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to himself. Dad said thousands of us left with the great
wizard, and there’s less than a thousand in this town. He looked at Finn, standing alone briefly. And soon to be one less.
    He put his arms around his friends as they
huddled together.
    One of us four next
year, Sven thought darkly, his breath
puffing out in front of him. We are the
only four who will be of age.
    He remembered there once
being seven kids his age. The trek from their old town took one
kid, and two more had died from Dinah’s Curse after Rustiford had
been founded. He shook his head and stood up, his friends’ eyes
following him. There had been six when
Katla had chosen to go. There were three for this year. Next year,
there would be four.
    And the year after that?
    Sven realized he could not recall the number
of sixteen-year-olds in Rustiford.
    Brand will return to Rustiford next year.
It’s only eight years.
    But eight years seemed like an eternity right
now. Eda had told him of her plans to stay away from all the men in
Rustiford until she could volunteer to join Horsa as Nightfire’s
slave in just a year. Two months later, though, deep in despair
over her loss, she had come to Sven for comfort. Sven still wasn’t
sure which he regretted more — that he didn’t refuse her or that
she still volunteered to go with Nightfire the next year.
    No. Eight years meant that by the time he
returned, many people here wouldn’t even remember him. It would
break his father’s heart, his father who had already lost his wife
and daughter to the wizards.
    Erbark helped Lori stand, and silent, giant
Hauk, who had a tear on his cheek, grasped Sven’s hand to pull
himself up. Sven looked at his companions, his friends, and saw his
fear mirrored in their faces as they left the green behind. They
knew it, too.
    Erbark broke the silence, “This is our last
Weardfest together.”
    They walked, their boots breaking the frost
on the ground, their breaths puffing out in clouds. The morning sun
crawled out from behind the horizon as though it had overslept. The
tall homes of the first adult citizens gave way to the shorter
cabins of newly declared men and women.
    “I’m scared,” Lori voiced what they all
felt.
    “I’m not tired yet,” Hauk made a universal
suggestion.
    “I’ve some soup,” Sven invited.
    “All right then,” Erbark agreed for them.
    They walked through the village. The sun
struggled over the trees, slowly shedding light on the town. The
smoke from scores of chimneys hung against the blueness of the
clear sky. A brief gust of wind from the north moaned through the
trees. Their heavy boots clunked up the stairs to the door of
Sven’s house.
    Sven turned the latch and pushed the door
open. The sun had not yet become bright enough to light the cabin,
so he lit a lamp and stirred the hearth fire before hanging a small
pot of soup over it. The four of them took a seat in a circle near
the hearth.
    They sat without speaking for a long time.
Hauk lit a pipe, inhaled deeply, blew a stream of smoke through his
lips and launched into a brief fit of coughing. Lori pulled the
strip of cloth away from her hair, allowing the dark strands to
cascade to her shoulders. She produced a brush and began brushing
the black, curly hair rhythmically. Sven stirred the soup, watching
as the flames engulfed the wood with greedy hunger. Erbark
sharpened a dagger along a small whetstone.
    Long moments passed in this way — the scrape
of the metal, the crackle of the fire, the spoon against the bottom
of the pot, the coughing fits between puffs of smoke and the
whisper of hair against the brush. Then Sven spoke.
    “The soup’s ready.”
    The other three looked at him, a little
surprised. With tired smiles, they accepted the meal offered
them.
    The soup was mediocre, being leftover from
the previous day. It was a mixture of rabbit and root vegetables
with just a hint of laurita, a wintertime soup that they would soon
grow to detest. None of them complained, however.