by Jeff Gunzel
Immovable Mountain: “Eric, come back inside. I already told you once, and I’m not going to tell you again. You can play when you’ve completed your studies.”
“Dad, we’re never going to be finished. I never get to play with the other kids.”
“I’m sorry, Son, but I promise you...someday you will understand.”
Dancing Winds: “Where is my mom? The other kids all have a mother. Where did she go?”
“Son, I’m afraid she isn’t with us any longer. She passed away shortly after you were born.”
“Is...is it my fault?”
Gentle rain: “I’m not doing this anymore! No one else has to study this hard. None of the other kids have weapons shoved in their hands every single day, then forced to push themselves to complete exhaustion.”
“What the other kids do is of no concern to me. You will do this because I told you to. Eric, I’m your father.”
Skin the Wolf: Eric, I’m your father.
Thunderstorm: Eric, I’m your father.
Quivering Leaf: Eric, I’m your father.
His fiery blade whirled around him effortlessly as he transitioned through the forms, each melting smoothly into the other with frightening efficiency. His lungs burned in the thin air as the exotic dance went on for hours before exhaustion finally began to set in. His arms felt like lead as the forms came slower and slower. His body screamed; his muscles burned with white-hot fire, begging him to stop pushing human limits—a pleading request he defiantly ignored.
But human limits were what ultimately stopped the dance of death as he dropped to his knees. His labored breath came in long, hard gasps while he kneeled on all fours, trying to summon the strength to do it all over again, strength not even a God possessed. He pushed himself back up to his feet, determined to go on with the only thing that was able to distract him, to help him forget he had failed his friends when they needed him most; to help him forget he was trapped on top of this cursed platform with no apparent way down. He lifted the blade slowly as if it weighted a hundred pounds before his knees buckled once more, sending him sprawling back to the ground.
He lay there face down as his labored breath came in short pants. With a strained effort he was able to slowly slide his hands into his sides, but the simple act of pushing himself up proved to be no easier that moving a mountain. His arms simply went limp and flopped back to the ground. Hanging on to consciousness by a thread, he felt a cold muzzle snuggle up to his cheek as he lay there helplessly. The quick strokes of a rough forked tongue found their way around his face and neck, licking the salty sweat away. A sad thought occurred to him before total exhaustion pulled him into blackness. You might be the only friend I have left.
****
Jacob stared right through Athel like she wasn’t even there. His eyes were unfocused and off-centered, as if honed in on something far off in the distance instead. His blank expression remained completely unreadable while he sat on the ground with his legs crossed and arms wrapped around himself. He began to rock back and forth ever so slightly, looking as if a stiff breeze would surely topple him.
Athel held her open hands out passively, not sure what he was thinking and trying to appear as harmless as possible. Fearing he may well leap up and run away from her, she moved toward him with care, each step slow and deliberate, but he never once threatened to move as she approached. She ran a gentle hand across his shoulder while turning to his back, then leaned down and melted into him, softly wrapping him in a hug while placing her cheek against his. “It’s still me, you know,” she whispered before pressing her cold wet lips against his cheek. “I would never hurt you. You know that, don’t you?”
To her great relief he reached back around her neck, pulling her in even closer. “Athel, you know I trust you with my life. By the Gods, you’ve saved it several times already, and not a day will ever go by that I won’t think about that. But I’m asking you as a friend—no, I’m begging you—to please tell me what’s going on. What’s happening to you? Your physical strength, that aggression I’ve never seen from you before. I wasn’t sure if you were going to make love to me or kill me yesterday.”
She gasped in horror. It hadn’t been a dream!
He whirled around and faced her suddenly. “And what’s going on with your eyes? I’ve never seen anything like it before.”
She took a step back as her hand absently touched her cheek. She had all but forgotten about this. “What’s wrong with my eyes?”
He cautiously stepped in closer, placing his hand on her cheek. His thumb gently swept the skin under her eye as he forced a smile. “Well, I don’t actually know that anything is wrong with them. They seem to be working just fine, and given the amount of strange things we’ve already seen, I’m no longer sure what’s considered wrong anymore. But regardless, you need to know.” She tensed up as he pulled her in close. The reassuring hug from her friend went on for some time before he finally spoke again. “Your pupils have changed shape,” he whispered. “They’ve become slitted like a cat’s.”
Her first panicked instinct was to push him away, but he hung on to her as tightly as he could. If she really wanted to send him flying through the air it would have been simple feat. As it was, he still had to fight hard to maintain his grip on the girl who had had suddenly become considerably stronger than himself. “Shhh, shhh...it’s OK,” he said while fighting to keep her close. “We’re going to figure all this out, I promise you. Everything is going to be fine.”
She suddenly went limp in his arms, sobbing uncontrollably. Athel didn’t know how much more of this she could take; her world was crumbling all around her and she felt powerless to stop it. “No no no,” she pleaded in between sniffles, all the while rolling her forehead back and forth under his neck. Jacob held her close, allowing his friend to release her pain and confusion in any way that suited her. With a last sniffle she looked up at him, then carefully pushed away as her tear-streaked face gazed off to the south. “Can you hear them?”
“What? No...hear what? I don’t hear anything.”
She had already forgotten that her hearing was so sensitive now. Of course Jacob couldn’t hear the light chattering off in the distance. “Look, I know this is going to sound crazy, but you have to believe me. When that beast entered the camp...well...it spoke to me.” Jacob simply nodded. He was no longer in a position to question anything. “It told me these men were coming and that we should go with them. I...I think Jade is with them.”
His eyes widened with excitement. “She’s alive! What about Eric? Is he with them as well?”
“I don’t know, Jacob,” she said honestly. “But there is only one way to find out. I mean, what choice do we have anyway? We have no real shelter and only a limited supply of food. We’re going to die out here sooner or later, so we might as well take this chance.”
Jacob’s face hardened as he looked over her shoulder. Now he was able to hear horses clopping along as well as a stray voice here and there. Nodding his agreement, he walked a few paces from the camp. Still within the light of the campfire, he began waving his arms while shouting into the night. Athel walked up beside him and did the same.
The distant laughter stopped abruptly, but the clopping increased as the men broke into a near gallop. The outlines of riders began to form from the shadows as they neared the camp. Before either Athel or Jacob could blink, the horsemen had burst through the darkness and surrounded them. Each of the six riders pointed down at them with thin curved blades sparkling as they caught tiny bits of light from the fire. The two of them raised their hands up high, silently questioning the wisdom of this move.
“I dare say these two must be the ones we’ve been looking for,” said the thin rider with oddly squinted eyes and long black hair. His black full-body leather armor made him look almost invisible while mounted on his sleek-looking black horse. Laughter erupted from underneath the gray hoods of the other five riders, although one voice was distinctly female.
Jacob s
tepped forward. “Greetings to you all on this fine evening. We are—”
“We are well aware of who you are, young man.” The man’s accent was quick and sharp. He turned toward Athel. “And you must be...” His sudden alarm became quite obvious as he looked into her eyes, then urgently motioned to the hooded rider on his left while muttering something incoherent. The rider leapt down off his horse and quickly approached Athel. Startled by their sudden aggression, she grabbed Jacob’s arm and moved in closer to him.
Jacob shifted his shoulder, trying to prevent the rider from getting any closer to her. “Hey, what’s going on? What are you doing to her?”
The man pulled back his hood only far enough to get a good look at Athel, revealing the same odd-looking eyes the other man had. He turned back around with a concerned look and shook his head, indicating their suspicions were true.
The man in black sighed and looked around at the others, apparently waiting for suggestions.
One of the riders pointed his sword toward her. “She is too dangerous to bring back with us. I say we kill her right now!” Athel leapt back several feet and landed on all fours in a low defensive stance, hissing like some sort of animal.
“No!” the leader of the group barked. “Our orders were to find them and bring them back. After that, they can do whatever they want with them.” The other man slowly sheathed his sword just as Jacob ran over to Athel to stand over her protectively with his small dagger in hand. “But precautions will have to be taken,” he continued. “First of all, you both must be blindfolded. For all we know, you two are spies seeking the exact location of our village.” He then looked at Athel, “I’m sorry, but you will have to be bound as well. I can see you are only in the early stages of transition, but you still can’t be trusted. The two of you either accept these terms or stay out here and starve to death. Whichever choice you make is of little concern to me.”
Jacob had just started to protest when Athel stopped him by grabbing his shoulder. Her voice was calm and even sounded a bit relieved. “We accept your terms.” These men seemed to have at least some idea of what was happening to her. That alone was good enough for her.
Chapter 12
The tiny green jewel strapped across Nima’s forehead twinkled as it caught bits of light from the low, burning lantern hanging in the corner. The beautiful girl tilted her head thoughtfully while keeping her eyes fixed on Jade, but Jade’s returning scowl held more frost than a mountaintop. The deep silence hung heavy in the air, but neither girl broke off their stare. The apparent standoff ensued for some time before Jade finally spoke. “So how long do you plan to keep me prisoner here?”
Hunched over on a stool with no backing, Nima seemed to ponder the question as her eyes drifted upward in thought. “The answer to your question depends on too many factors to be certain, dear,” she finally replied with an almost bored look on her face—a look that didn’t match her quick, hurried speech. “Maybe a day...maybe a year...but I would like to point out where your reasoning is slightly incorrect.” She sat up straight and flipped her long black hair over her right shoulder. Her dark eyes suddenly turned to steel as her face went hard as stone. “You’re not exactly a prisoner here. It would be more accurate to say...that you are my property.”
Jade returned a look that made Nima’s appear to be all milk and honey. “Your property?” she hissed. Her fists trembled, but her voice remained surprisingly calm. “Like a chair or table? Or perhaps you mean more like a dog. Although a dog is a pet, and even pets are not considered property. Is that it? Am I now your...pet?”
Nima’s icy expression melted away as amusement filled her eyes, further enraging Jade. “Well, well. She does have a bit of fire in her belly. But I still don’t understand why you are complaining. If not for me, you would be dead. And by all rights we should have left you on the beach to be consumed by crabs. In fact, I’ve taken a great risk by claiming you as my own. It’s quite clear to me you are not from these lands, and I felt it was important to bring you back to the village so we could learn all we can from you: of your lands, your culture, why you are here. But in order to do that I had to lay claim to your life. This is the way of our people. Anything you do or don’t do is now my responsibility. Do you understand? You are now my property until Kelus or I tell you otherwise.”
Jade began a series of breathing exercises to help slow her heart rate and calm herself down, all the while trying to stay composed as she met Nima’s eyes. “I see,” she said calmly before breaking off her stare and glancing toward the door. “And this Kelus, he is just outside, is he?”
“No, but there are a few guards.”
“I can handle a few guards.”
“They are merely a precaution, dear. You would never get that far.”
“Oh...I see,” Jade said absently as the icy standoff continued once more. The following seconds felt like hours as their eyes remained locked.
Suddenly, Jade exploded from her seat on the cot and bolted toward the door. She was quickly met by a hard, rigid hand strike aimed at her throat. The skilled assassin got her hand up just in time to take the brunt of it, although it threw her off balance a bit. She leapt back and got both hands up high in an aggressive stance.
“There is no need for this,” said Nima as she shook the tingle from her numb hand. “I told you before you can’t possibly—”
Jade quickly closed in with impossible speed, cutting off the woman’s sentence with a left hook to the ribs. Six more lightning-fast punches found homes across her chest before a hard wheel kick caught her square in the mouth, sending her sprawling across the floor. Jade turned toward the door, already devising a plan to take out however many guards stood outside. Weaponless, she would simply have to overwhelm them with her speed, as she had done to so many before. But two steps was all the progress she made before her body seized up in a series of painful convulsions. She hit the ground hard while her body flopped and jolted about like a fish that had jumped into a boat. Her teeth locked together as the crippling pain surged through.
Nima slowly walked toward Jade with her palm held out while the green jewel strung to her forehead seemed to pulse with light. Her once dark eyes now shone green as they pulsed in rhythm along with the jewel. She used the back of her other hand to wipe the trickle of blood running from the corner of her mouth.
“Stupid girl!” she barked, more irritated at herself for significantly underestimating this warrior. “My untying you in the first place was a courtesy. I see good in your eyes, and yet you make me regret my decision so easily?”
“I-I’m n-not going to s-stop trying!” shrieked Jade through chattering teeth as her body flopped around the floor helplessly, white foam now seeping from the corners of her mouth.
Slowly Nima lowered her hand as the light from both her eyes and the jewel began to fade away. Jade’s violent twitching ended in a sudden surge as her chest pushed out and her back arched in a nearly grotesque fashion. With her eyes bugged out and mouth open as wide as it would go, she gasped for air as if she had been underwater for over a minute. After several desperate breaths she rolled onto her side, showing a bit more composure as her breathing began to steady, but in a raspy voice through heavy coughing she was still able to whisper, “You can’t keep me here. I’ll find a way to reach Eric, I swear.”
Nima’s forehead crinkled with lines of sadness as she looked down on the poor girl. “I was afraid you would say that.” She threw her hands into the air and sighed loudly while turning away. “Are you going to make me do this over and over again? I assure you, the result will never be any different.” She turned back toward Jade. “I take no joy in hurting you, surely you know that.”
“Then let me go,” Jade growled.
“I can’t! It’s not even up to me anymore.” Nima slammed a fist into her open palm in frustration. “Such ignorance! You just show up in a foreign land and pretend to know how things are supposed to work. You know nothing of my people, just like I know nothing of you
rs. And to be blunt, that is really the only reason you are alive right now. Your knowledge of the old world holds great value to us. Other than that, you are simply another mouth to feed.”
Jade drew in on herself as she hugged her knees to her chest. Everything Nima had just said was true, and for someone who had spent most of her childhood learning about all the different cities and cultures within Tarmerria, she should certainly have known better. For all Jade knew, the penalty for not keeping her “property” in line could be death. She owed this girl at least some measure of cooperation; after all, she had saved her life. It was just that she wanted to get back to her friends so badly it hurt. What if they were in trouble? What if they were hurt? What if...
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I don’t want you to think I’m ungrateful for saving my life. And you’re right; I know nothing of your culture at all. It’s just that I’m so worried about my friends, and as long as I’m being held here I can’t help them if they are in trouble.”
Nima let out a sigh as she leaned back against the wall with her arms crossed, the metallic taste of blood still fresh in her mouth. She spit a clear and red swirl onto the floor while silently cursing herself once again for underestimating the speed of this young assassin. Her ribs had certainly seen better days as well. “Our laws must be followed, that’s all there is to it. For what it’s worth, I assure you they are looking for your friends as we speak. Perhaps not for all the reasons you might hope, but looking nonetheless. As far you simply leaving, well, that was never really a possibility.” She absently wiggled her sore jaw, wondering to herself how much truth there was to that last statement.