Pathfinder (Pathfinder 1)

“When they come to kill me—and they’ve already tried it twice, once on the journey here and on my first night in Flacommo’s house—is it your job to protect me or to help them do it?”

“Protect you,” said Olivenko. “I would never have taken an assignment to harm Father Knosso’s son, no matter how royal or irritating he might be.”

“I’ll tell you this much,” said Rigg. “When it comes time for me to escape from Flacommo’s house, I will do it, and there’s probably nothing you can do to stop me. But I like you. I don’t want you to be blamed for letting me get away. I’ll do it when someone else is in charge of watching me.”

“That’s very kind of you,” said Olivenko. “That will allow me to continue my brilliant military career without a blot on my record.”

“You have a better idea?”

“Take me with you,” said Olivenko.

“I told you,” said Rigg. “I’m not going to build an army. I’m going to cross through the Wall.”

“Take me with you.”

“I’m not sure I can do it?

??take you with me through the Wall.”

“Then take me to the Wall and let me watch you go through. Let me help you all the way until you cross.”

“You’ve done it before, Olivenko,” said Rigg, “and it didn’t turn out well.”

“In a way it did,” said Olivenko. “Father Knosso did get through the Wall alive.”

“Whether he got through with his sanity, we don’t know.”

“I think he did,” said Olivenko. “Will you?”

“I think I will,” said Rigg.

“How will you do it? Please?”

“I’ll find a path and follow it,” said Rigg.

Olivenko tried for a moment to figure out what this meant. “What path? What makes you think there’s a path?”

“If the Wall was made eleven thousand years ago, then there was a time when it wasn’t there. Animals will have moved through the space where now there’s a Wall, making a path. That’s where I’ll cross.”

Olivenko rolled his eyes. “That’s a plan?”

Rigg shrugged. “It sounds pretty good to me,” he said. “If you really want to go with me, you’ll just have to trust me for now.”

Olivenko nodded. “All right then,” he said. “I will.”

Too bad I don’t trust you at all, thought Rigg. I’d like to, but I can’t. If your job is to spy on me, then the best way for you to learn all my secrets is to pretend to be my friend and fellow conspirator. You might be what you seem, and if you’re not, what an actor! But wouldn’t my enemies choose such an actor to try to deceive me? I can’t even follow your path to find out whom you’re working for, because I already know—you’re my guard, you report to the people who keep me imprisoned.

I hope you’re really the man you seem. I hope you really are my friend. I hope I don’t have to kill you to get away from here.

CHAPTER 21

Noodles

Ram sat up in his stasis chamber—the resemblance to a coffin was unavoidable, but at least the lid was transparent—and said, “I’d like to ask a question.”

“What’s the point?” asked the expendable. “Your brain patterns have already been fully recorded. Anything I tell you now will be lost when your memories are reimplanted after you come out of stasis.”

“That means you can answer my question without regard to whether it damages my psyche or not.”