Gemworld (34 page)

Sal was anxious to get going, and was about to book passage on the open ferry when he thought better of it. Considering the sickening deference that mundane gave mages in a sprawling city like Scholar’s Ford, he could well imagine the cramped quarters of a ferry magnifying it.

“A room will be fine, thank you.”

“Of course, milord. I shall add the cost of passage on the
Academic
to our standard nightly rate.”

The innkeeper quoted his price, and Sal doled out a few coins from his still bulging purse. He was surprised at how much was left over. Apparently, Mikel was very generous in his estimate on what “a few pints” might cost.

Finley took Sal’s money, promising to purchase Sal’s boarding pass the moment the docks opened in the morning, then called a serving wench, also a mundane, to lead Sal to his room.

“I must say,” Sal started, toning down his acted arrogance a bit for the sake of the young woman, “I’m somewhat surprised to find an establishment that catered specifically to mages being managed by a mundane.”

“Oh, don’t think lightly of him, milord,” the wench said pleasantly enough. “Master Finley is quite a shrewd man, more than a match for the stuffed shirts that find their way to our front door.”

“That may be so,” he laughed, thinking back to the self-important examples of arcane mastery that he’d seen since that afternoon. “But does he have to come off as such a... ummm...”

“A windbag?” she finished sweetly. “Maybe not. But wouldn’t you, as the mundane owner of a place like this?”

Sal had to agree. The more time he spent in the Ford, the more it reminded him of the big cities back home—dog eat dog, winner take all.

“I wouldn’t take it to heart, though,” she said as she unlocked a door at the far end of a side hallway, then handed him the key. “He’s a good man, far better than most. You won’t find a more honorable man this side of the Eastern Shores, and definitely not in the Ford.”

“I’ll remember that,” Sal said earnestly. One never knew when such information would be useful. He thanked her for her services and ordered a hot meal, then ducked inside the room. He had barely time to drop his pack at the foot of the bed when she returned with a platter loaded down with beef and carrot stew, hot bread, and small wedges of white cheese.

The room was more than satisfactory, as rooms went. After living in this world for the better part of nine weeks—not quite a month, according to the local calendar—he’d gotten used to rustic simplicity that his new world had to offer. Baths of drawn water, horse-drawn wagons, dinners cooked over a spit, they all had a certain appeal to him. Even the outhouses and chamber pots, once he got in the proper mindset. Granted, there were magical helps for all aspects of life, but the world he found himself in was about as close to medieval Europe as he would ever see, and he had to admit that it was growing on him.

A hot meal before him, and a warm bed calling him with equal insistence, he instead drew his katana from its sheath and assumed
shol’zo mitsu
—the primary fighting stance of armed
shol
’
tuk
. With a gusto born of abstinence, he fell into his now beloved forms. Though the doeskin forms were few, they were strenuous, especially after almost three weeks on the road. By the time Sal found himself in
shol
’
zo rah
, his body was wracked with painful cramps. But it was a bearable pain, the pain of a man satisfied in a long-awaited indulgence.

He centered himself, mentally kneading his muscles from
shol
’
zo rah
. He had found precious little time to work his forms while traveling with Mikel. The old man wasn’t fearful of
shol
’
tuk
—quite the opposite; he seemed to have almost as intimate a knowledge of the Silent Blade as Retzu himself—but he was cautious of doing anything that might draw unwanted attention. So Sal found himself sometimes going days at a time without going through his forms, each day hoping that the night would find him in a campsite secluded enough to work out.

And his inactivity had definitely taken its toll on him. He could still perform each move, quickly and flawlessly, but his body practically screamed in protest. Sitting in
shol
’
zo rah
, he could feel the sweat dripping from his blondish hair, now grown a bit shaggy from the time spent in this new world, far removed from the typical Navy barber and his standard high-and-tight. The perspiration cut rivulets between the aching muscles in his arms, his back, his lumbar region. But protest as his body might, he refused to embrace Emerald. He was a mage, true enough, but he was also
shol
’
tuk
. He knew that pain was quite often the price one paid for his hilt. And his hilt wasn’t thrust upon him the way Diamond had been. He had
earned
the doeskin. As much as he’d wanted to be a SEAL in his former life, he was honored to be
shol
’
tuk
in this one.

After a time, his aches faded, and he relieved himself from
shol
’
zo rah
, granting himself only enough time to eat a few bites before washing in the basin and retiring to the comfort of his bed, passing the night as comatose as possible.

***

The night also passed in relative silence for those in the oppressive growth of Aeden’s Lost Garden. It was well into second watch before the moon finally peeked over the Icebreak Mountains, casting its half-bodied brilliance down upon Caravan, and upon the two shadowy figures in the ad hoc village green. One figure hacked and slashed its way through imaginary foes. The other could have been carved of solid rock for all it moved.

Keth worked furiously through his forms, beaded sweat catching the torchlight as it fell in torrents from his shaggy curls. Retzu watched the granite run through the form with an appraising eye.
So focused, this one. So incredibly intent. Too intent, really
. There was such a zeal about Keth that Retzu was silently impressed. A driving blow here, a cutting upper block there, each arc of the sword flowing seamlessly into the next, all performed with a skill and precision far beyond his rawhide hilt. Impressive, yes, but also worrisome.

With a silent huff, Keth dropped into
shol
’
zo rah
, his katana ending up on the night darkened ground before him, sitting at such a perfect angle that the granite might well have never picked it up to begin with.

“Outstanding,” Retzu breathed. “I can find no flaw in your technique. Your appear more than ready for the doeskin.”

“Thanks,” the granite mumbled. He was careful not to surrender
shol
’
zo rah
, as his master hadn’t yet given him permission. Retzu’s praise filled him with satisfaction, but not so much as to make him forget his place.

Retzu nodded his approval, then said, “To the ready.” In one motion, Keth grasped his katana and swept it into a tight arc, sheathing it neatly as he took his feet. He stood before his
shol
’
tuk
master, ready to accept any commands that he might give. But what Retzu had to say, he doubted the granite would be ready for.

“What’s your problem, mate?” he asked gruffly, crossing his arms before him.

“Huh?”

“Don’t give me that dumb look; you know what I’m talking about. We’ve been at this for weeks, and you’ve always proved to be an apt pupil. But since the attack on Caravan, you’ve thrown yourself into your training with inhuman effort. Now, while I appreciate the attention you’re giving your studies with me, I must admit that I’m starting to worry about you a mite.”

“I’m fine,” the granite said numbly, evading his master’s eyes.

“No, you’re not.”

The granite sighed irritably, but said nothing. The assassin ran his eyes over Keth, noting his body language, his stance, his posture, anything that might reveal what was going on inside the mysterious youth.

It wasn’t as if Retzu didn’t know him, didn’t understand him. They’d talked at length about Keth’s supposed crime, his enforced exile from his family. Keth had even told him about the girl, Nanette, a subject that the boy apparently held in reserve for only his most trusted companions. But for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out what was
driving
the boy. It was anger, as pure and distilled as any that he’d ever seen, but he couldn’t fathom where it came from, or on whom it focused.

“We’re doing
nothing
, Master,” Keth said finally. “I absolutely detest this inaction! I need to be doing something, to feel like I’m making progress, anything to keep from feeling that we’re wasting our time sitting on our heels.”

Retzu empathized with Keth, but had no easy answers. Not even for himself. They had a plan—and a right smart one at that—but they couldn’t so much as budge on it until the time of Harvest, still many weeks away. Until they moved on Bastion, every second would feel wasted. He knew that. He’d performed similar operations, and each time the wait leading up to the event weighed heavily on him. “Sitting on go,” Sal had called it once. And although he didn’t understand the term exactly, it seemed to fit.

He sighed deeply, though it wasn’t a sigh born of empathy. It came from the deep-seated frustration that Retzu could only imagine a master having for his apprentice. He’d heard others in Caravan claim that such frustration could also be felt for a prodigal child, but Retzu knew nothing of such things. It just wouldn’t do for him to have children. His choice of career generally precluded any thought of family. He stretched that line a good bit with his association with Reit and his “Cause”, but that was a special case. He saw little conflict between killing for the Cause and killing for commission. It would be vastly different if he were to try and balance his life as an assassin with the rigors and commitments of marriage, let alone family life.

No. As far as he was concerned, the katana was the only wife he would ever know, and the apprenticeship his only offspring. And right now, his “son” was lying to him. Or if not lying, at least not telling the whole truth. He shook his head, then thrust a hand into his pocket and pulled forth a strip of soft doeskin.

“We
are
making progress, mate,” he said, studying the strip of leather. So simple, that strip, and yet its making cost a majestic creature its life. To gain anything, something had to be lost. He wondered, still staring at the doeskin, what Keth would have to lose to gain his freedom from whatever was driving him.

“But we trade in death,” he continued, “as your Master Seti trades in tools. And death has no room in it for anger, not when we’re the ones dealing it. You must find peace within yourself before you can truly know what it means to be
shol
’
tuk
.” With a finally glance at the strip, he handed it to Keth and turned to leave.

“If death has no room for anger, why are you still granting me the doeskin?” the granite called from behind him, the confusion in his voice all but drowning out his elation at achieving the promotion.

“I’m just giving you the leather strap, mate. Only you can say whether or not you’re ready to apply it to your hilt,” the assassin said over his shoulder, not slowing his pace in the slightest.

***

Jaren watched the exchange between Keth and Retzu from the comforts of his wagon stoop. There was no doubt, not from any of Keth’s masters, that he was an apt pupil. Master Seti glowed with praise whenever Jaren came to call on him. He would parade the emerald around a workshop filled with tools that Keth had crafted, each one a study in precision and practicality. No skill was ever wasted in making a particular tool pretty, Jaren noted, but there was a kind of beauty in the simplicity of Keth’s designs.

And Keth’s advances in his own practice of magic... The boy was nothing short of a prodigy, constantly coming up with new and enticing uses for his granite magic. Recently, it seemed as if the boy’s imagination had absolutely exploded all over the inside of his skull. In no time at all, Keth had eclipsed everything that Jaren knew about granite magic, and had more than fulfilled his end of the bargain by keeping Jaren abreast of his discoveries. He’d even took time out of his duties to his various masters to look over the artisan Marissa’s runelist, as pertaining to Granite. That had done her good, given recent circumstances. She seemed confident that Keth would be able to impart no small amount of knowledge to her, making her wares all the more valuable.

Likewise, the granite seemed to have a real knack for
shol
’
tuk
. Even more so than Sal did, if Retzu could be believed.

Sal...

Not for the first time, Jaren wondered after his other pupil. He had proven so resourceful, so quick to adapt to change as to almost seem fluid. Even the first time he met Sal, back in the Highest’s prison, Jaren could see the wonder, the
intellect
the man had. No more was his resourcefulness proven than in his ability to master, at least to some extent, his ability to wield the various magics that he could use. And to help Keth do the same! Absolutely remarkable, the things that he could do!