“You are well spoken, Mr. Harlowe. I do not think your trust is misplaced, nor ours with you. Sir Karigan’s example goes both ways. If she trusts you, that counts for much, as does Scruffy’s regard of you. He is attuned, shall we say, to Black Shields. However, it is not necessarily enough proof for us to release you.”

“What will you do?” Karigan asked, stiffening.

“There is a brief test we can administer,” Joff said, “and it shall help us determine all is as Mr. Harlowe says.” The Weapon then gave what must have been a rare smile. “We’ve already tested his fighting skills and they are not bad. Not bad at all.”

“Let us do this test,” Cade said eagerly.

“We must enter the portal. If you fail the test, then you shall never see the outside world again.”

“I’m ready.”

Was he so keen to give up everything? “Cade,” Karigan said, touching his sleeve, “do you know what you are doing?”

“I know enough that if I don’t even try, I will have to stay in the tombs anyway. Forever. So it will hurt nothing to undergo this test.”

She nodded. He knew.

Joff gestured for Cade to precede him. Karigan moved to follow, but Dash blocked her way. “I am sorry, Sir Karigan, but you must stay back.”

“Open the Portal, Mr. Harlowe,” Joff instructed. The other Weapons stood in a semi-circle behind him, waiting.

Cade did not hesitate. He strode right up to the door. He must have observed it being opened and closed enough times that it was no mystery. His hands hovered almost reverently over the glyph of Westrion, and then again, without hesitation, he pushed it in. The door released and exposed a handle that rose from its flat iron façade. Cade pulled it open, the cool air of the tombs tumbling out and mixing with the moist world of outside, suffusing him in a vaporous cloud.

“Congratulations, Mr. Harlowe,” Joff said. “You have passed the test.”

“Opening the door? That’s it?” Cade actually sounded disappointed.

“If there were more time, there would be more rigorous testing of your knowledge and physical skills, but as far as ascertaining your suitability to be a Black Shield, thus deserving of our trust, this test was enough.”

“You see, Mr. Harlowe,” Chelsa explained, “it is usually only Weapons who can open the door. It is said the reigning monarch, and certain others attributed as worthy by the door, can open it. Always the Weapons can, but few others. It knows the Weapons.”

Attributed as worthy by the door? Karigan shook her head. Would the oddness of the world never end?

Cade glanced at his hands as though they belonged to someone else. “What would have happened if I could not open the door?”

Chelsa shrugged. “The door would have remained locked, exposing you as unworthy to the Order, and we would have had to welcome you into our caretaker community.”

“Come,” said Joff. “Let us go inside for a short while, and we shall talk a little more.”

Joff led Cade, Chelsa, the death surgeon, and most of the Weapons through the Portal. Even Scruffy abandoned Karigan and trotted inside after them. Dash, who remained outside, closed the door after them. Karigan could only stare at the portal in disbelief, feeling a little left out.

Raven whickered a query, and she went over to him and stroked his neck. She wondered what would happen if she tried the door, but she had a strong sense of foreboding, that this was not her time.

Time. It was all about time.

CADE VALIDATED

While Karigan waited for Cade to return from the tombs, she felt herself growing stiff where she sat on the log, so she stood and paced and went through some exercises with the bonewood, the mist swirling around her as the staff arced through the air. She ran through the words of the captain’s riddle as she worked, again and again, ensuring they were committed to memory.

The scything moon is held captive in the prison of forgotten days. The bonewood hummed in a forceful downsweep that could break an opponent’s collar bone.

Seek it in the den of the three-faced reptile, for you are the blade of the shadow cast. She thrust and parried to the rhythm of the words.

Beware! The longer you linger, the faster we spin apart. She flowed through a series of forms, feeling free with the release of movement, and she ended with a backward thrust.

She paused after several repetitions, panting from the exertion, and planted the tip of the staff on the ground.

Dash said, “It is good to see the staff at work. I fear we have come to rely on firearms too much in this day and age.”

So deeply focused had Karigan been that she’d forgotten the Weapon at his post by the Heroes Portal. She wiped sweat from her brow with her sleeve.

“I also fear the day,” Dash continued, “when our firearms become so accurate that we no longer have to be at close range to see the faces of our foes, their eyes.” He shook his head. “Battle, I think, will become far less personal, a matter of business and efficiency, like the mills.”

Karigan’s cooling body, or perhaps Dash’s words, made her shiver. Soldiers as machines, efficient killers. I must get home. I do not belong here. I do not like it.

The Portal opened, and finally Cade, led by Chelsa, Joff, and Serena, returned. He appeared well, except for the bruises on his face and swollen lip that had developed from his initial tangle with the Weapons. She slid the bonewood to cane length, and joined them.

“It is time we bade you farewell, Sir Karigan,” Chelsa said. “The night grows old and dawn will be upon us all too soon.”