Deynas pulled up level to get a target lock on her. Too high. The two patrol flyers they’d seen earlier were speeding their direction. He dove again and pulled up well below her, steadying the craft and holding a finger over the trigger for the rescue net. When Misa was a few feet above their altitude, he hit the trigger. The net wrapped around her. The line reeled out more and stretched to slow her descent without jerking her too hard. When it finally pulled tight, the craft tipped and Deynas shifted his weight hard to counterbalance. As soon as it steadied, he flipped the switch to start reeling her up.
A massive knot of tension unwound in his chest, allowing him to breathe again. He closed his eyes for a second, the image of Misa falling burned into his mind. He exhaled and leaned back, letting the support stand and harness hold his weight for a moment. A shifting of the craft drew his attention to his other passenger. Ren was working at the buckles on his harness.
“Don’t,” he ordered. “Stay there. I’ll get her.”
Not wanting to risk another incident, he scanned around for the rogue spirit. The other flyers were pulling up alongside them now. The spirit was nowhere in sight. He clipped a safety to the support stand before unbuckling his harness from it and moved to the edge where the line was bringing up their catch. As soon as she was in reach, he grabbed her and pulled her up, releasing the bands on the net. It fell away and retracted into the craft.
Misa wrapped her arms around his neck and clung to him, her grip almost strangling. She was shaking.
“Are you all right?”
He pushed her back, holding tight to her arms, and looked her in the eyes. There were tears on her cheeks, but she nodded, a fire of shame coloring her face.
“I’m an idiot.” Her voice shook.
“You let enthusiasm and overconfidence override caution. No matter how sure you are on your feet, clipping on the safety needs to be your first action any time you move around on a flyer.” He wiped away a tear running down her cheek and forced a smile. “But you fell very well, Misa. You kept your head and used your body to slow your fall.”
She nodded and wiped away another tear with one trembling hand, staring into his eyes with an intense admiration that made him feel suddenly awkward holding her. “I knew you would catch me. You’ve always protected us.”
The words twisted like a dagger in his chest, stealing his breath away.
She didn’t seem to notice. Instead, she shifted her weight against him and reached toward the pilot support stand.
He found his voice again. “What are you doing?”
She gave him a puzzled look. “Driving.”
“I suppose I did offer.” He nodded approval when she clipped in her safety. “You could have died. If you make another mistake like that, I will have to recommend that you be grounded.”
Satisfied with the look of abject horror on her face at his words, he stood and moved back to the pillar, attaching his harness to it before securing her harness to his. She wasn’t yet approved to fly solo so it was tandem or nothing.
One of the other craft sank down alongside theirs.
“You three all right?”
Deynas nodded. “We’re all right, though it looks like we’ve got a corrupted wind spirit. I’ll report it to Master Kochan after we land.”
The pilot nodded. “I expect we’ll see you on the hunt then. Fly strong.”
Deynas nodded in return. Misa settled herself against him, refreshing that awkward feeling from moments ago. Forcing himself to ignore it, he gave her the go ahead to move them out.
•
“You did well today, Deynas.”
Deynas knelt before Kochan and lowered his gaze. “I almost got Misa killed.”
“Her overconfidence and a corrupt spirit almost got her killed,” he countered. “You are too quick to assign guilt to yourself. This once I will tell you kindly to stop doing so. Next time, I will take a staff and use it to pound this foolishness out of your head. Understood?”
It was remarkable how the man could threaten bodily harm and sound so benevolent doing so. “Yes, Master.”
“You did precisely what was expected of you. We must all mentor the young. When something went wrong, you kept your wits about you and dealt with it as well as any true Endless warrior would have.” Kochan paced in front of him, striding back and forth before the bare feet of The Undying with his hands clasped behind his back. There was an uneasy air about him. “The important thing at the moment is that we have a corrupted wind spirit to deal with. Though I hate to do so, we must hunt it. As you are familiar with the spirit now, I would ask you to lead that hunt.”
“Yes, Master.”
“I also ask that you to take over mentoring Misa in her flying and begin her combat training. Be careful with her though. She is taken with you.”
Deynas forced back the memory of those awkward moments on the flyer. “She’s seven years younger than me?”
“She is sixteen now and she looks up to you. Young hearts are easily won and even more easily broken.”
“Then why assign her to me?”
Kochan shrugged as if the answer were obvious. “Because she will try harder for you. I have seen that her spirit is ready. She is strong like your Argus-ra was.”
My Argus. “Then it will be my honor to mentor her.” Deynas started to rise then hesitated. “Is that why you assigned me to Argus?”
Kochan smirked. “You may go.”
Swallowing frustration, he rose and turned to leave.
“Deynas, I would know how the Wind Lord addressed you today?”
He turned to stare back at Kochan, puzzled. The master was gazing up at the three faces of The Undying high above them.
“By my name.”
“Just Deynas?”
He thought back to the encounter and shook his head. “No. It called me Deynas-ra. I corrected it.”
Kochan smirked up at the statue as if his answer were a subtle joke shared between the two of them. “Did you?”
“Of course.” Deynas had to struggle to keep his tone respectful. Nothing had changed. He was still not Endless. Why did they insist on taunting him with it?
Kochan waved a hand toward the door then. “Go now. Hunt well.”
Deynas bobbed his head in a quick bow and stalked from the temple.
CHAPTER FIVE
There was something fitting in the fact that Naago left the city on foot. The image he presented, in his worn duster and hat, trekking along the desert road with a pack on his back and the hard case in one hand, simply looked right. Were all the Endless like that? Did they all fit whatever place they were as if they always belonged there?
He claimed to prefer travelling afoot. It let him see the world in greater detail and gave him time to think about things, he claimed, though the Keeper didn’t notice him staying silent long enough to contemplate much of anything since they left the confines of the towering metropolis. If he typically travelled alone, then perhaps he had built up a backlog of things to say, though she always travelled alone and did not share his proclivity for conversation.
“You don’t talk much, do you?”
The question almost made it seem as if he were party to her thoughts. But no, he was bound to notice the one-sidedness of the conversation eventually. “Of what would you have me speak?”
“I don’t know. If I already knew what you might have to say, I wouldn’t need you to say it.”
There was a certain logic to the statement.
A heavily laden wagon driven by an old part-demon with dark blue skin, sagging jowls, and a piggish nose was rolling past, drawn by a plodding eyeless beast with six burly legs and two long trunks that waved ahead, seeing with touch and smell in place of sight. The young human boy sitting on the seat next to the blue-skinned crossbreed was staring openly at Naago.
“Do not stare, boy,” the crossbreed rumbled. “A man’s madness is his own affair.”
She laughed under her breath at the sound of Naago grinding his teeth be
side her. He held his tongue until the wagon was well out of earshot.
“I’m glad my humiliation can be a source of amusement for you, Keeper.”
She smiled. It was an odd thing to smile so much. The expression served very little purpose and yet it was pleasant somehow. “Does the pride of an Endless man increase with his age?”
“Not so much. I believe it has been rather the opposite for me.”
He sounded sad when he said those words, though his stolid expression didn’t change. A gust of wind blew dust around them. He turned his face away from it and put his free hand on his hat to keep it in place. The power of her cloak also shielded her from such petty annoyances.
“What do you do when you are not keeping spirits?” he asked after the gust died down.
Nothing like this. “Sometimes I rest and wait in the Halls of the Blooded. Sometimes I roam alone and watch the passing of time.”
“That’s a start. Where do you go when you roam?”
Why did this meaningless talk matter to him? Perhaps she would come to understand if she indulged him. At the very least, there was a touch less grimness to his expression now that she was talking. Reason enough to humor him for now.
“Wherever I am inclined to go.”
He shook his head and looked up, squinting his eyes against the bright sunshine. “You must have seen many incredible things in your time. Tell me about some of those things.”
“I do not understand. What things?”
He gave her an odd look. “Things that have made an impression on you.”
“I still don’t understand what you’re asking for.”
Another gust came up and he turned away from the stinging dust, waiting patiently for it to pass before speaking again. “What’s your favorite place to go?”
She looked at him, almost wishing he could see her face. Would the extra input of her expressions be enough to salvage what felt like a hopeless rift in communication?
It didn’t matter. She wasn’t supposed to be seen like that. “What makes one place better than any other?”
His lips pressed into a tight line and he faced forward, sinking into a brooding silence. They walked on the road that way for a while, passing two sweepers busily dusting sand off the road with their myriad tentacles and a travelling merchant with whom Naago bartered to replenish their water stores and acquire more food since he hadn’t packed for two. He stopped them late in the afternoon to stand and watch a pod of sand dolphins diving through the dunes off to one side of the road. She watched him watching them, intrigued by the soft smile and the childish delight that lit his eyes.
Even a day’s walk away, the towering city brought an early dusk over them as the sun sank behind it and he found them a sheltered spot within the dunes that now crept in at the very edge of the road. He gave her his pack to lean on while they sat in the sand and, when they had both settled, he passed her one of the meal bars he carried.
“Do you ever take that thing off?” He gestured to her cloak with a half-eaten meal bar.
“Not where I can be seen.”
“Why n…” His words trailed off and he stood, turning his intense gaze out into the distance like a predator sighting for prey.
The Keeper closed her eyes and followed his gaze with her spirit eyes, quickly spotting the approaching blue glow. A wind spirit. She opened her eyes and stood beside him. The spirit swept low over the dunes, sending up a fine spray of sand to either side like water before the bow of a ship. Its big blue eyes shone bright in the deepening darkness. It drew up before Naago, but its eyes locked on her while its form rippled back and forth, to and fro.
“Wind Lord.” Naago bowed his head in respect.
“If I had known delivering this message would bring me before the Keeper, I would have begged the man to let me carry it rather than delay this moment with the chase.” There was something akin to awe in its whispering melodic voice. “It is a great honor to exist in your presence, Umahk-ra-sehndo.”
True spirits bound to roam forever in this world, the wind spirits could see through all her protections. It was their right, for she was more a part of their world in many ways than she was the world of men, demons, and gods.
She inclined her head. “Thank you, Wind Lord. You are most gracious.”
The blue eyes blinked once and it gazed upon her for a moment longer in silence before turning to Naago.
“Naago-ra, I bring a message.”
“I am grateful to you.” The Endless man held out his palm.
The spirit swirled around him and a pile of red dust appeared upon his palm. Then the spirit settled into its rippling motion once more, its eyes turning to her again as if unable to resist gazing upon her.
“I have completed this task to satisfaction?”
Naago closed his hand. “Yes, Wind Lord. The contract between our races is venerated by your efforts.”
The wind spirit blinked once more then left, spraying sand over Naago as it sped away.
Indifferent to yet one more sand bath, Naago turned to her, giving her a long, scrutinizing look. His pale eyes strained to see into her hood. Her hands itched with the desire to reach up and ensure that the hood hadn’t shifted. She made them stay still at her sides.
“Is something wrong?”
“It called you Umahk-ra-sehndo. A title spoken in the Voice of The Undying. One I’ve never heard before.”
There was a nervous squirming in her gut. The black roots pulled tight upon her skin as they had when she made the decision to go with him. “I know nothing of this.”
He continued to stare as if determined to read the answers he sought in the dark shadows of her hood. He still held up his hand, the fingers closed over the red dust.
She gestured to the hand. “Your message?”
He glanced down with a look of mild surprise. “Yes.”
He moved around her and she stepped to one side, watching while he crouched down and dug into a front panel on his pack with one hand. For a second she considered offering to help, but this man was accustomed to functioning alone. She remained still and quiet. He pulled out a thin slab of red stone about twice the length of his hand. This he held up flat in front of him. She took a step closer now, watching with interest.
“A reading stone?”
“Yes.”
He let the message dust trickle out onto the face of the stone while he moved his hand in a smooth spiraling motion above it until the surface was covered in a fine film. Then he blew upon it and the dust cleared off in a puff. Beneath it, the blank stone now had characters marked upon it in the written language of the Endless tribes.
She read over his shoulder. “You have been summoned to the Temple of The Undying in Valbra.”
He gave her another long look, his brow furrowing. “You can read this?”
Her stomach squirmed again and she took several steps back from him. “Yes.”
“Then you have no demon in your blood. If you are neither god nor demon, what are you?”
She turned away and stared up at the darker form of the distant city looming in the night. “Will you answer the summons?”
“I will, though I do not imagine I will find much welcome.”
She glanced back at him. “Why not?”
He poured a sparing trickle of water over the stone and the characters vanished. When he had the stone put away again, he stood and gave her a hard look. The good-natured curiosity had vanished from his eyes.
“We all have our secrets, don’t we?”
•
Though she woke often in the night with the thought of leaving, morning found them walking together again. Naago’s apparent irritation with her had faded overnight. He was more distant than he had been, his mood contemplative and perhaps a bit sullen as he stared ahead on the road, but not angry as he had seemed when he’d put his back to her to sleep. Soon after the sun began to rise, casting a gold and orange glow over the landscape, she pointed out another pod of sand dolphins, hopi
ng to better his temper.
He stopped as he had the day before, only this time she saw the shine of tears in his eyes while he watched them. She stood watching him once again, feeling the air around them begin to warm up from the chill of the night. Through the black roots, she could feel the spirits of the sand dolphins. She could feel his spirit as well, strong and very old though his face bore no more age than that of a human man in his early forties at most.
“Have you a name other than the Keeper?”
She turned to watch the last member of the pod disappearing in the distance, the early sunlight turning the graceful creatures’ tan skin gold. “Not that I am aware of.”
They began to walk again. He kept silent while a group of seven young crossbreeds on flyers sped past, several of them looking down on him with disdain. The red-skinned leader went so far as to bare his pointed teeth and toss his mane of flaming locks as he tipped the flyer just enough to shoot up a spray of fine sand at Naago.
The crossbreeds often thought themselves better than men because they were stronger and faster. They weren’t likely to recognize the Endless man for what he really was, which was probably for the best. His kind was of a different blood than common men and their inherent ability alone made them an easy match for any crossbreed. A young, hotheaded bunch like this might be tempted by such a challenge.
When they were out of sight, he took off his hat and shook the sand off the brim. “How did you become what you are?”
She glanced at him, hoping to understand without asking more questions, but it was no good. His face told her nothing. “What do you mean?”
“Were you born the way you are now, with the powers and responsibilities you have?”
“I am the Keeper. I have always been this way.”
He gave her a look full of sympathy, which only served to confuse her more. “Even as a child?”
Why did he ask such questions? Her chest tightened with inexplicable sorrow. “I do not remember a childhood.”
The Keeper (The Endless Chronicles Book 1) Page 4