The twig lay between the two lines.
Torren looked at it for a long while.
One line went straight through the soil, neat and unbroken. The other left it from the same point and ran beside it, close enough to seem almost the same road until distance made the difference plain.
Root waited.
The old singer had the patience of buried things. Rhunor stood beyond it, huge and silent, his staff held point-down in one hand. Konnan was still across the clearing with the green men, speaking too quickly, too brightly, too much like a boy who had found a door and did not yet know what it would cost to walk through.
"No," Torren said.
Root did not seem surprised.
"You have said that word often here."
"And you keep mistaking it for weakness."
"No," Root said. "I mistake it for love."
That made Torren's jaw tighten.
He stepped closer to the old singer.
"You show me one shadow and ask for my son."
"I ask nothing."
"You drew the line."
"I showed you where your feet already stand."
Torren looked toward Konnan again.
The boy had taken a staff from one of the green men and was trying a movement Rhunor had shown him. His first attempt was too sharp. Rhunor corrected his wrist. Konnan did not snap back. He frowned, adjusted, tried again.
That should have pleased Torren.
It did not.
It hurt.
"Why him?" Torren asked.
Rhunor answered this time.
"Because he listens when strength speaks."
Torren turned to him.
"He listens to strength because he wants it."
"Yes."
"That can ruin him."
"Yes."
Rhunor's honesty was plain enough to be irritating.
"And you think you can stop that?"
"No."
Torren's eyes narrowed.
Rhunor continued, "I think I can put weight on it. A strong thing grows crooked if nothing presses back."
"He is six."
"He is old enough to want. That is enough."
Torren disliked the answer because it was true.
Rhunor looked across the clearing at Konnan.
"The boy does not need soft hands. He does not need flattery. He does not need men afraid of what he may become. He needs rules that do not bend because he is loved."
Torren said nothing.
Root smiled faintly.
"That one took me three centuries to make useful."
Rhunor ignored it.
Torren kept his eyes on the green man.
"And what would you make him?"
Rhunor looked down at him. There was no boast in his face.
"Still."
The word sat between them.
Not harmless.
Not gentle.
Still.
Torren understood the difference.
"You would keep him from his blood," Torren said.
"No," Rhunor replied. "I would keep his blood from becoming all he hears."
Root tapped the twig against the ground.
"Ask the cub."
Torren looked at it sharply.
Root lifted one clawed hand.
"If you mean to choose for him, then do it. Men do that with sons and call it order. But do not pretend the boy is a cloak being folded into a chest."
Torren walked across the clearing before he could answer.
Konnan saw him coming and straightened at once. He still held the staff. His hood had fallen back, white hair loose around his face. There was dirt on one cheek and a darkening bruise near his jaw. He looked tired, alert, and more alive than he had in days.
Torren stopped before him.
"Walk with me."
Konnan looked at Rhunor.
Rhunor gave no sign.
The boy followed.
They went to the edge of the clearing, where the trees thinned enough to show a strip of dark lake through the trunks. The mist had lifted from the shore, but it still waited over the water, low and pale. Torren could hear the green men behind them, hear Root's claws against bark, hear leaves moving without wind.
Konnan stood beside him.
For once, he did not ask first.
Torren watched the lake.
"They want you to stay."
Konnan's fingers tightened around the staff.
"For how long?"
"Long."
"Until you come back?"
Torren looked down at him.
"Longer than that."
Konnan's face closed a little.
"I thought I was going back with you."
"So did I."
The boy stared at the water.
"Mother will be angry."
"Yes."
"At me?"
"No."
Konnan's eyes shifted toward him.
"At you?"
"Yes."
That answer seemed to settle something in him, though not comfortably.
Torren crouched, not because Konnan was too small to hear him standing, but because this needed no height between them.
"You remember what I told you before we left?"
"Many things."
"Do not be clever."
Konnan lowered his eyes for half a breath.
"You said you would train me."
"I started."
"You are stopping."
"No."
Konnan looked up again.
Torren took the staff from his hands and set it across both of the boy's palms, correcting his grip without thinking.
"I can teach you war. I can teach you roads, silence, fear, when to strike. I can teach you what I know."
"And they know more?"
"For this? Yes."
The word cost him less than lying would have and more than he liked.
Konnan looked back toward the clearing. Rhunor stood where they had left him, vast under the red leaves.
"He put me down seven times."
"I saw."
"I nearly struck his knee."
"No, you nearly made him notice your knee existed."
Konnan's mouth twitched despite himself.
Then the small almost-smile vanished.
"Do you want me to stay?"
Torren did not answer at once.
Konnan noticed. Of course he noticed.
"I asked plain."
Torren rested his hands on his knees.
"No."
Konnan blinked.
"No?"
"No. I want to take you home. I want to put you in front of your mother before she decides to gut me. I want Savar to scowl at you and Morna to pretend she was not worried. I want you under my roof."
Konnan swallowed.
"Then take me."
Torren's hands curled once, then loosened.
"I am not choosing what I want."
The boy looked away.
That answer was not comfort. It was not meant to be.
"You can learn here," Torren said. "Not because they are kind. They are not. Not because this place is safe. It is not. But Rhunor will press back when you push. He will not fear you. He will not hate you. He will not love you enough to let you win when you should lose."
Konnan listened with a hard face.
"And if I do not want to stay?"
"Then you come with me."
That startled him.
Torren meant it. He saw Konnan understand that he meant it.
The boy looked again toward the green men.
Rhunor had turned away now and was speaking with another of his kind. He did not watch Konnan as if begging for a choice. He did not need to. That mattered too.
Konnan lifted the staff slightly.
"I want to learn what they know."
Torren nodded once.
"That is not the same as wanting to stay."
"No."
The boy's voice was small now. He hated that and pushed it harder.
"But I think I should."
There it was.
Not courage. Not destiny. Not some clean answer fit for songs.
Only a child trying to stand where the ground had moved.
Torren put one hand on the back of Konnan's neck and drew him forward until their brows touched.
"Then you listen. To Rhunor first. Root second."
"Root will not like that."
"Root likes little."
Konnan breathed out through his nose. Almost a laugh.
"You do not answer quickly when angry. You do not strike because you are embarrassed. You do not make fear into a game. You do not forget your name."
"I know my name."
"Say it."
"Konnan."
"All of it."
Konnan's throat moved.
"Konnan. Son of Torren. Of Pale Roots."
Torren held him there one more heartbeat, then let him go.
"And of Lysa," he said.
Konnan nodded.
"And of Lysa."
They returned to Root and Rhunor.
Torren did not stand before them like a supplicant.
"You will not make him a hostage."
Rhunor answered, "No."
"You will not make him a sacrifice."
"No."
"You will not teach him to hate his own blood."
Rhunor's face hardened for the first time.
"No."
Torren looked at Root.
"You will not put roots in him without telling me what they are."
Root's smile was thin.
"You ask that as if men always know what they put in children."
Torren took one step toward it.
Root lifted a clawed finger.
"No roots. No binding. No hollowing. He will be taught. He may be changed. Learning does that."
"He can leave."
"When he is ready," Rhunor said.
Torren's eyes cut to him.
"When he is ready," the green man repeated. "Not when he is bored. Not when he is angry. Not when he misses a warm fire."
Konnan looked down at the staff.
Torren saw that too.
"You send word if he is hurt beyond training."
Root laughed once.
"You want ravens from the Isle?"
"I want truth."
"You will get what the trees allow."
"Not enough."
Rhunor spoke before Root could.
"If he is dying, you will know."
Torren studied him.
That was the first oath-like thing any of them had offered.
"Good."
Root turned its great dark eyes toward Konnan.
"And you, cub? You understand enough?"
"No."
Root grinned.
"Honest. Better than most kings."
Konnan did not grin back.
"Will I see my mother?"
"Yes," Torren said before Root could answer.
Root glanced at him but did not correct it.
"When?" Konnan asked.
Torren's mouth tightened.
"When I can bring her without losing her to the lake."
That answer gave the boy something solid enough to hold and rough enough not to be a lie.
Konnan accepted it.
The leaving came too soon after that.
Torren had little to pack. The island had taken a moon from him but given him almost nothing he could carry in his hands. Lady Forlorn remained wrapped. The skiff waited where he had tied it, though the knot was not the knot he remembered making. He chose not to ask.
The green men walked with them to the shore.
Konnan carried the short staff Rhunor had given him. It was plain pale wood, heavier than it looked, smooth where many hands had used it before. The boy held it with both hands. His face was tight in that stubborn way that meant he was holding more than anger behind his teeth.
Torren pushed the skiff into the shallows, then turned.
"Listen to Rhunor."
Konnan nodded.
"And Root?"
"Listen first," Torren said. "Answer after."
Konnan nodded again.
For a moment, he looked as if that would be all. A hard nod. A hard face. A boy trying to be the shape he thought men respected.
Then his mouth broke.
Not fully. Not into tears. But enough.
He stepped forward fast and wrapped both arms around Torren's waist.
Torren went still.
Konnan held him with a child's strength, fierce and uneven, staff trapped awkwardly between them. His face pressed into Torren's cloak. His shoulders shook once, then stopped because he forced them to stop.
Torren put one hand on the back of his head and the other between his shoulders.
He did not tell him not to cry.
He did not tell him to be strong.
He only held him.
Konnan's voice came muffled.
"Tell mother I listened."
"I will."
"Not that I was good."
Torren closed his eyes for a breath.
"No. I will tell her you listened."
Konnan held him tighter once, as if that could make the words reach home faster.
Then he let go first.
Torren let him.
The boy stepped back, wiped his face quickly with his sleeve, and gripped the staff again with both hands. Rhunor stood behind him, broad as a wall. Root waited beneath the trees, unreadable and old.
Torren stepped into the skiff.
The water accepted the boat too easily.
He took the oars.
Konnan stood on the bank. He did not wave. His face was set with the effort of not calling after him.
Torren rowed.
The shore drew away. Red leaves hung above his son. The green men became shapes. Root became a small crooked shadow beside a white trunk. Konnan remained clear the longest, pale-haired and red-eyed, smaller among them than he had ever looked in the mountains.
Then the mist moved between them.
Torren kept rowing until the island vanished.