Traveler

by Arwen Elys Dayton

How dare an unsworn apprentice speak to a Dread like this?

  The girl was no longer following, and Maud could hear her rubbing her cheek where she’d been struck.

  “He’s done things he shouldn’t have done, and he’s not a fair judge,” Catherine called after her.

  Both of those accusations were, of course, true. The Young Dread had known it for some time. And yet it was not Catherine’s place to challenge this.

  “A lot of Seekers have written things down about him,” the girl said, though she was still not following.

  Maud slowed at that, recalling something from a very long time ago. As a child, centuries ago, she’d accidentally spied a fight between the Middle Dread and the previous Young Dread. In his dying words, that Young had told the Middle that he’d written many things down. And then he’d smiled, as though he were the winner of the fight, even though it was clear the Middle Dread was about to kill him. Maud had always wondered what that Dread boy had written. And where he’d written it.

  Years afterward, she’d gotten up the courage to tell the Old Dread about that incident. The Old had responded by telling her calmly, “There is little about the Middle Dread that could surprise me, child. He admitted that act to me. And yet he has changed his ways. He is different now. You must leave him to me, for I have him in hand.”

  Maud increased her pace, until she was in a half run, slipping between the trees with a silent, steady, rhythmic tread. Still, she heard what Catherine said next:

  “My parents don’t want to know,” the girl muttered, “no one on the estate wants to know, and you don’t want to know.”

  The Young Dread drew her hearing back to herself, shutting Catherine out.

  Much later, when she was returning to the estate with two wild fowl for supper, she saw the Middle himself. He stood near the cottages of the Dreads, speaking to Briac Kincaid, who had a swollen nose and a blackened eye.

  Catherine’s strangest comment echoed in the Young Dread’s mind: My great-great-grandfather saw the Middle Dread training others.

  The Dreads often spent time together stretched out There, but the Middle had the capability of waking himself, and she did not. This meant that he was often awake when Maud slept. What did he do all those times when he was abroad in the world without her?

  As the Young Dread watched, the Middle put a hand on Briac Kincaid’s shoulder. It was a gesture of camaraderie Maud found unsettling.

  “Did you ever speak to the Young Dread?” Quin asked her mother.

  She and Fiona were sitting on Quin’s bedroom floor. Hours ago they’d carefully taken apart their copy of Catherine’s journal, and had laid the pages about them so they could study everything more easily. Quin had woken, restless in the middle of the night, and found her mother still awake, and together they’d stayed up through the wee hours and into the next day, transcribing the oldest journal entries into more legible handwriting, and making sense of the difficult words.

  Fiona, sitting cross-legged a few feet away, ran her gaze over the pages in front of her before turning to Quin. “I never did,” she said. “I stopped my Seeker training when I was fourteen. I saw the Young Dread on the estate a few times, when I was a young girl and she’d come to administer the oath to older apprentices, but our paths never crossed.”

  “And Catherine? Did you know her?”

  Fiona’s eyes darkened at the mention of John’s mother, but Quin couldn’t read the reason for this change. “I knew her slightly,” Fiona answered, her manner abrupt and inviting no further questions. “She was a year older than I was. She and her friends probably thought I was weak. I did drop out, so perhaps they were right to think so.”

  Quin let the topic drop and turned back to the pages on the floor. She was so pleased with Fiona’s improved health, she didn’t like to bring up subjects that made her upset, for fear she might somehow set back her mother’s recovery.

  “From the journal, it seems Seekers have been fascinated with the number two hundred,” Quin murmured after a while, as she read through the pages. That number occurred several times in the journal, though in each instance Quin was left to wonder two hundred what, since this was never made clear. “But Briac and Alistair never said anything about that when I was training. Look—this entry here, from about a hundred and fifty years ago, talks about the ‘concentration of two hundred.’ ”

  “I noticed that,” Fiona said. “But I’ve never heard it mentioned before either.”

  There was a noise like a sigh from Quin’s bed. Shinobu was still asleep there, lying in almost exactly the same position he’d been in all night and most of the previous afternoon. She looked up at him, saw him shifting beneath the covers.

  “Maybe he’s finally going to wake up,” she whispered.

  Fiona nodded and got to her feet. “I’ll go to Master Tan’s and fetch his tea for today,” she said.

  Master Tan had been making Shinobu a medicinal tea every morning, using herbs from his famous collection. The tea was, according to Shinobu, very disgusting, but it was effective in accelerating his recovery.

  Fiona squeezed her daughter’s shoulder and passed out of the bedroom. Quin thought that squeeze carried more than comfort; it felt as though her mother were saying, You brought this one home…He’s yours to look out for now.

  When Fiona was gone, Quin got up from the floor and seated herself on the edge of the bed. At the shifting of the mattress, Shinobu came awake with a start.

  “Quin? What…”

  “You’re alive,” she said quietly, touching his cheek. “A couple of times I thought you might be dead.” That wasn’t quite true, but his unconsciousness had been so deep she’d been reluctant to leave the room all night. She was more relieved than she could easily admit, to see him awake and speaking.

  Shinobu glanced at the clock, and she watched him try to make sense of the numbers. “Have I been asleep since yesterday afternoon?” he asked.

  “You have.”

  He dropped his head back onto the pillow and stared at the ceiling. “How?”

  She ran a hand through his hair. “I think the focal made you extra alert by draining all of your energy.”

  He blinked a few times, then passed a palm across his forehead and rubbed his eyes in a gesture that was so boyish and unguarded Quin had the very strong urge to draw him into her arms.

  “It was so interesting when I wore it, Quin. It was like I could see and understand everything. Like the world was so clear. Like my thoughts were lining up all by themselves.”

  Hearing his description, she could appreciate why he’d enjoyed it so much. “It’s called a ‘focal,’ so I imagine its whole purpose is to help you focus,” she told him, “but the first rule for using it is ‘Be firm in body, in good health.’ You’re not quite there yet.”

  “You think that’s why I fell asleep for so long?”

  Quin shrugged. “Maybe.”

  He sat up, and the covers fell off his bare chest. He was still in only his underwear, just as he’d been when she found him covered in acupuncture needles. She looked at the scar along the right side of his abdomen. It was much, much better than it had ever been, but it was still an ugly purple line seven inches long. And he was too skinny.

  “Quin, I want to use it again.”

  “The focal?” She laughed, then stopped. He wasn’t joking. Scoffing a bit, she asked, “You want to use the thing that made you pass out for nearly an entire day?”

  “It was doing something for me. My thoughts are still more—more logical than they were before. Whatever it did for me has lasted all night. I still feel it, Quin. And I want to let it finish whatever it was doing.”

  “That’s not—”

  “So what if I sleep a lot? I could use the rest anyway. I felt all achy yesterday—”

  “Because of the helmet. You were in pain when I took it off you.”

  “I just want to use it for a little while.”

  He’d put a hand on her arm and was staring at her w
ith an intensity that reminded her of how he’d looked while wearing the focal. It was troubling. Quin had treated many drug addicts during her time as a healer—drugs were always a problem on the Transit Bridge—and this was exactly the sort of thing an addict would say when trying to convince you they were making good choices. It was particularly troubling coming from Shinobu, who had only recently stopped using drugs. He was such a good fighter and so tough from years of Seeker training that, she suddenly realized, she hadn’t been as alert to his weaknesses as she should have been.

  “Shinobu,” she told him gently, “let’s not think about the focal just now. I’ve put it away.” He looked disappointed at this and glanced restlessly around the room as if planning to immediately search out where she’d put it. She had, in point of fact, set it beneath clothes at the bottom of her closet, but as soon as she had a moment alone, she would find a much better hiding place for it.

  She put her hands on either side of his face and said, “Let me work on you. Right now.”

  His gaze came back to her, but his eyes were cloudy, unfocused. After a few moments, he nodded and his face began to clear—as though he realized how oddly he was behaving. “Yes, please,” he whispered.

  She settled him back onto the bed and threw the covers off him entirely, so she could see all of his body. The bruises were mostly gone, the broken bones were nearly mended, but there was still something fragile about him.

  As she’d trained herself to do under Master Tan’s tutelage, she centered her thoughts and let her mind shift. It was like teaching your eyes to go out of focus until something farther away clarified. After a moment, the ordinary world became less crisp and she began to see copper-colored lines of energy surrounding Shinobu’s body.

  When she’d first trained with Master Tan, he’d been startled by the ease with which Quin achieved this concentration. It was only later, when she’d regained all of her memories, that she grasped how much her Seeker mental training had prepared her to enter this state of heightened observation.

  Shinobu’s energy flowed in patterns about his body, but the bright lines were broken where there had been trauma. Dark patches hovered above his wounds, particularly the whipsword injury on his right side. And there were dozens of fainter blotches surrounding his head. Shinobu had also added electricity to the equation by wearing the focal.

  Quin shut out all other thoughts, calmed her breathing, and focused more deeply. In a moment she could see her own energy field, bright copper streams running down her arms. She spread her fingers wide, held her hands a few inches above Shinobu’s chest, and let the energy flow down from her own arms, over her fingers, spilling off her body and onto Shinobu like a river of lightning.

  Methodically she moved her hands across all of the muddy patches above his injuries, breaking them up, washing them away. At last she reached his head, where the copper lines formed whirlpools around a constellation of dark blotches. Slowly these broke up, and the bright streams about his face and head became symmetrical and ran without obstruction.

  Shinobu let out a long sigh of relief, and Quin watched him visibly relax. She allowed her vision to settle back into its normal state, and the patterns of energy faded from her view. When he opened his eyes to look up at her, she let her hands fall to the bed.

  “Better?” she asked him quietly.

  “Better,” he whispered back. “You’re very good to me.”

  She smiled. The fragility she’d seen in him was gone, at least for a while. He sat up on the bed next to her, leaned in, and kissed her softly. Then his eyes darted around the room before coming back to hers.

  “Did you really hide the focal?” he asked.

  She didn’t like that he was asking about it again; the metal helmet had certainly gotten under his skin. However, he appeared to be resigning himself to the idea that he couldn’t have it.

  “I did,” she answered. And I will hide it better.

  He nodded. “Do you mind if we get out of this room? I know I shouldn’t wear it. But I need to do something to push it out of my mind. I’d like to fight.”

  Quin laughed. He’d been asking her about a practice fight for days. Maybe now was the time. As long as they were cautious, it would be good for him to use his muscles.

  “I’ve been up most of the night looking at the journal,” she told him. “So there’s a very, very small chance you might be able to beat me.”

  He bumped his shoulder into hers and kissed her again. She was happy to see his mood improving so quickly.

  “Should I tie one hand behind my back to help you out?” he asked her. “Or put on a blindfold? Or do you need more help than that?”

  “Get yourself out of my bed!” she said.

  She pushed him away playfully, then went to the desk against the opposite wall.

  “I brought you a better gift from your mother than the focal,” she told him.

  She retrieved the whipsword from one of the desk’s deep drawers and tossed it to him. Shinobu caught it and cradled it in his arms for a moment, like a baby. He looked down at it lovingly.

  “I’ve missed you,” he said to the weapon. Then he tossed it back to Quin and began pulling on clothes. “Watch yourself, Quin Kincaid. I’ll not go easy on you.”

  Fiona arrived then, with a soft knock, bearing tea from Master Tan. It was Quin’s pleasure to watch him drink down the entire bottle, while plugging his nose and gagging. Then they went up to the roof to spar.

  Shinobu opened his eyes to discover it was nighttime again. He was lying on Quin’s bed. Through the round window next to him, a glow came into the room—the distant city lights of Hong Kong reflected off the dark water of Victoria Harbor. A pale oval of this light was slowly making its way across the ceiling. Quin lay next to him in the bed, deeply asleep and breathing softly. Her warm hand was against his arm.

  She’d brought him up to the roof of her house in the afternoon, and they’d sparred for nearly an hour. She’d gone easy on him, he knew that much, but he’d been happy to discover that his muscles weren’t too out of tone. He was healing well and his strength was coming back quickly.

  After the fight, he’d lain on the floor of Quin’s bedroom, exhausted. Every part of his body ached, and the wound in his side throbbed with the beat of his heart, but it hadn’t mattered. The fight had been exhilarating.

  Since Quin had been up most of the night before looking at the journal, the sparring had drained her completely. She’d fallen asleep, and he’d fallen with her. But now he was awake.

  His body was aching still, but differently. He rolled onto his side to look at Quin. Her face was relaxed, and locks of her dark hair fell across her closed eyes. Shinobu smiled at how pretty she looked. He thought of the many different girls whose beds he’d found his way into. Usually there was a lot more fooling around and a lot less sleeping next to each other fully clothed, but Quin had watched him almost die twice, and she was being careful. Looking at her now, he couldn’t imagine why he’d ever been with anyone else. This was the only girl he wanted.

  He pulled her close and put his lips against her shoulder.

  “I love you, Quin Kincaid,” he whispered.

  In her sleep, she turned toward him, and her arms came up around his neck.

  “I love you,” he said again. He kissed her softly, and he could feel her kiss him back. “I love you,” he whispered to her. “I love you. I love you.”

  She was waking up and pulling him closer and kissing him for real now.

  “I want to undress you,” he murmured.

  She nodded against his cheek.

  A noise from downstairs floated up to the bedroom.

  Shinobu raised his eyes and discovered that Quin’s bedroom door was still open. It was nighttime, but not too late. Fiona must be awake and downstairs.

  “I’ll be right back,” he whispered.

  He crawled out of the bed and moved over to the door. Poking his head out into the hall at the top of the stairs, he listened. He cou
ld hear Quin’s mother in the healing office downstairs, humming to herself.

  He began to close the bedroom door, but paused in the middle of the motion. Just outside the bedroom was the open door to the upstairs bathroom. A faint light from downstairs reached into the bathroom, and Shinobu noticed a small ceiling panel that was out of alignment with the others. The panel was only a quarter of an inch out of line, but he’d been trained for most of his life to notice small changes in his environment. He looked at the ceiling and guessed immediately that that was where Quin had put the focal—in a hurry.

  He stood in the doorway of her bedroom and stared at the out-of-place panel. The odd ache he’d felt when he’d woken up—now he knew that it was an ache for that metal helmet. He’d woken up wanting it as he used to wake up craving opium. But the focal wasn’t a drug. It was only a tool, a tool Seekers had used for hundreds of years, a tool that Quin admitted was to help focus the mind. It was a good thing, and it had made him feel so good the first time he’d worn it. It had given him inklings of something greater than himself, something almost like a grand design of which he could be a part. Where was the harm in that?

  Quin had taken the helmet off his head before he’d been able to understand everything it had made him feel. She was right, of course—he shouldn’t be using it until he was completely healed. She’d shown him the instructions his own mother had written out. And yet she’d stopped his thoughts just as they were becoming clear. When he’d worn the focal, he’d begun—just barely begun—to feel himself connected to the world in a way he hadn’t felt since he was a child. He only wanted to finish experiencing that feeling.

  He’d told her he wouldn’t put it on. And yet…he’d stopped all the drugs, and he never wanted to start them again. The focal was something else. He could wear it, just for a short time, right now, while Quin was sleeping. And when he took it off, if he fell unconscious, it would be all right. It was nighttime, and he’d be sleeping next to her.

  He looked into the bedroom behind him. Quin had fallen back asleep. He could see the line of her profile in the pale light from the window. She was beautiful, and even if she was dreaming again, she was waiting for him to come back to bed. If he crawled back under the covers, they could finally be together…