8 Why can’t we live without choosing?

“Ah… Over here, there’s something very similar to ferilompard morjas,” Yabir muttered, stopping in the middle of the street.

He had led us to several butcher shops so far, so I did not cry out in victory. I watched him intently as he raised an index finger and waved it around indecisively, looking focused.

“Yes. Just… there,” he concluded.

No sooner had he signalled than I ran off in that direction, accompanied by Dakis, leaving the hobbits and the twins behind. We were in Tarmil, an area in which they did not think the gang that had attacked me could be hiding, and yet I had convinced them that “maybe” they had already sold the gem and thrown the bones nearby. I hadn’t mentioned to them that Little Wolf was wearing a necklace very similar to mine.

I gasped, spun round, and looked among the passers-by, turning my gaze downwards, looking for a small figure. He must be… Then I looked up and turned pale. I was standing before a small building with a metal plate on it. I spelled out:

“Abandoned Children’s Home—Blasthell of blasthells!” I spat.

I rushed to a window of the orphanage and stuck my nose to the glass. I saw some figures sitting on the floor. I pushed. It was as sunny as the day before, and it turned out that someone had opened the window and forgotten to turn the handle to close it. I peeped in, and as about twenty eyes were riveted on me, I hastened to put an index finger to my lips. The little kids said nothing. Several of them covered their mouths to keep from laughing. There were no adults. I looked for Little Wolf. It was easy: recognizing me, the blond boy had stood up and was now running towards me, his mouth open with joy, round as a half-siato coin. I smiled with happiness.

“Come, Little Wolf, come!” I urged him in a whisper.

As soon as he reached the bottom of the window, I grabbed him, pulled him out, and ran away. The hound beside me looked almost as pleased as I was. I stopped as soon as I reached the hobbits and the twins. While the former greeted me with expressions of disbelief, the Blonde One laughed and the Blue One rolled her eyes and scoffed:

“So that was the bone necklace we were looking for, kid?”

I smiled back at her.

“You’ve made a fool of us,” Yabir complained, still stunned.

I put Little Wolf down and hurriedly put my scarf over his head, so that he would not be recognized with his blond hair, while I answered:

“That was the first and foremost thing, sorry. I’m not leaving Little Wolf in that den, not even for a thousand crowns. Now, let’s get the gem. This time, no tricks, I swear. I remember where those isturbags attacked me. And I know where they live.”

Zalen, the Blonde One, gasped.

“What? But Dalto told us you didn’t know them.”

“Yes, but I do know them,” I assured. “The problem is, I didn’t remember, because they shook me and they put something in my nose that made my head spin like a top, but now I remember. I remember everything. Can we get moving? Actually,” I explained as I started down the slope, quickly moving away from the orphanage. “These guys wanted me to give them my money. But, if I had given it to them, then they would have popped me off anyway. These guys are the worst. They set up shop in the Black Quarter, but in reality, they’re from the Cats. Real screwballs. Well. So that’s it. End of story. So is it true that my brother is going to pop them off?” I enthused.

The twins exchanged eloquent looks. Cautiously, Zalen asked:

“What exactly do you mean by ‘pop off’?”

I huffed.

“Cut them, spirit them away, kill them. That’s what I mean,” I said gravely. And I pointed to a street to take a shortcut while adding, “The Braggart is a murderer.”

After a silence, I insisted:

“So? Is he going to liquidate them?”

The Blonde One cleared her throat, and it was the Blue One who answered with serenity:

“Justice will be done, boy. Justice will be done.”

I bit my lip, looked at her out of the corner of my eye, and nodded, convinced.

“Good.”

And, thus relieved, I led my little party into the Cat Quarter. Almost immediately, I found the place where the Braggart’s had attacked me, and the rocky path, but Yabir did not sense the presence of ferilompard bones there. We found the bones of several rats. And I found the necklace of my Daglat star. That was something. I tied a knot in it to repair it, put it around Little Wolf’s neck, and smiled while the little one examined his second necklace with curiosity.

“Keep it well, shyur. I hope it brings you more luck than it did me,” I said. I hesitated and turned to Yabir. The hobbit had his eyes closed to concentrate as best he could as he grasped the Orb. Shyly, I interrupted him, “Yabir?” The hobbit opened his eyes. I tilted my head to the side and asked in Caeldric, “Why are you looking for this gem? Is it really valuable?”

“Oh.” The hobbit rubbed his neck thoughtfully. “I’m not sure about that. I don’t think the stone itself is worth much, but… the energy symbol etched on it… if it’s indeed what I think it is, then, this stone may indeed be very valuable.” Facing my watchful eyes, he smiled and observed, “I don’t know how it got to you, but… if I’m not mistaken, this stone belonged to the royal family of the underground city of Hilemplert.”

I blinked.

“What family?”

“The royal family of Hilemplert. The kings who were dethroned and slaughtered two years ago. Much to the relief of many, it must be said,” Yabir coughed. “Hilemplert is less than a week’s journey from Yadibia… so, I cannot deny that I, myself, welcomed the fall of those tyrants.” He tossed the Orb into the air and caught it in mid-air, adding, “The stone is undoubtedly valuable… but only to those who know what it is. To a jeweler in Estergat, I don’t think you can sell it for more than forty siatos. I, on the other hand, can offer you much more for it. Uh…” He took on a worried look, “Are you all right, boy?”

I nodded, my heart beating rapidly.

“R-ragingly,” I stammered.

I breathed in deeply and felt the hand of Little Wolf very clearly in mine. I thought of that woman who had paid Coldpalm for the papers with Little Wolf and the Gem. Who was she? I didn’t know, the witch didn’t know, but maybe she came from the Underground. And maybe Little Wolf had been carrying the gem all his life, just as I had been carrying the little metal plate from the valley. And that meant that Little Wolf was a king. Well, no, the son of tyrant underground kings who had been slaughtered two years ago. Good mother. Now that was really… Blasthell. That was really incredible. Of course, I wasn’t going to tell anyone. Never. Ever.

But the hobbits know, I thought with a shudder. Or they should know, if they had really spied my conversation with Coldpalm through the Black Opal. Maybe they hadn’t heard me, or they had forgotten, or they hadn’t made the connection…

Facing the curious looks of Yabir and Shokinori, I cleared my throat and recovered. There was no point in thinking about kings and that sort of nonsense. I looked down at Little Wolf, wiped his nose, then raised my head, waving vaguely.

“For sure, the isturbag took the gem to the Black Quarter. Let’s go, I know a shortcut.”

I led them through the alleys of the district, avoiding the patrols of the flies, and we came to the slope of the Timid River and the border with the Black Quarter. The thought of entering Braggart’s domain filled me with apprehension, but I was so well accompanied, and Yabir seemed so willing to find the gem, that I overcame my fears, crossed the bridge, and led us onward between the hovels of the Black Quarter.

I had only been in there a few times. Why go there anyway? There were taverns there, but there were also taverns in the Cats. There were working-class families like in the Cats. There were gangs, thieves, scoundrels, just like in the Cats. Well, all in all, it was basically the same as in the Cats, except that in my district the families had lived there for several generations, whereas in the Black Quarter there were newly arrived foreigners, Tassians, Valley People, Plaarians, Swamp People, and certain races, such as the ternians, who had never been fully accepted as sajits.

In principle, Yabir had hired me as a guide, so, at first, I pretended to move forward with confidence… However, after a while of wandering through the muddy, cluttered alleys, I felt it necessary to confess:

“This whole area, I don’t know it that well.”

Yabir didn’t look disappointed or surprised. He was too focused on the Orb to pay any attention to me anyway. To tell the truth, the others didn’t seem to have heard me either. The Blonde One was looking around, her expression both shocked and pained. The Blue One was scanning the faces of the people we passed, as if she knew their deepest secrets—at least that’s how it looked when she looked at you with those sparkling eyes. As for Shokinori and Dakis, they seemed to be absorbed in a mental conversation. Finally, I wondered if anyone in the group had been listening to me. Feh. I looked down at Little Wolf, and seeing him exhausted from so much walking, I hoisted him onto my shoulders, earning him an enthusiastic smile. Then I slowed my pace and let Yabir go ahead. After all, he was leading us now.

We went down the slope again until we came to an area which was almost flat, but also full of shacks, small markets, and some rare hard buildings. Then Yabir stopped, did a half turn, and we turned back; he stopped again after a while and huffed.

“Shok, help me out here, will you?”

And he passed him the Purple Orb. Shokinori concentrated in turn. After a few moments, the hobbit warrior shook his head.

“I don’t know. I can tell the morjas of a plant from that of a bone, but not a chicken bone from a gahodal bone. I’m not an…” he glanced at me eloquently and concluded, “expert.”

Yabir cocked his head to one side, and in a sudden rush, the young Baïra took back the Orb and handed it to me.

“Take it. You try it. It’s activated. See if you can find anything. I’m stuck.”

The proposal left me stunned and at the same time delighted. I took the Orb. The last time I had held it in my hands in the Hostel, I had felt the link to the Black Opal, nothing else. This time, I did not perceive the presence of one link, but of many others. A great many of them. Obviously, this relic could be activated in different ways. One for the Black Opal, another to search for bones. I smiled as I felt the explosion of morjas coming from Little Wolf’s necklace. I concentrated and tried to find other sources. I found mine, of course, and my companions’, but theirs was far less noticeable. As I looked around for other supplies of morjas, my smile widened. This was so wonderful! My master would have loved this. It would have made his jaw drop in his lap for sure. I could sense the morjas of a chicken bone, abandoned under the mud, the morjas of a dead rat carcass a little further on, the morjas of a… sajit? I shuddered and looked in the appropriate direction, towards a house… No, behind that house. Filled with an unhealthy curiosity, I walked forward, Little Wolf on my shoulders. As I came around the corner, I saw a small mound of earth just below the house. Someone had recently placed flowers there. A grave, I realized. After swallowing my fright, I let out a breath, turned to my companions with a big smile, and exclaimed:

“This is so awesome!”

I laughed, euphoric, put Little Wolf down, and trotted off with him into another alley. So much morjas, so much food for my master! I kept exploring the area, fascinated, ecstatic by each discovery. An old man sitting on the threshold of his house watched me come and go with a curious expression as I picked up bones, dug them up, and admired them, and after showing them to Yabir, I put them in my pockets and continued my hunt. It was so wonderful!

“And that one, and that one!” I exclaimed, pulling out a huge gnawed shin that must have belonged to an ox or something. “Have you seen it, Little Wolf? It’s almost as tall as you!”

Finally, Shokinori intervened with a loud clearing of his throat.

“Um, boy.” I turned around. The Blue One was whispering with Yabir, the Blonde One was laughing under her breath, and Shokinori was looking at me with a mocking expression. The latter resumed in Caeldric, “I never imagined that a bone could be the cause of so much joy, and I am glad of it, but I fear that Yabir is not looking for ox legs.”

For a second, I was speechless. Then I laughed and nodded, throwing the bone.

“Sure, it runs, there I go. I’m gonna look for them. I know where they are,” I assured, raising the Orb.

And I set off. Dakis trotted beside me, the others followed, I felt like the king of the expedition! So I tried to concentrate and make sure that the Orb was really pointing to the ferilompard bones I had been carrying for the last two weeks. They were, I was sure, for they were the sister bones to those carried by Little Wolf.

I found them abandoned carelessly in the mud beside a large warehouse door. We were now in a warehouse area. I crouched down, picked up the bones one by one, counted them and nodded. They were all there. That meant that… I looked up and around, suddenly alarmed. If the bones were there, it meant that Braggart had been there with his gang. I stepped back and said:

“Those are the bones. But I have no idea where the gem might be. We’d better get out of here.”

“But there’s no one around,” Yabir argued.

I shook my head and assured, nervous.

“There is.” I pointed to the warehouse where I found the bones. “There are bones in there.”

Yabir made a face.

“Alive?”

I gave him a curious look.

“The bones live. But I can’t tell if the sajits in there are alive. Let’s get out of here, okay?” I insisted.

I was getting more and more nervous. This place was deserted and silent, the sky was darkening, and we were in enemy territory. I said urgently:

“I’m legging it.”

“Wait,” Yabir interjected. “You think that Braggart lives just here? It’s a warehouse, not a house.”

I rolled my eyes.

“It’s got walls and a roof. It’s a house. I’m not saying that Braggart lives there, but I’m sure that…”

I fell silent as I suddenly saw a figure creeping between two walls. It disappeared behind a building. Dakis growled. I could take no more of it and repeated in a muffled exclamation:

“I’m legging it!”

I grabbed Little Wolf and ran off as fast as I could. Dakis passed me quickly. We ran between the warehouses, with our backs to the Rock, so that in a few minutes I came upon the lowest street of the Black Quarter, near the only temple in the district and the Rida Bridge. This area was already lit by streetlights, people were walking, and though I didn’t feel much safer, I relaxed, caught my breath, and put Little Wolf down as we reached the bridge.

“Where have the others gone?” I muttered, glancing back with concern.

Dakis wagged his tail. He didn’t look very worried. I scratched my head, scanning the growing darkness. Perhaps the hellhound was right not to worry, I thought. After all, both the hobbits and the twins were celmists, powerful wizards, and—apart from Yabir—all carried weapons. I bit my lip and muttered:

“I’m not a chicken, am I?” I turned to the hellhound and repeated, “Am I?”

The hellhound, of course, did not answer. I would have liked to have been able to hear his thoughts through brejic arts. Unfortunately, I had no idea of these mental arts.

I shook my head and continued to wait, getting more and more nervous. Then I saw Shokinori appear running. He knew right away where we were; he ran straight towards us and shouted:

“Kid! Run to Moon Square and see if you can find Kakzail and tell him to call the police.”

I opened my eyes wide, dying of curiosity.

“What the…?”

“Go!” Shokinori cut me off. “I’ll wait for you here.”

Leaving Little Wolf in his care, I stormed off, crossed the little bridge, and ran down the Haven Walkway as fast as I could. Why did Shokinori want my brother to call the police? Had something bad happened? I didn’t have time to really worry. I passed the busy Hippodrome, dodged the carts and the strolling nail-pinchers, and finally arrived at the Moon Square, gasping for breath, and turning my head in all directions, looked for the gladiators. To my relief, I soon saw them standing in the middle of the square. They were armed as they had been when I first saw them at The Drawer. None of them wore the fly uniform. The alchemist was there too, eating a bun that looked delicious. They were chatting quietly: I interrupted them as I came storming in.

“Shokinori says you must call the police!”

For a second, the four men were stunned. Then Kakzail became as nervous as a flea.

“What happened?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I found the bones at the warehouses in the Black Quarter. But then Shokinori told me to tell you to call the police.”

My brother huffed, and swallowing his questions with evident difficulty, he threw out in an urgent tone:

“Let’s go.”

He rushed to the police station in the square, and as Dalto and Kakzail entered, I slowed down to stand outside. I waited with Sarpas and the alchemist. The giant gave me a worried pout.

“Are Zoria and Zalen in trouble?” he asked.

I shrugged my shoulders.

“I don’t know. It’s just that… it’s just that I legged it before with Little Wolf and Dakis, and Shokinori came afterwards. But don’t tell my brother. I’m not a coward,” I assured him.

Sarpas smiled slightly and shook his head without answering. The alchemist rolled his eyes and finished his bun before stating:

“I believe you. If you were a coward, you wouldn’t have gone into the mine to save me like a hero. What an adventure it was, huh?” he grinned.

The gnome’s words were oddly comforting to me. Because they were right. I, Mor-eldal, was not a coward: I was a cautious gwak. My master would have been proud of me: for once, I had been careful!

A few moments later, Kakzail and Dalto came out of the station, followed by three flies, and from the way they were talking to one of them, I deduced that he was a friend. They got into a vehicle in a hurry, and to my dismay, I saw the moment when they were going to forget me completely. Then Kakzail glanced at me and growled.

“Get in, come on, quick.”

I climbed in with a mixture of excitement and horror. Excitement because I had not been left out after all; horror because the last time I had ridden in a fly cart it had gone straight to Carnation. The horses began to move at a fast trot before I could find a place, and in the end, I lost my balance and fell into Sarpas’ lap. Kakzail prevented me from getting up.

“There, you’re fine, don’t move. Tell me, did something happen to Zoria and Zalen?”

“I tell you I don’t know,” I repeated. “I didn’t see anything. Shokinori came all the way to Rida Bridge. He’s waiting for us there. He didn’t explain anything to me either.”

“And they were supposed to avoid trouble,” Kakzail grumbled.

The traffic on the Haven Walkway put him in an even worse mood. And he went on growling: “if anything has happened to them, I’ll lose it, I’ll really lose it, guys, oh man, get out of the way! Police! It’s urgent!” My brother was saying things like that. Fortunately, because we were in a fly vehicle, the carts moved aside, and soon we were crossing the Rida Bridge. Shokinori greeted us by saying in Drionsan with a horrible accent:

“Please follow me!”

I leapt down, retrieved Little Wolf, and this time, the gladiators and flies really forgot all about me. The one who seemed to be the fly chief called out to two guards on the main street for reinforcements, and the eight warriors disappeared into the Black Quarter, following the hobbit. Only the alchemist remained in the police cart with the driver. But I was dying of curiosity and could not wait there. So I ran behind the warriors, with Little Wolf in my arms. I tried not to fall behind, but it wasn’t easy. The only one who seemed to pay any attention to me was Dakis. He followed me like a shadow through the maze of houses, junk, and sheds.

When I arrived in front of the warehouse where I had found the bones, I heard the sarcastic baritone voice of the fly chief inside.

“Ah, you didn’t know that was illegal, did you? Sorry, young man, but I don’t buy that. Let me remind you that no one is supposed to ignore the law. Where’s your leader?” he barked.

I stopped at the half-open door and looked in. A bright harmonic light illuminated the whole interior. It was filled with pots with plants. Pots of dandepassion for sure. A boy of about fifteen and a boy of my age were kneeling with their hands behind their heads as the flies examined the place and the police chief questioned them. Kakzail was whispering agitatedly to the Blue One, and she seemed to be laughing at his concerns.

Suddenly, the Blonde One averted her eyes from her light spell and turned to me.

“Draen! Come in, come in. Tell me, do you recognize any of them?”

I did not move from my spot. I was appalled at the thought of going in to identify the culprits. I, a gwak, was going to tattle to the flies? It would have been a mortal blow to my dignity, even if it was an enemy gang. I met the young trafficker’s gaze and saw him widen his eyes. He had recognized me. That meant, without a doubt, that he was a member of Braggart’s gang, that he had participated in the confrontation on Sheer Cliff Street, and… perhaps he had been present when I had been “decorated”. I did not recognize him, however, and hastened to say:

“No, ma’am.”

I was about to back away, but Dalto grabbed me by the arm and pulled me inside.

“Don’t duck out. This is important. Do you really not recognize them? Are none of them part of that gang that attacked you?”

I bit my lip and shook my head. Why was I lying? Out of dignity. Because I knew that neither the kid nor the youngster had been among those who had decorated me. Maybe they had seen it. But they hadn’t done it. And that was an essential difference. I wanted to see Braggart dead, not some gwak who was just working for him watering plants. That’s why, when I saw that they were going to send them to the hole, I wanted to give them a hand.

“Those are Braggart’s slaves, for sure,” I said. “It’s not their fault. I’m sure they didn’t know about the plants. I didn’t know it was illegal either, I learned about it not long ago. Around here, we don’t know much about laws,” I explained. “Because they don’t teach us.”

The fly chief contemplated me with a dark look while, a few steps away from me, Kakzail exhaled and whispered:

“That’s all we needed.”

The two young traffickers looked at me, full of hope. The younger one exclaimed:

“He’s right! We knew nothing. We didn’t know anything about anything. We were locked in!”

The fly chief smacked him on the back of his neck.

“Enough of your bullshit,” he growled at him. “Just to be clear, ignorance of the law is no excuse for breaking it. And now let’s go.”

The flies forced them to stand up, and as they went out, I heard the fly chief comment to Kakzail in a mocking tone:

“In the end, your dear queen was doing just fine, huh? She was hunting down smugglers, sword in hand. And quite the smugglers at that: an entire warehouse, no less! Maybe we should hire her—”

“Don’t even think about it,” Kakzail replied. “We’re a group of mercenaries: we’re hired as a group.”

The fly smiled, amused, patted him on the shoulder, and walked away to attend to the business at hand. He passed by me and gave me a look that seemed to say: you’re lucky this time, rascal, but if I catch you… I grabbed Little Wolf more tightly and joined the Blonde One.

“What about the gem?” I inquired.

The mage shook her head gently.

“I do believe we’ll find it quicker if we ask in every jewellery shop in Estergat. Those poor wretches said they knew nothing,” she commented, glancing out.

And pressing a hand on my shoulder in a gesture almost as maternal as Taka’s, she gently pushed me towards the exit. There, on the street, everything was dark and there was no one there. Not a curious person had approached for fear of being questioned. Guided by Dakis, we headed for the main street, following the inmates from a distance, and on the way, Zalen whispered to me:

“Why did you defend them?”

Her tone of voice reflected curiosity. I shrugged my shoulders, not knowing what to say, and she laughed amiably:

“Maybe in the end ‘popping them off’ is a bit too drastic a remedy?”

I looked up at her with curious eyes.

“What does drastic mean?”

“Mm… radical, violent,” the mage explained demurely.

I nodded thoughtfully, but disagreed:

“Not for the Braggart. That one is like the Black Hawk. If he ever attacks me again, I’ll give him one that his ancestors will remind him of.”

We walked for a few moments, silent. I was already thinking about the hunger growing in my stomach when the Blonde One asked:

“Would you really be able to do it in cold blood, kid? Taking someone’s life. Destroying a mind. That’s a horrible thing.”

Her whispered words gave me goose bumps; I frowned uncomfortably and then finally remembered how the Braggart had thrown the explosive ball at Swift. If it had activated in my hand, he would have popped me off. How could Braggart have been okay with doing something like that? It was horrible. Yes, it was horrible. With a heavy heart, very quietly, I stammered out:

“I’m scared, ma’am.”

“What are you saying?” the Blonde One asked.

She hadn’t heard me. I sighed.

“Nothing. It’s just… I’m hungry, ma’am.”

I saw the Blonde One’s half-smile, already illuminated by the streetlights on the main street. She raised a hand to the alchemist who was waiting for us near the policemen, immersed in a conversation with the coachman, and she replied:

“That can be remedied. There’s a tavern right over there, past the Rida Bridge. They serve pretty good food. As soon as the others arrive, we’ll go there. How about that?”

I smiled and nodded.

“Yes, ma’am. Thank you very much. Is Little Wolf invited too?”

Which, of course, implied that she was inviting me for free too… right? Zalen’s smile widened.

“Of course he is.”

The gladiators, the Blue One, and the hobbits soon joined us. They immediately accepted the idea of going to the tavern chosen by Zalen, and as they were all talking animatedly on the way, I followed them, hardly listening to them and dragging Little Wolf behind me. The latter still had the Master with him, to my great joy, because it would have taken me a whole morning to remake the doll, especially to look for the bones, unless…

I bit my lip, suddenly remembering: I still had the Purple Orb in my pocket, in the middle of my bone stash. I quietly pulled it out as I walked behind the adults and examined it. It no longer showed any links. How did it activate? If only I knew how to do it… But, blasthell, if Yabir knew how, there was no way a necromancer wouldn’t be able to do it, huh?

Thus encouraged, I concentrated, groped the intricate tracing, and touched the links somewhat haphazardly. Suddenly I heard a gasp and Shokinori turned around. He had put one hand to his neck—where he kept the Black Opal, perhaps?—and he held out his other hand to me.

“Give me that back, kid.”

We were already almost in front of the tavern, a beautiful, bright building of nail-pinchers. I stopped and looked at the hobbit’s hand, annoyed. I couldn’t help but look innocent.

“Give what back?” I asked.

Yabir turned in his turn and cleared his throat as he understood the problem.

“It is not yours, boy. This orb belongs to the Great Library of Yadibia.”

My face darkened. It wasn’t right. The Purple Orb had been made by a nakrus, a necromancer, and it made sense that it belonged to another necromancer, right? Perhaps seeing the look on my face that I was looking for arguments, Shokinori insisted, holding out his hand. My brother hissed.

“Ashig. Give that back.”

I looked into the bearded man’s eyes, and as I saw that he was approaching, I returned the purple stone to Shokinori. My heart broke. And my eyes filled with tears, but I swallowed them, clenched my teeth, and… I couldn’t bear it, I took Little Wolf and left.

They did not pursue me at once, and I thought for a moment that they really did not care what I did with my life. I had helped them to look for the bones, and I couldn’t help them anymore. So they forgot about me. As usual, right? But then, as I was already climbing the Hippodrome hill towards Sheer Cliff Street, Kakzail caught up with me.

“Draen.”

It was the first time he called me by my real name. Well, more like the name everyone called me except him and Samfen. I put Little Wolf down, turned around, and watched my brother approaching from the shadows. The light from a distant street lamp allowed me to see his face, but I couldn’t make out much about his state of mind.

“I told you, if you go back with that gang, goodbye family. Remember?” he asked.

I nodded mechanically. I could hear the rumor of the Timid River flowing down the Rock, and the distant voices on the Haven Walkway. And the winter breeze that made me shiver. And a bell. And a muffled laugh… And a sigh. My brother’s.

“Actually, let’s do it like that,” he said then. “You can go now. I’ll give you one day. One day for you to decide. If by tomorrow night you have not come to see me, then our parents, Skelrog…and I will make no further effort on your behalf. Father will give your description to the police, as the law commands, and he will tell them to arrest you if they see you, but you will not go to the barber shop or to a school: you will go to the charity house. Just like any vagrant gwak.” He paused and added, “If you come tomorrow, if you trust me, I will treat you as a brother, I will do everything in my hands, and Father and Mother too.”

I shook my head and protested:

“You said they’d send me to a youth center. That’s not treating me like the others. I don’t want to be locked up. I’m not crazy. I’m not a murderer.”

I fell silent as Kakzail crouched in front of me and assured:

“And no one thinks you’re crazy, Ashig. Just… you still have a lot to learn, and our parents can’t give you all the time you need. They work. They have to feed the family. That’s why they think it’s best for you to learn good manners in a special center. Just for a few moons maybe, no more, until the teachers think you’ve given up the bad habits. Trust me, boy. Our parents only want the best for their kids. All their kids. Including you. If they can’t give you a future, it won’t be their fault. Do you understand me?”

I swallowed and nodded again. Kakzail cleared his throat.

“I feel like, if I let you go now, you’re not going to come back… But I’ve decided to trust you. You’re not a little kid anymore. I hope you can choose properly. Whatever you choose… you can’t go back on your the path you take.” He paused and straightened up, adding, “Think hard, Ashig. Think hard. You know I’m very bad at making speeches, so… I’m only telling you that it would make me very sad if you didn’t come to see me tomorrow.”

He patted me on the shoulder, smiled at me and, without further ado, turned his back on me, and walked away. And I remained as silent as a wall. But inside me, a battle of a thousand demons was being waged. My companions against my family. My present against my future. What a horrible dilemma, huh? But that’s exactly what it was about.

I walked away up the hill, and Little Wolf followed me. I shuffled along, as if I were dragging a heavy chain. Finally, I arrived at Sheer Cliff Street and huddled at the foot of the stone parapet overlooking the ravine. Without even thinking about it, I grabbed Little Wolf, and he, who unlike me was very calm, sat down beside me, obediently. Then I buried my head in my arms and closed my eyes, my head on fire. Kakzail was so kind! And so was Samfen. And then Skelrog, the schoolmaster. By inference, my parents must have been, too. And the others. My whole family were good people. And they wanted me to learn, they offered me a future! The more I thought about it, the more tears rolled down my cheeks. Because my friends were good people too. And they were all the family I had had up to that point, not counting Yal and Rolg. They were my brothers. Manras and Dil, the Priest, Diver… Just the thought of leaving them forever tore me up inside. It runs, Kakzail said he would feel sad if I didn’t show up the next day at his house, but right now, I was feeling much worse than that! Because I didn’t know what to do, because no matter what I did, my happiness was going to go to hell.

Little Wolf was worried about me and tried to get me to play with the Master, but to no avail. I did not raise my head once. Suddenly, I felt a cold nose and a dog’s breath, and without even looking at Dakis, I knelt down, wrapped my arms around his neck, and continued to cry.

‘Stop crying, Mor-eldal. It’s no use.’

The voice of my nakrus master echoed in my head. It was so clear that, for a moment, I thought the mist hellhound had talked to me. But no, it was the harmonies. It was my damned head playing tricks on me again.

“I’m lost, Dakis,” I sobbed. “Why do people always want us to choose between two things? Why can’t we live without choosing? I hate choosing,” I stammered.

I was lost. I wanted to go away, to leave all this mess and go to… go to… An idea came to me, and I almost calmed down at once. The idea thrilled me. It dazzled me. I could not come to a conclusion, so why not ask for advice? And I knew of only one person who could give me the perfect advice.

I stepped away from the hellhound and wiped my eyes, smiling. I had found the solution. I glanced at the Master that Little Wolf was playing with, and breathed out in relief.

“I’m going home.”