by Will Wight
If anyone could tell him how to break free, Whisper could.
Elder Whisper had joined the clan founders to create the Wei clan, dominating the native Remnants to carve out a section of wilderness in Sacred Valley. He had created the Path of the White Fox, the most common Path in the entire clan, and used its powers to control and assimilate several lesser clans. Not even the current Wei Patriarch was as honored as Elder Whisper.
So when Lindon finally reached the door at the top of the stairs, he set his heavy bucket down and took a moment to catch his breath. He couldn’t appear before Elder Whisper panting like a dog.
To open the lock, he had to brace it in the crook of his sling-wrapped arm and twist with his free hand. Both the lock and the key were heavy bronze, each bigger than his head. Why they had to use such giant devices to secure Whisper’s door, he couldn’t imagine. They didn’t appear scripted, only heavy. Surely a normal lock and key would work just as well.
Once he finally wrestled the lock open, he had to lean his shoulder against the slab of a door, forcing a way inside with his whole strength.
He pulled the bucket inside and let the door slam shut once again. The inside of the door was covered by a scripted mirror—part of a spirit-trap, designed to keep Remnants and sacred beasts imprisoned by their own madra. While the door was open, the circle was incomplete, and Whisper could sneak out.
If he did, he would find himself stuck on the stairs, unable to cross the closed circle at the tower’s base. As far as Lindon knew, Whisper had never even tried to escape. He enjoyed a respected position, intervened in clan affairs as much as he wanted, and the elders released him from the tower on formal occasions. As a boy, Lindon had wondered why Whisper was trapped in the first place, but it was simply one more part of the way things were.
Lindon had heard several myths about Whisper’s imprisonment, but never one he believed. The truth was likely beyond his comprehension.
Elder Whisper sat on his haunches, watching the clan below through an open floor-to-ceiling archway. A line of script engraved in the floor prevented him from simply leaping out and running down the side of the tower.
Cold wind, crisp with the scents of a spring night, ruffled his white fur. Five bushy tails lashed behind him, tracing arcane patterns in the air that reminded Lindon of a script.
“You have eaten of a wonderful fruit,” said the sacred fox. “Tell me the story.”
Lindon dropped to his knees next to the bucket of fish, bowing respectfully. He was more conscious than ever of the flickering lightning in his core. “This one found an ancestral orus tree, Elder. This one was fortunate enough to obtain its fruit after it was destroyed.”
Whisper turned slightly, fixing Lindon with one jet-black eye. “There is more.”
Chapter 4
Naturally, Lindon concealed nothing before Elder Whisper. “This one engaged in a small conflict with a Copper practitioner from the clan. In the battle, the tree was broken, and a Remnant released. This one was able to protect himself.”
The Wei clan’s signature Path of the White Fox had been created by—and named for—the very sacred beast that stood before him now. They produced madra that deceived the senses, that created illusions, that twisted light and sound. And Elder Whisper was the Path’s original master.
A second five-tailed snowfox stepped out from the first, like an image walking away from a mirror. This second body dipped its muzzle into the bucket of fish even as the first continued speaking. “The Foundation stage defends himself from a Remnant, and leaves with its prize. Commendable.”
Lindon bowed deeply. “This one is unworthy of such praise.”
Neither Whisper responded. One continued devouring the fish, while the other examined Lindon with eyes of opaque darkness. On any other day, Lindon would take his leave now.
But the First Elder had thought that Whisper might be able to help him. “This one humbly begs a question of you, Elder.”
A fuzzy snout slid over his shoulder, cold lips brushing past his cheek. He focused his entire body on remaining still, on not trembling, as a third Elder Whisper rested his head on Lindon’s shoulder.
“Speak,” the third sacred beast said quietly.
“This one is not allowed to follow a Path of the sacred arts.”
“Why should the Wei clan water a tree that will never bear fruit?” Elder Whisper asked, simultaneously watching Lindon from three directions.
“An Unsouled may never have a family of his own, for fear of passing on his deformity to a new generation.” Lindon couldn’t keep bitterness from his voice. “He cannot practice sacred arts, and so cannot travel or engage in battle. This one cannot rise if he does not bring honor to the clan, but he is not permitted to do so.”
Elder Whisper and his two reflections began to pace around him, three five-tailed snowfoxes each bigger than a man. Lindon shivered as the fox’s head slid back away from his shoulder, but kept himself in place out of discipline. The elder was still an ancient sacred beast, mysterious and feral, and if he devoured Lindon no one in the clan would make a sound of protest.
“What are the sacred arts?” the elder asked, his murmur coming from three directions at once.
“The path of refining a spirit and pursuing connection to all of creation,” Lindon recited. There were many correct answers to Elder Whisper’s question, and any child of Sacred Valley could recount them on command.
“When does that path reach its end?”
This answer was more vague, but Lindon answered as best he could. “When an artist’s spirit is as pure as gold.” Gold was the final stage of any sacred artist’s Path.
A tail whipped the back of Lindon’s skull, leaving a sharp sting. “Is a Gold practitioner one with heaven and earth? Does he control everything in creation? Can he create worlds and break them at will?”
The obvious answer was ‘no,’ but Elder Whisper would not be satisfied by the obvious. In humility, Lindon fell to his knees and pressed his face to the floor, despite the groan of pain from his broken arm. “This one is unworthy to even guess at such profound answers, Elder.”
The fox’s chuckle softly filled the room as his three bodies continued to circle. “There is no profound answer here, young human. The answer is ‘no.’”
Hesitantly, Lindon raised his head. “Pardon this one’s ignorance, but…does the Path not end with Gold?”
“The spirit has no limit, nor does the sky. How could a true Path have an ending? If you studied until the end of the universe, you would still have not touched true comprehension. The Path of the White Fox is but one among countless others, and none reach the end.”
“This one thanks you for the enlightenment, Elder Whisper,” Lindon said, though he still didn’t fully understand what the sacred beast meant to teach him.
All three foxes paused, side by side, regarding Lindon. “When a traveler cannot find a path, sometimes he must make his own.”
Understanding washed over Lindon, and he bowed again out of gratitude. The shame that had been exposed by the First Elder’s words ignited like tinder until determination blazed alongside the lightning in his belly.
One of the Whispers blinked out of reality, leaving one staring Lindon in the eye and one feasting on fish. “Remember. Cutting a road through a forest is always harder than following one already cut.”
Lindon straightened. “If all it takes is work, Elder Whisper, this one will not fail you.”
“Fate is not fair, but it is just. Hard work is never in vain…even when it does not achieve what you wished.” With those words, the five-tailed fox faded away, leaving only the real Elder Whisper enjoying his meal.
Though the elder had clearly dismissed him, Lindon had to show his respect before leaving. He bowed deeply three times to Elder Whisper’s back, taking the empty bucket from the elder’s last feeding and returning down the stairs.
The trip down was no easier on Lindon’s legs than the trip up, and his broken arm had begun to ache ev
en through his mother’s script, but he spent the time in contemplation. The First Elder had spoken of Lindon’s situation as though he should give up and accept his fate, but Whisper had given him the opposite advice.
Lindon knew which he preferred. The First Elder would have him wait at home, safe and relatively content, but he would die having accomplished nothing. The fruit’s power tingled in his core, begging him to process it, urging him to take the first step on a Path of his own devising.
When he returned home, his family was gone. He sat cross-legged in the center of his house, focused entirely inward, cycling his madra with a greater intensity than ever before.
He felt as though he should make some breakthrough tonight, as though Elder Whisper’s words should trigger some understanding that would take him to a higher level and allow him to comprehend some deep truth. Or perhaps the spirit-fruit would show more of an effect than it had so far, allowing him to unexpectedly advance to Copper.
Nothing happened beyond the ordinary. The storm in his core subsided somewhat as he continued digesting the fruit’s pure madra, and his legs eased somewhat as they received fresh power after their exertion earlier. Even his broken arm felt better, though he could just as easily attribute that to the fresh pain-suppressing script his mother had left for him.
He quickly bathed and slept.
***
The mirrored door to Elder Whisper’s chamber swung shut, leaving the ancient fox staring at a reflection of himself. He tilted his muzzled back, snapping up a fish and letting it slide down his throat.
He had spent most of the past five decades in this room, where every day was much like another. Compared to the excitement of his younger days, this was a perfectly satisfying way to spend a few years.
But now the Unsouled had visited of his own volition. That was interesting.
He left the remainder of his meal, pacing circles around his chamber. In the mirror, his sleek white reflection followed him.
Whisper harvested both light and dreams into his core, blending them so that he could blind any eyes, stifle any ears. The humans understood light to some limited degree, but they had great difficulty with dreams. Whisper, however, had spent a hundred years meditating on the nature of dreams.
For the most part, a dream was nothing more than a mind deceiving itself. Only rarely did dreams tap into greater forces…but when they did, they could reveal pieces of fate.
Over the years, Elder Whisper had developed a sense for that fate. It was distant, imperfect, but he could dimly see the shapes of impending events.
“The Unsouled is connected,” his reflection said.
“He could be,” Whisper corrected himself.
The reflected snowfox whipped its five tails in irritation. “A drowning man will seize any branch, no matter how thin.”
For centuries, the shape looming in his dreams has been dark and impossibly vast. It would crush them all beneath its ponderous weight, and there was no stopping it. Sacred Valley’s past was coming back and bringing death with it. But there was something strange about his premonition this time.
Somehow, he felt as though the titanic threat were years distant and months close at the same time. One and then the other, like fate had yet to decide.
Now, he saw the familiar shape of fate’s touch on the Unsouled: the resolve in his eyes, the agony of a difficult decision in the set of his shoulders, the timing of his appearance in the tower. The boy’s future was in flux.
However it turned out, Whisper had done what he could. Now he would wait…and watch.
***
Every morning, the entire Wei clan turned out to meditate and cycle. The more distant families followed this tradition in their homes, but the core members of the clan all gathered together. It became the time where clan business was conducted, and a center for gossip and competition.
Ordinarily, Lindon arrived in the central courtyard outside the Hall of Elders to find fifty or sixty people already in conversation. The number would grow as the sun approached, and by daybreak the two hundred or so most honored members of the Wei clan would be united in cycling their madra. Even Lindon, an Unsouled, was no exception.
Today, the courtyard buzzed with excitement. Under the gray light before dawn, over two hundred people gathered in the courtyard of the Elder’s Hall, and none were meditating. News of Wei Mon Teris’ punishment had spread, and they were here to witness the penalty for cowardice.
Public punishments weren’t unheard of, but the most recent one was over a year past. They were always an occasion for the families of the Wei clan to snipe at one another, to witness a rival falling down a step on the endless ladder of position. The Patriarch hadn’t shown himself, but the First Elder stood atop the steps of the hall, his long eyebrows hanging down to his white beard.
Wei Mon Teris knelt before him, no ropes binding him. Honor would keep him in place. The rest of the Mon family stood behind him, his immediate family in the front, with aunts and uncles and cousins behind.
Teris’ father, Wei Mon Keth, stood like a mountain over his son. With his arms crossed, his face set, and a sword on his back, he looked like the statue of an ancient guardian.
As dawn broke, the First Elder addressed the crowd. “Yesterday, the young Copper Enforcer called Wei Mon Teris failed our clan. Faced with a Remnant on the slopes of Mount Yoma, he fled for his life, abandoning a child of the Foundation stage to danger. For this punishment, I will deliver three lashes from my own hand. Let this serve as a warning to cowards.” From his belt, the First Elder produced a thin stick of supple orus wood.
More than pain, these lashes were meant to deliver humiliation. The clan didn’t want to injure a sacred artist with a future, but they had to curb any potential embarrassments. A public lashing would show the Mon family as weak, and would undermine their position in the Wei clan.
If they fell low enough, eager relatives would seize their assets, leaving them weakened in truth. Weakness and the appearance of weakness were the same, and only strength had a place in Sacred Valley.
For his part, Lindon would take no pleasure in watching Teris beaten. He had never expected the Copper to defend him in the first place, and this whole process was a grim reminder of what could happen to him at any time. He was reliant on the honor and goodwill of others to protect him, and those were thin walls.
But if he could walk his own Path…then strength would be his defense.
As the First Elder raised his hand for the initial blow, Wei Mon Keth stepped forward. Teris’ father was also the head of the Mon family, and it was expected that he should defend his son. But the glance he sent toward the Shi family, toward Lindon, carried an impending threat.
“One moment, Elder,” Keth said, stepping in front of his son. “There is one matter we must resolve first.”
The First Elder’s switch blurred through the air, halting to point at Keth’s face with the threatening air of a sword. “It is not your place to guard your son from punishment.”
Teris’ father scowled even deeper. “I beat Teris myself when he came home a coward. But he was not the only one to run.” Keth turned to Lindon. “Let the Unsouled be punished with him.”
Lindon froze when the crowd turned its attention to him. Keth was only trying to save face by pulling the Shi family down together; it was a common enough tactic in scenes like this, and the elders would see through it. Lindon was patiently waiting for the First Elder to rebuff Keth when he caught sight of someone pushing his way through the gathering.
Wei Shi Jaran had to lean on a cane, but he still shouldered other families aside. His scarred face turned from Lindon to the Mon family, but in the end, he addressed the First Elder. “First Elder, why do you allow this dog to bark?”
Lindon’s stomach dropped, and he could see his sister over the crowd. She paled when she heard her father’s words.
Mon Keth loomed over Shi Jaran, glaring down at the cripple. “Men do not fight with words alone. Will you face me on t
he stage?”
Jaran acted as though he hadn’t heard the challenge, keeping his attention fixed on the First Elder. “By what right does Wei Mon Keth accuse my son? Surely it is not lack of courage that keeps a Foundation child from defending a Copper fighter.”
“Of course your son could not have protected mine,” Keth responded, before the elder could open his mouth. “But he is a coward nonetheless. What bravery has he shown before the clan? What courage? Surely he should work twice as hard to prove his worth, but what has he brought to the clan?”
Jaran’s scarred lips twisted further into a sneer. “Once, you would not have said such things to my face. If not for these injuries, I would teach you a lesson here.”
“First prove that you have taught your own son his lessons.” Keth looked around and found his daughter, a ten-year-old girl with an arrow on her wooden badge. She ran to him eagerly, and he placed his hands on her shoulders. “Your son is at the Foundation stage. If he is not a coward, he will accept a fight from someone his own level.”
The little girl looked Lindon straight in the eyes. “I, Wei Mon Eri, challenge Wei Shi Lindon to a duel of honor before the entire clan.”
The words echoed in the courtyard, accompanied by shocked silence.
They planned this, Lindon realized, hearing the girl’s recited challenge. They needed to distract the other families from their dishonor.
Perhaps the First Elder would have prevented Wei Mon Keth from speaking further, had he been given a chance. He’d surely seen more complex gambits from subtle opponents. But Lindon’s father had opened his mouth, and thereby opened a crack in his son’s armor. Now, Lindon was feeling the sting of the blade.
When a child first passed their test of spirit and received a Foundation-level badge, they were taught a rudimentary Foundation technique. This technique was the same for everyone in the clan, and was designed to acclimate children to feeling and cycling their own madra. When the child was ready, they would learn a more advanced cycling technique, one suited for their future Path. Unless the child was Unsouled.