Guild Of Zeroes

Chapter 17

"I think I hate this too," said Quin.

We were plastered in the stinking fluid that the snakes used to tell each other apart and I had painted the leftover goo onto the sides of our rowboat.

"I'll have to throw these robes away after this," Stargazer griped.

"Quit whining," I said. "We're almost there. Stay quiet unless you're really keen to go down in the archives as the person who tried to fight a hundred serpents and lost."

The fork was directly ahead of us. To the right, lay the longer loop around the old Imperial Iron mines. The river curved around a stretch of stony, barren ground before disappearing behind the hunched shoulders of what I called a mountain. Our more widely traveled Guild Siblings had told me that it was nothing compared to the realy mountains further west but it was still the biggest lump of stone I had ever seen and in my mind that made it a mountain. Either way, it didn't matter. We would be avoiding the mountain and heading down the wide straight channel on the left side of the fork. The water was deep and still, and the banks of the river were solid grey and green cliffs of tangled trees. Branches overhung the water, leaving us in a tunnel of deep shadow.

We had decided to finally give Mouse a Stargazer a break from rowing, and they sat on the bench behind us while Hawk leaned over the bow, bow in hand. Quin and I manned the oars, but Quin seemed distant. Their face was locked in a deep scowl, and not just from the sharp fishy stench smeared all over us.

"Just think," I said. "Only a few more hours of rowing ahead of us and we'll catch your friends."

Quin answered with a one shoulder shrug. "They're not really my friends. None of the warriors are."

"Well, whatever you want to call them, it'll be good to help them get some payback right?"

Quin shrugged again and kept staring forward.

I followed their gaze and jumped as I met the black staring eyes of Sabre's empty helmet tucked under the bench seat in front of us.

"It certainly won't make me feel any better," said Quin. "It's not like it's going to bring him back."

I broke eye contact with the helmet and turned my gaze to the dark water, watching the surface ripple and churn as uncounted serpents swam back and forth beneath us.

"I know," I said. "I ... I know there's nothing I can really say that will help."

"I guess things will just have to be awful for a while."

I took one hand off my oar and put it on Quin's leg. "If there's anything at all I can do, you let me know. I'll do it. And I don't care what it is. You want me to bring you a thousand ogre pelts, I'll do it. You want me to jump up and tear the moon out of the sky, I'll do that too."

Quin shot me a sad smile. "Thanks, Snip. If I need anyone to do something utterly foolish, you'll be the first person I call on."

"And when you do," I said. "I'll be there."

"The more I think about it, the harder it hits me that he's not coming back. I won't have anyone to teach me how to fight anymore. He'll never get around to pushing me through those riding lessons I've been avoiding. I'll never finish my apprenticeship with him. It's like," Quin paused. "I don't know, I've always been terrible with words, it's like there's this hole where he used to be, and a million little things pointing to that empty space and reminding me he's never going to be there."

A wave broke over the side of the boat and something slammed into us from below.

Hawk turned to us and shot me a pleading expression. "I know we're all struggling right now, but maybe you should follow your own advice?"