They ran for nine days. The running was not the road; it was the ash. On the second day, at the village of the hundred, they hid the ember in a cold cistern, under the moving water, in a chest of grey ash-wood. The ford knew nothing of the water, and the two thousand could not tell the difference between a cistern and a road that was not there.

Vaerun's two thousand were on their heels, not for the ember. Vaerun did not know where the ember was; the letter had not said. But for the four. The camp did not know about the four, and the not-knowing was the one thing the Pyre did know. The Pyre did not need to catch the four. It needed to catch the road.

The ash had a way with running that the grain country did not. It was flat, and water moved through it. The ford, which knew only the road, could not follow the water. The two thousand followed the road, and the road was what the Pyre had named. The ash had no names. The not-naming was the keeping, and the keeping was the two hundred and thirty, who had chosen it, and who had named it with their feet instead.

Yrren led the running the way the trade led everything: not with the hand, with the rhythm. The rhythm of the ash was the one thing the empire's riders had not learned in a thousand years. They had never learned it, because the burning did not teach it, and the two hundred and thirty were all that was left who had.

"The water is on the left," Yrren said, on the third day. "The ford doesn't know about the left, and the two thousand don't either."

They ran the ember in a chest of grey ash-wood that Yrren had made in Redmills, for the cart they had come in on, on the seventh day out of Mourne. The plain had let them pass without noticing, the way the plain did everything, with the hand, the hand not closed.

Corvin ran with the leg. The siege had done it twenty years ago. He ran the way the door ran: with the whole body, and the body was the wound, and the wound was opening. The scar did not close, because closing was not a thing the ash did.

On the seventh day they came to a village that was not a village, the one the water had not named. A hundred people, of the two hundred and thirty, had walked it out of the water nine days before the four. The rumor had carried the word ahead of them, the way the trade carried everything.

"Serath walked them out first," the elder of the hundred said to Ashe at the fire that was not the Harvest. "The old man is the village. The village is the two hundred and thirty. And the two hundred and thirty did not wait for the four. The not-waiting is the running."

"He stayed," Corvin said, to the fire. The fire did not answer; the ash did the not-answering.

"He will walk the ember out, if the two thousand come to the water," the elder said. "He chose the walking before the Fall. The choosing was the length of the sky, and the length was longer than the mountain, and the mountain is where the two thousand are."

On the ninth day the two thousand came to the water.

They came at night, the way the Pyre's armies came: the seals on the banners, the hand, the hand not closed. Vaerun stood at their head.

At the head of the water, in the empty chest of grey ash-wood, stood Serath. The chest was empty because the four had emptied it on the second day, in the village of the hundred, and the water had taken what was left.

The old man had walked the village out of the water the way the running was. The running was the ash, and the ash was not a thing the two thousand did, because the doing was the camp, and the camp was the mountain.

"The ember is mine," Serath said to Vaerun. His voice was not a door. It was the road. "The Pyre does the keeping. The keeping is the two hundred and thirty. The two hundred and thirty are the village. The village is me. And the I is the ember."

"Walk it to the Pyre," Vaerun said. "The Pyre is what the rite needs, and the rite is the Blackenings, and the Blackenings are four months away, and the four months is the walking."

"Walk it to the Pyre," Serath said, "and the Pyre will wake the god. The waking is the killing. The killing is the Long Night. The Night is the sky. The sky is the first of the new stars. And the stars are the feeding — the feeding is not the ending."

The two thousand did not move. Vaerun looked at Serath.

"Take it," Vaerun said.

The two thousand moved.

Serath did not run. He had chosen the not-running before the Fall, and the choosing was the length of the sky. He walked the way the road walked, with the chest of the ember in the hands that were not closed, and the walking was not the running.

The ash caught him once, on the second step of the water's edge. He stood up. He walked on.

He did not reach the four. The two thousand took the chest, and the Pyre did the taking. But the taking was not the keeping. The two hundred and thirty had chosen the keeping, and they had been, for a thousand years, on the other side of the mountain, in the water that moved.

But the chest was empty.

The empty was the cistern, and the cistern was dry; the Harvest had done the dry. The cup was the four, on the water, in the night, with the ember in the hands that were not closed. The not-closing was the road.

Serath had walked the ember into the water, the way the running was. The running was the ash, and the two thousand did not do the ash: the doing was the camp, the camp was the mountain, and the word closed the mountain.

The old man's body was at the head of the water, where the chest had been. The hands were not closed. The not-closing was the road, and the four walked the road the way the ash walked. The two hundred and thirty had been, for a thousand years, on the other side of the mountain, in the water that moved. The ford did not know about the moving.

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In the burning the old man is the one who walked the ember into the water. The into-the-water is what the running did not do, and the not-doing is the ash. The ash is not a thing the two thousand did. The not-doing was the keeping, and the keeping is what the two hundred and thirty had chosen to be. The choosing is the village. The village is the water. The water moves. The ford does not know about the moving.

The hands were not closed. The not-closing is the road. The road is what the four are, on the water, in the night, walking the way the ash walked. The walking is what the Long Night does not know, and the not-knowing is what the singing is for.

— Dream-Ledger, entry of the ninth night of the running, written by Ashe Wren at the head of the water, where the old man had been, the index of the hands that were not closed