Forever the Road (A Rucksack Universe Fantasy Novel) by Anthony St. Clair

sky.”
    “How can that be? You’re not telling me something, Rucksack. If we’re going to figure this out… Look, we have to trust each other. You know I’m not just a bartender. And I know you’re not just some itinerant drunk who rambles off nonsense that passes as wisdom.”
    “I prefer to think I ramble off wisdom that passes as nonsense.”
    Jade set his fresh pint in front of him and grinned. “Jakes and Jades have lots of stories about you, did you know that?”
    Rucksack chuckled. “I’m sure your Management love that.”
    “They tolerate it. It’s like ghost stories kids tell around a campfire. Though if most people saw you, they’d never tie you back to the stories.”
    “You’ve got a fierce quick mind, Jade of the Everest Base Camp. You can seem like old winter ice, but your heart blazes. You remind me of my mum.”
    “That’s not something any woman ever wants to hear.”
    “If you’d known my mother, you’d know what a compliment it was.”
    Jade stepped back and stared at him. His heart beats like a person’s, she thought. He breathes and blinks. He drinks and eats… and drinks. The sun, cold, wind, water, and dust of the world are etched into him like tattoos. He could seem like other people . Jade stared hard at where his silvery helix should flow out into the world. Except for this emptiness, this loneliness around him. He is so alive, life burns like a fire in him and hums like a song, but he has no path. She locked her gaze on his. “Tell me why you don’t have a helix,” she said.
    Rucksack looked away.
    “You don’t want to tell me?”
    “It’s not that. It’s pretty hard to believe.”
    “I accept plenty that would be considered hard to believe. It’s pretty much a Jade’s job description.”
    Rucksack looked at her again. “I lost my helix—my paths of decision and destiny—when I lost my parents.”
    “How did your parents die?”
    Rucksack sighed.
    “I told you,” Jade said. “I can believe it.”
    “Jade, my parents died in The Blast.”
    “But that… but that would make you…”
    “A lot older than I look,” he said, nodding. “I appreciate you saying that I’m keeping well for my age.”
    She stepped back.
    “I thought you said you could believe it.”
    “Just because I can believe it doesn’t mean I don’t need a moment to let it sink in,” Jade replied. She smiled, thought for a little while, then said, “No wonder the letter is so perplexing. Your parents died so long ago, then to be told that you would be reunited with her. But for this to happen today, the same day Jay arrives with something strange in his backpack? The same day you and I see helixes clear as leaves and rivers? These things are connected.”
    “You’re okay with this? Really?” Rucksack drank another long quaff of stout.
    Jade shrugged. “It’s high up on my list of strangenesses that I’ve encountered or have learned about, yes. But it explains a lot.” She stared at him a moment, chewing her lip. “Rucksack,” she said, “did you survive The Blast?”
    “Mostly,” he replied, his left hand clenched tight. “Sometimes I think I didn’t survive enough. Sometimes I think I survived too much.” He drained his pint and set the empty glass on the bar. “Do you trust me now, Jade?”
    “I heard there was this guy,” said one of the two men at the table. “Went to the top of Mount Everest and back in a night.”
    Rucksack nearly knocked over his glass when he whipped around. Jade stared at the men and their empty pitcher. She’d now and again caught snippets of their conversation. They were like two traveling businessmen who were catching up and swapping stories. This is the loudest they’ve been all evening. Lager making them louder? she thought. Their winding helixes were like existence’s practical jokes. Or do they mean for us to hear this?
    “I know, right? Impossible,” the man continued, his indistinct face looking only at his companion. “Takes