Llew smiled, enjoying the sensation of oneness as she lay on top of Jonas, his fingernails trailing up and down her shirt-covered back. The night air was cold. As soon as they were spent, she’d covered her shoulders again. It seemed her rump was immune to the cold, though. Or perhaps it had something to do with the warm hand resting there.

The sounds of sheep and cattle calling through the night lent a strange comfort to their situation. Llew had never thought herself a farmer’s wife before, but time spent with Merrid and Ard cultivated a desire to emulate them. And so, she lay, listening to the baying and baaing, and tried to imagine herself milking and mustering, and she smiled.

The fingers on her back contracted. That drew an even bigger smile, and she lifted her head to look at him.

‘I love you,’ he said.

She wanted to reply that she loved him too, after all, now would be the time, wouldn’t it? But whatever spontaneity she might have hoped for had vanished the moment he’d said it first. So instead she said, ‘That’s the first time you’ve said it.’

‘You never have.’ It wasn’t an accusation, simply fact.

‘I thought those you love ended up dead.’ Even as she said it, she wished she could take the words back. They were sharing a moment, a perfect moment, and she’d gone and killed it, like she killed everything. ‘I didn’t mean—’

‘You’re right.’ He moved to sit up, forcing her to scramble off him. He gripped her wrist before she got too far and nodded to the thinly spread straw beside him. She sat. ‘But I been thinkin’.’ A knuckle caressed her jaw, neck, collarbone, breast, belly. He gripped her thigh lightly. ‘You’re in trouble anyway.’ He kissed her. ‘So, I figured I might as well get somethin’ out of it, in the meantime.’ He kissed her again.

‘In the meantime.’ However long that would be. Not long by the looks of things. Llew let him guide her to straddle him, her belly welcoming the heat his torso radiated as he kissed the dip at the base of her throat. ‘My history with men doesn’t bode well for you,’ she said.

‘What’s life without a little risk?’ He nibbled her earlobe, hard enough to hurt, but only just, illustrating his point nicely.

Before the night chilled them to the bone, they parted ways, Jonas heading to the bunker and Llew letting herself up to her room.

Merrid and Ard were at least as surprised by Llew’s enthusiastic good morning hugs as Jonas, when she came down the stairs for breakfast. She threw her arms around Merrid’s shoulders, pulling the woman in for a slightly longer than usual embrace, and repeated the same with Ard. She glowed, seeming younger – almost improperly so. Neither Merrid nor Ard seemed to know what to do but show their surprise with wide eyes, and pat Llew gently on her back. Jonas couldn’t deny a certain satisfaction that he’d had something to do with Llew’s buoyant mood. Both Braph and Hisham looked to him for some explanation. He whisked his coffee mug to his lips.

‘Good morning.’ Llew slid onto the opposite bench, a bright smile spread across her face, every facet lit. She reached for a hard-boiled egg and began peeling, still smiling to herself.

‘Seems to be.’ Braph bit into a fresh-baked scone.

Jonas took a deep gulp of coffee, watching Llew over the rim. She watched him back, her smile growing sly, almost suggestive. He recalled her once saying it was just sex. In Jonas’s experience just sex didn’t usually make girls quite this happy. Flattering enough, if it did, but even the Quaven girls who’d begged him to give them Karan babies hadn’t glowed the way Llew did. More often than he’d care to admit, they’d cried. Not before. Never before, or during. But after, sometimes. Sometimes, they’d begged him to stay, begged for it to be more than a hero’s obligation. Sometimes, they’d pitted their regular strength against his Syakaran power even as he’d walked out their door.

He shook his head clear. Now wasn’t the time to be thinking on such memories when he had Llew’s love to bask in. No, she hadn’t said it, but he’d never had a woman respond to him the way Llew did, not even Kierra, and they’d worked at it. As nice as it would be to hear it from her lips, he was content in accepting what evidence he had. Llew felt what he felt.

‘What?’ Those lips shaped the word and then half-curled into a sardonic . . . something. Not quite a smile, but she was on the verge of laughing at him. Again. Llew was about the only girl who’d ever laughed at him. He’d been looking at her lips too long.

‘Nothin’.’ He sat straighter, more commanding. ‘Got a couple days before the Ajnai wood is dry enough to be any good to us. Braph and I have a project we’re workin’ on today. How about you keep up the trainin’ with Hisham.’

‘Sure.’ She watched him; eyes narrowed. Seeking some ulterior motive.

He looked back, giving nothing.

The brothers sat hunched at the workbench outside the stable, the horses milling around them in the corral. Jonas used his two hands to fit rivets to their leatherwork, while Braph used his one good hand and stump to guide leather shapes under the thick sewing machine needle.

The horses were all itching to get back on the road. Even a run in the larger, farther paddocks would have been good, but they needed the horses close. They needed the horses ready. Just in case. They’d managed a couple of rides around the farm, especially when Ard needed a hand mustering his sheep, but it wasn’t enough for these horses who had grown used to life on the road. Jonas promised Chino it wouldn’t be for much longer when the horse dipped his nose over his shoulder.

New weapons. Just in case the Gaards weren’t enough. Just in case a knife or sword was knocked from a hand, they were building new weapons that would strap a stake of Ajnai wood to their forearms, secret until required.

As with everything, it was a work of faith. Fact was they didn’t know the rules when it came to fighting Immortals. Did it have to be another Immortal at the other end of the weapon to drain the power from the dying? Was dead Ajnai wood enough? Did it need a metal coating? Any metal? Or a particular kind?

There was so much they didn’t know. But time was running out for Llew’s ma, if it hadn’t already.

Jonas hammered the leather punch, creating a hole, popped in each half of the rivet, and hammered it closed, fixing the leather fast. The work was satisfying, but took more effort than he expected, and his muscles ached already.

Something was wrong.

He punched another hole, lined up another rivet and hammered it closed.

Braph paused in his sewing, giving Jonas an appraising look. Jonas looked back, silently telling his brother to mind his own business.

Something was very wrong. Each day now, he’d been feeling it coming on, but denied it. He felt heavier on his feet. Climbing from his bed felt like work. Crouching to evacuate his bowels had his thigh muscles aching. As for getting into Chino’s saddle, Chino wasn’t a short horse, and Jonas wasn’t a tall man, but it had never been a problem before. Physical exertion. That’s what it was now. Exertion. Wearying. Frightening.

At first, he’d thought it maybe a side-effect of a poor diet on the road. But they’d eaten several of Merrid’s meals now, and instead of feeling better, he felt a whole lot worse.

The ease with which a child crouched to sort through his favorite stones, Jonas had kept that into adulthood. That’s what he’d been born to, what others expected of him.

Confidence in his abilities to protect himself and those he loved. He’d had it, he’d projected it.

But he was losing it.

He stood, making a show of flexing his stiff fingers. Even the great Syakaran could only put up with finicky work for so long. He stretched his arms behind his back. Pressed one behind his head, then the other. Completely normal actions for anyone carrying out such work.

He walked to the corral fence.

Hisham and Llew were in the house cows’ paddock. As he would with any non-Karan trainee, Hisham was taking things slow, showing Llew the precise moves she needed to practice rather than going at her with speed and force. Learning such moves was meant to give even the least physically gifted person a chance against a strong opponent. Jonas knew those moves; he’d taught them for years.

He turned back, resting his gaze on the studious Braph for a moment before leaving the corral.

A large sack of chicken feed leaned against the stable wall. Jonas stopped beside it, looking down at it out the corner of his eye. It mocked him, that sack sitting there, plump with feed. Or did it? Maybe he was just off his game. They hadn’t been eating well until recently, maybe it wasn’t as bad as he thought. He reached down, folded the top of the sack over in his fist and lifted. It came up easily, but his arm trembled under the weight. It was . . . heavy. What was it, a hundred pound? Featherweight. Or should’ve been.

Arms trembling under the weight, he dumped it down. It landed on an angle, chicken feed cascading from the open top. Cursing, he bent to scrape what he could without contaminating the feed with too much soil and dumped it back in the sack. He folded the top over, leaving it as he’d found it, except for a scattering of feed spread about its base.

He stood looking down at the sack a moment longer. He wasn’t ready to fall apart over an unfounded fear, but he sure felt nervous.

What was a Syakaran without elevated strength and speed? Nothing. A nobody.

Llew would go to pieces if she found out. If it was true. She, more than anyone, needed a Syakaran at her side. If Turhmos came for her, he could no longer stop them taking her. And no one in Quaver would tolerate her without Jonas’s endorsement. Would his word count for anything in Quaver anymore?

And Aris. How could he fight Aris if he really had lost his speed and strength? From where he stood, he could see no way.

He took a step back to look at Braph still sat at the workbench. His brother struggled to write and draw with his left hand, and yet he struggled on anyway. Always thinking. Always planning, despite his disability. Braph would have ideas. Maybe he would know what was wrong and could help. Or he’d take advantage of Jonas’s weakness.

Braph looked up and Jonas nodded, encouraging like. Like he was still in control.

Braph turned back to his work.

Jonas scowled at his own feet. Maybe things weren’t all that bad. Maybe he was overreacting. He turned his back on the forge, left the corral. Where to now? Something heavy. A real test of strength. He turned for Ard’s three-sided shed. Apart from the cart, which wasn’t difficult to move even for Ard, there wasn’t much in there that was especially heavy. The horses would be a good test, but he could guarantee that the one time he wanted Llew’s gelding to fight him, he wouldn’t. Besides, he didn’t want to make a spectacle of himself in front of everyone. He remembered a heavy rock round the back of the chicken coup.

Walking round back, he faced that rock. He planted his feet and looked down on it, squared off against it. It wasn’t so big. Shorter than arm-length. Perhaps as thick as a chubby thigh. Not so big. So why was he still standing over it?

He bent and wrapped his arms around it, hugging it, and heaved. Nothing happened, except his own strained grunt. The rock was buried in the ground, anyone would struggle with that. He stood and kicked it, hard. The blow reverberated up his leg. He felt his knee twinge. But the rock had tilted. That was something. He kicked it from the other side. It leaned again, the ground loosening. He bent and wiggled it, hefting it one way and the other; grunting, sweat springing up on his brow, down his back, under his arms. He got it in the air, lying across his arms, which quivered under the weight, muscles straining. Muscles in his back spasmed. He dumped the stone back to earth, leaned against the shed to catch his breath.

Something was very wrong, and he didn’t know who to talk to about it. They all needed him to be strong, and fast. He could bet he wasn’t that anymore, either. But how to test without the others seeing? He’d have to take a late-night run.

He cursed, punched the wooden wall. He normally would have put a hole through it. It shuddered but held firm.

‘You look like you need to talk to someone.’

Jonas spun around. Braph. Shit.

‘Your brother, or the genius inventor?’ Braph’s lips curled in smug satisfaction.

He knew something.

‘Neither,’ Jonas said, wary. ‘Maybe both.’

Braph peered at him, reading him like a book, as he always seemed to be able to do. Jonas felt like a disgraced schoolboy under that gaze, which slipped down to the rock and back to Jonas’s moody demeanor. Jonas lifted his chin, cultivated a neutral bearing. He’d been right not to go to his brother. He couldn’t trust him.

‘Maybe you don’t need to talk. Maybe you need to hit something, or someone. Are you looking for a fight, Jonas?’ Braph closed the distance between them. Jonas backed up. ‘Do you want a brotherly scuffle? A skirmish? A brawl?’ Braph stepped in again, getting right in Jonas’s face the way he had when they were little. And Jonas still had to look up at him. ‘What do you say? Shall we rumble?’

For the first time, Jonas felt fear before a fight, because a fight was surely coming.

Braph’s left hook was good, sure, powerful. It came up under Jonas’s jaw, threw his head back, made his ears ring, made him stumble to keep his feet. Braph stalked after him, clocked him in the nose, not giving him a moment to recover or defend. Pain radiated across his face.

Years of training, and a naturally quick to fire temper kicked in. Instead of defending, Jonas struck back. Braph twisted, ducking the move smoothly. And too quick for Jonas. He came in low, winded Jonas with a gut shot, again sending him staggering. He only had one arm, but he moved so fast, Jonas felt sluggish by comparison, like he was in slow motion. But he wasn’t down, so he wasn’t out. He swung with his left, a solid, hard punch, and Braph’s stump came up to meet it. The magician’s own left pummeled Jonas’s side. Something went crack and pain radiated through his chest. Historically, Jonas would fight on, unbothered by pain, knowing he could still win, but this time he had doubt. Worse than doubt, because, this time, he was certain he would lose.

Braph had all the advantages in this fight, and both knew it. Jonas dug deep, calling on the lessons he’d instilled in others less strong and less fast than himself.

Braph lunged and Jonas twisted, moving with his brother, gritting his teeth through the pain. Lashing out as he sent the one-armed man past, he caught Braph’s chest with his palm, and Braph went down, rolled, and jumped to his feet. Braph’s fist took Jonas in the face again, his nose crunching. The stump came around to distract him. So fast, so fast he didn’t have time to react before the fist came at him again, into his gut, winding him.

It was like fighting Aris. For the second, maybe third, time in his life, Jonas was being outfought.

He went down on hands and knees. Braph’s boot caught him in the guts, and he went down on his side, curled up like a baby.

Braph knelt at Jonas’s back, gripping his hair, and pulling his head back.

‘Had enough?’

He hesitated. Bravado would dictate his usual response here, but his denial caught in the back of his throat. He coughed on the blood trickling from his nose. ‘Yes,’ he croaked. He sounded weak. He was weak.

The stump wavered like Braph was going to hit him. Frustration rippled across his brother’s face. ‘I guess you have, then.’ He threw Jonas’s head into the mud and stood. ‘I can’t even kill you, now. There’s no challenge in it.’