Way Walkers: Tangled Paths (The Tazu Saga)

by Leigh, J.

  Cyaone D. Ja’han never mentioned rmlkoka could do that, Jathen scrawled to his sister later that night.

  The day after the rmlkoka encounter, Jathen overheard a conversation between Cy’shā and Setsuken. He was passing their large canvas tent on his way back from relieving himself when he heard her voice, sharp and stark.

  “What of this name, Chann? Is not Clan name.”

  “He’s older, Cy’shā, maybe over a millennium, and an outlander. A lot of them change their names to avoid new or old politics.”

  “Not wise get involved with older Clan. Rheanics keep too many secrets.”

  “He’s a Bree follower, not a Rheanic, a charm master. And his coin is good as any.”

  “More reason to be concerned. Why hire such young Clan to protect charm master’s luggage? Think he wish stronger protect great valuables he have with him.”

  “Might have. He’s not mentioned anything.”

  “Too many secrets.”

  “Did you have an actual vision, Cy’shā?”

  “No. Just a bad feeling.”

  “Then we don’t bother with it unless you see otherwise. Visions we can plan around. Just a feeling... that could be from too many things: past, present, or future. It’s not enough to deny a commission.”

  Cy’shā was also a source of stories. Speaking six languages, she could relay tales from almost every single culture on the continent. That was a grand improvement over Esop, who sang in his native Nor’wise ballads of the Twelve Hundred Warriors loudly, deeply, and according to Jephue, horribly out of tune.

  Jathen earned some goodwill from the Msāfryan lady when she told the story of Bree and Bron by relaying what he’d read in Lost in the Landscape.

  She responded, “’Tis good you know this but not the whole story. They return to the desert after. That is the most important part.”

  Jathen inquired if the explanation of the odd comment that ‘Death did come’ if the Tyr’sat did not keep moving was in the second half of the tale.

  “No, the elders never really explain. They just say that way.” Jathen gave her a disbelieving look, and she sniffed. “If you not want to hear the full story…”

  “No, no, I’ll be quiet,” he said. There were really only so many times he could read Lost in the Landscape.

  With a nod, Cy’shā finished the tale as they rode, speaking in a smooth Tar’cil. “‘Msāfryan,’ Bree and Bron called, ‘you are all one, our people, our Ishim. Come.’ With that, they parted ways with the other travelers and headed once more into Whydā Shrā. ‘But we have been here before,’ the old Tghyyr’sāqyn told them. ‘There is nothing. We will thirst. We will starve.’ And Bron said, ‘You will not thirst. You will not starve. You will see what has not been seen.’

  “Many days passed, and soon the Tghyyr’sāqyn said again, ‘There is nothing. We will thirst. We will starve.’ Again, Bron said, ‘You will not thirst. You will not starve. You will see what has not been seen.’ More days passed, and there were fewer and fewer supplies with each sunrise. Soon the humans began to say, ‘We believe our new brothers. There is nothing. We will thirst. We will starve.’ To them, Bron said once more, ‘You will not thirst. You will not starve. You will see what has not been seen.’

  “They followed to the heart of the deep Whydā Shrā. Bree stopped and said, ‘Here, we rest.’ ‘But there is nothing,’ the Msāfryan cried. ‘We will thirst. We will starve.’ Then Bree said, ‘No. You will see what has not been seen, for I have found what has never been found, hidden by what was never hidden.’ And the Msāfryan said, ‘We do not understand.’ But Bree simply played her flute. So to Bron, the Msāfryan said, ‘We do not understand.’”

  “I don’t blame them.” The image of the confused and scared people turning from the flute-playing Avatar to ask the same question of a hopefully less riddling Aspect was an all-too-familiar notion to Jathen. It seems to me Avatars speak like a Drannic.

  Cy’shā ignored him and continued her story. “But Bron told them, ‘You do not need to understand,’ and he beat on his drums, slow and steady. ‘All you need to do,’ he told them, ‘is dance.’”

  “Dance?” Jathen snorted. “Really?”

  Ass’shiri punched him in the arm. “Will you shush? I haven’t heard this one either!”

  Shaking her braided head, Cy’shā resumed her tale. “Though they were unsure, the Msāfryan began to dance to the toot, toot of Bree’s flute and the thump, thump of Bron’s drum. ‘Faster!’ Bron called, as Bree played more quickly and he drummed to keep up. And so they danced faster to the toot, toot of the flute and the thump, thump of the drum. ‘Even faster!’

  “For four days, they danced, faster and faster until the sand was beaten to glass beneath their feet. ‘Faster,’ Bron yelled one last time, and then Bree stopped, flinging the flute down hard upon the glass. A great crack ran down the middle of the glass. As the glass shattered, it became water, beautiful and clear, a great lake. There was rushing and whooshing and a burst exploding into the world, and the great Nhr River flooded past them, carving its route south.

  “The Msāfryan were astounded, but they were also afraid. There was so much water and raging and foam that they could not see their Child. But then they saw a great bright tyrn in the sky, flying like a snake sidewinding in the sand. It flew higher and higher and then was gone, bursting into a million points of light across the desert and beyond. The Msāfryan cried and mourned their loss. But when the storm of rushing water ebbed and the lake was calm, they saw Bron walking across it, his feet staying atop the surface as if it were still glass.

  “‘Oh Bron,’ the Msāfryan cried, ‘woe to you and woe to us, for Bree has died!’ Bron shook his head and smiled. ‘Oh, my Ishim, why do you mourn? You have seen what has never been seen, have found what had never been found, the grand spring of water hidden by what was never hidden, the sand. From nothing, a grand something was created. Do you now believe so little, you create only nothing from something so great, imagine no other ending than death?’ ‘No, no,’ the Msāfryan called, ‘we believe!’ ‘Then we shall come back to you,’ he told them, ‘and be born among you.’ The Msāfryan were glad, but they asked, ‘What shall we do until then?’ ‘Follow the Way we have left you.’ Bron pointed at the river and the drum. ‘The water is good, and the land will grow. Spread out and move but always return to this place and follow the river back to where we first met. Dance, play, and create, and extinction will not come to you again.’ They asked, ‘And you and Bree will return?’

  “‘Yes, so long as you are good to each other, live alongside each other, and give children to each other to raise in the Way, we will return. Many times we will return, to be born amongst you, and amongst other Ishim. But you are ours and first in our hearts, and to you, we will always make our return.’ The Msāfryan were gladdened by this, and Bron smiled to see them so. Then he became an amber phoenix and flew across the Veil.

  “Thus the Msāfryan came to travel as we do, and Antqāl Mdynh makes its course every year from the lake Rāqsh Bhyrh in Whydā Shrā to the split of the Nhr and Shr Rivers, where we first met Bree and Bron.”

  Jathen nodded. “That’s a really interesting myth.”

  “Not a myth,” Cy’shā insisted. “It happened. Every word.”

  Hatori said, “In my homeland, they say the Red rose out of the Pit to eat Marin Manna’s heart, too. And the Tazu tell the tale of the First King. So we all have stories that border between legend and fantasy, Jath. It’s no use debating them.”

  “But the story of the First King was at least about a real person,” Jathen said, “not some mythical ‘death that came.’”

  “And I also recall a delightful tale about how Montage turned himself into a woman and laid the nine eggs of the great pureblood families,” Hatori said over Ass’shiri’s snickering. “Some of it’s real; some
is allegory. Some is just the whisper of a rumor given life by a gifted narrator. Just smile and enjoy the story, boy.”

  Maybe I’m just getting too old for stories. And need to start seeking out new ways to amuse myself.

  Luckily, Ass’shiri had a deck of jimble cards. While Jathen wasn’t very good at the bluffing aspects of the game, he was happy to bet with stones and twigs. When they graduated to the higher stakes of swapping chores and then to money, he always folded, knowing better than to rely on his luck.

  Setsuken also possessed one of the strategy games Jathen had seen Clan parties toting with them. The beautiful round wooden board had solar lights and fold-away drawers to store the pieces. Under the wood board was a thin layer of metal, and the pieces contained small magnets. The pieces all moved the same, and to win, one had to conquer the kingdom by capturing their opponents’ pieces and holding their own territory across the board’s many interlocking circles.

  “You aren’t half bad at this,” Ass’shiri said after their third game.

  Jathen did seem to have a certain aptitude for it, and he became fond of playing. Everyone in the party had some experience with the game, even silent Hkym, and they would all trade off partners, except for Hatori, who was too good, so only Jephue would play him. Jephue and Hatori played the final game each night, Jephue murmuring things like, “Oh, so that’s what you’re up to,” and, “Are you certain you want to make that move?”

  “I cannot believe Jephue actually beats him,” Jathen said one evening, sitting around the second of their three fires with Ass’shiri, Hkym, and Cy’shā.

  Prodding the fire with a stick, Ass’shiri recited, “Never, ever, underestimate a human.”

  “That quote is real?” Jathen shook his head. “I thought Hatori made that up.”

  “Of course it’s real. Why wouldn’t it be?” Ass’shiri asked. “Humans are crazy. You can’t ever be certain if they’re really helpless or if they will suddenly turn and knock your head off. You never know what kind of Ability a human’s got under his skin. In Tar’citadel, whew! The whole of the Rosin Walkers were these crazy powerful Talents, and you know how many were human? More than half! I had a tru’suli—that’s a path of Ulic that’s all philosophical—break down the numbers for me once. Humans, because there are so many more of them, have less a percentage of their population who are measurable Talents. But even though their percentage is lower than that of all the other races, because there are that many more humans in the world, they make up half of the combined Talents.”

  “Huh.”

  “Yeah. So even though almost every Clansperson has a touch of Ability in them, there are still just as many human Talents. And the Tazu. And the Muilan.”

  “What about the Lu’shun?”

  “I think of them as pretty much being human. They breed like humans, they die like humans, they live as long as humans. The only difference is the hair and eyes and that whole glamour-thing they do.”

  “That’s exactly what makes them not human.” Jathen laughed. “You’d better keep that opinion to yourself when we get there. Otherwise, you might insult another high-ranking member of society.”

  Ass grinned, poking Jathen with the tip of his boot. “Yeah, well, last time I did that, I made a friend, so it’s all right in the end.”

  “Heh.”

  “You know, thinking about this stuff made me remember something. I’m pretty sure I’ve heard people say moots are supposed to be pretty powerful Talents. Have you been holding out on me, Jath?”

  Jathen sighed. “No, I’m not. This moot’s an exception to the stereotype.”

  “Aw, now that’s just unfair.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “So no Ability at all?”

  Jathen shrugged. “Just some of ‘the bastard’ every now and again.”

  “Precognition?” Ass’shiri nodded and rose to fetch one of his bags. “Well, that’s something at least.”

  “Not really, as there’s no predicting the predictions.”

  “Ha! That’s funny.”

  “You can thank my sister for that one.” Jathen took up the stick and prodded the fire. “What kind of Talent are you, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  He shrugged, hauling his bag over to the fire. “Not much. A little energy empathic, little bit emotional empathic. Nothing to write to the Originals about.”

  “So how did you come to study at Tar’citadel?”

  “Damn Native Near-Siders,” Ass’shiri said, riffling through his bag. “My travel knife is gone!”

  “Near-Siders again?” Jathen snorted. “Hatori was going on about them before. You really believe there are random spirits stealing and then returning your things?”

  “Eh, I guess. It just keeps happening. My knife keeps getting lost, then it returns. If they aren’t doing it, then who?”

  “Maybe Hkym is borrowing it and not telling you.” Jathen grinned as Hkym snorted. “Or maybe Esop is doing it to mess with your head.”

  Cy’shā broke in, her voice almost a rasping hiss. “Tack, silly boy. Not everything must be seen to be there. You ever see a ghost? A demon? A Drannic?”

  “Actually,” Jathen replied, “I have seen a Drannic.”

  “Doubt it, I do.”

  “Really?” Ass’shiri’s face lit up like a child’s. “My great-great-grandfather saw one once. He used to tell me the story. What was it like?”

  “He wanted soup.”

  Ass’shiri looked confused, but Cy’shā nodded. “You have seen a Drannic. But have you seen a baby Drannic?”

  “No.”

  “Of course not, no one has. But though no one ever has, they still have to exist. Otherwise, how would we get more Drannic?”

  “Mitosis?” Jathen offered.

  Ass’shiri giggled.

  Cy’shā furrowed her brow. “What is this? This mi-toes-ess?”

  “What? They don’t have microscopes in Zo’den?” When she looked annoyed, Jathen explained in a less sarcastic tone, “It’s when single cells split in half to reproduce.”

  “Single cells?”

  Ass’shiri answered, “Like in energy manipulation, a Talent absorbs the vibration of matter. Well, it’s these little teeny-tiny bits that everything is made of that vibrate. We just can’t see them without a powerful magnification tool—a microscope.”

  “These single cells?”

  “Well, cells are actually made of the little vibrating bits too. Though cells are the smallest organic matter, I think. And living things are all made of millions of the cells. I think it’s millions, might be more. It’s been a while since I was in a Desmoulein-type class.”

  She snorted. “I doubt this very much, but even if it true, I very much doubt Drannic make more Drannic this way. Too complicated a body to just split in half and have another.”

  “How do you know?” Jathen asked. “You said not everything had to be seen to be believed. Maybe the Drannic do split in half and make full-grown offspring. You haven’t seen it, have you?”

  “Yeah,” Ass’shiri jumped in. “Or maybe they are like the Solki race! You know… there are a set number of them, and none of them ever age and die? They don’t reproduce at all, and they keep to themselves, so no one’s ever killed one, either, and the numbers never change. Maybe the Drannic are like that.”

  “Tee-ya,” she spat. “Jathen, you are both too smart and too stupid for your own good! Sacred are Drannic, and here you joke and prod fun, and for what? To make a sad point about how narrow-mindedness is good?” Rising, she turned to go. “You learn nothing that way.” Hkym shot them an annoyed glance, then went after his wife on camel-like legs.

  Ass’shiri plopped down on the log beside Jathen. “So, do you think she—” He reached around and plucked something from the other side o
f the log. “Hey, my knife!”

  Jathen blinked at it. “How did that get there? It was not there when I sat down, and your bag wasn’t even near me!”

  Ass’shiri grinned, waggling the blade between his fingers. “Damn Native Near-Siders. I told you they—”

  “Ee-yah! Ruddy Kubeshian cutlasses!”

  “That’s Esop.” Ass’shiri had his crossbow out and ready before Jathen even turned toward the sound. By the time a second yell came, Ass’shiri was running off toward the shout.

  “Hold up, Jath,” Hatori called. He approached with his sword cane in hand and Jephue trailing behind him. “Stick by me for the moment.”

  Jathen followed Hatori over to where a frazzled Esop was hoisting his kilt in one hand and one of the charm-lanterns in the other.

  “I was takin’ a piss in a hole that’d been dug for what I thought was relief, when I saw this.” Esop dipped the light.

  In the crags and crannies of the rough pit, a body was half covered in soil and refuse.

  Chapter 21

  A dead body.

  As Jathen’s eyes adjusted, he recognized the brown turban and the travel bag. “Oh, by Turin. Samad.”

  “You know this one?” Esop asked as Cy’shā jumped into the hole with the corpse.

  “Yes, we crossed paths on the road,” Hatori said. “He’s an Artifact hunter.”

  Setsuken raised an eyebrow. “That sort can get messy real quick. You sure you don’t have something deeper going on, Charm Master?”