The Silver Lake (40 page)

And that was because of Brax.

They’d been at the southernmost tower of Anahtar-Hisar for twenty-two days and, true to their word, Kemal and Yashar had separated the two of them from the rest of the garrison delinkon, concentrating on individual rather than on unit training. The older boy had responded with the same level of fevered intensity coupled with agitated impatience he’d shown at the temple in Anavatan, but despite this, Spar could see a marked difference in his demeanor: he was calmer and more willing to listen—whatever Yashar might think—held himself with greater confidence, and seemed much less likely to throw his shield across the courtyard in frustration.

“This is stupid! No one’s ever gonna come at me this slowly!”

All right, maybe only a little less likely, Spar amended.

“I think we should take a break.”

Striding forward, Kemal held out a bulging waterskin and, bristling with indignant disinterest, Brax very carefully set his sword and shield to one side before accepting it. As he followed the two men into the shade of a nearby potted palm tree, only Spar could see the effort it took him to keep from simply falling over. Estavia didn’t seem to be helping him as much as Brax had said She would. And again, only Spar seemed to notice this.

The older boy himself had been wildly excited when he’d finally returned to bed that night at Serin-Koy, blurting out all that had happened in a barely contained jumble of words that had made no more sense to Spar then than it did now.

He never had explained what that everything was supposed to be—and Spar wasn’t even sure he could—whenever he talked about that night, he got such a dazed and awestruck expression on his face that he looked as if someone had hit him over the head with a barge pole.

A chuckle sounding deep within his mind interrupted this cynical observation and his expression hardened. The tower’s voice in his head had grown increasingly pushy in the last few weeks, interfering with his thoughts and offering up wholly unwelcome advice on his actions while still refusing to identify itself. It was really starting to piss him off. Drumming his fingers against his knife handle, he waited for it to make some further annoying observation but, after a few moments of silence, he cautiously returned to his earlier line of thought.

Brax obviously believed the Battle God had gifted him with special powers—although strength, endurance, flexibility, patience, and wisdom didn’t seem to be on the list—but what disturbed Spar the most was that he was just as vague on what Estavia wanted in return as he was about what these great powers were supposed to be. Nothing came free, especially when it came from Gods. Cindar had hammered that into their heads all their lives; Brax had taken less than a month to forget it.

Turning his face toward the brisk, salt-encrusted breeze blowing in from the sea, Spar snorted.
“I’m not telling you anything,”
he replied tersely.

“If not mine, then whose? Your new
abayon?”

Ignoring the sarcasm in the voice’s tone, Spar turned his attention, almost unwillingly, back to the courtyard. Kemal was holding his sword out at arm’s length, explaining something to Brax. As he watched, the older boy lifted his own sword, mirroring the movement with an intense expression. As Yashar nodded his encouragement, Spar smiled.

“How nice,”
the voice sneered.
“He’s learned how to hold it properly. One move down and only a thousand more to go before he’s thrown, all too unready, into battle. Is that what true abayon do for their delon?”

Lying on the ground beneath the rooftop, Jaq raised his head and whined. The dog didn’t like it when Spar came up here and not only because he couldn’t follow. With an inward glare, Spar scrambled farther up the roof, hopefully out of the animal’s earshot. The movement caused the small delos-drum at his side to vibrate gently and he covered it quickly with his hand to quiet it.

Yashar had given him the traditional instrument of the youngest delinkon before they’d left Anavatan. Usually he kept it with his belongings, but in the last day or two he’d taken to carrying it about, tied to his belt by its short leather strap. Yashar had been pleased to see it and, for some reason, that made Spar feel warm inside. Now, as the sounds of the village militia training beyond the tower—adults and delinkon moving to the constant thump of the same drums—filtered up to him, he ran his fingers along the soft, faded vellum, squinting down at the markings along the body.

“That’s the symbol for Caliskan-Koy where I was born,”
Yashar had told him, pointing to the outline of a small boat.
“The finest ships on Gol-Beyaz are built there. That there’s my father’s mark,” a grain flail. “It was his drum first, you see—and this mark’s mine,” a short
sword standing upright beside a cypress tree.
“If you find it useful, you might set your own mark on it before you pass it on to one of your own delon some day.”

Spar had been more pleased then he’d wanted to admit, but somehow the older man had sensed it in the short duck of his head and had smiled at him.

“Yes, yes, yes, he gave you a drum just like a real abayos would,”
the voice allowed impatiently.
“But shouldn’t a real abayos also give his delon every chance to realize their full potential when he isn’t passing down terribly valuable family heirlooms? I mean, be honest, how much time have either of those two spent teaching you something actually useful, like how to read and write for instance? ”

“I know how to read and write,”
Spar shot back.
“A little,”
he added grudgingly when the voice scoffed at him.

“Exactly,” it
agreed.
“A
little.
You’ll need a lot more than that if you’re going to make anything at all of your life.”

Spar just shrugged, but inside he had to admit—if only silently—that he knew neither Yashar nor Kemal cared much about reading and writing; he’d had to find the library on his own, and Brax had yet to pick up a scroll, never mind an actual book. Spar had a suspicion that their new abayon had forgotten that part of their young
Champion’s
training altogether, and the older boy obviously had no intention of reminding them.

“Piss off.”

Below, Jaq let out a yip.

“I don’t need any more ambition,”
Spar snapped inwardly, feeling his temper rising.
“I’m safe, I’m fed, and I’ve got lots of skills I can work just fine.”
Glancing up, he watched an immature eagle land on the tower ridge-pole, a hamsi fish dangling from its beak and, pulling his knife, flipped the thin handle through his fingers and around the back of his hand, catching it before it came close to falling. He cocked his arm.

“Very physically dexterous,”
the voice interrupted in a patronizing tone.
“But if you throw it, you might lose both bird and knife.”

“With proper mental training, you’d
know.”

“No, you’re not.”
The voice was getting definitely snippy now, and Spar sneered at it.
“Because if you were,”
it continued, ignoring his response,
“you wouldn‘t be wasting your time reading books on Ystazia’s equinox tea ceremonies and learning how to gut your enemies—and your birds—you’d be learning how to wield your considerably powerful, although deeply latent, mental abilities before they wither on the vine for lack of use.”

“They do have seers here, you know,”
Spar retorted, his own tone dripping with disdain, as he resheathed his knife.
“Don’t you think they’d have said something if I really had all these great latent abilities?”

“What, Sable Company?”
Now it was the voice’s turn to sneer.
“You can’t be serious. Not one of them could find their arse on a sunny day. Besides,”
it continued in a imore mollifying tone, “you have the strongest natural
shields I’ve ever felt—nearly as powerful as my own—I doubt that lot could even see you to look at you. No, use your head, Delin; if they were really any good, they’d be
sworn
to Incasa, wouldn’t they?”

“Whatever.”
Despite the voice’s very good point, Spar was getting bored with the argument.
“It all comes down to one thing,” he said. “The Warriors of Estavia took us in, they fed us, and they clothed us. You didn‘t, so they have the right to direct our training and you don’t.”

“And far be it for me to cast aspersions on such a noble enterprise as expecting two hungry delon to offer up their lives in exchange for temporary food and shelter,”
the voice sniffed, refusing to back down,
“but the least they could do is ensure that they direct that training properly. ”