Ehrban Wagar straightened up from where he’d been kneeling in the soil. He stared at the soggy, misshapen lump dangling from the leaves in his hand. Something furry was growing on it, and it seemed to ooze.

  “What’s that supposed to be?” Lemar asked. He had paused on his way from fetching his little herd of mountain goats from the field above Ehrban’s hut where they grazed during the day, and now leaned on the fence enclosing Ehrban’s sad attempt at a garden. “Potato?”

  “In spirit if not in fact.” Ehrban tossed the defunct vegetable on the compost heap to join its equally deceased fellows. “I assume they’ll all look like that.”

  Lemar looked at the various holes dug in different parts of the potato patch and grimaced. “When’s the last time you watered ‘em?”

  “Three weeks ago, just like you told me. As soon as the leaves started to turn.”

  “Well.” Lemar scratched his head. “Are you sure? We didn’t even have rain since.”

  “No, we haven’t.” Ehrban dusted his hands with a sigh. “Gardening is clearly not my strong suit.”

  Lemar’s eyes flickered to the blue-green tattoo that cut from Ehrban’s right temple to his cheekbone. Ehrban forced himself not to wince. It was sheer willpower, and long practice, that stopped him from raising his hand to his face in a futile effort to cover the tattoo. He knew what Lemar was thinking: no wonder everything Ehrban tried his hand at turned to rot.

  He was unthulan. Outcast. Forsaken. Tainted.

  “Well. It’s not like you had much opportunity to learn how to grow things, in your life,” Lemar said kindly. “Next time, let’s see about getting one of Khada’s dedicates from down in the village, maybe they can do a blessing for you after planting.”

  Ehrban nodded, even though they both knew this would never happen. Lemar was only trying to help.

  “What are you going to do now?”

  Starve, Ehrban thought. Break his vow to himself and join a mercenary crew down south. Jump off a cliff if it seemed that vows still had meaning and starving was too painful.

  “I’ll get by,” he said. “Don’t worry.”

  He was not oblivious to the way Lemar’s lined face relaxed. Stopping by to chat and give gardening advice was one thing, but if Ehrban asked anything outright, Lemar would be too kind to refuse. Even if it meant being ostracised by the community — or worse. Already there were those in the village who looked askance at the old man just for having the misfortune of living within a mile of Ehrban’s hut.

  There were days when Ehrban, uncharitably and shamefully, couldn’t help but resent Lemar for being so friendly. On occasion, returning from his dawn-time ramblings through the hills, he’d find a basket of fresh bread or a small jar of new nut-cheese on his doorstep. Lemar’s kindness at the cost of his standing in the community added just one more small burden on Ehrban’s conscience, but Lemar and his wife still remembered Ehrban’s parents from years ago and to reject their kindness would’ve been hurtful.

  As the old man finally left, his hand raised in goodbye, Ehrban lifted his gaze to the horizon. Beyond the winding humps of fir-covered hills, the mountains stood stark and majestic against the deepening blue of the sky, the late afternoon sun turning the snow-covered tips a glowing pinkish gold. Somewhere, a dew-owl called, its mate answering from further afield.

  Another day at an end. On the stove, his last few handfuls of split peas were gently simmering. It would be done soon, such as it was. He’d had no more carrots or garlic, and the last small onion had been very far past its prime.

  Ehrban went to the stone washroom at the back of the house. He had filled the big clay jar that morning after doing his breakfast dishes, and the water was refreshingly cool.

  Washing at this hour as the sun was just starting to touch the horizon was a relic of Temple routine, where the bell would call them from the training ground to prepare for evening vespers. It was just Ehrban now, and he no longer observed the vespers, the dawn prayers, or the dances of the middle hours, but he kept to the routine.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  In the early days here, when the mere thought of the Temple was enough to make him shake with loss and shame, he’d sometimes found himself sitting in the kitchen in the evening dark without knowing how he’d filled the hours since breakfast. Or thinking he should be getting lunch just to find it was dusk already. Or seeing a full moon rise when he was certain it had been no more than half the day before.

  Being oblivious to the passage of time terrified him. It was too much like Dnisenfeld. Far better then to slip back into the rigour of the Temple hours that he had kept for the biggest part of his life.

  He washed quickly and methodically. Long ago, he might have relished the feeling of good, clean soap and water after a session in the training yard, and he would have hummed the Ritual of Cleansing under his breath as he did so (his singing voice not something to be inflicted on the public bath). Now, he merely skimmed as efficiently he could over the scars so as not to dwell on them.

  It wasn’t only the face tattoo, marking him as unthulan. In the centre of his chest was a brand the size of his outspread hand: the Flaming Wheel, symbol of the Goddess’s protection. It was white against his skin, which was the tawny brown of an Ulgarian heritage.

  Surrounding it were smaller brands, fine lines of holy writ covering his chest, arms, shoulders and back. Sometimes, in the darkest hours of the night, Ehrban would place his hand on the Flaming Wheel and feel the ethem of the priest who had placed it there. It gave him comfort, even as it filled him with shame, and shameful rage.

  He dried and dressed again, combed his dark blond hair out before tying it back up in its usual knot. Taking stock, he sighed. His last bar of soap was worn down to a thin wafer. Soon enough, he’d need thread to mend one of his only two remaining kaftans. Again. The split peas would be dinner and breakfast tomorrow. He still had enough flour for one loaf of bread, perhaps two, now that he would not have potatoes. Oats, buckwheat, lentils — even if augmented by wild leaves, sugar roots and dew berries from the hills, he’d have enough food for a week at most. A week and a half if he cut down his already spare portions.

  After that there was nothing left of the orphan’s pension left so many years ago by his father.

  Ehrban could say without boasting that he was — used to be — a good swordsman. He preferred a two-handed broadsword, but was decent with a short sword and dagger, or a sword and shield. He could get by with a crossbow and knew the principles of using an arquebus. He was — had been — good at tactics and strategy and general planning and maps. He was a good rider. If there was no one else, he could do a passable job at shoeing a horse. And all the other things the Temple had taught him: how to repair chainmail and keep plate armour functional and mend clothes and shoes and take care of a horse. And while he was not a gifted cook, he could prepare a handful of filling, hearty and moreover edible dishes, of the solid, nourishing kind that could sustain a large knight for hours riding a horse or wielding a sword for as long as it’s usually necessary to do so.

  But no one would employ him now. Not if they valued their souls, which understandably most people did. The ones who didn’t, like the mercenary bands or highwaymen, would value him only as long as he could fight. And he had vowed never to pick up a sword again.

  Perhaps he could become a mendicant, living off alms and scraps — but mendicants devoted themselves entirely to Omren and lived their lives as prayer in communion with Her. Ehrban had not heard Ruoi’s voice or felt Her touch in four years; it seemed unlikely that any other aspect of the Goddess would deign to make Herself felt. He’d be no more than a beggar.

  So if he was too proud to beg, too scared to starve, too violence-averse to become a mercenary, what then? Go up into the mountains and find a cave so deep no one would even find his corpse, and wait there for the end?

  End it right here, a little voice said. Or better yet, in the village square. Slit your own throat under the five pillars and surrender yourself to the inevitable. Your soul belongs to Vishak: let Her use it to teach Her children the terror and the ecstasy of Her ways.

  No. Rather then the mountain cave.

  Ehrban sighed and stood up from where he’d sat on the kitchen step to brood. It was a bad habit, but as it harmed no one but himself, he saw no reason not to indulge in it.

  Pia would have teased him. Laughed up into his face with her generous mouth, her green eyes bright and merry, and he would have kissed her, and forgotten whatever imagined worry he’d been fretting about.

  Now it was just him and his thoughts. He had plenty of them, at least, even if he was poor in everything else. Notably food. And skills to survive anything more mundane than a full-scale war.

  As a knight of Saint Celund, pledged to the Ruoi the Many-limbed, She of War, Ehrban’s ethem had been pure and fierce. It had glimmered blue-white along the edge of his sword, flowed over his shield like quicksilver, given his armour a sheen that was more than that of burnished metal. In the sacred dances of combat, his battle prayers had flared and shone like holy beacons, had lent his comrades renewed strength and had filled the infidel with fear.

  Now, his ethem was unconsecrated and he could not even do as much as grow a single potato.

  Tomorrow, Ehrban decided. He would prepare the food he still had in ways that would keep and he would take himself up to the mountains for as far as his strength lasted. He would go look for a suitable cave and lever a boulder in its mouth to seal himself in. Or perhaps he’d find a deep and inaccessible ravine. Somewhere his body could safely perish without unleashing the terror of Vishak on the innocent.

  It would be the last honourable act of a man who had lost all honour.