"Gods damn it," Apollo muttered, but under his breath so no one, especially the gods, would hear.
As he pressed his fingers to the skin. A tremor ran up his arm, not the weakness of hunger, but a warning: the aether inside him was low, a candle burned down to its own wax.
He closed his eyes. It was impossible to recall the old rituals, the right order of words, the way the power used to flood him with nothing more than the mory of a sunbeam.
Now, it was effort. Now, it hurt.
He bit his tongue and focused. At first there was only the pulse of his own blood, the oil and salt of Thorin’s sweat.
Then, slowly, sothing opened: a twin to the wound, but inside Apollo’s head.
A matching rawness, a hunger that called and answered at the sa ti.
He reached for it, let the trickle of light run down the length of his arm, through his fingers, into the heat of the wound.
Thorin jerked, a low animal sound caught in his throat, but did not wake.
The flesh around the cut tightened, the blackness receded, and the fever’s heat dropped by half, Apollo could feel it, the way a wound feels when the scab finally takes and the pain becos mory instead of prophecy.
It was done in seconds, but cost years. Apollo staggered, bile in his mouth, the world a rinse of blue-white and then nothing at all.
When he woke, the moon had set. The only light was the slow, pink creep of sunrise, and the pain in his own bones, a debt he’d borrowed from Thorin and now owed to himself.
The dog nuzzled at his hand, mouth wet, eyes anxious. "I’m fine," Apollo whispered, though he didn’t believe it.
Thorin’s breathing was normal. The bandage was crusted, but the flesh beneath no longer glistened, and the veins ran healthy and blue, not the angry red of poison.
Lyra sat up, scrubbed her face, and glanced over at the dwarf.
"Still alive?" she asked, voice hoarse.
Apollo nodded. "He’ll make it."
Nik rolled over, half-smiling even before his eyes opened. "You’re a better healer than liar, Lio."
Apollo shrugged, not trusting himself to words.
They packed up camp. Nik saw to the cart, Lyra checked the periter, and Apollo fumbled with the last of the bandages, hands clumsy but steady.
He caught Thorin’s eye as the dwarf woke, the pale blue of it wary but, just for a mont, grudgingly grateful.
"Don’t fuss," Thorin said, voice no softer than before, but with less of the old hate behind it.
Apollo grunted, kept wrapping. "Next ti, try to dodge," he said.
Thorin snorted, but kept his arm still.
They ate what was left of the sardines, washed it down with marsh water that Lyra strained through her sleeve.
The dog licked the tin clean, then trotted ahead, nose to the wind.
They walked with the city to their backs, the marsh stretching wide and flat, the air sharp and cold enough to clear the head.
By midday they reached the first hill, a knob of rock and old blasted trees, the road little more than the mory of a path.
Lyra called a halt. Nik scouted ahead, Thorin dozed in the cart, and Apollo sat, arms wrapped round his knees, letting the wind dry the sweat from his hair.
He was so tired he almost missed the figure coming up the far side of the hill.
It was a man, or sothing passing for it. He wore a robe the color of cat piss, spattered with stains new and old, and a hat with a brim so wide it doubled as a shield.
His gait was lopsided, as if one leg was slightly longer than the other, and he carried a stick topped with a fist-sized lump of amber shot through with veins of green.
Lyra squinted at the newcor, then muttered, "Shit." She motioned Nik back, who circled round and crouched at the ready, one hand on the hilt of a knife.
The man stopped ten paces away and leaned on his stick. His face was narrow and pale, the kind of skin that never saw sunlight; the eyes were the yellow of old candle grease.
He smiled, showing teeth sharpened to points, each one capped with a line of gold.
"Travelers!" he called, voice high and a little unbalanced. "Greetings and felicitations! Might I share your fire, oh, but you haven’t one. Economical, yes. Yes. Are you headed east, or are you lost and too proud to say it?"
Apollo said nothing, watching as the man’s gaze flickered over each of them like a candle fla. The magician for what else could he be?
Wore a dozen pouches, each sewn with a different sigil, and his boots, if they were boots, were stitched from the hides of animals Apollo couldn’t na.
"We’re headed east," Nik said, the lie so smooth it almost sounded like a question.
The newcor grinned wider. "Then we’re kin for a ti. The road’s not safe. Sothing’s eating the Watch patrols, and the Blackhearts have started putting heads on sticks. Bracing for those with an appetite for novelty, but I prefer company."
He sat, without waiting for permission, and drew from the folds of his robe a battered flask.
He took a swig, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and offered it around. Lyra took it, sniffed, and passed it to Nik, who drank.
The magician watched Apollo, eyes bright. "You’re the healer, aren’t you?"
Apollo stiffened. "Why do you say that?"
The man waggled his fingers, as if testing the air. "Old news runs fast on the roads. Word is, soone in Marrowgate paid a fortune for a healer, and soone else paid more to see him dead. I’m just a humble traveler, but I know a mark when I see one."
Apollo didn’t reply. The magician seed to find this delightful.
"My na’s Torgo," he said, as if that explained anything. "I collect stories, stray cats, and the occasional debt of gratitude. You can think of as a magician, but that word’s lost most of its aning."
He eyed Thorin, who had roused and was staring at Torgo with a look of deep, philosophical disgust.
"Dwarf, you look like you could use a drink," Torgo observed.
"Don’t trust any liquid that cos from a man in a hat like that," Thorin said.
Torgo laughed, a peal that rose and fell like a badly-tuned bell. "Wise! I respect that." He produced from a pocket a handful of sugared nuts and began eating them, each crunch loud in the quiet.
They sat like this for a while, the sky gone white and the wind running colder. Torgo told stories, so about Marrowgate, so about the salt cities to the south, so about the gods and why none of them answered prayers anymore.
He was good at it, and Apollo found himself listening despite the exhaustion, or maybe because of it.
At dusk, they moved on together, the magician slotting himself into the group as if he’d always belonged.
He walked beside Apollo, whistling tunelessly, sotis muttering to the stick, sotis to himself.
"You’re not from around here," Torgo said eventually, voice low. "You don’t move like the rest. Old injury?"
Apollo shrugged. "Sothing like that."
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