The King Who Broke Heaven’s Tithe

Chapter 17 A Breath He Could Keep

Daren tried his old breathing form at sunset and nearly drowned on dry land.

He drew warmth from the hearth, held it beneath his ribs, and pushed toward the place where his core used to sit.

His new channel closed like a fist.

He fell from the bench, unable to inhale.

Selka rolled him onto his side and struck his back with the heel of her hand.

“Let it out.”

He could not.

“Stop trying to hold it.”

The warmth broke from his mouth in a ragged cough. He lay on the floor until the room stopped tilting.

Orin stood beside the hearth, both hands pressed over his ears.

Daren reached toward him.

The boy stepped back.

“Don’t say you’re fine.”

Daren let his hand fall.

“I’m not.”

Brida took Orin outside to watch the last light on the quarry stones. Selka waited until the door closed before helping Daren back onto the bench.

“You knew that form would strain the damaged channels.”

“I knew it used to work.”

“It used to feed a reservoir. You don’t have one.”

He looked toward the iron chest containing his old core.

“Not one I can use.”

Selka followed his gaze.

“We are not opening it.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“You didn’t need to.”

The room smelled of smoke because they had blocked the old heat vents. A gap above the door let it escape, wasting warmth but keeping the unknown bronze mechanism below from reaching the hall.

Another compromise. Another thing he could not fix by wanting it badly enough.

Selka drew a circle in the ashes, then rubbed half of it away.

“Your old technique fills a closed vessel. This path seems to carry warmth through you and back into the works.”

“So I’m a pipe.”

“Tonight, a blocked one.”

He laughed once, then regretted what it did to his ribs.

She sat opposite him.

“I can show you the first form children learn before they have a core. No holding. No forcing. A breath in, a breath out, and enough attention to know the difference.”

“I learned that twenty years ago.”

“Then you should be excellent at it.”

He almost argued. Then he remembered Orin’s face and straightened on the bench.

They began.

The first attempt did nothing.

The second made his scar itch.

On the fifth, he felt the faint warmth of the hearth enter with his breath and leave when he exhaled. It passed through the narrow channel without snagging on the old wound.

He tried to keep some.

Pain answered immediately.

Selka raised an eyebrow.

“I noticed,” he said.

“Good. Again.”

Outside, the workers finished packing earth against the gate braces. Voices passed through the open door. Someone argued about where to hang wet clothes. Someone else laughed.

Daren let those sounds set the pace instead of the marching rhythm he remembered from the army.

His shoulders loosened.

The warmth returned.

This time, he allowed most of it to leave. A trace remained around the copper scar, no brighter than a coal beneath ash.

Selka held out a small stone.

“Take it.”

He closed his hand around it without flinching.

The burned skin still hurt. The new warmth did not heal it. It merely steadied the muscles that had been trembling all day.

For three breaths, he held the stone.

On the fourth, the warmth faded.

He set it down.

“That’s all?”

“That’s something you can do twice without dying.”

He looked at the stone for a long time.

He asked Selka what she had done when her own first teacher lost patience with her.

“Practiced until my hands bled.”

“Did it help?”

“It impressed him.”

“That wasn’t what I asked.”

She looked down at his bandages.

“No. I learned the form after someone made me rest.”

Daren turned the stone between his fingers. He had spent years mistaking endurance for improvement. Pain was easy to measure. Skill was quieter, and it sometimes asked him to stop before he had proved anything to himself.

He put the stone down while he could still lift it.

Selka rose to fetch water. When she returned, she did not congratulate him for obeying. She asked him what he had felt during the successful attempt.

For once, he had an answer more useful than how much it hurt.

They practiced until he could repeat the movement and stop before exhaustion made him careless. Then Selka led him outside the gate, beyond the strongest warmth of the refuge.

The scar dimmed.

“Try here.”

Cold air entered his chest. For a moment, he thought nothing would answer. Then a faint thread of warmth moved through the channel, slower and thinner than before.

The world held spiritual breath beyond Hearthfast. He simply lacked the strength to gather much of it.

He managed one controlled circulation.

His knee remained bad. His ribs remained broken. The mountain still hung above them.

But he had done it himself.

When they returned, Orin waited on the steps.

Daren sat beside him and described what had happened, including the mistake.

The boy listened, then leaned against his uninjured side.

“You can learn slowly,” Orin said.

Daren closed his eyes.

“Yes.”

At the western boundary, Maera’s pale ring shone around the quarry stake. Beyond it, a lantern moved along the market road.

Then another.

Brida climbed onto the wall and watched the lights turn south.

“Grain wagons,” she said.

Daren stood carefully.

Every wagon carried the white banner of the Summit.