It was starting to snow again by the time Brand and the rest of the Vangen left the cozy inn. Wet, fat flakes plopped and spattered against his face and cloak, feet quickly churning the road into chilly paste. They were led towards the stable by the innkeeper, his two boys watching warily as they pulled the doors shut.

"Wait here," The man grunted, gray mustaches twitching with worry. "And don't do nothin' to startle the horses. They spook easy."

Brand stared up at one of them, a huge looking charger with a coat like black velvet. It looked keen enough to eat him if it suited the creature. He took a cautious step back.

"Well, get comfortable everyone. I fear we may be here awhile." Libro sighed as he took a seat on one of the crates lying around, stretching out a leg that had once been a mangled mess of meat and bone.

Brand still didn't know how the Captain had done it. One minute he'd been limping around the Iron Round like a cripple with a death wish. The next he was walking like the Empire's ordained champion. And all it had cost him was an arm, and a set of strange marks burned into his flesh.

It was still a mystery how it'd happened. No one was inside the Inner Sanctum of the Iron Round save for Libro and Raylein when the Golden Heart had detonated. The Captain had been tight lipped on the subject from the start, and, well, dead men tell no tales, as they say.

His thoughts shifted as he moved on from the grim subject, seeking new directions, settling over his memories in the tower. The light from Libro's arm. The faint resistance of the monster's magick fighting back. The unstoppable pull as it was ripped out. It made him wonder. What else could the marks on his arm do?

"So what? We're supposed to sit here and wait until someone fetches us?" Cent plopped down on his own seat, annoyance boiling out of him with every snorting breath. "More like they're having us sit here in the stables like a couple of arseholes while they laugh it up back at the inn. Look at the outsiders, sitting with the beasts."

"I don't like the way that horse is staring at me," Moss added, jabbing one finger at the sleek coated charger. "Looks hungry."

Brand took another cautious step back.

"All right, that's enough moaning for one day, I reckon." Elba stepped between the two of them and threw her arms around their shoulders, eyeing Cent first. "Do you really think that bitch of a witch would play a prank on us so early in her grand scheming?" She swiveled her head around, eyeing Moss now. "And do You really think after proddin' our asses for days on end babbling on about needing to be in this town since yesterday, that she'd stop to have a fething lark?"

"Well, not really, now that you mention it," Cent said, eyes rolling over the scars along her shoulders, where many a wound had left its sharp reminder. "Although, Moss did try to stab her with a spoon."

"I regret nothing," the man shot back.

"Regardless of intentions or...regretful past actions, we still know better." Elba shook them ever so ungently, as a big sister would her younger brothers. "The Captain knows better, and I know better." Brand blinked as she turned to look at him, blue blue eyes fixed on his. "And you know better, aye Brand?"

"Aye," he said, too scared of spooking the horse beside him to argue over his name. Cinnis could put up a fiery resistance if he wanted to, but Brand did not want to experience being bitten by a jaw made entirely out of molars.

"So let's have a little faith then, and hope for the best." Elba planted herself on a hay bale, arms folded over her chest. "And if things get ugly we'll just kill the bastards. Dare say I haven't seen a man you two couldn't turn to meat in a timely need."

"An unfortunate side effect of working for the biggest, meanest Empire in the world," Cent said with a shrug. "Pays better, at least."

"Food ain't so bad once you've tried it," Moss added and the three were soon talking as if the whole argument had never even occurred. From the corner of one lip, however, Brand could see Elba smiling ever so ruefully. She could be quite the shrewd diplomat when the mood came to her, weaving Cent and Moss around her fingers like dogs on a leash. Even Libro couldn't resist her charm, smiling at her as he sat there patiently, one leg over the other, one foot swaying back and forth in a lazy pattern.

"I've an idea," Brand said as he settled beside the Captain, close to his good arm. "Since we've time to spare."

"Oh?" Libro perked up. "About my mark, I'm assuming?"

"You assume well. I've a hypothesis I want to try out."

"A hypothesis?"

"It's like an idea you want to try out."

Libro snorted mirthfully. "I know what hypothesis means, Cinnis."

"I know." Brand felt the tips of his ears burning red. Partially in embarrassment, partially because he'd heard his new name spoken out loud. "I mean, I know you know. I mean..."

"Breathe, lad."

Brand sucked in a breath and blew it out, his racing thoughts settling. "Sorry, Captain. I didn't mean it like that."

"I know you didn't. You've always had good intentions. Now, show me this little hypothesis of yours."

Brand smiled as he rooted around in his bag, producing a sphere of pure iron that fit snugly in his palm. "How's your arm feeling?" He asked. "Do the scars still burn? Do you still have feeling in your extremities?"

"The burning sensation has mostly gone away." Libro rolled up the cuff of his sleeve, exposing more of the dark marks running down his wrist and into the forearm. "There's still a little tingling in the tips of my fingers, but nothing to worry about for now."

"I trust your judgment." Brand placed the ball of iron in the Captain's outstretched palm. "Do you recall what you did to that...man in the tower?"

Libro puzzled over the question, eyes darting for answers in the straw scattered muck. "I do, if vaguely. These last few days of travel have given me a lot to think about. Why do you ask?"

"I saw something when you touched him. A pale light leaving his eyes and disappearing into your mark. Like you'd torn the magick out of him, or something. And then the air above your shoulder started to shimmer—"

"And the glowing," Libro interrupted to add. "Don't forget the glowing."

"I think there's more to your marks than we initially thought, and I have just the experiment in mind to test this little hypothesis."

"What are you going to do?" The Captain asked, looking more than a little wary. "It's not going to hurt you is it?" He eyed the black charger, a string of drool running down its lips. "It's not going to give this creature a reason to bite me, is it?"

"It's a simple test," Brand assured him. "I'm going to divert a sliver of my magick towards the iron ball. Try and warm it up a little. If my hypothesis is correct, your mark should instantly snap at it like a fish to bait."

"Just be sure you've the strength to reel it back in. You saw what it did to that poor bastard afterwards, right?"

Brand paused, remembering exactly what had happened, and the pools of red ash they'd left behind. "I can handle it."

"All right," Libro said. "Then let's do it."

They stared at the metal ball together as Brand willed the magick around him. The air shifted slightly, a tiny breeze in the enclosed space, whirling straw and making the tools hanging along the walls clack and rattle.

He reached out, plucking at a single thread, small enough that even the gold in his bones couldn't sense it. He edged it closer towards the iron sphere as he slowly agitated the metal.

Light began to blossom from Libro's fingertips the moment he made contact. Softly at first, barely an ember's worth, until it coursed down the back of his hand and surged into the cuff of his sleeve.

"It's starting to get warm," the Captain said, narrowing his eyes at the smooth, metal ball. "Like it's been left in the sun all day."

"Good," Brand said, never keeping his eyes off the sphere. "Let me know if it gets too hot." Just as he'd theorized, the mark was beginning to react to his presence now, feeding off the residual magick around them, but so far his tether remained unseen, undesired even. Was the mark only interested in higher forms of magick? Doubt came over him as he realized what the next step in the equation had to be.

With careful precision he reached out and added a drop more of his magick. Just a push, a pulse to entice the worm around his hook.

The mark bit, and bit hard. Brand felt a surging tug, not physical, but much, much deeper, against the very fabric of his being. It knocked the breath out of him as his magick was ripped out the sphere and sent spiraling into Libro's arm.

The Captain grit his teeth, the glow in his arm steadily growing. "Cinnis, is this supposed to happen?"

"Yes," Brand breathed, eyes fixed on the iron ball. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. The sheer incalculability of it all. "I believe so. Your arm, your mark, it's latched on to me. It's consuming...no, it's siphoning my magick from the sphere."

"Is that good?"

"It's not bad, I think."

"You think?" Libro's brows went very high. "You're the expert in all things magick, remember?"

"Not this type of magick," Brand said, licking his lips nervously. "If you could even call it magick."

"What would you call it?"

"I don't know. Anti-magick?"

"Good enough for a first draft but we're definitely changing that later." Libro grimaced as a shard of light pulsed through the mark in his forearm. "Argh, damn that stings."

"What the hells was that," Brand asked as he felt a harder tug this time, shadows crawling up the walls as the glow brightened.

"You're the bloody expert," Libro repeated before another pulse sent them both doubling over. The iron ball began to vibrate in Libro's hand, trapped in the man's vice-like grip. Like he couldn't let go. Like the damn thing was fused to his palm. The mark began to glow brighter, tiny lights flickering like stars along the patterns.

"Brand, what's going on?" He heard Elba call out. "You're starting to spook the horses."

"Testing out a theory," Brand said quickly, too afraid now to correct her a second time. "Don't worry about it."

"I'm more worried about you getting eaten by old pucker lips over there."

"I've got it under control." Brand winced, realizing that was the exact thing people said when it was precisely the opposite. He turned back on Libro's hand, trying desperately to tear himself away from the mark. The thing was clawing at him now, gobbling greedily at the magical tether as it moved beyond the bait and directly towards him. Inch by painful inch it was pulling him apart, tearing out his magickal tether and consuming it within the flesh of his Captain's arm.

The air above Libro's shoulder began to shimmer now, as it had before at the tower, pulsating every so often. Through the glare of the mark's light, Brand could make out the Captain's muscles bunching up, tendons tight, fingers digging into the sphere, metal groaning painfully.

His eyes went wide as another pulse flared, Elba's worried babble lost in the buzzing in his head, the roar of blood in his ears. He couldn't pull away from the mark. It was consuming him now, ripping and tearing at him with an unstoppable grip. He felt panic surge within him, felt the need to run, but he was rooted to the spot, unable to get away, unable to stop the endless hunger devouring him from within.

Out of nowhere, there came an ear splitting crunch. Brand gasped as the tether suddenly snapped, releasing him. He fell, ass hitting the dirt as his head reeled back, mind buzzing with a splitting headache. Through tear blotched eyes he looked up, he saw what had severed him from the mark's grip.

The iron ball in Libro's hand had been crushed entirely. Pieces of the catalyst lay scattered about the ground, inert and useless, a few chunks still smoking.

"Well now," Libro said, his face pale and clammy with sweat. "I hope that answers your little hypothesis, Cinnis." He stared over at Brand, haunted eyes fixed on him. "Because I'm never doing that again."

***