“Well, I don’t exactly know. Amzil said they were just sprawled all around your wagon, like they’d been gathered around it and then just died right there.”

“Who were they?”

“Nevare, I don’t know. I didn’t hear the story firsthand, and between Amzil’s blubbering over you and the hysteria that followed, I didn’t get much information. Only that Sergeant Hoster was saying that you’d probably killed them all to shield yourself and that you should be arrested until we can discover what’s going on.”

“Hoster would say that. The man hates me, for no reason that I know. Do you think they will arrest me?”

“Nevare, I don’t know! We still have the inspection team here, and the mysterious death of four men inside the barracks stable doesn’t make any of us look good. Command will have to cover it up, explain it away, or find a scapegoat.” He rubbed his face and then looked a stark plea at me. “You didn’t have anything to do with it, did you?”

If he hadn’t asked me directly, I could have maintained my deceit. But Spink had always had that honest, open stare of a boy who wants to believe the best of his friends. Even in a face that was beginning to show the care lines of a man, that look still demanded honesty. If I lied to him now, I’d know that I’d given up all hopes of ever being the man I thought I’d become. “I probably killed them,” I admitted bluntly. “But I don’t know how. And I didn’t do it on purpose.”

He sat very still, looking at me. His mouth was a tiny bit ajar, and I could hear his breath going in and out of it. He looked as if he was about to speak, and then his face crumpled. “Oh, Nevare. No. I can’t go back and tell Epiny that. I can’t. It will kill her. It will kill her and the baby and they’re all I have in this godforsaken piss-hole of a post.” He leaned forward, his face in his hands, and spoke hoarsely through his fingers.

“How could you do this, Nevare? Who have you become? I’ve seen the changes in you, but I always thought I knew the true heart of who you were. How could you kill men in your own regiment? How?”

“The magic did it,” I said softly. “It wasn’t really me, Spink. It was the magic.” It sounded like a childish excuse. I didn’t expect him to believe me, but he didn’t lift his face from his hands or interrupt me. I found myself telling him the whole story of what had happened to me in the last week. I didn’t mince words or find excuses for myself. I told him everything, even going back to fill in the truth about Olikea and myself. It felt good, cleansing, to be honest finally with someone. His shoulders sagged as I spoke, as if he took on the burden that I shed. When I was finished, I felt hollow and he looked like a man crushed beneath the weight of a world. Two worlds, I thought to myself. I got up quietly and filled a kettle. My throat was dry and despite everything else, I was ravenously hungry. Perhaps coffee could soothe that pang a bit. As I set the pot on to boil, Spink finally spoke. “They’ve always known the trees were sacred to the Specks?”