by S. G. Night
Racath knew it was a test of sincerity, Oron’s way of seeing if he had really meant what he had promised. So each time Oron hexed him, Racath would take a moment to recover, shunt his irritation to the back of his mind, and continue talking as though nothing had happened. Although he didn’t say anything, Oron looked impressed.
When he was finished, Oron expressed his satisfaction with Racath’s goal and asked if he had told Nelle. Racath sheepishly admitted that Nelle still hadn’t spoken to him since she’d left the pit after their argument. Oron gave him a sympathetic grimace — apparently, Nelle wasn’t the kind of person who was quick to anger. It took a lot of effort to piss her off.
Racath asked what he could possibly do to apologize. If there was something special he could do to make it up to her. The older Majiski just smiled and shook his head. It would take more than flowers and a note to put Nelle in a forgiving mood, he told him. She would only respond to an earnest, verbal apology.
Oron then informed Racath that he, along with Sokol and Elohim, would be leaving the domus temporarily; he needed to travel downrange to a sequestered village in the Spikes to acquire some materials necessary for Racath’s curriculum. By his estimate, he would be gone until the following Keirtag: a full week from that morning.
Seeing as Racath had the next eight days to himself, Oron encouraged him to spend his time exploring the eight-mile-diameter ring of the domus’ landscape, perusing the library, and finding a way to make amends with Nelle. Oron had already told Nelle that they had the day off from sparring, but starting tomorrow, they would be expected to bout for several hours every afternoon. It would be in Racath’s best interest, Oron intimated, to get back on her good side before then.
——
Oron left around midday, hiking out over the hills of the domus toward the distant wall and the tunnel that led to the gloomy world outside. Sokol and Elohim flew along above him, two angels against the sky. Racath watched until they had vanished from sight. Then he went looking for Nelle.
She wasn’t in her bedroom. She wasn’t in the library or the living room. She wasn’t in the gardens or by the well. She wasn’t at the chicken coop, the pig pen, the pit, or even the bathing pool. Which meant she had to be somewhere out amongst the domus’s hills and meadows.
Racath donned the cloak-coat of his Shadow, slipped on his Stinger gauntlets, and strapped on his boots. He left his hood down and his miscellaneous weapons behind. Stepping out the front door and down the porch steps, he paused to look out over the expanse of the domus, its greenery stretching out for miles in every direction.
Oron had mentioned that the domus was about eight miles in diameter. Racath did the mental math and came up with roughly fifty square miles of area to cover. Should be easy enough, he thought. Taking a dramatic breath of crisp mountain wind, he set out to find the girl with golden hair.
I won’t bore you with the fruitless hours Racath spent searching for Nelle. By the time the artificial sun had begun to sink, he had barely covered a miniscule fraction of the domus. All he had gotten for his trouble was one brief glimpse of golden hair in the distance — which had immediately vanished without a trace as soon as he called out Nelle’s name.
It wasn’t until sunset, during his dejected hike back to Oron’s cottage, that he realized just how badly he had underestimated what “fifty square miles” meant. The domus was the size of a fauling city.
Idiot.
He caught sight of her again about a hundred yards from the cottage. She was standing on the porch, her blond hair glistening in the crimson light of the setting sun. Racath called out to her again, breaking into a brisk jog towards the house. Nelle turned, saw him, then vanished behind the house.
“Nelle!” Racath shouted again, accelerating into a sprint. He reached the house and searched for her in the backyard. But she wasn’t there. Nothing. She was gone.
Racath blew out an explosive sigh. He knew when he wasn’t wanted.
Sullen, he slogged back around the house, up the stairs, and through the front door. “Women…” he cursed. “Try to tell them they’re wrong and they chew you up and spit you out. Try and come crawling back to say you’re sorry, and it just turns into a stupid game of groveling.”
He carelessly kicked off his boots in the foyer and slouched into the living room where he began to pace again. His fists started clenching and unclenching, his Stinger blades opening with a sharp clack and shut again with a whispered ssst.
“And half the time they won’t even let you grovel!” he spat. “They never tell you what they want you to do, and when you ask them to, they get all pissed off that you don’t know the answer on your own. Fauling overcomplicated. Why do they have to be so guarded and cryptic?”
With each muttered sentence, Racath’s pacing grew faster and faster. With each quickening step, his Stingers clacked open and shut with greater frequency. Clack! Ssst! Clack! Ssst! Clack ssst! Clack ssst! Clackssstclackssstclackssst!
“Faul,” Racath swore again. “This is ridiculous. I just want to apologize! Why is she making it so damn difficult? Why?!”
He’d been expecting an answer, but no response came. He looked around, but the room was empty. It was only then that he realized that he was alone in the cottage. Sokol had gone with Elohim on Oron’s trip. He had grown so used to her presence, to thinking aloud with her, that he hadn’t even noticed that she wasn’t around to hear his ranting. Her absence suddenly struck him like a lead brick. His pacing halted.
Sokol was his outlet. His confidant. Without her — and without Nelle — Racath felt strangely alone.
Sheepish, Racath stilled his tongue and shuffled toward his room. On the way, he stopped to find something to read from Oron’s library. But he couldn’t focus enough on the titles to make a decision, so he took the copy of Seven Storms Away by Isaachar Basti — something he had read a dozen times already. Slumping into his narrow bed, he opened the book and flipped through the flyleaf.
He struggled to read for a long while, but couldn’t muster the concentration to get through the first page. Eventually, Racath gave up and set the book down on the table. Blowing out the candle, he curled up under his blankets and went to sleep early. Sleep, he had always found, was one of the best ways to sulk.
——
Racath spent the next morning dreading the arrival of midday. Oron had warned him that it would be safest for everyone involved if Racath could make up with Nelle before their obligatory sparring session. Which…he hadn’t.
When noon finally came, he dressed in the full cocoon of his Shadow, gauntlets and all. Then he reconsidered and stripped off the cloak-coat, weapons, and gauntlets. This left him wearing only his boots, plain black tunic, and trousers. He left his markara bare.
Nervous as a chicken bound for the chopping block, Racath made his way down to the pit. There he waited, pacing a nervous circle around the perimeter. The steel toes of his boots kicked up puffs of sand with every step.
Five minutes past. Then twenty. Racath's pacing hastened.
After a long hour, the sound of footsteps finally descended the stairs, bringing Racath’s circuit to a stop. Nelle wore the same thing she had worn the day before: half-shirt, pants, and elbow-length gloves. Over her shoulder she carried the bag of training weapons, which she dropped unceremoniously into the sand. She did not look at him. Her face was blank and unresponsive as a statue. But Racath could see the anger in her ice-blue eyes.
She approached him, every step awkward and stiff. Eyes still fixed on the ground, Nelle walked right up to Racath — and threw a punch at his nose.
There had been no hint, no warning to foretell the attack. But Racath had seen it coming nonetheless. He pivoted away, and Nelle’s hand went flying past his ear.
The unconscious, analytical part of Racath’s brain assessed the augur in a short instant. Her fist was clenched, not open and controlled like she had demonstrated the other day. All of her unreadable rigidity had evaporated — now, her teeth were bared
and her eyes flashing bright with temper. But she was off-balance. She hadn’t found sure footing before attacking.
So Racath tripped her as the momentum of her punch carried her forward. Yelling, Nelle stumbled four steps forward before she caught herself against the wall. Turning back, her eyes seared him. Her snarl was unbelievable. The look she gave him could have blasted a hole in the domus.
“Nelle,” Racath tried to say. “Listen, I—”
Before he could finish, Nelle flew at him, her hands flying in a flurry of wild punches. Thus began their sparring session for the day. If you really want to call it that.
Racath held his own this time, remaining on the defensive amidst her barrage of whirling fists. He used his arms to keep her just out of reach. It only aggravated her more, and she let out a wordless growl of frustration as she fruitlessly battered Racath’s elbows.
He knew exactly what was going on. She was furious with him, livid, and she was trying to beat him to a pulp because of it. But her anger was uncontrolled, sloppy, leaving him plenty of opportunity to block every attack. It was almost as if she were trying to provoke him, to get him to strike back.
But Racath wouldn’t. Instead, he moved only defensively, blocking her advances. He blocked until his arms were sore from the impacts. He blocked until the impacts started to weaken as Nelle grew gradually tired. He blocked until the augur was literally screeching in fury.
“Damn you!” Nelle finally shouted through her grinding teeth. “Hit back! Damn you — hit back!”
“I won’t,” Racath replied calmly. “Nelle, stop it, I—”
“No!” Nelle screamed back. “Shut up — Shut up!” She launched another punch at his groin.
Racath slapped her hand aside. “Listen to me!” he demanded — Holy Mother of heaven, this woman had issues.
“No!” she screamed again. “Shut up and hit back! Hit back, God damn you! Hit back! Hit—”
“Enough.”
Racath caught both her wrists and twisted her into a body-lock, pinning her arms down to her sides. She snarled again like a raging cat but Racath held her fast. He imprisoned her in the iron bands of his arms, trapping her back against his chest like he was hugging her from behind.
“Let me go!”
“Nelle! Listen! To! Me!” he shouted in her ear. “Relax! I just want to talk to you!”
Nelle wriggled and grunted angrily, but she didn’t shout again. He didn’t know if he’d get another chance to speak, so he seized the opportunity.
“I get it, I get all of it!” he told her. “I thought about what you said, and you’re right! I talked to Oron, and I just wanted to apologize to you too!”
Nelle did not respond aloud but her struggling slowed. Her body heaved as she panted. Her snarling began to diminish.
“You were right to say what you did,” Racath said, his voice becoming more soothing as Nelle’s anger subsided. “I am sorry. I’m sorry I was selfish and I’m sorry I doubted you.”
The augur stopped resisting entirely. She allowed herself to go limp in Racath’s arms, her breaths coming long and deep. But still she did not speak.
Racath craned his neck around over her shoulder to get a look at her face. “Do you hear me?” he asked gently. “I’m sorry.”
Nelle finally looked at him. Thin tears lined her eyes. “Are you truly?” she asked. “Or do you merely wish to spare yourself my anger?”
She was quoting something. An allusion to Isaachar Basti. It was from Under Night’s Embrace — by far Basti’s least noteworthy work. Racath knew the entire book line-by-line. And so he answered appropriately.
“If sorry is truly sorrow and regret, then yes, no man could be as sorry as I am,” Racath said.
Nelle fixed him with her stare and quoted again. “Gilded though your tongue might be, I fear you speak to your own vanity.”
It was a line from Passion’s Fall this time. The scene where the young hero tries to beguile the beautiful daughter of the nobleman.
“Vanity comes in unheeded words and prideful lies. But for you, my tongue spills only truthful cries. Yours it is to judge their worth. Lady, they are sincere; would you find me so unjustly wanting?”
After a moment of silence, Nelle answered with Seven Storms Away. “So I have made my meaning clear, milord?”
“Indeed, good friend,” Racath spoke the hero’s line. “The lesson is learned, and the learning is mine.”
“Question me again and I will break you,” Nelle said, now quoting an early chapter of Eldin of the Fae. “There is still much for you to learn from me, still much for me to show. Listen well and I will make you strong. Promise me your faith and I will show you all there is to know.”
It was the line said by the faerie mistress who taught the character of Eldin about magic and power. He answered in Eldin’s words:
“Give me all that you will, My Lady Light. And I shall make you proud.”
The ice that had coated Nelle’s demeanor began to thaw away. A tepid smile melted its way through. “You’d better, Thanjel,” she said shyly, her playfulness beginning to resurface.
“I’m sorry for being stupid,” Racath said, returning her smile. “Am I forgiven?”
“Yeah, you’re forgiven,” she sighed. Then she grinned shamefacedly at him. “Can you forgive me?”
“For what?”
Nelle rolled her eyes. “Oh, you don’t need to pretend with me. I was being just as much of a child as you were. I may have over reacted a bit.”
Racath couldn’t help but laugh aloud. “Yeah, just a little bit. Now, are you gonna hit me again, or can I let you go?”
The girl with golden hair made a mock-pensive face and leaned her head against his shoulder. “I dunno. This is kinda nice…”
Blushing, Racath released her. She laughed at him and he felt his heart lift.
“Are we good?”
“We are,” she answered. Then she looked at the ground. “Just…no more doubts, okay?”
Racath nodded. “I want us to be friends, Nelle — I trust you, you trust me. I’ll be your Dragon Amongst Wolves and you’ll be my augur. No doubts, no secrets between us, that’s my promise. But that goes both ways.” He lifted his eyebrows at her. “Right?”
“Right…” she suddenly seemed hesitant. She was picking nervously at her gloves. “No secrets….”
He didn’t look away from her. “Promise?”
She shook herself, nodded. Then smiled again. “Promise. Come on,” she said, holding up her hands again. “We should probably spar a little for real. If you’re willing to hit me this time.”
It was Racath’s turn to roll his eyes, a crooked grin finding his lips.
——
They spent the next hour or so sparring in the pit. Nelle was much more controlled this time, and she landed more than half of the strikes she threw at him. But the entire time, she was laughing, giddy, grinning like a little girl. The contrast was so stark it left Racath a little befuddled for a while.
They cycled through empty-handed fighting, swordplay, and an assortment of other training weapons. She instructed him as best she could, and in return he showed her some tricks with the Stingers.
When they decided they were finished, they left the pit, talking and laughing. Nelle led him to the nearby pool where they bathed together again. Racath felt only marginally less embarrassed about the whole thing. But he was at least a little more at ease than he had been the first time.
I should be clear on something: neither of them were blind. And they didn’t spend the entire time with their backs turned, either. They each saw each other. It was tentative at first, but after a while it became…easier. Eventually, Racath felt comfortable looking at her. He could look her in the eyes while she talked without feeling like he was violating her personal space. Eventually, her own gaze didn’t seem to bother him as much anymore, either.
And as I said, Racath wasn’t blind — Nelle was beautiful. Undeniably so. Although she still wore her inexplicable g
loves. The black leather darkened the water, like blood beneath the crystal surface.
——
After they as well as their newly washed clothes had dried out on the rocks, they redressed and returned to the cottage. By the time all the chores were done, the sun was setting again and the air was growing pleasantly cool. They entered the house, leaving their boots in the foyer, and headed for the kitchen.
“Take a seat,” Nelle offered grandly. “I’ll whip up some dinner.”
Racath remembered the morning two days prior, when he had wanted so desperately to get up and help her. How he had felt so weak, like something was preventing him from assisting her. Well. That feeling was gone, now.
He put a hand on her shoulder. “Allow me,” he grinned. “It’s my turn.”
“Oooo, he cooks, too?” Nelle mused, raising her eyebrows. “This should be good. You sure you can handle yourself?”
Imitating something she had done a few days before, Racath showed her his tongue. “I was forced to learn to how to cook when I was thirteen. With Pots — you know, the Velik Tor cook. Not a fun experience, but I learned a lot.”
“Aww, woe is you,” she teased, tapping his nose with a finger. “Alrighty then. Dazzle me.”
They bantered some more over dinner, talking about everything and nothing at the same time. While Nelle was jovial again, Racath could remember the edges of the ice that had frozen her eyes before. Something was still troubling her.
But, for now, Nelle was smiling once more. And Racath found himself smiling too. It had been a good day. He had his friend back. His nightfire. That was the most important thing.
TWENTY-FIVE
Dosdom
Oron returned late on Boltag night, Sokol and Elohim at his shoulders, just a few hours ahead of schedule. Since the day that they had reconciled in the pit, Racath and Nelle had spent nearly every waking moment in each other’s company. They had sparred every afternoon, per Oron’s request, honing each other’s talents and strengthening each other’s weak-points. She instructed him on the sword and hand-to-hand fighting. He coached her with the Stingers, demonstrating the fine nuances that he had mastered long ago. By the end of the week, they had reached the point where she could hold her own against him with Stingers, and he could occasionally best her with hand-fighting. If she let him.