Noravi when I talk to them ain't no animal."

"I'd have to agree with that," he said. "Anything I need to take back to the shop?"

"Nah, just tell Holm I'm still waiting for that five point blue."

"Timble's working on that one."

"Well, I'd like to get it tomorrow, so tell him to put you on it. You're faster than Timble and Holm put together." He glanced at Kyven. "When are you gonna open your own shop?" he asked.

"Soon, I hope," he answered. "I still have until next Midsummer indentured to Holm, unless I get lucky prospecting and I can buy out my contract. After that, I hope to open my own shop, but it won't be cheap."

"That won't be a problem, man. Don't tell Holm, but there's quite a few alchemists who are already floating the idea of loaning you enough chits to rent a shop and buy your tools. You're the best cutter in Atan, kid, hands down. Holm's not the only cutter who's starting to get very nervous about the idea of you striking out on your own."

Kyven laughed. "I couldn't possibly cut enough to supply every alchemist in Atan, Master Virren," he protested. "There's a shortage of cutters. I wouldn't make a dent in the business of the other shops."

"True, but if I ever have a really good crystal, like a twenty pointer or a green or yellow, I'd bring it straight to you. There ain't five cutters in Atan I'd trust with a crystal like that. If I give it to you, I'll get back something that made it worth the investment."

"Wow, thanks for the vote of confidence, Master Virren," Kyven chuckled.

Kyven returned to the shop, and immediately reported to Holm. "Master Virren said he'd like the five point blue finished by tomorrow, Master Holm," he said.

"Tell Timble to get it done."

"Yes, sir. What's next for me?"

"You finished the twelve point yellow. Just teach the others for now."

"Yes, sir. Can I possibly finish early today?"

"Oho, what are you up to, Kyv? Already scoping out possible shop locations?"

Kyven laughed. "No sir, I'd just like to go talk to a friend of mine, he's teaching me how to prospect for crystals out in the mountains. I'll start early tomorrow to make up for it."

"What, I'm not paying you enough, son?" he asked with a smile.

"You pay me fine, Master Holm, but if I ever want to open my own shop, I'll need more than that. I've been trying my hand at amateur prospecting and cutting the crystals I find to sell myself."

"Well, that's rather clever son," he chuckled. "Good business sense, I can appreciate that. Go ahead and knock off an hour after lunch, and you can pay me back by taking in the new batch of first years in the morning."

"Ouch, you're making me pay for it, sir."

"You bet I am," he grinned. "Now get."

Kyven supervised the younger apprentices for the rest of the morning as Timble worked on the five point blue, then, after lunch, he cleaned up his workbench and just watched the others. "What, you weasel some extra free time?" Timble asked him.

"I traded the afternoon off for doing induction tomorrow," he answered.

Timble winced. "Brother, you got the short end of the stick," he said. "Master Holm would have to pay me triple to do induction."

"Well, if I ever wanna take my own apprentices, I'd better be able to deal with the newbies," he chuckled.

"Eh, that's true, I guess," he said, adjusting the magnifying glass over the blue crystal, which was being oval cut. He was literally finished, Kyven saw. He made one more tiny cut, chipping off a final burr, and left behind a perfectly cut crystal, cut to bring out its maximum power and potential. Kyven could almost see the power pulsing inside the crystal, just yearning to be released.

"Damn, nice work, Timble!" Kyven said honestly as he took a closer look at the small blue gem. "Look at that sheen! You've really brought it out!"

"Thanks, brother, it really turned out nice," he said. "I hope I didn't just jinx it," he then laughed as he carefully cleaned it with the polish cloth.

Kyv's complement attracted attention, and the apprentices all gathered around Timble's bench, which was rather rare. Timble was an outstanding crystalcutter, but he did not work well with an audience. He could cut to demonstrate well enough, but when he was doing serious work on valuable crystals, people watching him made him nervous, so he did that work alone. So long as no one was looking over his shoulder, Timble was an outstanding cutter, one of the best. Kyven didn't have that problem, so Kyven was the one that did the demonstrations on crystals that were too valuable to damage with a bad cut.

Timble inspected the blue crystal under his magnifying glass as the apprentices congratulated him, checking with a meticulous inspection for what Kyven could tell just by looking at it, that perfect alignment of crystal lattice combined with perfectly cut angles on its surface to focus the crystal's power to its maximum potential.

Kyven left Timble to bask in the adulation of his junior apprentices and went upstairs. The apprentices lived above the shop, the first years in a large dorm on the top floor, the younger apprentices four to a room on the third floor, and the senior apprentices had private rooms on the second floor. Kyven's room was utilitarian, spartan, and functional, a reflection of his sober personality. The room held a bed, washstand, bureau, footlocker, and a writing desk, with no decorations on the walls. To Kyven, his room was for sleeping, studying cutting manuals, and writing letters to the Guild, and nothing else. He picked up his prospecting backpack, filled with outdoor gear, a hand shovel, a pick, and a sniffer, a little device that Master Verrin made for him that pointed to raw crystals within five paces of it, and headed for the Three Boar Tavern.

Aven was sitting at his customary place in the tavern, at the end of the bar near the door, downing a tankard of ale. The prospector was about fifty years old, with iron gray hair, a thick, bushy beard, and wearing rugged leathers durable enough to handle the rigors of the outdoors. He had a Hudson musket leaning against the bar, and the handles of a pair of double-shot pistols were stuffed into the back of his belt. The barkeep here was unusual in town in that he refused to employ Arcans in his inn. He hated them with a passion, and always gave a free tankard of ale to any new face that showed up wearing Arcan fur. "Aven!" he called excitedly. "I got off early! Are you ready to go?"

"Lemme finish my tankard, boy!" he called roughly. "You got my payment?"

Kyven handed him a tiny two point blue crystal, one of his finds from last week. Aven looked at it in the dim light from the lamp overhead, then nodded and pocketed it. "That'll pay for lessons all the way to winter, young buck," he announced.

"You're letting this old swindler teach you anything?" the barkeep laughed.

"His advice helped me find that two point blue," Kyven said in defense of his prospecting mentor.

"Beginner's luck, cutter," the barkeep laughed. "What can I get you while you wait?"

"Nothing, really. I'm going to go on ahead, Aven. I'll meet you at the oak."

"I'll be along in a bit, young buck," he nodded.

Kyven left the inn, then got on Miner's Road and headed out of town. The road wended up into the mountains, up a shallow gulley that led to a large, shallow valley between to long mountains. There were literally hundreds of mines on the west ridge of that valley, burrowing into the side of the ridge at varying altitudes, and hundreds of filled-in holes along the base of the ridge from surface digging, looking for crystals. The wide road was deeply rutted from carts and wagons, and at the top of the rise there was a large tent city where many miners housed their Arcan workers. They weren't allowed to stable them in town, so they kept them there, in a large communal compound surrounded by a rail fence and patrolled by armed guards that both kept wild Arcans out and kept the tame Arcans in. It wasn't unknown for Arcans to sometimes slip their collars and escape, at least the smarter ones. The collars were usually set to zap any Arcan trying to take them off, but sometimes an Arcan was clever enough to figure out how to take them off by themselves.

He wasn't going all the way up there, though. He turned up a narrow trail about halfway up, climbing a ridge that led to a small plateau on the top of the east side of the valley, which wasn't as heavily mined because the main concentration of crystals were on the west side. There used to be mines on the east side of the east ridge, but they'd played out all those crystals and moved their mining to the next ridge. And when that ridge was mined out, they'd move to another mountain; there were already some mines on the next mountain over, prospect mines to check for rich concentrations of crystal.

He reached the big oak, a small meadow in the forest that rustled in the warm summer wind, sending waves of white as the wind bent the blades of grass back through the tall grass of the narrow clearing, exposing their white undersides. Hardwoods ringed the clearing, oaks and maples and birches and ashes, with a small trio of pine trees to the left of the big oak, a massive oak tree on the edge of the far side of the clearing. He dug out his sniffer and turned the knob to engage its crystal and activate, then waved it around just for fun, though he knew that there was nothing in the meadow. It had been played out long ago.

Aven joined him a few minutes later. "You ready, kid?" he asked.

"I'm ready," he nodded. "Where are we going?"

"Well, it was a pretty heavy rain yesterday, so we'll go down south to Cougar Creek and pan the stream. See if anything got washed down."

"Sounds like a plan."

Cougar Creek was south, over the ridge and down in the next valley. They hiked down to the large creek, the water a little high from yesterday's rain, and Aven pulled out his own sniffer. "Alright, kid, you go one way and I'll go the other. Let's see if we get lucky."

Panning a stream was something Aven already taught him. Kyven moved slowly downstream as Aven moved upstream, sweeping his sniffer back and forth slowly along the bank, looking for crystals. The sniffer was set to react to any crystal a tenth of a point or larger, which was the size of a tiny pebble, barely larger than a grain of sand. With such a sensitive setting, the sniffer kept pointing to the bank, and Kyven spent a lot of time sifting through the dirt and mud on the bank with a small sieve, using the sniffer to find where the crystals were, scooping up the mud around it, then sifting until he found the crystal.

He moved about fifty paces in an hour, and in that hour, he had managed to pan up about a point's weight worth of crystal chips. Most of it was red, but he did find a small black chip mixed in with it. That black chip was worth almost ten chits all by itself, which made the day profitable. He kept working down the bank, feeling the warm sun shine down on him, hearing the wind rustle the trees, and then a cloud passed over and dimmed the forest, making him glance up.

It was there.

The black-furred fox, the hallucination, it was back. It sat sedately not ten feet from him, closer than usual, its unblinking eyes fixed on him. Kyven blinked and looked away, rubbing his eyes. Just focus. It'll go away, it's just the same old thing. Focus on what you're doing. He kept his eyes deliberately down, but something felt… different. He looked up again.

For the first time ever, the hallucination moved more than its neck. It stood up on all fours, uncurling its tail from around its front legs, then turned away from him. It took several steps towards the hillside on the far side of the creek, then it stopped and looked back to him.

Kyven was rooted to the spot. What did it mean? He'd never seen the hallucination move anything other than its head before. Sure, other visions he'd seen moved, but never that one. It had always been the same every time he'd seen it, but not today. Today, it moved. And not only did it move, but he'd seen it twice in one day, which was just as strange. Did it mean something? Did it mean he really was going crazy, or he was Touched?

It looked right at him, still with its back to him. It was waiting.

It wanted him to follow. Why? It was just a hallucination, why should he follow a phantom, something that didn't exist?

But… there was something else. The shadowed wood felt… foreboding now. Uninviting. He didn't feel safe, for some reason. He looked around, but saw nothing among the trees around him, and the squirrels were still chattering away as they usually did. Why did he feel this way? Had this change in an old hallucination unsettled him?

Maybe. But the black-furred fox still stood there, its tail still and unmoving, looking back to him with unblinking, glowing green eyes.

Waiting.

He found his feet moving of their own volition. He waded across the creek, his sturdy wool trousers and boots soaking in the cold water, moving towards the apparition. It looked back ahead and started walking away from him slowly, deliberately, at a pace that let him slowly catch up. He followed the animal up the hillside for a long moment, until it reached a large rock partially buried in the loam of the forest floor. It stepped up onto the rock, turned to face him, then sedately sat back down and wrapped its bushy black tail with its silver tip around its forelegs, in that pose he knew so well, and then vanished.

It had never done that before either! Always before, he looked away from it, and then it was gone when he looked back. But this time it vanished right before his very eyes!

He rubbed his eyes and looked at the rock, but it was gone. He advanced up to the rock, even touched it, but it was a rock. Cool to the touch, covered with moss, probably had earthworms and rolley bugs under it. It just proved what he already knew, that there was no fox, that it was just a recurring hallucination that he'd suffered for many years.

Before he could even think about it, the sound of a gunshot ripped the air. Kyven started and stood up, then he heard another one, a higher-pitched one that was clearly the sound of a pistol. A musket and a pistol?

Aven!

Kyven charged back down the hill, to the stream, then ran upstream. Kyven was tall and lithe, and he covered the ground quickly, jumping over the stream twice as it wound down the gentle rise. He wove in and out through the trees lining the streambed, but he stopped abruptly, nearly falling over, when he found Aven.

There was blood everywhere. Spattered on the grass, on the rocks of the stream, mingling in the water. Aven was laying on his side on the side of the bank, but one of his arms was laying nearly five feet away, oozing blood onto the rocks. Laying face down on the opposite side of Aven from the stream, was an Arcan. It was a naked Arcan, a canine of some kind, its leg twitching as blood spurted out of a huge hole in its side. That spurt of blood pumped several times, then faltered, spurt one more time, and then ceased.

"By the Trinity!" Kyven gasped, moving to rush to Aven's side, but the injured old man sat up quickly, cradling a mangled stump of his left arm, the limb literally torn off just below the elbow. Bloody stains were all over his front, and there was a clear bite wound on his right thigh.

"No, kid!" Aven barked. "Stay back!"

"But–"

"I may have been Touched!" he called.

That stopped Kyven dead in his tracks. He scrambled backwards, literally hiding behind a tree. The Touch! The most feared of all illnesses, so deadly that no man had ever been known to survive it! Arcans could catch it too, but it made Arcans go blood mad, turned them into rampaging beasts. It made humans go mad as well, but humans didn't usually become violent the way Arcans did, they had hallucinations like the ones Kyven had endured most of his life. It was known as the Touch because it was so virulent that one could catch it from a single touch from an infected person. If Aven was Touched, Kyven could catch the disease from the lightest of contacts and not know it for months, until the disease set in… and that was too late. By the time the symptoms began to appear, the person had been contagious for weeks and had probably infected the entire village.

"Aven, what happened?" he managed to ask.

"I never saw it, kid, it came from downstream. I heard rustling, thought it was you, but then the bastard blindsided me. I gave back more than I got, that's for sure," he said with a grim chuckle as his mangled stump dribbled blood on his buckskin trousers. "Thank the Trinity he missed you, kid."

"I, I wasn't at the stream, I was–checking something out up on the hill."

"That saved your ass, kid. Now around wide and get to where you can see the dog's mouth. Don't touch any blood anywhere."

Kyven quickly circled the pair, getting around to where he could see the Arcan. Arcans infected with the Touch would have pink foam in their mouths, and any attack like that, with that kind of savagery, might be caused by it. He went around a tree, then another tree, and got to where he could see the canine's face. The eyes were open, staring, and glazed, his tongue on the ground between his open jaws.

And bloody pink froth oozed onto the moss under his head.

Kyven's shoulders slumped and he looked at the ground. "Well, kid, I can see the answer," he said, then for some reason, he chuckled. He reached behind himself with this right hand, the only hand he had left, and pulled out his other pistol. "All these years, to think I'd get it from a damned Arcan. Ain't life just a bitch sometimes," he sighed.

"Aven–"

"Shut up, kid, and listen. Go back to town and warn the Loremaster. There might be another infected one running around, this kind of thing spreads through them the same as us. They need to make sure the area's safe."

"But what about you, Aven?"

"I'm gonna skin myself a dog," he said with a grim chuckle. "Then I'm gonna watch the sun set. Now get you gone."

"But–yes, sir," he said, turning and hurrying off. He didn't even think about it, he was almost in shock. The Touch, the Touch, and he was that close! It could have been him! Aven said the Arcan came from downstream, came from where he'd been. If it was coming up the stream, then it must have went by him when he was up on the hillside.

The fox. Did the vision save him? Had it lured him away from the stream to keep him away from the diseased Arcan? That was silly. The fox was a hallucination, a spectre, a waking dream. He'd seen it for most of his life, from time to time. It couldn't–

A gunshot ripped the air, making Kyven jump.

He didn't want to think about what it meant. But he knew.

He knew.


There was only one Loremaster in Atan, the representative of the organization governed most human settlements on Noraam in a loose coalition. The Loremasters didn't really interfere with the cities all that much, though. The Mayor and city elders ruled Atan, and just kept the Loremaster informed of what they were doing.

The Loremasters were everywhere on Noraam. Some people didn't like them, but some, like Kyven, he didn't see anything wrong with them. They didn't really harm anyone, and they didn't rule with an iron fist. They were based in Avannar, about a hundred minars from Atan, a journey of nearly ten days on foot or three by horse. The Loremasters were devoted to the study of the Great Ancient Civilization, their ancestors, humans who had achieved such technological mastery that it was said they built machines that could fly through the air without using mana crystals, and had buildings so high, so big, they looked like mountains. There were billions of humans then, the Loremasters taught, a number so big that most couldn't fathom it, filling the entire world. The Great Ancient Civilization had been so amazing that they had even visited the moon and sent men out into the stars!

But despite their advances, they were still human, and had human weakness. The Great Ancient Civilization fractured and fell into war with itself, known to them simply as The War, a war so vast, so sweeping, so destructive, that it shattered the Great Ancient Civilization, completely destroying it, and scattering the few human survivors to leave them to fight for survival without their mythical technology. The War had destroyed their ancient ancestors and wiped the knowledge of their wondrous technology from the minds of the survivors, leaving humankind to rebuild from the ashes. The War had tortured the very earth itself, had been so destructive that it had caused the Breach, the titanic accident that, the Loremasters said, caused the Great Ancients to tap into the power of magic for the first time and without control, and caused a catastrophic explosion that had virtually wiped the humans off the east coast of Noraam, destroying the Three Great Cities, and starting the series of historical events that would end The War and force humanity to begin the long, hard road of returning to the glory of their ancestors.

That was the goal of the Loremasters. They were scientists at heart, historians, men and women of intelligence and vision, seeking to reclaim the technology and knowledge of the Great Ancient Civilization. They'd started in Avannar nearly six hundred years ago, starting as a society in a college in Avannar that dedicated itself to recovering the lost secrets of the Great Ancient Civilization. But over time, they'd also come to unify the different kingdoms and city-states of Noraam under a loose coalition, a confederacy that the Loremasters oversaw, to better undertake and coordinate their research and experiments. Each of the Ten Kingdoms of Noraam were independent, but the Loremasters were there to keep the peace between them, acting as diplomats, and having men in every human settlement to allow swift communication across all of Noraam.

Some men hated the Loremasters, saw them as overlords, a shadowy organization that killed anyone who crossed them, but Kyven hadn't really thought of them that way. The Loremaster of Atan had always been a helpful and friendly man, always willing to stop and chat with people on the street, and was always willing to give a hand with any problem, even something as simple or silly as helping a child look for his missing cat.

But this wasn't a simple or silly problem. Kyven tore through Atan, nearly knocking people over as he raced to the Loremaster's office, a simple little cottage with the three interlocking circles symbol of the Loremasters embroidered on a flag that hung on a small flagpole on the front lawn. He banged on the front door, paused only a second, then banged on it again. He kept knocking until the door opened abruptly, opened by the Loremaster himself. Loremaster Gint was a small, thin man in his thirties, with a small nose, large blue eyes, and sandy blond hair that was tied back from his face in a tail. He wore the Loremaster's Tabard, a surcoat of sorts over a day jacket, linen shirt, and sturdy brown woolen breeches, which was blue with silver lines along its edges and had the red, blue, and green interlocking circles in a triangular pattern emblazoned on its chest and back, a clear indicator to any who looked at him just who he was. "Goodness, what's wrong, citizen?" he asked in a calm voice.

"Come quick!" Kyven wheezed, a little out of breath. "It's the Touch!"

The man's smile drained off his face. "Did you–"

"No sir, I was warned away! Aven told me to come warn you!"

"Calm down, young man, tell me what happened."

Kyven blew out his breath and told him in short, disjointed sentences, about hearing the shots while prospecting with Aven, running to him, and how Aven warned him off until he checked the dead Arcan. When he told the Loremaster about the pink foam, the man's eyes narrowed. "Your friend Aven did the right thing, young man," he said. "Now take me there."

Kyven led him back to the scene, and the Loremaster stood at the edge of it as Kyven couldn't help but stare at the still form of Aven. Half of his head was missing; he'd put his second pistol to his forehead and pulled the trigger, and Aven liked overpriming his pistols. The Loremaster reached into his jacket and produced a small bronze ball, separated into two halves. He twisted it until Kyven heard an audible click, then he held it firmly in his left hand as he advanced into the bloody mess. Kyven saw that the blades of grass around the Loremaster bent away from him, as if repelled by some invisible hand. He squatted down by the dead Arcan, not putting his knees on the blood-spattered ground, and boldly reached down and rolled it over on its back. Blood saturated the fur on its chest, and its eyes were still open and vacant. The Loremaster leaned down to look at its jaws, then sighed and stood up. "Your friend saved your life, young man," he said simply. "This Arcan is Touched." He took something else out from under his surcoat, what looked like an oversized dart with a black metal tip. He twisted the bulbous body of the dart until the shaft seemed to begin to glow with a dark nimbus, then he drove it into the chest of the Arcan. It quivered slightly when he let go of it, then he turned and hurried away. "Quickly, citizen, we have to be away from here."

"What is that, Loremaster?" Kyven asked as he followed the Loremaster as he retreated quickly from the area.

"An Eradicator," he said. "It will destroy the bodies of the Arcan and your companion, I'm sorry to say, and kill the Touch that infects the area. But it'll kill us too if we're too close to the device when it goes off."

"I've heard of those."

"They're very expensive, and can only be used once, so we only use them for the most dire of situations, like this one. Those bodies would be contagious, and who knows who might come by to loot your friend or skin that Arcan? They could infect the whole town!"

There was a dull thudding sound behind them, then the loud crashing of a tree as it fell to earth. The Loremaster stopped. "There, that's it, let's go back."

They returned to a much different scene. Aven and the Arcan were gone. So was the grass. There was a bare patch filled with gray dust, a perfect circle some ten paces across, extending over the stream. There was a jagged hole in the ground, over which the smoking end of a fallen maple tree, the end of it blackened as if it had been burned. The Eradicator, he realized, had destroyed the trunk of the tree in a circle around the dart, and the rest of the tree had fallen down when its bottom had been destroyed. The only things left were bits of metal, the barrels of Aven's musket and pistols, some metal tools, and crystals. All that remained was that which wasn't made of flesh, bone, hair, wood, leather, or cloth. Only minerals remained. "This may sound ghoulish, young man, but we should collect up what remains of your friend's belongings."

"I–yes, sir. We can't just leave it out here."

"Naturally. I'll keep watch in case there's another Touched Arcan out here while you gather it up." Kyven took off his backpack and took out a rolled burlap sack, and knelt down and began the sad task of collecting up what was left of his friend's possessions. It was hard to believe that just a minute ago, Aven was laying here, but now there was nothing but this fine grayish dust. It clung to his fingers as he picked up the pistol barrel and put it in the bag, then picked up the metal parts of the pistol that had been bound together with wood. It had happened so fast. It made him feel strangely vulnerable to think of how fast it had all happened. One minute everything was normal, and then in the blink of an eye, it could all change. It made him realize how fragile life was, and how vulnerable they really were. There could be another blood-mad, Touched Arcan lurking out in the woods, looking for them, stalking them at that very moment.

It was a little scary. He'd never really felt afraid in the woods before, not because the large number of miners around tended to scare off the monsters, animals and most Arcans. But now he felt a little vulnerable, now that he'd seen that the woods weren't as safe as he once believed. He gathered up what was left of Aven's gear quickly, putting it in the bag, then picked up his long musket barrel and stayed very close to the Loremaster, who was holding a small silvery ball in his hand, whose function was unknown to Kyven. "I'm finished, sir."

"Alright, let's get back so I can organize a sweep of the surrounding forest. We want to make sure there's no more Touched Arcans in the vicinity."

Kyven stayed very close to the Loremaster as they followed the trail back to Atan. Kyven brought Aven's things to his office, and then the Loremaster released him to his own devices as he hurried to the office of the mayor. Kyven returned to the shop, quiet and unsettled, sitting at his bench as the other apprentices stopped to regard him strangely. So close. He'd been so close to being the one that was now nothing but a memory. If the fox hadn't lured him away from the stream, that Arcan would have attacked him, and if he survived the attack, he would have been the one asking to be left a pistol.

The Touch was invariably lethal. Better to die by his own hand than to suffer that agonizing death, and potentially take everyone he knew with him.

"Kyv, what are you doing back? I thought you went out prospecting," Timble said as he came into the shop, carrying a small box of dulled chisels that would be sharpened by the younger apprentices.

Kyven blew out his breath, then leaned over his workbench. "I don't think I'm ever going to do that again," he said. "Timble, Aven's dead."

"What? What happened?" he gasped. "Did he have an accident?"

"He was attacked by a Touched Arcan," he said.

The entire workshop stopped, and they all ran to him, asking him questions, clamoring fearfully around him. "I wasn't there when it happened," he said over them, then he told them what happened. "The Loremaster's probably organizing men to search the woods right now," he surmised. "To make sure there aren't any more of them."

"Wow, Kyv!" one apprentice gasped. "I woulda fainted if it woulda been me!"

"I almost did," he admitted, shuddering. "To think I was that close to the Touch," he said, then trailed off.

"What's all this? Back to work, the lot of you!" Holm's voice boomed across the shop, which caused the apprentices to rush back to their own benches or duties. But when he saw Kyven sitting at his bench, he hobbled up and leaned against it. "You're still working induction tomorrow, whether you take the time off or not," he teased. But his teasing smile faded when he saw Kyven's fearful expression. "What's the matter, son?"

Kyven repeated it to Holm, who frowned throughout. "There hasn't been a case of the Touch in Atan for twenty years," he grunted. "I'm sorry to hear about your friend, son, but be thankful in one way. Your friend may have saved quite a few lives, and at least he understood that at the end."

"Yeah, he did," Kyven sighed.

"But don't let it scare you either, son. It's been twenty years since something like this has happened. Don't think it's going to happen every other day. Keep on prospecting, son. If you hide from it, the fear will gnaw at you. Just jump right back on the horse. As soon as the city watch sweeps the forest and says it's safe, get back to prospecting. You need enough to open your own shop and try to put me out of business, you know," he grinned.

"Maybe tomorrow," he said, looking up at his mentor.

"Well, get out of here, young'un," he said, shooing him. "Go relax or something. I don't want to see you until sunrise tomorrow."

"Yes, sir."


The village was all atwitter over news of the attack.

Everyone knew now what happened, and that the old mountain man Aven had been killed. Everyone was a little concerned, but Kyven saw that there wasn't any panic, just concern. The miners did come in from the mines, gathering in their camp in the clearing above the village, and most of the able-bodied men gathered in groups and did a thorough search of the area, led by dogs and hunters as they searched for any signs of other wild Arcans in the vicinity that might be infected.

There was some fallout, though. The vet who had a shop at the edge of town found a long line of men and women dragging Arcans with them, some on leashes, all of them collared, to have them checked to make sure they weren't infected by the Touch. It was an irrational idea, for if they were infected it was too late now, as it would have spread to anyone who had touched them. But there they were, queued up and waiting for the vet to check their Arcans. There was also a sudden glut of Arcans down at the kennel, fearful people who had sold their Arcans after hearing the news, probably selling them for a song, which the kennelmaster probably was happy to do. He could just wait for the panic to settle down and sell the Arcans he bought at a tidy profit.

There were a few other incidents that night, too. Kyven was one of many woken by a commotion out on Gem Street, and he and the other apprentices came out to find three young men beating a small rodent Arcan with heavy sticks, a small female wearing a maid's dress. The Arcan was collared, huddled against a wall in a fetal position as they beat and kicked it. Master Holm stormed out angrily and shouted them down… not for beating an Arcan, but for making such a loud issue about it. Holm didn't particularly like Arcans, and wouldn't buy any to work in the shop. Virren appeared as well, coming from down the street, wearing nothing but a pair of braes. While Holm berated the three young men, thin spatters of blood on their faces, the alchemist collected up the shivering, whimpering Arcan and carried her back to his shop. A squad of the watch arrived, and after talking to Master Holm, they took the three young men and carted them up to the courthouse. Attacking Arcans wasn't illegal, but attacking a collared Arcan was an attack on another citizen's property. They'd have to answer for that, and pay the owner of that mouse restitution for the damage they caused.

"Did you see the way its arm snapped like a twig when they hit it?" one of the younger apprentices said excitedly. "It was so cool!"

"I didn't see anything cool about beating a defenseless Arcan," Timble told the youth, a bit coldly. "How'd you like three miners to drag you into an alley and beat you 'til your bones break?"

"Timble, zone, zone, it's just an Arcan," the youth sniffed.

"I hope nobody ever looks at you and decides that you're just a cutter," Timble told him, then stormed back into the workshop.

"What's his problem?" one of the other apprentices asked after Timble left.

"Guess he's one of those Arcan lovers," the first boy snorted. "They're just animals, for the Trinity's sake. They'd be running naked through the woods if it wasn't for us."

"Break it up, boys, and back to bed!" Holm boomed, shooing them towards the shop.

But Kyven didn't move. He remembered the look on that mouse's face, the blood, the fear in her eyes, and an image of the dead Arcan that had attacked Aven seemed to superimpose over it in his mind. They were both Arcans, but they were… different. One had been maddened by disease, violent, the other was just terrified. But neither of them had any control over what happened to them. The canine had been driven mad by the Touch, blood mad, violent, while the little mouse had probably been sent out onto the dangerous streets by an owner who hadn't considered the heightened tension in town because of the attack. One was dangerous, the other harmless, but both had been nothing but victims.

Kyven found himself at Master Virren's shop before he knew what he was doing. The main door was open, and Virren was in his customer's waiting room, where the wares that Virren's shop created were on shelves in display for those looking to buy. The burly alchemist had placed the Arcan on the counter, a large hand on her stomach to hold her down as she seemed to convulse, coughing up a copious amount of blood, smearing on the counter and into her gray fur. He glanced back at Kyven just once, but a cry of pain from the Arcan caused him to look back to her. She gasped, her back arching, and she grabbed Virren's wrist in a powerful grip, then she slumped to the counter and gave a long, eerie sigh.

Virren sighed and shook his head. "Stupid, senseless people," he grumbled as he reached up and used his fingers to urge closed the Arcan's eyes.

"Master Virren," Kyven called, a little fearfully.

"Such a waste," he sighed. "Since you're here, run this up to the watch." He reached behind the Arcan's head, and unfastened her collar. That surprised Kyven, that he could do it without the owner's key, but he was an alchemist. Odds were, he made that collar, he would certainly know how to take one off without the key. He held it out in a quivering hand. "I'm not going to let them skin her like an animal and butcher her for meat," he growled. "She deserves a better end than that."

"Master Virren?" he asked in confusion as the burly alchemist collected up the Arcan, blood smearing on his chest, his hand stroking her fur and gray hair almost gently from her closed eyes.

"Just do as I said, son," he said, cradling the dead Arcan almost gently. "Now get you gone."

Kyven couldn't do much else. He walked along dark streets in his undershirt and trousers, on bare feet, taking the collar to the watch building. It was a small building by the courthouse the twenty men who made up the watch used as their headquarters. The town's jail was in the building, which was usually only used to hold a miner who had a little too much to drink, but did see its share of real criminals. Since there were so many crystals and artisans in Atan, it attracted drifters and thieves who came to prey on the town's residents. Right now, the jail were said to hold four such thieves, waiting for the Loreguard to come on their monthly visit to cart the thieves off to Avannar to serve their sentences, a deal that Atan had had with Avannar for nearly fifty years. Avannar had the Black Keep, a prison on an island in the middle of the city where the city housed prisoners from several outlying towns and villages in addition to their own, providing the towns a means to punish lawbreakers without straining their own resources.

"What is it, fella?" the watchman said as he came into the main hall of the watchhouse, a room lined with benches in the front and tables behind a gated waist-high fence in the back. The three young men who'd been carted up here sat at those tables, where uniformed watchmen wrote on loose papers on the desks across from them, taking their statements or something, he supposed.

"Uh, Master Virren told me to bring you this," he said, offering the watchman the collar. "The Arcan those men attacked died."

"It did, eh? Not a surprise, they must have torn its head off if the collar came off. Cevik, change it to destruction of property and theft by deprivation!" he called back to the men behind him. He took the collar from Kyven and put it on the desk. "I'll make sure this gets back to whoever owned it. Have Master Virren bring the body to the watchhouse."

"He said he'd take care of it, sir."

"What does that mean?"

"I think he was going to deal with the body, sir."

"Well, he'll owe the owner for the pelt and the meat," he grunted, making a note in his little book before him. "Virren, you said? The alchemist on Gem Street?"

"Yes, sir. That's him."

"I'll have a watchman go talk to him in the morning so he can settle with the Arcan's owner."

"Thank you, sir," Kyven said with a nod, then padded out of the watchhouse on bare feet. He sighed and hooked his thumbs on the waist of his trousers, pondering what he'd just seen. It seemed, well… silly. Why would three men beat up an Arcan like that? She was too small to be any threat. Sure, he was no Arcan lover like Virren, but he also just didn't see any sense in being that way. Torturing Arcans for fun was no fun in his eyes. He was a decent man, he didn't inflict pain on others, be them human, Arcan, or animal, just for his own amusement. People who did were just sick.


Induction.

No matter how unsettling yesterday had been, it wasn't much better than this. Standing in the warm pre-dawn at the front door of the shop, where a large crowd had formed. It was a ritual of sorts all through Atan on this morning, the Monday before Midsummer, where the parents of children formally presented them to artisans in hopes of having them taken as apprentices.

Some shops simply interviewed all comers and tested the children to select that year's round of apprentices. Some shops, like Master Holm's, had already carefully screened the applicants to find the kids with the aptitude, and the money had already changed hands. All these boys had already been accepted. Some had a mixture of those extremes. In almost every shop, though, it was the same. Parents would pay the artisans to apprentice their children. After the first year, if they were taken as indentured apprentices, they were literally the property of the artisan. Kyven and Timble were owned by Holm, who could pay them whatever he wished, treat them however he wished, even sell their contracts to another crystalcutter and pack them off to another shop. When an apprentice was indentured after the first year, the apprentices had to earn their keep, be it either with manual labor or with producing goods for the shop. Holm set a yearly amount that represented the money it cost him to feed, house, clothe, and train his apprentices, and each apprentice had to earn enough money to meet or exceed that amount through work. Some apprentices, like Timble and Kyven, earned the shop far more than what the shop paid to support them, so they didn't pay Holm, they were instead paid by Holm a percentage of the difference of those sums. Not every shop did it the way Holm did, but Kyven had to admit, Holm's system was fair. Holm didn't have to pay them a single chit for their labor, but he quite fairly allowed them to profit from their hard work and dedication to the shop.

Kyven was a private man, and having to face some thirty or more faces unnerved him a little. He didn't mind speaking to the other apprentices when he taught them, because he knew them. But these were strangers, people he didn't know, more people that might discover his secret and think he was crazy. "Good morning," he said nervously to the nine families, nine eleven year old boys and their parents, and even a few older and younger children who had also come, all of them dressed in their Sunday church best. "I'm Kyven, one of Master Holm's senior apprentices. Please, step inside, all of you, and go down the hall to the schoolroom at the end."

He remembered being on the other end, holding his father's hand as the grizzled miner led him into the schoolroom, feeling nervous and afraid. Kyven had known that he'd be separated from his father then, that he'd be living here, and that idea had scared him. His father had been his only family, and to be separated from him was almost traumatizing. He remembered his father kneeling before him, holding him by his shoulders, and telling him in that voice damaged by mine dust, "ya do yer best, squirt. Master Holm's a fair man and a good crystalcutter, one of the best. He can give ya a future here, train ya to be more than I ever could, far better than ya wasting out yer lungs in the mines like yer old man. I'm not leaving ya here because I don't want ya, I'm leaving ya here because I love ya. Can ya understand that, squirt? Good. Now, I'm gonna get out of here so I don't distract ya. Just do yer best and remember to write every week. I lova ya, son."

He could still hear that voice, just like it was yesterday. And it was the last time he'd ever heard his father's voice. His father died in a mine accident six months after Kyven began his apprenticeship… which put even more pressure on him at his first year test. If he'd failed that test and been put out, he'd have been homeless, with nowhere to go. There was no telling what would have happened to him if he would have failed to win an apprenticeship with another crystalcutter. He'd taken that first year test literally with his life on the line, and thank the Trinity, he'd passed it.

That memory made him a little more tolerant of the fussing parents as they hugged and gave encouragement and instructions to their nervous, frightened sons than Holm had been at his own induction. Holm had been surly and a little scary, yelling at them, banging his cane on the floor, scaring them into doing as he commanded. "Everyone take a seat when you get free of your parents!" Kyven called. "Parents, wrap it up, it's not like we're tossing them in a dungeon! You can see them next Sunday!"

Kyven sat on the teacher's table as the parents and siblings fussed with the apprentices for a few more minutes, then filed out, blowing kisses. When they were all gone, when it was nothing but Kyven and the apprentices, he was silent a moment. He blinked when the light in the room seemed to shimmer from the lamps, and then he felt it. He felt the eyes. He looked to the door leading to the front showroom, and it sat there in the doorway, glowing green eyes unblinking, just watching him. He shook his head and blinked, then looked back, to see it was gone.

Thank the Trinity.

"Good morning, then," Kyven called. "My name is Kyven Steelhammer, I'm one of the two senior apprentices in Master Holm's cutting shop. Today, you will hear me talk more than you will hear me talk for the next ten years put together," he said, which made the onlooking apprentices who know him laugh in agreement. "There's only one man in this shop that speaks with a larger voice than me and the other senior apprentice, Timble Longbranch, and that's our Master Holm. Let me explain what we do here one more time, because I'm sure you were too nervous to fully appreciate it. Myk," he called. A fourteen year old hurried over carrying a small box, handed it to him, then left. "Boys, what we do here is take this," he said, taking a raw red crystal out of the box, a fairly large nine point crystal, "and then turn it into this," he said, taking another nine point out, cut in the Princess cut, a heart-shaped crystal that was slightly oval. "This is a crystal, boys. A mana crystal. These are the backbone of all those nifty little gadgets and devices you use around the house, the army uses to keep us safe, and so on and so on. We cut the crystals they mine out of the mountains, and then the alchemists use them to power the devices they build. Each crystal is unique, boys. Each crystal holds inside it the power of magic, but it's not refined, not focused. It comes to us raw, and we inspect it, study it, analyze it. We study its structure to understand how the magic in it flows, and then we cut the crystal to maximize that power. Each crystal needs to be cut to bring out that power, so every cut is different, unique to that crystal. We use basic cutting patterns as a guide, but every crystal's cut is unique. No two are ever cut exactly the same. Our job, boys, is to make each crystal as strong as possible. The better we do, the stronger they are, and the longer they last when they power things like that," he said, pointing at the lamp hanging from the ceiling.

"Cutting is a job that requires two skills, boys," he said to them. "The first skill is appraising. You have to see what kind of potential a crystal has, and by appraising it, you know how best to cut it to bring out the crystal's maximum potential. After you appraise it, you move to the next skill, and that's making the actual cuts. You'll learn both of these skills, and here, at this shop, you have to be good at all both of them. Some men are good appraisers, but can't cut. Others are good at cutting, but can't appraise. You won't find them in this shop. To make it here, you have to prove you can take a crystal from beginning to end, take a raw crystal, appraise it, then cut it. And remember one more thing, boys. This is not a game, but there is competition. In one year, you'll take your first test, and only two of you will be moving into indentured apprenticeship. If you want to not worry about it, then don't. I don't think any apprentice that wasn't picked didn't go on to get apprenticed at another shop, but that's because Master Holm is the best. He only takes the best to be his apprentices. So, the seven of you who don't make it, don't panic. You'll apprentice to another cutter and go on to make a good living. But if you want to be here for more than to make a living, if you want to be the best, then work for it. Work to be one of those two who makes the cut.

"You're going to be very busy for the next year, boys. First, we'll teach to read. We teach you to read because being a good cutter requires you to be able to read and study books and draw up cutting diagrams if another cutter is doing the cut. And you'll study lots of books. Master Holm has an entire library on books about crystalcutting, and you'll read them all. While you study books, you'll work with us, the older apprentices, and we'll teach you the art of crystalcutting from the beginning to the end from the practical side. You'll watch us appraise and then cut crystals, and you'll learn the method behind the craft. We'll teach you the skills, while the books teach you the theory and the science behind cutting. But, since you are just started, be ready to work. You're going to be doing a lot of sweeping, scrubbing, washing, and cooking for your first year… but I'm sure you knew that."

The boys chuckled a little and nodded. "When you prove you're good enough, you'll take lessons from Master Holm himself. But that's a privilege you have to earn. At first, you'll be working with the middle apprentices, the fourth and fifth years, and our tutor, Mistress Henna. She'll teach you to read, they'll be teaching you the basics. Once you learn the basics, you'll be taking lessons with the sixth, seventh, and eighth years. They'll teach you the basic skills that the senior apprentices, me and Timble, and Master Holm will refine. If you think it's strange that you're not being taught by us, consider this. Part of being a crystalcutter is being able to teach your own apprentices when you finish your apprenticeship. As you learn from your seniors, your seniors learn a skill you'll practice yourself when you're at their level. And since we taught them, and we'll be watching them, be assured that they won't teach you wrong."

One boy raised his hand, then stood up when Kyven nodded to him. "Sir, if you were taught by apprentices in your first year, doesn't that mean you taught them when you were their age? I mean, how can we learn to be the best if the Master doesn't seem to be directly teaching us, and leaving our instruction to his own students who aren't masters? No offense, sir."

Kyven laughed. "I asked that same question at my induction, kid, so no offense taken at all," he smiled. "It's a valid question, and it deserves an answer. Yes, I was teaching first years in my fourth and fifth years. But it's not a matter of filling glasses over and over with a pitcher until the water's gone, kid. It's like pouring the same water down the line from glass to glass. Each glass gets filled to the same amount. Yes, Master Holm won't be giving you direct lessons until you're in your third year minimum, but remember that he taught the people that taught the people that are teaching you, and he wouldn't allow us to teach you if he didn't believe we could teach you right. He won't be teaching, but he will be watching. Master Holm is the best, boys, and that means he demands we live up to that standard. You'll learn more from our fourth year apprentices than you'd learn from the masters in other shops in Atan. But you're going to work, boys. Trust me, you're gonna work for it. Does that answer your question?"

"Yes, sir, thank you, sir."

"Don't call me sir," Kyven snorted. "My name is Kyven. You can call me Kyv. Any other questions? Yes, stand and speak," he nodded to a blond boy in the front row.

"Mister Kyven sir, my father said we'd learn numbers and the law, too. Do we?"

"Yes. Master Holm will teach you everything you need to know about running a cutting shop, and that includes being able to do numbers to keep your books, being able to run a staff that keeps your shop going, and understanding the laws of Atan concerning cutters and the rules of the Crystalcutter's Guild, which you'll be allowed to join when you start your own shop. But you won't start taking those lessons until your eighth year."

"Thank you," the boy said, then he sat back down.

"Any other questions?" he asked, and they were silent.

"Alright then, let's begin by showing you where you're going to sleep for the next year. Now, everyone pick up your things and follow me. I'll show you to the first year dormitory."

Kyven took them up and had them pick beds in the attic, which had two rows of four beds facing each other and a lone ninth bed by the stairs. Each bed had a footlocker and a small desk against the wall behind it, where the first years could practice reading, writing, or practice using the cutting tools. They had a brief moment of interaction with the other apprentices that had taken the test yesterday. It was an awkward moment. Seven of those nine boys were leaving the shop today at noon sharp, and the two who passed would be moving one floor down. They were looking at their replacements, looking at that feeling that they were just cogs in the machine. Kyven singled out the boy who had asked him about learning from Holm and had him take the bed by the stairs. "Listen everyone," Kyven called. "For now, this boy is your dorm chief," he told them. "He'll hold this position for the first week, until Master Holm interviews you and chooses who will lead the first years. So, at least for this week, you obey him up here in your dorm. It's his responsibility to make sure the dorm is clean and orderly, but how you keep it clean and orderly is your own affair. When I was in my first year, we all met and drew up a schedule of chores that rotated every week so everyone did a little instead of a few doing everything, and nobody got stuck doing a job they hated all year. It worked for us, it may work for you.

"Look around, boys. See how clean this dorm is? See how all the beds are made, all the walls are clean, and how every footlocker and desk is polished? This is a clean and orderly dorm. This is how it has to stay. Think about what you need to do to keep the dorm clean, how you want to do it, then meet and do it. We won't tell you what to do, and it's your first test as an apprentice. We all work together here, boys, you have to prove that the nine of you can work together to keep your dorm clean and orderly. You have an hour to unpack and meet each other, boys. Put your things away, get to know each other, and I'll be back in an hour to take you to breakfast." He tapped the dark-haired boy on the shoulder. "Remember, kid, it's your job to keep order, but don't make them angry with you."

"Yes, sir!" he said, putting his rucksack on the bed and opening it.

That was the start of a long day. Kyven basically herded the new apprentices around the shop all day. After breakfast, He gave them an extensive tour of the five floors and basement of the shop. He showed them every room that concerned them, and introduced them to the only three servants in the shop, the three women who served in the kitchen to do most of the cooking. Every one of them would spend time in the kitchen themselves as their chores, helping Amva, Shii, and Surry cook the large meals required to feed the some twenty men and boys that lived and worked in Holm's shop. He showed the schoolroom where they'd learn to read and take other lessons, then took them into the workshop, where the apprentices and Master Holm did the actual work of the shop, cutting crystals. The clever dark-haired boy looked around curiously, then raised his hand to ask a question. "Excuse me Kyven, but where are the other apprentices and their benches? I mean, if there's two a year and we're here for nine years, shouldn't there be eighteen benches? I only see twelve."

"You're a sharp one, kid," Kyven chuckled. "Just getting past the first year test isn't a guarantee. There are only ten apprentices here right now besides you first years. Master Holm has dismissed or sold off nine of them, and bought the contract of one apprentice in return."

"Sold off?" another boy asked.

"Master Holm holds the contract for your services, kid," Kyven explained. "He can sell that contract to another crystalcutter who needs apprentices, and believe me, kid, masters need apprentices. We're the ones that do most of the work. Since I've been here, Master Holm has sold five contracts to other shops, three apprentices were dismissed, and one died in an accident last year. That's why there's only ten of us, instead of eighteen."

"Why would he sell a contract and send us to another shop?"

"He may not like you," Kyven shrugged. "He's gotten rid of a couple of apprentices that just got on his nerves. You may not be making it at our level, but are still good enough to be a competent cutter to work in another shop, doing easier work. We're the best, kids. We cut crystals they won't dare risk taking to other cutters. This shop has cut crystals worth tens of thousands of chits, and if they're cut wrong, they're worthless. Some of you may not be up to that kind of pressure, but be good cutters. And you'll find plenty of work, cutting smaller, less expensive crystals. The last apprentice to be sold had that problem. He was a great cutter, but he got nervous, and he couldn't seem to be able to handle cutting anything that was valuable for fear of ruining it. He works over at Master Jevik's shop now, and he's doing well. He's happier over there."

"Wouldn't a master like Holm rather buy accomplished apprentices from other shops, then, instead of taking us in from the beginning?"

"You're smart, kid," Kyven laughed. "He has bought a few apprentices like that. Merik, a seventh year, started over at Master Torvan's shop. But Merik was an exception rather than the rule. Merik came in his second year, his first indentured year, so he hadn't really learned enough for us to have to undo and retrain. Master Holm prefers to control every aspect of his apprentice's education, so he knows beyond any doubt that you were trained and educated the right way. With an apprentice from another shop, you never quite know what they've been taught, or what bad habits they've been taught you have to undo. In a shop like this, working with the crystals we do, that's a risk Master Holm doesn't like to take. He'd rather go through fifty apprentices to find the one good one rather than buy promising-looking apprentices from other cutters and have to retrain them. After all, Master Holm is already quite wealthy and established. He can afford doing it his way."

"I understand, Master Kyven."

Kyven laughed. "If Master Holm heard you call me that, he'd whip your bottom red. Never call another apprentice Master. We haven't earned that title. If you don't want to call me Kyv, then call me Senior Kyven, because I'm the Senior Apprentice."

After the tour, they were introduced to Mistress Henna, a gray-haired spinster who made her living by teaching reading and writing, which were rare skills outside of government and the clergy. After that introduction, Kyven explained the chores they'd be doing. He then fed them lunch, took them back to the schoolroom, and Master Holm met them. He gave them a speech about what he expected of them and what he would teach them, then he sent them to their dorm and called them down to his office, one at a time, to interview them and test them. All of them had already been given tests in coordination and dexterity or Holm wouldn't have even accepted them, but he liked to give them a second test in stressful conditions to see how they handled the pressure. He would make them cut an intricate pattern out of a piece of paper with a razor blade while he was screaming, yelling, banging pots and pans, and throwing things at them. While they were interviewed one by one, Kyven got their names and wrote them on a slateboard at the head of the stairs of their attic dorm, and assigned them their shop chores for the first week. After the first week, the dorm chief would assign those chores. After the interviews, the first years were introduced to the rest of the apprentices again, more formally, at dinner in the main dining room. "Get used to it, boys, because tomorrow you'll be doing the serving!" Holm told the first years with a laugh as Surry ladled stew onto their plates.

Kyven leaned on his hand and played with his stew a moment, feeling exhausted after herding the new kids all over the compound, glad that the day was over. He saw the light shimmer a little around the table, as if the crystal in the lamp over them was about to fade, and he blinked, then looked around. There was a strange light around that clever dark-haired boy, the one that had all the questions, like a soft glow, and there seemed to be a golden hawk perched on his shoulder sedately, looking down at his plate.

Not again. Why had it been happening so much in the last few days? He blinked and turned to look behind his chair, and there it was. The fox. Sitting sedately, silver-tipped tail wrapped around its front legs, watching him with those glowing green eyes. He looked away deliberately, staring at his plate, blinking his eyes. He looked back to make sure that the hallucinations were gone, and saw that he could no longer see a hawk on the new boy's shoulder, but then realized that the fox had not vanished. The fox still sat there, still watched him, and it did not go away. It persisted all through dinner, as Kyven kept glancing behind his chair, ruining his appetite. He left the table first, going around the fox, who again moved. It turned its head, watching him, and when he was behind it, it stood up and turned around. As Kyven walked down the hallway towards the stairs, it followed. He turned and started up the steps, looking behind himself, but it didn't follow him up. It simply stood at the base of the stairs, looking up at him as he looked down at it.

Then it barked.

That sound startled him into missing the step. He fell against the stairs, sliding down a few steps before catching himself, then he got up on his knees on the stairs and looked back down as his elbows throbbed in pain from having the skin stripped off of them by the corners of the steps.

He'd never heard it make any sound before. Its bark sounded vaguely like a dog, but different at the same time, deeper, throatier, more forceful. It stood at the base of the stairs and just looked at him.

By the Trinity, was he really going crazy now? Before, it had never been like this. It had never moved anything but its head, but now, in the span of two days, this recurring vision had moved, twice, and now he heard it bark? He got back to his feet, but the fox barked again, making his jump and nearly fall down again. He looked back and saw it standing there, not sitting there, but standing there, its tail bouncing slightly behind it. It took a single step back, then turned sideway to him, and then barked again. It took a couple of steps down the hall, then it barked once more and looked up at him… expectantly?

It wanted him to follow it.

Kyven immediately thought of what happened yesterday. He had followed it yesterday, and it had literally saved his life. What harm was there in following it again?

Plenty of harm. To follow it was to acknowledge it, to acknowledge that it was there, and face the fact that he was going crazy.

But crazy or not, it had saved him yesterday. He owed it to the fox to follow it now.

He started down the stairs. It vanished around the corner, walking down the hall, and he saw it down by the alley door when he reached the landing. He started when the fox walked through the door like it wasn't there, but then recalled that though it always looked solid, it really was just a figment of his imagination, and was therefore not bound by the laws of reality. Kyven rushed down to the door and opened it, then looked out into the narrow alley. He saw the fox walking away from him, moving up towards the dead end, where the door to Virren's shop was located. It stopped, turned, and sat down by Virren's door, and watched him.

He was startled. That was it? It brought him out into the alley? Why? Maybe he really was crazy. It certainly made no sense. He turned away and was about to go back in, but he heard a door open down the alley, and he stopped and turned partially around to look.

The fox was gone, but behind where it had been sitting, Virren's door opened. Virren himself stepped out, and he seemed to look down the alley. He stopped and stared at Kyven in surprise, and moved to step back into his shop, but a small figure behind him literally walked into him from behind. It was covered in a cloak, a full, deep cloak. Virren turned and urged the figure back into the shop, and when it turned, its cloak rose up just enough for Kyven to see its foot.

A gray-furred Arcan foot. The tip of a pink mouse tail ghosted down by that foot, and then slipped back up under the cloak.

It made Kyven stop as he realized what he was seeing, and fully comprehend what was going on. That small figure behind Virren was the Arcan that he thought had died in his shop last night. Virren had saved it, somehow, healed it of its injuries, and now he meant to… to what? Keep it? Clearly he was taking it somewhere. What did he mean to do? It didn't seem to be, well, legal. He was slipping the Arcan out the back of his shop at sunset, when most people were eating dinner. And now that he thought of it, he'd taken the Arcan's collar off it last night, made Kyven take it up to the watchhouse. And the watch was going to come down and make him pay for the worth of the Arcan's body since he'd kept it. So what was the reasoning here? Had he paid for the value of the Arcan's pelt and meat, just to try to steal the Arcan? That wouldn't work, the town was too small. Someone was going to visit his shop and see the mouse, and word would eventually get back to the original owner that Virren had stolen the Arcan. He couldn't keep it, he didn't kill it and sell its pelt and meat… so what did he mean to do with it? Sell it? He couldn't sell it to anyone in town, and couldn't sell it to the kennel, so was he going to sell it to a merchant? Was he going to meet a merchant to sell it to him? If he was meeting the merchant like this, the merchant had to know the Arcan was stolen, and there was no guarantee the Arcan itself would keep quiet if it had been fond of its former master. Dealing with stolen Arcans was a dangerous business, especially since Arcans weren't all that expensive. Kyven had enough chits and raw crystals saved just from prospecting and his pay to buy an Arcan, if he wanted to. It would be an untrained one, maybe a wild Arcan or an older one, but he could buy one.

Very weird.

Bark!

Kyven started, whirling around. The fox was back. It stood in the mouth of the alley, at Gem Street, then turned and started slowly walking away. Kyven only hesitated a second before moving to follow. He was curious now, very curious, and illusion or no illusion, now he wanted to see what else it meant to show him. He followed the fox as it padded through town and left on the Avannar Road. It went just out of sight of the village, then turned down a hunting trail. Kit followed it, not paying attention to the fact that it was getting dark as it led him down to another section of Cougar Creek, near a ridge where Cougar Creek had a small, five rod waterfall as it drained down into the Blue Valley. Kyven followed it to the top of the waterfall, then it sat on a flat rock near the edge, its back to him, wrapped its silver-tipped tail around its front legs, and looked down.

He had never seen the back of it like that before. Its fur was thick, a little shaggy, and dark, almost black. The tips of its ears and the tip of its tail was silver, just like the ruff under its chin. Kyven seemed mystified by his old hallucination, and crept up behind it. Its ears twitched slightly, but it did not look back to him. It looked down, down to what Kyven knew was a little meadow at the base of the irregular waterfall that wasn't entirely vertical, merely very steep. He advanced to near the edge, and saw someone down there. For some reason, he didn't know why, he knelt down out of sight, then realized he was so close that he could reach out and touch the fox if he wanted to. He resisted the urge to try, for he knew it wasn't really there. It was just an illusion, a hallucination… but maybe, maybe it was more.

For the first time in his life, Kyven pondered the possibility of a third option. Maybe he wasn't crazy, and maybe he wasn't Touched. Maybe… maybe this fox was, was real. Maybe not real like the real world, but maybe it was real in some way he didn't entirely understand. He had always thought it was nothing but an image, but the last two days had proved to him that it was more. It moved. It could even bark. And it seemed to know things. It had warned him of the Touched Arcan, had lured him away from the creek and to safety. And it had lured him into the alley to show him Virren, but Kyven didn't understand what that meant. And now, now it had lured him out here, to the top of Cougar Fall, where a shadowy figure stood in the clearing at the bottom in the darkening evening.

Kyven leaned forward just enough to look over the mossy rocks of the edge. The figure was still there, a bit gloomy in the twilight murk as the dimming light compounded the shadows of the surrounding forest, a very tall figure that looked… wrong. It wore a cloak, and he was looking at it from above and behind, so it was hard to pin down why it didn't look right, but it didn't. It seemed, well, not standing right. When it turned, he realized why it seemed that way.

It was an Arcan.

A muzzle appeared from the hood of the cloak, and then it pushed the cloak back to reveal the hilt of a sword as a faint rustling tickled his ears. A rust-colored furry paw gripped the hilt of that weapon, and the shape of the muzzle hinted that this was a canine Arcan… a coyote, or perhaps a wolf. Kyven saw a shadow at the edge of the small clearing, and two shapes appeared from the deepening gloom.

It was Virren and the mouse Arcan.

Virren stood up and raised his empty hand, and the cloaked canine released the hilt of his sword and stepped up. Then they clasped wrists in some kind of greeting. "Thank you for coming so quickly," Virren told the Arcan. "Any trouble from the sweep?"

"Luckily no," the Arcan replied. "We saw it coming when we found signs of a Touched Arcan in the area."

"Was it anyone I know?"

"No, we'd never seen him before. It was a roaming feral Arcan. Who did he kill?"

"Aven, a mountain man, no one of consequence," Virren answered. "Come now, my dear," he said gently to the cloaked mouse, "this is Shard, the coyote I told you about. He'll take care of you from here."

"I'll take you far from the human lands," the coyote told her, holding his paw out. "You'll never be a slave again."

"Never?" she asked in a disbelieving voice.

The coyote opened his cloak. "Do you see a collar on me, mouse?" he asked simply. "I'm a free Arcan. Come with me, and you can be too."

"Free?" she said in a small voice, then she buried her face in her paws and dropped her knees, weeping.

"There there, dear, there there," Virren said comfortingly, reaching down and picking her up, keeping his hands on her shoulders. "It's going to be alright now. But you do need me to give me my cloak back," he said with a gentle smile. "I may need it again."

"Of–Of course," she said, sniffling. She unfastened the cloak and gave it to him, revealing that she was wearing a wool shirt and a pair of leather breeches much like the clothes that Virren's apprentices wore.

Unbelievable! Virren was a sympathizer! They were humans who hated the fact that humans enslaved the Arcans, and worked to free them. He'd heard of humans like him, but had never believed he'd know one, because their beliefs were both radical and considered illegal by the laws of many coalition governments, including Atan. What Virren was doing could get him hanged!

Amazing! What a cover Virren had, for he owned Arcans himself, used them in his shop! Nobody would ever believe for an instant that Virren was a sympathizer… and maybe that was exactly why he kept Arcans. But it fit. It fit that off-handed remark Virren gave him about how Arcans couldn't be animals because they could talk. It explained why he was angry at the young men who had beaten her, and why he wouldn't let them take her body. He had saved her, and now he was risking his own life to hand her over to–

To who? An Arcan, but a free Arcan? Kyven had never heard of a free Arcan that was, well, intelligent. The Arcans that were free were wild, feral, acting like animals. Sometimes they were captured and tamed to be used for labor, but those Arcans were never quite like Arcans who were born into it. Tame Arcans were intelligent, they could speak, and could follow directions and perform complex tasks. Was this coyote once a tame Arcan, but had slipped his collar and fled into the wilderness to the west of the Smoke Mountains? There were no organized governments over there, just frontier settlements and mountain men eking out their own livings off the land. Was he just one of many escaped Arcans who had banded together into one of those mythical Arcan villages that the mountain men liked to tell stories about, places were only Arcans lived, imitating the culture of the humans they had served?

It was entirely possible. This coyote, he knew Virren. Virren had obviously summoned him here, somehow. And he was dressed. He wasn't nude like what Kyven would expect from a wild Arcan, and he said he'd take the mouse far from human lands.

There was a glint of movement. The fox, who had been sitting so close to him, stood up. Kyven watched it as it padded back towards the path to town on silent feet, its dark fur melding with the coming gloom until Kyven could see it no longer. Was he supposed to follow it? It didn't turn to look at him. Maybe this was what the fox wanted him to see, and now that he'd seen it, it was done? Possible. He backed up from the edge so he wasn't seen if he stood up, then turned and crept back to the path as quietly as he could. He heard them talking as he retreated, but with the fox gone, he wasn't sure he felt entirely safe. If that coyote heard him or smelled him, it could catch him and kill him to protect Virren, who was obviously his friend. One on one, he was no match for an Arcan. Because of the shape of their legs, with that third joint in them like other quadrupedal mammals, they could drop down on all fours and run as swiftly as any horse, but were just as nimble, agile and mobile as any human when standing upright because their thighs were just as long as a human's thighs, which gave them stability and agility while moving on two legs. Their legs were only different from the knees down, but they were different enough to give Arcans a way to chase down any human with ridiculous ease. They were faster than humans, stronger than humans, and more agile than humans. According to legend, Arcans were created to work and to fight, and that gave them distinct physical advantages over humans. Kyven would stand no chance against him, especially since he had a sword and Kyven had no weapon.

Kyven retreated from the falls as quietly as he could, and spent nearly an hour moving very slowly and very carefully along the path because it was now dark and Kyven had brought no light. He had to literally feel his way along the path until he reached the road, and then the dim lights of the town guided him back to the safety of Atan.


The town was the same, but he knew he was different now.

It was different. Kyven went to the Three Boars and sat at a table near the fireplace, with a tankard of ale in front of him, lost in thought.

What he'd learned today… it made things different. He'd discovered a dark secret about Virren, a secret that could get him hanged if Kyven ever revealed it. But he'd never do that. Virren was a good man, a good alchemist, and Kyven had always rather liked him. What he'd learned about him tonight didn't make him hate Virren, not at all. Virren was following his heart, doing what he believed was right. Kyven didn't have much of an opinion about Arcans, so Virren's beliefs didn't impact him very much. It did show Kyven that Virren was a very kind man, though, to care so much about the Arcans, so much he was willing to risk his very life for them. And it was definitely a risk. Virren wasn't the only man that lived at the shop. He had apprentices, servants… did they know about Virren's secret? Were they in on it? It was impossible to know, and because Kyven could get arrested for aiding Virren's activities if they found out he knew about them but didn't report it, he wasn't about to try to find out. It was a secret that would never pass his lips, both for Virren's protection, and his own.

He learned something about himself, too. The fox… it couldn't be just a hallucination. If it was, then the only way it could have led him away from the stream, led him to Virren's secret, was if he had known about them himself, and that was quite impossible. If it was a figment of his own imagination, then how did he know about that Touched Arcan? How did he know Virren's secret? No. The fox was not a mind image, not a hallucination, not a part of himself. It was… external. It knew things he did not. The fox, it was real. It wasn't real in body, but–it was hard to comprehend. The fox was something not part of him, but at the same time, it seemed to be something that only he could see… and not even all the time. All these years, he always thought it was some sign of insanity, something he had to ignore. But yesterday, the fox had taken action, forced him to recognize it as something other than a hallucination, and that saved his life. And today, it had shown him Virren's secret, for some reason he couldn't quite understand, but it had. Was it… proving itself to him? Proving to him that it was real? Or was there some undiscovered reason for why it wanted him to know about Virren?

Questions, questions, and more questions, and no answers for them. He took another drink of his ale, grimacing a little. He hated the taste of ale, because he rarely drank it. He'd always been afraid to get drunk, afraid that he might tell people about his secret when the alcohol loosened his tongue. So he was always careful to keep control of his mental faculties all the time. But tonight, after the revelations that were shaking his life, by the Trinity, he needed a drink.

A figure came up to him, looming at the end of the table. He didn't look up, but he did when the figure sat down across from him. It was Virren. The burly man set a pewter tankard down with him on the table and looked at Kyven with hooded eyes. Kyven could sense his… reservation. Somehow, Virren knew he knew. He didn't know how much Kyven knew, but he knew he knew about the Arcan.

"Ale? That's not like you," Virren said, a touch nervously.

"I needed it tonight," he answered, then looked right at him. "I never knew you had a girlfriend," he said directly. "She must have a brother that doesn't like you to slip her in and out the alley door."

The aged man gave Kyven a long, searching look. "I think I might break it off with her. I enjoy her company, but it would be the scandal of Atan if we became common knowledge. The old crones would talk about it for years."

"Well, they'll never hear it from me, Master Virren. When I have my own shop, I'd like to have you as a customer. I can't poison a business relationship before it even starts, you know."

Virren gave him a long look, then chuckled. "I guess not. And don't call me Master Virren when we're having a drink." He gave him a close look. "What's wrong?"

"I had a nasty shock earlier today."

"Over what?" he asked nervously, but trying to sound casual.

"I learned something about myself today, something that surprised me."

"What is that?"

"I'm… not the man I thought I was."

"That can be good or bad, depending on what you discovered. Might I ask which it was?"

He looked to the fire, which burned despite the warm night, illuminating the tavern's common room along with the crystal lamps. "All my life, Virren, I've seen… something," he said, tracing the lip of his tankard with a finger. It spilled out of him, then, something he had never told anyone before, but something… something he just needed to say. Something he had to admit. "An animal. A fox, but it's not a fox. It looks like a fox, but it has glowing green eyes that aren't natural. It watches me, all the time. Sometimes, I can see it. Sometimes, I can't… but I know it's there. It's watched me since I was a little boy, since the day my mother died. Nobody else can see it but me. I always thought it was a hallucination, that I was going crazy, but it never seemed to get any worse, and I got used to it. Until yesterday. Yesterday, for the first time, the fox appeared to me, and then left. It walked away from me, then it looked back at me and… I just knew it wanted me to follow it. It had never done that before. I didn't understand why, so I followed it. I found out why just a few minutes later. It lured me away from the creek, away from the Touched Arcan that killed Aven. If not for the fox, that Arcan would have came across me first, but it went by me and attacked Aven instead. It saved me, Virren. I didn't want to believe it, so I just went on, put it out of my mind. But tonight…" He took a long drink from his tankard. "Tonight it showed me that it's not a dream. It's real. I know I'm crazy for saying it, but it is. It showed me something that convinced me that it's not a figment of my imagination."

"What did it show you?" he asked seriously.

Kyven looked him directly in the eyes. "That I can trust you with my secret," he answered, then he looked into the fire. "I don't really know what to do with myself, Virren," he said in a low tone. "I don't know if I should be happy I'm not crazy, or scared to death that I'm not. Or maybe I really am, and just don't know it."

"I don't think you're crazy, Kyv," he said after a moment. "Sometimes, we all see things that others miss. We see things that others don't, and they think we're crazy for it. I understand, my friend. Probably more than you know."

"I guess," he sighed. "Thanks for the company, Virren. I… I think I needed it tonight."

"Hey, a chance to get the most notoriously silent man in Atan to talk? Who would pass that up?"

He chuckled in spite of himself, and drained his tankard dry. "I have just one question, Virren. You don't have to answer it if you don't want to."

"What is that?"

"Your girlfriend. Will she be alright now that you've broken off your relationship? Some women take that kind of thing very hard, you know."

Virren gave him a long look, then nodded. "I think she will be. She has friends to help her through it."

"I'm glad to hear that." He looked to the fire again. "I'm going to head home, Virren. Maybe I'll see you tomorrow."

"Oh, I think you might. I managed to get my hands on a seven point green, Kyv, and it needs to be cut. A crystal like that, who do you think I'm bringing it to?"

Kyven laughed. "I might not have hands steady enough for a crystal like that tomorrow, Virren."

"I wouldn't put it any hands other than these, Kyv," he said, patting Kyven's wrist with his large, scarred hand. "These are hands I can trust."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Kyven chuckled, standing up. He put a single chit on the table, an amber disc that shimmered with red flakes that made it sparkle in the firelight. The Loremasters made them, mixing crystal dust with some special combination of tree resin and chemicals that hardened the resin into a material with the composition and hardness of amber. It was inscribed with its value, one chit, which meant that the disc was worth 1/100 of the value of a pointweight of red crystal. "We'll see if my hangover lets me do any work tomorrow."

"Then I'll wait," Virren told him, then waved as Kyven left the bar.


Virren leaned back in his chair, then waved to the Arcan barmaid, a slender mink whom the innkeeper kept naked to tease the patrons, wearing only a waist apron. Though her breasts were covered with fur and they could see nothing, the fact that they were very handsome breasts that would do any human woman proud kept them coming back to be served by her.

"Drink?" she asked in a meek tone, her words clear, but it was well known in the bar that her language skills didn't go much past "drink." She could understand what drinks one wanted and was smart enough to be able to bring the right drinks to the right people, but that was about it. She was cute, in an Arcan kind of way, pleasant on the eyes to humans because of her female curves, but she was as dumb as a box of rocks.

But that's all they were meant to see.

"Another drink," he said, looking right into her eyes. He tapped his finger on the table, and made a single hooking motion, then turned his eyes and looked directly at Kyven as the young man left the inn.

The mink's blue eyes widened in surprise, and she nodded and hurried away.

At the bar, she held her tray out to the male rat who was drawing from a large cask on a stand. "Drinks," she said to him. She made the same hooking motion with her free paw on her tray, then looked the rat in the eyes.

"Ale?" he asked.

"Ale, ale," she answered. He put a full tankard on her tray, and she leaned forward, checked the location of the innkeeper, then brought her muzzle close to the rat's ear. "Kyven," she whispered.

The rat gave her a startled look, then nodded and turned to fill another tankard. He put it on her tray, then put two fingers on the lip of the tankard, which caused her to nod imperceptibly.

The mink brought the tankard to Virren's table and set it down. She put two fingers on the lip of the tankard and tapped it once. He handed her a chit, and tapped it in her padded paw two times before releasing it to her. She bowed to him and moved off to wait on another table.

Virren leaned back in his chair, put his feet up on the table, and drained half his tankard in one long draw.

Amazing. Simply amazing. Almost unbelievable. If he hadn't heard it from Kyven's own mouth, he'd wouldn't have believed it… but he did.

Kyven could see spirits. The spirit had saved him, and from the way it sounded, had guided Kyven to Virren to show him that Virren was a man he could trust, had guided Kyven to the one man in Atan that would understand his cryptic confession for what it was, and see the truth.

Kyven wasn't crazy.

Unless Virren was crazy himself, Kyven was a Shaman. A human Shaman. Just the thought of that seemed ludicrous, impossible, absolutely insane, but what he had heard from Kyven was just impossible to deny.

In two days, they'd find out if his hunch was true or not. In two days, the Masked would send a Shaman to check and see if the impossible had indeed come to pass.

In two days, they'd know.

Chapter 02