David Farland - The Sum of All Men

The herbalist fed several more borage flowers to the kitchen wench, gave her some rosemary to help fight fatigue.

Binnesman then strolled to a grassy slope, reached down and broke the stem of a flowering bush. “Eyebright,” he whispered, taking the stem. A fragrant oily sap was dripping from it, and Binnesman drew a line over Gaborn's brows, another high up on his cheek.

Suddenly, the night shadows did not seem so deep, and Gaborn marveled. He had endowments of sight to his credit, and could see fairly well in the dark, but he'd never imagined anything like this: it was as if the herbalist had added another half-dozen endowments in the matter of a moment. Yet Gaborn recognized that he was not actually seeing more light. Instead, it was as if, when he glanced at something that he might have been able to recognize after minutes of study and squinting in the darkness, he felt no strain, yet instantly discerned shapes and colors.

He looked off to the woods, saw a dark shape there—a man hiding among the trees. A tall man, in full armor. Powerful. If not for the eye-bright, he'd never have seen the man at all. He wondered what the fellow might be doing, and yet...knew the fellow belonged.

When Binnesman finished administering the herb to the kitchen maid, he said softly to her. “Keep this stem in your pocket. You may need to break it and apply fresh sap again before dawn.”

Gaborn realized now that the herbalist was not just chatting about idle matters when asking how they felt, that perhaps this wizard never chatted about idle matters. He was preparing Gaborn and the maid to flee in the darkness. The ministrations of leaves rubbed over his skin would change his scent, throw off his trackers. Other herbs would magnify his abilities.

This took less than three minutes, then the herbalist began asking more penetrating questions. To the maid he asked, “Now how tired are you? Did the borage make your heart race too fast? I could give you skullcap, but I don't want to overtax you.”

And sometimes he spoke quickly, gave Gaborn commands.

“Keep this poppy seed in your pocket; chew it if you are wounded. It will dull the pain.”

He took them next to the edge of the wood, where three dark trees with twisted branches reared up like great beasts with twiggy fingers and mossy limbs, forming a dark hollow that enclosed a small glade. Here, Gaborn felt smothered, constricted. Something about the closeness of the trees gave a sense that he was being watched and judged and would shortly be dismissed. The earth was all around him here, he felt—in the soil beneath his feet, in the trees that surrounded him and nearly covered him. He could smell it in the soil, in leaf mold, in the living trees.

Among many small shrubs that huddled on a hummock near the glade's center, Binnesman stopped. “Here we have rue,” he said. “Harvested at dawn, it has some medicinal and culinary value, but if you harvest just after the heat of the day, it is a powerful irritant. Gaborn, if the hunters come at you from downwind, toss this into their eyes, or into a fire—the smoke from such a fire is most dangerous.”

Gaborn dared not touch it. Even going near the bushes made his lungs feel constricted, his eyes water. But Binnesman walked up to a low bush that held a few wilting, yellow flowers. He pulled off some leaves, taking no harm.

The kitchen maid would not draw close, either. Though she could feel nothing, she had grown careful.

The herbalist looked back at Gaborn, and whispered, “You do not need to fear it.”

But Gaborn knew better.

Binnesman reached down to his feet. “Here.” He picked a handful of rich, loamy soil, placed it in Gaborn's palm.

“I want you to make a commitment,” Binnesman said, in that special way that let Gaborn know this was serious, that much depended on how he answered. He spoke each word with gravity and ceremony, almost chanting.

Gaborn felt dazed by all that had happened, frightened. As he took the soil in his hand, he felt almost as if the ground wrenched beneath his feet. He was suddenly so weary. The soil seemed tremendously heavy in his palm, as if it contained hidden stones of enormous weight.

The wizard is right, Gaborn thought. This is not common ground.

“Repeat after me: I, Gaborn Val Orden, swear to the earth, that I will never harm the earth, that I dedicate myself to the preservation of a seed of humanity in the dark season to come.”

Binnesman stared into Gaborn's eyes, unblinking, and waited, with bated breath, for Gaborn to speak the vow.

Something inside Gaborn trembled. He felt the soil in his hand, felt...a tickling at the back of his consciousness, a presence, a powerful presence.

It was the same great presence he'd recognized yesterday, in Bannisferre, when he'd felt the impulse to ask his bodyguard Borenson to marry the beautiful Myrrima.

Only now that presence came immensely stronger. It was the feeling of rocks in motion, of trees breathing. An odd power pulsed beneath his feet, as if the earth trembled in anticipation. Yes, he could feel it—through his bare feet, the power of the earth rising beneath him.

And Gaborn saw that he'd been traveling here toward this destination for days. Had his father not told him to come here, to learn to love the land? Had some Power inspired his father to say those words?

And in the inn at Bannisferre, when Gaborn drank the addleberry wine, the best wine he had ever tasted, the wine with the initial B on its wax seal, he had felt this power. Gaborn knew now, knew without asking, that Binnesman had put up that bottle of wine. How else could it have had such a marvelous effect? The wine had quickened his wits, led him here.

Gaborn feared to take the wizard's vow, to become a servant of the earth. What would it require? Was he to become an Earth Warden like Binnesman? Gaborn had already taken other vows, vows he considered sacred. As Myrrima had said, he did not take vows lightly.

Yet somehow he also feared not to take this vow. Even now, Raj Ahten's hunters would be coming after him. He needed help to escape, wanted Binnesman's aid.

“I swear,” Gaborn told Binnesman.

Binnesman chuckled. “No, you fool. Don't swear to me, swear to the earth, to that which is in your hand, and that beneath your feet. Say the whole oath.”

Gaborn opened his mouth, painfully aware of how the herbalist clung to his words, painfully aware that this vow was more significant than he could imagine. Wondering how he could maintain a balance, keep his vows to both the earth and to Iome.

“I—” Gaborn began to speak, but the earth quivered at his feet. All around, through the fields and woods and garden, the earth went still. No wind stirred, no animal called. The dark trees surrounding him seemed to loom larger, shutting out all light.

Darkness, darkness. I am beneath the earth, Gaborn thought.

Gaborn glanced round in astonishment, for he had thought the evening quiet until that moment. Now, absolute stillness reigned over the face of the land, and Gaborn sensed a strange and powerful presence rushing toward him.

In reaction to this, Binnesman backed away from the rue plant, stood with an astonished demeanor, gazing about. The soil twisted near his feet, grass parting as if some great veil of cloth ripped.

And from the bushes at the forest's edge, a man emerged, a black form stepping from the shadows. Gaborn had discerned his shape moments before, had seen his shadow once the eyebright was administered, but had never guessed at the creature's true appearance.

For this was no mortal man. Rather it was a creature of dust, formed from rich black soil. Minuscule specks of dirt and pebbles clung together, molding his features.

Gaborn recognized the form. Raj Ahten trod toward him. Or, more accurately, a being of dust in the form of Raj Ahten marched from the woods, complete in armor, scowling imperiously, his high helm spreading wide with owl's wings, black as onyx.