“Me personally? No. But there were witnesses. And information like that travels. If a person wants to hear about it, he only has to listen. And some people very much wanted to hear what had suddenly impacted the whole system of Plains magic. You’re fair on your way to being a legend in your own time, Never.”

“Just who do you ‘scout’ for, Hitch? The information you’re gathering doesn’t sound like something Colonel Haren sent you after.” I was beginning to feel angry, the kind of anger that comes when fear threatens and one doesn’t know the exact source.

“Damn you, Never. You sit there and I talk to you and you hear the words, but it’s like you don’t listen to what they mean. It’s Speck magic, old son.

It’s got you. I told you before, it’s got me, too. It uses me. It uses you. The scary part is that you seem to be using it and I don’t think you have any concept of what you are doing. Or how heavily in debt you are to it. When it demands to be paid back, you’re going to have to give it more than just yourself. You’re going to have to give it things that don’t belong to you, things I care about. I’m here to tell you that you have to draw a line with it and fight. Be a Gernian, man, at least a little.”

“It seems to me that a few weeks back, you didn’t think so highly of my patriotism. If I recall correctly, you mocked me for it.”

“I mock anyone who does things without thinking for himself why he does them. And that is what you’re doing with your magic. You took out the Dancing Spindle. And when you did, I think that what the Plains magic lost, Speck magic gained. And certainly you seemed to have gained. You do things I’ve never seen anyone do, and I’ve seen quite a bit of Speck magic in my wandering. Last time I went through Dead Town, I saw your little vegetable garden. You told it to grow. It’s still growing. Just as the people at the courier station are still not receiving supplies, just as they denied them to you. You’re setting things in motion, Never, with no heed as to the ultimate consequences. You stopped the Spindle turning, but you’ve set all sorts of little things spinning for you.”

“Look,” I said bluntly. “I did those things. Well, I guess I did them. You say so, and I’m going to believe you. But I don’t know how I did them. And I don’t know how to undo them. If anyone is at fault here, it’s the damn magic, not me. It came into my life and took it over. I never sought it out.

It’s ruined everything for me. It’s taken my body, my career, my fiancée, my family, even my name. I’ve lost everything to it. And I still don’t know how it works or why it works or what it wants of me. But with all the things it has done to me, why can’t I use it to do a little good? Amzil and her children were starving. Was it so bad, what I did?”