by Joseph Lallo
Among those dedicated to silence, measures are taken to avoid verbal communication. Since they had arrived, Sama and his recruits had not spoken. The plan had been laid out days ago, and the instant the battleground had presented itself, they had each gone about their tasks. The first had been to find and secure the high ground. The second had been to dispatch scouts. One by one, they returned and sketched out a map of their section of the city. Each did quick, efficient work, and in the space of an hour, there was a fair approximation of most of the city sketched onto the floor of the bell tower in charcoal pencil. There was only one section that remained unknown, as there was one scout who did not return. Deena's absence provided the most important piece of information of all. It must be assumed that she had found and fallen to the enemy.
They knew where he was—or, at least, where he had been—and that meant that they knew where to start looking.
With little more than a nod, the stealth apprentices set out on the next stage of the mission. Communication of any kind would give away the position of one or more of them, so silence was maintained. Instead, they moved in waves.
The first pair of them sought out suitable vantages and made their way forward. Once there, they briefly held their position until they could see the shadows of movement signaling that they had been spotted by the second set, who then found positions of their own. In that way, the four stealth apprentices swept toward the unexplored section of the arena.
As they moved, the weather worsened. It was as though Azriel felt that if the final battle was to play out now, it deserved a suitably dramatic backdrop. Lightning danced from cloud to cloud and thunder rumbled across the city. The rain came down in sheets, cutting the visibility, and wind whipped it into a painful, stinging spray.
Their trained eyes quickly converted the city that unfolded before them into a network of nooks and crannies, each assigned a value and a risk. The best choice was selected and acquired just long enough to find the next. In their calculations, they determined where their partner would be, and moved forward only when each had seen the other. It was a dance, tightly choreographed and yet entirely improvised, spread across the whole of a street. Then, with a flash of lightning, the dance came to a stop, as all eyes turned to a single point. Ahead was a dangling form. Strung over the streets, midway down from the rooftops, was Deena. She was soaked to the bone and rocking in the wind. Vicious struggles revealed that she was bound, but still very much alive.
Sama and his men held their ground. They each came to the same conclusion. Deena was bait, strung there to prompt them to attempt a rescue. It was a foolish tactic, as each had received the same training, and thus each knew that the mission was paramount. There would be no rescue, nor any attempt. Each apprentice worked at the riddle of why this might have been done, and what to do about it. Some thought quickly, some more slowly. The slowest of them never reached the end of the line of thought, noticing first that his counterpart had moved on, second a brief hiss, and third a painful prick in his neck.
Sama watched from a considerably more secure hiding place as the weakest link in the chain stumbled forward from his perch and plummeted a mercifully short distance to the ground, one of Deena's darts protruding from his neck. Deena had not been bait—she'd been a distraction, and the blasted fool hadn't realized. Now odds had shrunk to three-to-one, but they had been given another clue. There were only a few places the dart could have come from, and fewer still were proper hiding places. Sama knew that his opponent must be in one of them.
He drew to mind what he'd seen of this stretch of street. The rooftops had been clear, but even if they hadn't, in this diabolical wind no dart would have stayed true to its course from that distance. The street was too dangerous, as it forfeited the high ground. There were five open windows near to the ledge the fool had chosen. Three were close enough to reliably make the shot that had been made, and all three were on the street-facing side of the same building. The malthrope could only have been hiding within it. The place was one of the larger structures on the street, four stories tall and perhaps five rooms wide. It was rectangular and simple. If not for the large, shuttered windows it might have resembled a prison or castle keep.
The member of Sama's team in the best position streaked along face of the building. He stayed low and tight against the face of the building. There it would be impossible for the malthrope to use the blow gun without revealing his position. Sama and the others moved to positions carefully hidden but properly situated to observe all three windows. From here, the sequence was simple. If the malthrope revealed himself from one of the windows to attack the approaching apprentice, Sama and his remaining partner would descend upon him and the test would be over. If the apprentice managed to enter the building, then the others would know that the entryway he selected was a safe one, they would each move inside, and the outnumbered malthrope would fall quickly thereafter.
They were the only two logical outcomes. The creature had allowed himself to be cornered, and thus would lose. It was at that moment that a third option presented itself. In a blur of shifting shadows—so brief only the trained eye of an assassin could have been swift enough to follow it—a figure launched from the alleyway, pounced upon Sama's infiltrating man, and bounded off. The stricken target staggered and clutched at another dart that had been driven into his neck by hand.
Sama and his one remaining ally launched after the fleeing form, neither willing to let their foe slip away. As they moved, Sama worked through what had happened. The scoundrel had been hiding on the street. He'd selected the weakest position, and he must have done so on purpose, knowing that it would have been dismissed. He was being deliberate, choosing the course of action not that he had been trained to choose, but that he had been trained to avoid. One of the surest ways to earn victory was to make one's enemy's choices for him. Normally this was achieved by creating a choke-point or concealing oneself someplace with a single entrance. This malthrope was using their own training against them.
But if the last two obvious courses of action had been traps . . .
The realization dawned a moment too late for his partner. His foot came down upon the very same caltrops dropped by Deena earlier, and the rush of pain was enough to give Shadow his chance to drive home yet another dart. The last of his allies having fallen, Sama knew he couldn't afford to waste another moment. He managed to grasp Shadow by his arm and pull him from the alleyway. The malthrope stumbled out into the open street and quickly regained his footing, drawing his black blade and facing Sama. The elder warrior drew his own weapon.
“So, here we are,” Sama taunted, yelling over the howling wind. “Funny that a test of stealth would come down to a test of swords instead.” He circled cautiously. “Funnier still that I taught you everything you know about swords.” He grinned, glancing at the bloody remains of Deena's one successful attack. “You're already bleeding. The only times you've ever bested me with a blade came when you used your blasted speed. That hole in your leg will take that tactic away from you. I know you can't beat me, and you know it, too.”
Sama launched himself forward, sword slashing with lethal skill. Shadow parried with his own blade. The clash of metal upon what seemed more like stone resulted in a flare of sparks. Three vicious attacks followed, but Shadow managed to just barely block each before retreating a few paces. He drew three throwing blades and released them with a single motion in a narrow arc. Sama deflected one with his sword and a second went wide, but the last bit into his thigh. He grunted in pain, refusing to take his eyes off of the malthrope even long enough to pull the dagger free.
“Now you are bleeding as well,” Shadow said.
The swordsman replied with a growl, lurching forward and tangling again. The battle that followed was vicious. Blades clashed and sparks flew. It was clear that Sama was the better swordsman, but he was not nearly so firmly Shadow's superior as he believed. The balance shifted back and forth between them, and when blades were locked, neither wa
s above using fists, feet, knees, and elbows to deliver punishment. Minutes of furious battle passed, and each was bloodied and bruised by the attacks of the other.
Sama was beginning to tire, the desperation of his attacks growing. A wild slash managed to catch Shadow across the arm, and a follow-up attack left the pair with swords crossed. Sama's downward slash was held barely at bay by Shadow's raised weapon. Shadow's injured arm was robbing his defense of strength. Sama pressed harder, bringing the blade of his weapon steadily closer.
Shadow's limbs were on the brink of collapse. He lacked the strength to break the attack with enough force to create an opening, and if he relented for even a moment, Sama's blade would come down. Either way, the battle would be over. His opponent leaned close, pressing down with all of his weight. Under the strain of holding off the attack, Sama's blade slid against his own, spitting a few weak sparks. Inspired, Shadow shifted his blade and dragged it in a swift swipe across the length of Sama's weapon. The darkness was suddenly a wash of brilliant white sparks. The flash was enough to momentarily blind and stagger Sama. He swung his blade viciously toward Shadow, and though the malthrope had managed to retreat somewhat, the attack caught his other arm and knocked the sword from his grip.
Rather than risk attempting to recover the weapon, Shadow fell back and disappeared into the shadows.
Sama recovered and swiveled his head madly about, eyes wild and teeth bared. “Well? Come on! Make your move! What have you got left? Those little throwing daggers?” Sama pulled three such weapons from a belt and held them at the ready in his free hand. “Do you believe you can score a blow that will kill me before I can return the favor? Let us see you try!”
In reply, five blades burst from the darkness. Hurled by the injured and fatigued malthrope, they lacked both the force and accuracy to finish Sama, but he nonetheless needed to dodge and deflect them, giving the creature a few precious heartbeats to charge out from his hiding place, coiling cord around his fists as he moved.
Sama sliced the air, but Shadow slid beneath the attack, springing to his feet behind his foe and throwing a loop of cord around his neck.
Training and discipline can go a long way to overruling one's instincts, but when something pulls taut around one's throat, it takes a tremendous amount of will to do anything but tear at the constriction in desperate hope of restoring air and blood flow. Sama made two attempts to stab at Shadow, but the awkward positioning made the sword nearly useless. By the time he was making a third attempt, his vision was already beginning to dim. He abandoned his weapons and clutched at the cord, struggling as his strength sapped away until finally he slumped into unconsciousness.
Shadow held tight for a few more moments, then rolled Sama aside and scrambled to where his sword had fallen. He collected it, then returned to the fallen foe and leaned low over him. Sama's heart was still beating, and his breath was weak but steady. The job was not yet done.
Shadow put his sword to the man's throat . . . but returned it instead to its sheath.
“No,” Shadow said. He stood and proclaimed to an unseen overseer. “This man's life was mine to take. I have succeeded in this task. I have been taught not to take a life unnecessarily, and it is not necessary that I kill him to prove that I could.”
He marched, cold rain pouring down around him, toward the edge of the city. As he walked, he cast a wary eye behind him every few strides. Though he was confident Sama would not be conscious again for several minutes, he knew better than to trust his confidence or Sama's mercy. The fallen opponent did not move. Shadow needed only to reach the edge of the arena again and it was over.
The edge of the false city was not more than a dozen strides away when something happened. Without knowing why, he found his hand flitting to the hilt of his weapon. He pivoted on his heel, shifted his weight, and twirled. In the same motion, he pulled his weapon free and angled it for a thrust. The blade sunk deep into a black-clad form that had been not two steps behind him. The figure stumbled backward, a blade dropping from its hand, and crumpled to the ground.
Shadow's attack had happened without thought, without a decision. He'd heard no sound of approach, smelled not a whiff of danger. He'd seen nothing, and even the peculiar burning of being watched had not alerted him. Yet he had acted. Had he not, the blade of his enemy would have been at his throat.
Shadow withdrew his weapon from the bloody wound it had caused and looked up for the first time to the face of this attacker. It was not Sama. Instead, it was a man hidden by a cloth mask and dark hood. Shadow tore the disguise away. Beneath, he found the aging face of the very man who had subjected him to this trial. It was Master Weste. He clutched at the wound, then lifted his fingers to his face to see them drenched in blood.
“A well-placed blow,” he said shakily.
“What were you doing? What is this?”
The city was wiping away now. With it went the rain and wind, leaving Shadow and the stricken Weste alone in endless blackness, surrounded by deafening silence.
“I told you. If you passed the Lain Trial, you would know how to overcome your blind spot.”
“But I didn't sense you. I didn't know you were there. I just . . . acted.”
“And that is the answer,” he said, his speech becoming labored. “No one . . . has perfect perception . . . there will always be something you cannot see . . . something you cannot hear . . . . Where vigilance fails, you must rely . . . upon instinct. And that comes only when it is needed . . . the danger had to be real. This test was never about killing your target . . . it didn't matter if you killed him or shook hands and agreed to go on your way . . . I would have been behind either of you as the moment of victory loomed . . . . That is why there has never been a Lain . . . until now . . .”
As Weste spoke, Shadow uncoiled rope and tore away the sleeves of his uniform to fashion a bandage. As he tried to apply it, Weste pushed him away.
“No, no . . .” Weste said, voice weak and fading. “You are an assassin . . . embrace this. It was always . . . my intention . . . well . . . done . . .”
With those final words, he leaned back and released his last breath. A moment later, Azriel coalesced beside him. Shadow turned to her.
“Can he be saved?”
“He did not wish to be,” she stated simply. “He was a warrior. This was the end he chose for himself. You should be proud that you were able to provide it. Now, rise.”
He did as he was told, standing before her.
“By the decree of Master Weste, and by my judgment, you have passed this trial. Congratulations, Lain.”
Chapter 29
In the days and weeks to follow, all involved in the Lain Trial—save Master Weste—recovered. The former master's passing was mourned and honored in the manner befitting of a warrior whose time had come. Now dubbed Lain, the malthrope was similarly honored for his achievement. Deena and the others recruited by Sama regarded their defeat with respect—and even an air of pride. To each of them it was something of a privilege to have made Lain's ascension possible. Only Sama regarded the trial as a failure, but he bore no malice.
Lain's new title, combined with the many other disciplines he had studied, afforded him the rank of “Full Master of the Warrior's Arts.” To attain such a title through so diverse an education was much admired, and the whispers regarding his skill, his race, and his mark began to flow.
Shortly after his recovery, representatives of the Wizard's Side began to approach him, requesting that he participate in the so-called “Ceremony of the Blue Moon.” The next blue moon was just a bit more than four months away, but Lain had other plans. His purpose in the world beyond Entwell had waited far too long already. The very day the falls relented, he made ready to leave.
“Are you sure you won't stay just a bit longer?” asked Fiora, her voice wavering a bit with held-back tears. “You could be one of the Chosen! I could help bring back the Great Elemental!”
She was fluttering in the window of Lain's hut. He wa
s busy loading what little clothing he had into a pack and strapping a few carefully-selected weapons to his belt. He was dressed for travel, a light but sturdy cloak about his shoulders. It was reversible, charcoal-gray on the inside and milky white on the outside.
“I entered this place hoping to become the warrior I needed to be. I've come far enough. I need to return to my purpose or it was all for nothing,” he said, fitting the sword Fiora and Croyden had made for him onto his belt.
“But no one ever leaves! Why does the one warrior I get along with have to be the one warrior who leaves?” Fiora moaned, crossing her arms.
“I'm sorry to hear we don't get along,” came Leo's voice as he approached.
“I didn't mean that, Stealth Apprentice Leo, sir. I only meant that . . .” Fiora paused, trying to work out how best to address her newly-promoted friend. “That Lain is my best friend among the warriors.”
“I, for one, find it admirable that in four years of intense training he has not lost an ounce of his resolve. He does, however, leave me with a bit of a dilemma,” Leo said.
“What?” Fiora asked.
“It was always assumed that, should anyone become Lain, he or she would take the master's place when he passed on. Now you are leaving. You will leave us without a master of stealth.”
“You know as much as I do. And you remain the only one besides Master Weste who has ever been able to sneak up on me.”
“Perhaps, but Sama will certainly be after the title for himself.”