Laryn spent that day with Gaten and Widan, harvesting organic matter from the ground. They packed leaves, fallen sticks, and rotten gobo berries atop a span of wood, and hauled it over to the kingdom core like a sled.

  “Why aren’t we just using water?” Widan groaned. “After all that work we did.”

  “It’s a quirk of this core,” Laryn said. “We can’t just feed it one type of essence.”

  Sifting decomposing leaves and other tree detritus generally produced life essence, but occasionally produced earth. As they worked, Laryn tried to keep on eye on Tasam and Coril’s movements.

  Tasam generally stayed around the fire, working on the gobo drying frames with some of the women. Coril stayed in the trees, helping the men work on harvesting berries and improving the shelter. The two men avoided each other, which was good for now, but also a problem that Laryn would have to resolve at some point.

  There were so few people here, he wasn’t sure he wanted to alienate either of the men by choosing one of them. Tasam was good at managing the preparation of the gobo berries, even if Laryn thought Coril would make a better steward.

  The day wore on. Laryn lead the boys deeper than normal into the tree cover to collect materials for sifting. Gaten lifted a large stone.

  “Should I add this to the barrel?” he asked.

  “Not unless you want to do a barrel full of stones,” Laryn said. “Sounds heavy to me.”

  Gaten tossed the stone aside. Something behind Laryn caught the boy’s eye, and he flinched, shrinking into himself. Laryn turned and came face to face with Coril.

  “Coril,” Laryn said, suppressing his own startled flinch.

  “Laryn, could I speak to you?” Coril asked. “I don’t think Tasam’s daughter is around to overhear us right now.”

  “How has your investigation gone? Any idea who moved the supplies?”

  “No, I haven’t turned up anything yet. But I do have a suspicion…” Coril glanced around, making eye contact with his son and nephew.

  “Tasam?” Laryn asked.

  “Yes,” Coril said. “He must have done it. He knows how to read a map. He knows he’s going to need hardier rations to travel to Townshold. Gobo is great, but it doesn’t travel well and takes a long time to prepare. He stole your provisions, because he’s planning to abandon us.”

  “He doesn’t have to do that,” Laryn said. “I would give him and his daughter what they needed, if they wanted to leave.”

  “Would you?” Coril said. “You don’t have much to spare, and you’re planning on doing a similar journey yourself soon. Longer, I understand.”

  Laryn thought about that. It was one of the main reasons he was worried about what happened to his supplies.

  “His daughter is a thief,” Coril said. “We caught her in the act. Jarden was preparing to whip her in the square when we were attacked by the void. I begged him to help us navigate back to Townshold and he agreed, but insisted we make decisions together. He’s too ambitious for an advisor. Now he sees that I don’t need him anymore, and he’s worried about what might happen to him and his family.”

  Laryn turned to the boys. Widan and Gaten watched quietly, eyes wide.

  “Is this true?” Laryn asked.

  They both nodded, eyes fixed on Coril.

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  “Thank you for coming to me, Coril,” Laryn said. “I’m going to talk to Tasam. In the meantime, we still need to locate the stores, so keep looking.”

  Coril nodded, then ducked back through the trees.

  They finished filling the barrel, then started dragging it back to the core. Laryn appreciated having two strapping young lads to help him with his work.

  As they emerged from the tree line, Laryn saw Talia.

  She waved anxiously back toward the campfire, but stopped and tried to act nonchalant when she noticed Laryn observing her. Following her gaze, Laryn saw Tasam walking quickly out of the core enclosure going back to the campfire.

  “What is he doing over there?” Laryn demanded, grabbing Talia by the front of her blouse. The girl trembled, knees knocking.

  “Nothing,” she said. “I mean, cooking?”

  “He was looking at the core,” Laryn said. “You were supposed to be watching for me, and wave him off when you saw me coming?”

  Talia’s eyes widened, and she gave a slight nod, then aggressively shook her head.

  “Don’t lie to me,” Laryn hissed.

  “I don’t know,” she said, tears welling up in her eyes. “Please don’t hurt me.”

  Laryn sighed. He directed the boys to carry the barrel back to the core, and grabbed Talia by the arm. He dragged her across the beach, bringing her to confront Tasam.

  “Your daughter has been spying on me again,” he said, as Tasam hurried over to see what the trouble was.

  Laryn released the girl and she stumbled over to embrace her father.

  “What were you doing at the kingdom core?” Laryn asked. “Don’t pretend like you don’t know. I saw you.”

  “I… I’m sorry,” Tasam said. “I was just curious.”

  “What did you learn?”

  “That’s quite a powerful core you have,” Tasam said. “I mean, I assume it must be. I… How… It can control time?”

  Laryn groaned. “You’ve betrayed my trust, Tasam. I asked you not to look into it.”

  Tasam shrugged. “Can you blame me? I couldn’t help the curiosity. I didn’t think… Is it one of the legendary cores? Where did you find it?”

  “I can’t answer any of your questions,” Laryn said, with a sigh. “I don’t know enough to satisfy you. Can you keep this to yourself? Do we need to make a contract?”

  “No, er, I mean yes… That is, yes, I’ll keep it a secret, and no, we don’t need a contract.” Laryn looked at the girl. Tasam shook his head. “She won’t tell anyone either.”

  Laryn pursed his lips. He didn’t like the way Tasam had been snooping around, but at least he’d come clean about it when confronted.

  “Tasam, you were on watch last night before Gall. You could have moved the provisions and hidden them somewhere. Did you?”

  Tasam’s eyes widenend. “No. I didn’t!” He looked about in surprise, as if trying to figure out where the accusation came from. “Coril,” he said, a note of certainty in his voice. “He accused me of it? No, no need to say anything, I can see it in your face. Coril hates me,” Tasam said. “He’d do anything to get rid of me.”

  Stepping in closer to Laryn, and lowering his voice to a conspiratorial level, he added, “Coril is too ambitious. He has always wanted to be a [Ruler]. I think he intended to challenge you but you surprised him when you said you killed the voidbloom. You didn’t really do that did you? It was a good move; it threw him off balance and made him worry that he might not beat you in a fair fight. But I think he’s growing more certain that you didn’t kill that voidbloom.”

  Laryn shook his head, disappointed to hear the accusations flying. The squabble between the two Jardenvalers was a big problem.

  “Have you learned anything about the missing supplies today?” Laryn asked. “You deny Coril’s accusation that you took them?”

  “I did not do it. I don’t know where they are. In fact, it was most likely Coril. He’s always angling to gain more power and support. I bet he stole them because he knows that it’s hard to eat nothing but gobo berry paste. He’ll offer tidbits of dried meat and portions of cracker to people in exchange for their support and friendship. He’s trying to undermine me. I knew he’d try it. That’s why I insisted on being an equal leader with him. He wants to whip Talia, too.”

  “Tasam, that’s enough. I’m not a mediator. I need the two of you to set your problems aside and work together. Help me find the rations; I don’t even care who moved them I just want them back.” Laryn let out a deep sigh. “If the two of you can’t get along, I’m going to need to elevate one of you. I need someone that I can trust to lead.”

  Tasam grabbed Laryn’s arm before he could walk off. “Listen, you can’t trust Coril. He wants to rule. He… He killed his brother.”

  Laryn froze, then turned to face Tasam. “He killed Jarden? I thought you said it was the void.”

  “I don’t know for sure. The circumstances were suspicious though. I wonder if Coril is a void cultist.”

  “Stop,” Laryn said, his voice cold and hard. “I’m tired of the baseless accusations being thrown around.”

  He spotted Coril walking across the beach, heading toward them.

  “Can’t I talk to either of you alone, without the other butting in?” Laryn moaned as Coril walked up.

  Coril smiled warmly. “I’m sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt. Just wanted to make sure no official business was being discussed.

  “This is impossible,” Laryn said. “Co-overseers is unacceptable to me. I need to elevate one of you. In the meantime, will you both just please go look for the missing supplies? The island isn’t that big. Organize search parties or something. I’ll let you know what I decided in the morning.”

  He walked away as Tasam and Coril protested, but he ignored them.