The verath strike faded by morning.
Knew gone because world returned to ordinary resolution — specific, contained clarity replaced by broader and more manageable awareness lived with thirty-seven years. Catalogued difference precisely, without judgment. Verath field had not distorted him. Simply removed padding.
Not sure padding doing as much work as thought.
Ate before dawn, practical decision — pace maintaining required fuel and been negligent previous day — and reviewed approach to point eight with map and marginal notes Fenrath added after review of anchor point sequence. Point eight in living territory. Shallow blight influence. Defense would come, because Serath’s pattern now established, but lighter than seven — moving in outer arc of configuration, further from collection center.
Pattern made tactical sense and been expecting since point five: closer got to center, heavier defense. Current points — eight, nine, ten — outer arc. Eleven and twelve denser. Collection center itself would be—
Set projection aside. Would address when reached.
Morgaine arrived at fire while still reviewing maps. Said nothing, poured something warm from pot one of soldiers left, sat on log across from him. Looked at map without asking permission, which was not something she did — looked at things wanted to look at, without performance of requesting access to information already shared between them.
“Eight is straightforward,” she said, after moment.
“Assuming pattern holds.”
“It will hold. She is thinking in same categories she has always been thinking in — defense of fixed points, interference rather than direct assault. Not adapting.”
Paused, eyes on map. “Which means either not capable of adapting or not yet concerned enough to change approach.”
“You think latter.”
“I think she has been planning long time and operating from framework designed decades ago and not yet had reason to revise.” Looked up from map. “She will revise it. Question is when.”
“At collection center.”
“At collection center,” agreed. “That is where she will stop using practitioners and start using herself.”
Thought about this. About being whose age made Morgaine’s eight centuries look recent — alive since before either of their civilizations existed, accumulating knowledge and power longer than anyone could meaningfully measure. Faced formidable opponents. Not faced anything like what waited at collection center.
“Can we defeat her?” Asked not rhetorically — plain operational question.
Quiet moment. Fire crackled. Camp waking around, sounds of soldiers and horses and morning routines of people preparing for another day of difficult work.
“I don’t know,” she said. Honesty bare and exposed, so characteristic almost smiled. “Varek and Fenrath believe answer yes — disrupting anchor points first will reduce accumulated power significantly, and without full weight of twenty years collection she will be diminished enough to address.”
Paused. “I believe them. Also holding space for possibility they are wrong.”
“As am I.”
Looked at him. “What do you do with that space?”
“Plan for both outcomes. Proceed as though we can win. Prepare as though we might not.”
“And if we cannot win?”
Held gaze. “Then we do as much damage as possible before end and hope enough to matter.”
Nodded — single, clean nod, agreement of someone who calculated same contingencies and arrived at same conclusion. Not resignation. Simply clear-eyed acceptance of condition existed and needed to be factored.
Stood. “Eight. Let’s go.”
Point eight fell in four hours with minimal defense — two practitioners, both withdrew after Morgaine looked at them. Did not entirely understand what done, but seemed to involve less physical engagement and more specific, terrifying quality of attention brought to bear on someone who did not want to be in path of it.
Filed as capability previously not fully accounted for.
Point nine harder — scholars flagging, sustained effort of counter-workings accumulating in ways sleep and food only partially compensating — but fell. Seven down? No. Nine down. Three remaining.
Camped that night at edge of section of living forest struggling — trees thin and pale, undergrowth sparse, blight’s influence not yet claiming territory but making pressure felt. Season turning further, nights marginally warmer, somewhere in distance natural world attempting spring with dogged determination of things didn’t have option of giving up.
Lay in bedroll and thought about three remaining anchor points. About collection center. About what Fenrath told him about sacrifice required to disrupt working of this scale from inside — anchor points could be disabled externally by scholarly counter-working, but collection center itself, with density of accumulated verath, could only be addressed from within working’s framework.
Someone would need to enter collection center directly.
Had not raised this with Morgaine. Going to have to.
He was still deciding how, when she raised it first.
Breaking camp morning of tenth day, routine so established by now happened with automatic efficiency of two units operating together for weeks rather than days. Reviewing route to point ten with Varek — who, since conscripted at first anchor point, proved more useful than initially expected, twenty years observation translating into specific and invaluable knowledge of terrain between points — when she said:
“Tell me about entering collection center.”
Varek looked at her. Expression developed for questions he’d been hoping to delay answering — slight squinting of mild eyes, fractional tightening around mouth.
“Was going to raise it closer to time,” he said.
“You were going to raise it when thought I was ready.” Held gaze. “Tell me now.”
Told her.
Collection center — physical location at geometric heart of Erath working, where twenty years extracted verath accumulating — not place that could be disrupted from outside. Density of power too great; interference that worked on outlying anchor points would be absorbed and neutralized before reached core. Working’s heart had to be addressed from within.
Entering collection center required passing through verath field at its most concentrated.
Effects experienced at point seven — heightened awareness, thinned defenses, unguarded state — would be magnified. Significantly. Accounts of Erath practitioners who entered collection centers described it as experience that stripped every constructed layer of person away and left only irreducible core.
Everything built over lifetime of defending yourself, gone for duration of approach.
And Serath would be there.
“She will try to use it,” Morgaine said. Not question.
“She will use every advantage available.” Varek paused. “Opponent stripped of defenses — operating from irreducible core rather than constructed self — is unpredictable. She will not know exactly what facing. That is both vulnerability and advantage.”
“Two people entering rather than one,” Morgaine said.
Varek looked at her.
“That was my recommendation, yes. Two people — two irreducible cores rather than one — are less predictable than single person. Serath has been studying you both. But she has been studying you separately. She does not know—” Paused.
“What you are together,” Morgaine finished.
Quiet moment.
Thought about ten days. About thing assembled itself in space behind eyes, specific warm thing stopped cataloging and started simply allowing to be there. Thought about entering collection center stripped of every constructed layer — every defense, every wall, every carefully maintained distance.
Thought about entering it with him.
Thought about what irreducible core might look like, when stripped of eight centuries of war. Insects. Garden. Time.
Thought about what his might look like, underneath thirty years of building weapons and fortifications.
Thought about being seen, truly seen, with no padding, no construction, no careful sentences.
Found she was not afraid.
Which was, perhaps, most informative data point of all.
“When?” she asked Varek.
“After points ten, eleven, twelve. Collection center is thirteenth.”
“Three more, then center.”
“Three more,” he confirmed. “Then you go inside.”
She looked across camp to where Caelum was checking horse, talking low to Reth, doing morning routine of commander who made people feel steady by being steady himself.
Three more, then go inside.
Stripped of everything.
With him.
“Understood,” she said to Varek. And walked toward Caelum to tell him what they’d have to do.