Whenever Max stopped at a grave, Scathach stood aside and let him be. It was a greater gift than she could have known. Max had borne the hopes and expectations of so many people for so long that he had become self-conscious and almost terrified of disappointing anyone. With Scathach, he did not have to mask his feelings or explain them. He could simply experience them and know that she was there.
They were not the only people visiting the gravestones. Hundreds of others were paying their respects. Some were larger groups and families, but often it was a solitary figure walking slowly along a row, consulting their little map and peering at the names.
Walking back toward the remains of Northgate, Max and Scathach passed near one small figure kneeling by a grave and talking quietly to himself. Max’s heart sank as the boy glanced up and their eyes met.
“Hello, Jack.”
The boy stood abruptly, brushing grass from his knees and removing his woolen cap.
“I didn’t steal it,” he mumbled. “I was giving it back to her.”
Max was at a loss until he glimpsed the pearly disk in the boy’s hand. It was the very piece of maridian heartglass Max had given to Tam. Looking past Jack, Max saw the girl’s name etched on the gravestone.
TAM TRENCH RATS BATTALION 2ND COMPANY, 3RD PLATOON
“Did she have a last name?” Max wondered. “She must have,” said Jack, blinking at the inscription. “But I don’t know what it was. She never told me.”
“Tam was your good friend, wasn’t she?”
The boy could not reply. He merely closed his eyes and sobbed.
“I know you want to give that back to her,” Scathach said gently. “But I think you should keep that glass and remember Tam whenever you look at it. What do you think?”
“It was her favorite thing in the world,” Jack sniffled.
“Then I’m sure she’d want you to have it.”
The boy considered Scathach’s words while turning the pearly glass over in his hands. “I won’t keep it forever,” he concluded. “When I’m old, I’ll give it to someone young and tell them all about her.”
“I think that’s a good idea,” said Max. “Do you want to walk back with us or stay out here?”
Jack stayed behind, sitting back down on the damp earth and touching Tam’s name with the heartglass. When they had walked out of earshot, Max shook his head.
“Did you see that medal on his chest?” he asked.
“I did,” said Scathach, gazing out at the sea.
“A bad bargain,” Max remarked. “Swapping a friend for a medal.”
“Such things happen in war.”
“I told them I’d see them after,” he muttered, recalling his words to Tam and Jack as they’d huddled in Trench Nineteen. “What a stupid thing to promise.”
Scathach took his hand. “War breaks many things,” she sighed. “It can break bodies and hearts. It can break promises, too. But it can’t break spirits, Max—not if those who are fighting believe in their cause. Jack may grieve for a long time, but I don’t think war has broken his spirit. And I know it never broke Tam’s. That girl was very strong and she knew what she was about.”
Trench Nineteen had been filled in with earth and smoothed flat. All that remained was a discolored seam along the ground, and even that was disappearing as workers laid out stakes and twine to mark the gardens that would come. Ms. Richter had declared that all the land between the citadel and the outer walls would be transformed into groves and orchards to honor the fallen. Even with the aid of dryads and druids, it would take many years for such an undertaking to reach fruition, but once it was completed, it would be the greatest garden on earth.
Trench Nineteen was gone, but a monument had been erected for its battalion. There were memorials for every Rowan battalion at the places where they had fought. One could see them here and there across the grounds or at the base of walls and towers, larger white obelisks set upon blocks of rose granite. Each memorial flew its battalion’s flag and bore the names of the fallen around its base. Max gazed at the Trench Rats’ standard flapping in the wind. He counted four hundred and eighty-seven names inscribed beneath it. When he murmured the number aloud, Scathach spoke up.
“I’m no mathematician, but I believe that means there are over seven hundred names not inscribed on that stone.”
“It’s still too many,” said Max.
“How many more would there be if you hadn’t trained them, or fought with them, or acquired that iron on their behalf? Your losses were half that of the other trench battalions. They were volunteers, Max. Their deaths are sad, but they are not tragic. Look at me.”
He did so, studying the sharp planes of her face and the shining gray eyes that studied him in turn.
“You are no stranger to war,” she said. “You are grieving, but there is something else bothering you. What is it?”
Max nodded and quietly told Scathach how close he had been to summoning Astaroth.
“I’m glad you did not,” she remarked. “A blood debt is ugly business and you must not play the Demon’s game. There is a reason he chose you for such a thing, my love. I do not know what it is, but it was no accident. You must be wary of his words.”
“I am,” said Max, bowing his head. “But there are times, Scathach, when words don’t matter to me. There are times when I could turn the entire world into that dead black chasm. It scares me.”
“It should,” said Scathach sagely. “Some people are born great, but no one is born good. That is a choice they must make for themselves. You were born greater than others. Your choices will be harder and you are not infallible. I know … I’ve read your poems.”
Max grinned and pressed his forehead against hers. She kissed him as Old Tom chimed eleven o’clock. When it had finished, she smiled and gazed for a moment at her shadow on the grass.
“Come,” she said. “We have honored the dead. It’s time to honor the living.”
Max would have known the healing ward blindfolded. He knew the number of steps down its hallway and the acoustics of its high ceilings and archways, but most of all he knew the smells. The air in the ward was always warm and faintly scented with the aromas of hearths and oils and innumerable herbs that were laid on tables and patiently mortared into medicines.
The ward was crowded, but it was easy to find the bed they sought. It was in the back, separated from the others and walled off with panels of runeglass whose sigils gave off a soft white glow. Walking quietly to it, Max and Scathach slipped between a slender gap in the panels to gaze at William Cooper.
The man was fast asleep, lying peacefully beneath a white blanket stitched with Rowan’s seal. Miss Boon was also there, snoring lightly in a bedside chair and half mumbling some sentence from the tome that was slipping from her fingers. Stepping lightly forward, Max took the book from her hands and laid it on a table. Cracking open her eyes, Miss Boon sat up abruptly.
“I must have dozed off,” she said, blinking and looking about. “Forgive the mess.”
She gestured absently at several coffee mugs and plates of half-nibbled sandwiches.
“David’s had a bad influence on you,” Max teased, offering the other chair to Scathach. “How’s our guy?”
“Remarkable,” she declared, taking Cooper’s hand. “He opened his eyes for the first time last night. And whenever I read aloud to him, he groans. It must be therapeutic. It’s very nice of you two to visit, but do be careful, Max—you’re about to step on Grendel.”
Glancing down, Max spied the Cheshirewulf lying at the foot of Cooper’s bed. The animal was almost wholly translucent as it dozed, only appearing now and again when it exhaled. There was something standing atop its head, however, perched like an Egyptian plover upon a crocodile. Looking closer, Max saw that it was indeed a bird, a brightly colored kingfisher with mismatched eyes.