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On the other side of the border, Falpian Caraxus watched the column of greenish smoke rise up over the shoulder of the mountain. Dawn was breaking. Behind him, his father’s men hovered around cooking fires, rolling up blankets or talking softly over last cups of steaming tea, careful not to disturb his thoughts. Some had already taken their leave with a nod or a silent bow and were leading their horses down the steep path.

Falpian stood in the dewy grass on the edge of the plateau. The mountains were a stunning sight. The zanthia trees had changed their color, turning every peak to crimson.

“The witches are in their reds,” he said to himself. Here, so close to the border, it was easy to see how the Witchlanders could believe in Aata and Aayse, the witch prophets. Even the red trees seemed to honor their customs.

Bron, his father’s kennel master, came up quietly beside him, his great shadow spilling over the lip of the plateau. “Firecall,” he grunted, frowning up at jagged peaks.

Falpian hadn’t considered that. At first he’d thought the rising smoke must be a funeral pyre, but then he remembered that Witchlanders didn’t burn their dead; they buried them in the ground, or worse, preserved them in dank catacombs.

“Black for war, green to gather, red when the coven is under attack,” Falpian recited. He turned to Bron. “Some witch calls for a gathering with that smoke. Do you think they know something?”

Bron took a moment to answer. “What is there to know?”

“I’m not a fool.”

After another pause the kennel master said quietly, “It’s always best to assume the witches know every move we make. And every move we’re going to make.” He turned to Falpian now, as if to use his face to make the point. Falpian was used to the cruel scars that slashed from left to right across Bron’s features—souvenirs of war—but seeing them now made him flinch. Witchlanders were a vicious people.

“Maybe I should just go home with you,” Falpian suggested hopefully. “These are dangerous times.”

“Are they?”

Behind them on the plateau, some of the others had noticed the smoke and were murmuring and pointing. They were young men mostly, too young to be veterans of the war like Bron, too young to remember when the fire-calls all burned black.

“It’s all right!” Bron shouted, but his words were for Falpian as much as for them. “I expect a call’s a common enough thing in these parts!” In a lower voice he went on, “There’s nothing to fear. The witches won’t break the treaty.”

“I don’t want to go back because I’m afraid,” Falpian snapped. Bron raised an eyebrow at Falpian’s tone. Although a servant of Falpian’s father, he demanded respect from someone so young. “I’m sorry, Bron. It’s just . . . I should be home. I should be training with the others.”

“Others?”

“Why do you pretend not to know what I’m talking about? There wasn’t a spare bed the day we left—there were even boys sleeping in the stables.”

“Men have always sent their sons to your father to learn their battle skills.”

“Never so many sons as this year.”

Bron pursed his lips and stared out at the scarlet mountains as if he enjoyed the view. He must be under orders, Falpian thought. He’d tell me if he could.

“We’ll await you in the gorge,” someone said to Bron, and the last of the men and horses began to make their way down the path.

Falpian watched the last horse disappear and felt a weight settle over him. Soon Bron would leave as well, and Falpian would be alone, alone at Stonehouse for a hundred days with only the dog for company—and even Bo’s company couldn’t be counted on. He was off chasing rabbits now, enamored of his new freedom.

Of course, Falpian would want for nothing during his stay. His father had sent crates of poetry, bags of flour, jars of honey, barrel after barrel of dried fish—everything he’d need and plenty of things he wouldn’t. Somehow the man could make even bounty seem like a slap in the face. In the old days he would have told his son to live by his wits, that hardship would make him strong; he would have scoffed at the idea of reading poetry and insisted Falpian study logic or military history. Now he didn’t seem to care.

“I can’t be completely useless,” Falpian said to Bron. “Surely there’s something I can learn to do.” He pointed to the smoke over the mountain. “I hate them as much as everyone else. If there’s another attack planned. If it’s war—”

“Shh!” Bron warned. The men were gone now, but he looked to the mountain’s crooked peak as if, from their high covens, red witches were listening. “You are in mourning, child. This is a time of grief for you—a time of meditation and prayer.”

Falpian waved his words away. “There are a dozen retreats where I could spend my mourning season. But Father sends me as far as he can, for as long as he can. Am I being banished?” He bit his lip, remembering how cold his father had been when they parted, barely taking the time to say good-bye. “You don’t have any magic in you either, but at least my father can stand to look at you.” This was the heart of the matter, Falpian knew. His lack of magic. “All those men and boys back home, how many of them will have the gift? One or two, if any? But he doesn’t treat the others as if they’ve disappointed him just by being alive. He puts a sword in their hands and teaches them how to use it.”

“I seem to recall your father giving you many lessons in swordcraft.”

Falpian blushed hotly. Neither he nor his brother had ever excelled with weapons. “I thought,” he stammered, “I thought I would have other skills.” He paused, steadying his breath. The last thing he wanted was for Bron to see him cry, and report what he had seen to his father. “I shouldn’t have assumed.”

The kennel master set a thick hand on his shoulder. Falpian shrugged away his touch, but at least Bron wasn’t like his mother, constantly telling him that he was a late bloomer, that his magic would come. Falpian was grateful for that.

“Perhaps your father has a reason,” Bron said, still speaking in hushed tones. “Did you think of that? A reason for sending you so close to the border, in these . . . uncertain times.”

“What do you mean?”

Bron’s eyes were suddenly brighter, and the torn corners of his mouth turned upward to a grin. There was a leather pack at his side, and from it he pulled a metal cylinder that glinted dully in the sunlight. Falpian recognized it as a container for a scroll.

“I was supposed to wait until the last moment to give this to you,” Bron said, “and I suppose that time has come.”

All at once, Falpian was reminded of a day years earlier—the day he’d been given his dog, Bo. He remembered the kennel master holding the trembling ball of fur cupped in both his hands, that same glad brightness in his eyes: It was something special, this scroll. Falpian looked again at the cylinder. He’d never seen it before, but he recognized the Caraxus family mark etched over its surface: the words DUTY, HONOR, SACRIFICE coiled together in the ancient Baen script.

“Is it . . . from my father?” Something like hope fluttered in his chest. “But if he had a message—”

“Not a message,” Bron interrupted. “A mission.” He smiled again. “I wish you could have heard him. Your father did not confide everything in me, but he did say your presence here was very important, that you were very important.”

“Very important? Me?” Try as he might, Falpian couldn’t picture his father saying the words. “Important for what?”

“For what’s to come.”

Later, when Bron too had gone, Falpian stood at the edge of the plateau clutching the metal cylinder tightly in one hand, delaying for a moment the pleasure of opening it. He had a mission. A reason to be here. His father had not banished him after all. The red mountains had been just a pretty picture before; now they were strangely thrilling, as if his destiny were hidden somewhere amid the rocky crags.

Nearby, a stand of zanthias shook their branches, and a cloud of seedpods floated down on him like fat red snow-flakes. Without thinking, Falpian pulled one out of the air. It was soft and feathery. He’d read somewhere that Witchlanders made wishes on them.

“Let me do this well,” he whispered, “whatever it is. Don’t let me disappoint him again.”

Falpian blew a soft breath over his palm, and the seed-pod floated down on a current of air, disappearing into the gorge.

He’d rather die than disappoint his father again.

© 2011 Cathleen Coakley