Monolith interested Pai greatly. He wouldn’t shut up about the Wanderer’s “magic” that they used to manipulate the aspects of aren, the “magic” that worked in the unstable zone somehow without exploding. He tried to ask around, hoping to learn more, but had no luck. Definitely, a Kuldaganian city was no place to learn the Wanderers’ ways.

Pai found some consolation after the caravan had left Aldaren-Turin, though, for they now followed an ancient road paved with rune-inscribed stones enchanted to keep the sands away. Since they had stepped on that road, Pai did little but staring at those runes, absolutely fascinated by them.

For the rest of the team, the journey was as mirthless as before. Thankfully (most likely due to Irin’s constant vigil and excellent marksmanship) no bandits bothered the caravan. At some point, Ramayana Arnika-Vadro approached Irin and asked him to stay and work for her. He refused but did that so loudly and hastily that there were no doubts about how much he actually wanted to accept the offer.

When the lights of Border came into view, it was early evening with only a few stars in the sky. The collective light of the city’s oil lanterns and firefly jars made it look like a gate to the dark unknown beyond. A gate to the No Man’s Land.

Milian felt his heart sink at the sight. The image was more that it seemed. It felt like approaching a point of no return, an unseen border beyond which nothing would ever be the same. The boy could not explain the dread it was giving him and had no words to express the feeling; but the others must have felt something similar for they were all grim despite the comforts and curiosities the city could offer.

The team left the city the next morning on the backs of ten chargas that stepped so softly on the firm ground that replaced the shifty Kuldaganian sand beyond the border.

Having killed a master, kill their apprentice as well, even if the apprentice is just a little child, for children grow, children learn, and children can hold a grudge. The child you’ve spared will become a warrior or a mage and come after you to avenge the master. Think of the future, always.

Assassin’s Handbook, part three

No Man’s Land. The territory of anomalies where each anomaly has a ‘heart’ that defines its centre and a circular border. Sometimes those borders cross, making the anomalous effects cancel or enhance each other but, more often, they barely touch.

Imagine a cook using a round biscuit-cutter on a thinly rolled layer of dough. Once the future biscuits have been all cut out of the layer, small, oddly shaped pieces of dough remain. This is what so-called ‘interstitions’ of the No Man’s Land look like, the territories between the neighbouring regions which don’t have overlapping borders. While still wild and unstable, the magic of interstitions is not explosive. Also, it is uniform, without any quirks an anomaly can produce.

Most interstitions are tiny, mere islands of peace surrounded by several anomalies, but some are long enough to be turned into trading routes. Brevir interstition is one of them. It looks like a trunk of a twisted tree on the map with all its tributaries and turns. Every tributary has a road of its own. Every road is a pulsing artery moving goods and people between the No Man’s Land settlements. While you’re following Brevir, you’re perfectly safe. There are villages and cities clinging to the road with lots of inns and markets; there are other traders to travel with. But once you’ve left Brevir, you’re on your own and the further you go, the more dangerous your journey becomes.