The Black Horseman

by Richard D. Parker

  Gwaynn shifted uncomfortably, but said nothing.

  “First I will teach you to meditate,” Nev continued, “and it is here in the cave that you will perfect what I teach you.”

  “Meditate?”

  Nev chuckled. “Yes, your mind must be under perfect control if you are to learn how to master time. It is not so hard,” he added placed another small log on the fire. “To begin I would like you to picture a man…the very first man. A man before family, before friends, before language; does he have thoughts this man with no language? What does he see when he first emerges from his own cave and looks out onto the world around him? Think on these things for a spell, or just sit and focus on your own breathing. Work on this for several hours each day and I will let you know when we can move on.”

  ǂ

  For nearly four months Gwaynn’s life fell into a routine of sameness. Everyday he awoke just after sunrise and climbed the mountain to the cave. Everyday he sat and contemplated about the man with no name, no knowledge, and no language and everyday he descended again to work in the garden for an hour and then spar with Tar Nev for the last five hours of daylight. He was thankful for his time alone, which he spent in thought. He could feel himself, his inner being, begin to calm. Even when thoughts of Mille or his family rose to the surface, his demeanor remained passive as he studied how these thoughts affected him, how his breathing became heavy along with his heart. His mind was becoming more disciplined and his body was becoming stronger by the day. Already he was beginning to see and feel the difference caused by working with the heavier katas. His arms were stronger, his grip was tighter and his reactions faster, but he was still no match for his instructor, who could plant him in the soft, loose soil of the sparring grounds at any time.

  Only once in the four months did Gwaynn feel he was close to a breakthrough. One afternoon when he emerged from the cave, he looked down on the island and sea spread out below him and suddenly he saw the world in a whole new way. There were no trees, no water, no beach and no island. Everything is one to someone with no language, no thoughts. There is no division. The world before him blurred in his eyes, like an impressionist painting viewed through water. Suddenly he knew he could manipulate time just as he manipulated his own fingers and he rushed back into the cave. He sat with his legs crossed took a deep breath and held the feather out directly before his face, and let it go. It floated serenely down to the cave floor. Gwaynn frowned and picked it back up, concentrating, attempting to flex his new knowledge. He held the feather out once more, and again it floated all the way to the floor. Over and over he tried and over and over the feather floated to the floor despite his efforts to hold it in time. Gwaynn shrugged, disappointed but still convinced he was on the correct path. He picked the feather up, then without another thought about it made his way down the mountain.

  “Everything is one,” he said to Nev as he sparred with him near dusk and his Master smiled.

  “Yes…yes. That is good…essential. You’ve discovered what many of the great philosophers teach us,” he said excitedly. He dropped his katas and sat down quickly on the soft dirt floor of the pit. He motioned for Gwaynn to do likewise.

  “You’ve controlled your mind,” Nev continued once Gwaynn was sitting across from him. “Not such an easy task to be sure, but your patience is impressive. Now, you will begin the process of learning to control your body…completely.”

  Gwaynn only nodded, wondering where his bushy haired mentor was going to take him to now. “I understand that everything is one, but as hard as I try I cannot stop the feather from falling,” Gwaynn told Nev.

  Nev laughed. “I’m not stopping the feather…that would be very hard. No I’m controlling my own passage through time instead. When I move faster through time the feather seems to slow and if I move very fast the feather appears to stop, but believe me, the feather is still falling at the same speed…every time.”

  “First you must control your breathing,” Nev said and closed his eyes. After a moment Gwaynn did the same.

  “Listen to your breathing, control it…in and out…consciously,” Nev instructed his voice soft and even. “Easy enough,” he added. “Now concentrate on your own beating heart. Can you feel the beats? Can speed them up, and slow them down? Practice slowing your heart. Practice this everyday and when you master it I will show you how to lower the energy state of your very atoms. When you can do that and bring them to the very lowest state imaginable, your entire body will vibrate in unison and then unimaginable things will be possible.”

  Gwaynn worked on mastering his body, his internal clock, for another three months. Most days he could not tell if he was making any progress at all, but on others he could actually feel his heart slow and he would enter a state of utter relaxation in which his awareness did not diminish, but rather, it seemed to expand. On these days he would emerge from the cave feeling very refreshed and strong. It soon became apparent to him that on such days his sparring was also heightened. On these days he felt he even pushed Nev to the limits of his fighting abilities.

  Nev however, said very little about his performance, and never asked how his meditations were going. It seemed he taught by pointing the way, then remaining silent. When Gwaynn asked him about it one night, just before they went to bed, Nev just laughed.

  “It’s obvious isn’t it,” he answered blowing out the oil lamp so that the light from the small fire in the hearth lit him dimly from the side, giving him and his hair an ethereal look. “Teachers can only show the path, students must walk it. It is up to each of us alone which paths we walk and which we stubbornly refuse to follow. Only you can control what you will learn and what you will not.”

  The next morning, Gwaynn sat on the ledge, which overlooked the island. He stared out over the lush green of the forest to the blue water beyond and thought about what his Master had said the night before and found that he agreed completely. Master Sath had tried to teach him a great many things, but at the time, he was not willing to walk the path, so he learned very little. For his entire life, he had been his own master, but until right now, this very moment, he had been utterly unaware of that fact. In the past, he had focused on the small things that others would make him do…practice this…read that…act like this and not like that. It gave the illusion that others were ultimately in charge of him. This, however, was never the case. He was always his own master, able to do anything, but never willing to accept the consequences of actually taking control. But not anymore, he was aware of his power now. He would make his own decisions now even if it meant failure and death.

  He calmed himself and banished such thoughts from his mind. He measured his breathing, released the pressure in his body and relaxed, slowing his heart, slower and slower. He was unaware when he dropped back onto the rock, unaware of the passage of time. Slower and slower his body functions fell, but inside his mind darted about faster than the speed of light. In all the universe, it was only with information that this was possible.

  Nev found him lying peacefully at the edge of the precipice in the late afternoon sun. To anyone else, he would have appeared dead, or very nearly so, but Nev immediately knew that the lad had made a breakthrough and shook his head. His decision to accept Gwaynn as his student was obviously the correct one. The lad was the one, Nev was sure. He would begin the revolution. He would begin the process of bringing back the old knowledge to all the people of the Inland Sea. It was time. The Temple Islands had monopolized such things long enough, after all, each of them belonged to the Quantum Race.

  ǂ

  Gwaynn woke almost two days later. He sat up in his bed in the cabin, gripped with hunger and thirst. He swiveled in bed, smiling, not the least disoriented. He knew where he was; he knew where he had been. He stood on shaky legs and went to the water pump in the small kitchen. He pumped and drank for several long moments before finally satisfying his immediate need. Nev was outside, tending the garden. Gwaynn could hear the light digging sounds coming through the
open windows of the cabin. A warm breeze blew inside and brushed his face. Gwaynn smiled again and walked to the door, his legs growing more solid underneath him by the second.

  He pulled open the door and was struck by the vision of the world before him. He stared for a long moment at the trees in the distance and closer, the tall grasses blowing in the wind, the occasional insect which flew through the air and the call of the birds. He smiled broadly and stepped out into the day. The sun felt glorious on his face and arms as he moved across the front of the house and around the corner to the side. Nev was crouching down, his back to Gwaynn, but the Tar had heard the water pump and the front door, so he turned and met Gwaynn’s eyes and immediately noticed the twinkle in the boy that had not been there before.

  “You’re back,” he said in his own light-hearted way.

  Gwaynn smiled at him. It was the first true smile Nev had ever seen on the boy’s face. It looked good there.

  “How’s your sister?” Nev asked and was not surprised when Gwaynn broke out laughing. Nev smiled back.

  “You knew!” Gwaynn said. “She’s good. I…I spent years with her. She’s good.”

  Nev smiled. “She would be the one to show you the way back,” he said. “And just in time too. We will be leaving in the morning.”

  “Leaving?”

  “Yes, we will be heading to Herra for the year end Competitions.”

  “The Competitions,” Gwaynn answered and then nodded as if he already knew this.

  ǂ

  The trip to Herra was filled with conversation as Gwaynn told of his experiences over the last few days. Time had slowed for his body, but not his mind and while his body was near death, his mind was learning to control itself on the very lowest and highest levels. In his mind, his teacher was Gwynn, with her bright smile and ever-present confidence. But her presence did not surprise him, for in his youth she was the only person to whom he ever truly listened. He adored her; hung on her every word and watched her every move. In his mind, she showed him many, many things. Her teachings spanned many mental years and he absorbed it all, needed it all. In two days he had reclaimed the lifetime with her that he had thought lost on that fateful day during the fall of Solarii. He woke knowing it was not truly so, that Gwynn was an illusion of the mind, but he was happier, more at ease with his true past than at any time in his young life.

  “You have taken step one…a very important step,” Nev said as they rode. “The others will come much more easily. It came faster than I expected.”

  Gwaynn said nothing to that and they rode in silence for a time.

  “It truly felt like I experienced a lifetime in those few days,” Gwaynn said and then almost shyly, like he was afraid of making a mistake and looked over at Nev.

  “Is…is Gwynn still alive…somewhere?”

  Nev nodded his head. “Your question is imprecise; but I will say that she does not live in this world, not in this reality. Make no mistake, as an individual in this universe, she is gone. For you, in this lifetime, she is dead. But in others…”

  “In others?”

  Nev nodded again. “There are countless worlds marching in stride with our own, countless Gwynn’s surviving…and dying, but that is for another time.”

  Gwaynn sobered and was thankful when the trail narrowed and they had to ride single file for a spell. It gave him time to think and consider. Even if Gwynn was dead to him, he was still glad of his experience. It left him with the feeling that he was close to his twin once more. As the trail widened again, his spirits rose.

  He spurred Prolly alongside then had to veer away sharply as Ardent tried to take a bite out his leg. Gwaynn scowled at the beast.

  “What is the next step for me?”

  “Next step?” Nev asked playfully. “You can already control time. Did you not just experience nearly a lifetime in a few days?”

  Gwaynn fell silent, considering this question. “Yes, but I cannot hold a feather in mid air?”

  Nev laughed and pulled his horse to a stop. “Can you not?” he asked and leaped from Ardent’s back. Gwaynn pulled Prolly up and dismounted, tying her reins to a nearby tree.

  “And just what is so important about that?” Nev asked searching his pockets. “Do you have a feather?” he asked and Gwaynn searched his own pockets. He didn’t find one and shook his head.

  “Never mind,” Nev added then pulled Gwaynn to the center of the trail and they sat down, as always cross-legged in front of each other.

  “Control yourself…” Nev ordered. “Stay completely conscious.” Gwaynn did as he asked, slowed his breathing, slowed his heart.

  “Can you feel your body? Can you feel your individual fingertips, the place behind your knees and the center of your back?”

  Gwaynn opened his eyes. His Master sat there before him, then suddenly he was gone, and then a moment later he was back.

  Gwaynn’s heartbeat increased. “You…you disappeared,” Gwaynn said astonished.

  Nev shook his head. “No, from my vantage point I moved normally. I stood, tied off Ardent and returned. But I did so in a different time frame than you inhabit. It is no different from what you did. You moved to a slower level of time and experienced many years in only a matter of days, at least in your mind. I did the same thing, but brought my body along. Once I make the jump, relative to me, I seem to be moving normally, but all else is nearly standing still. The feather falls at the same speed…that’s a law. I’m not changing that, instead I’m changing the rate I move through time.”

  Nev took a bite from an apple that seemed to just appear in his hand. “It is not something anyone can do for very long. It drains energy at an awful rate. Traveling through space is much, much easier.”

  Gwaynn was silent for a time considering, he opened his mouth to speak, but Nev held up a hand.

  “Start with your fingers…the tips first, feel them each individually, down past the blood flowing through them and down past the cells themselves. It time you will feel the beat…the vibration of your body and the universe, when that occurs, you will be able to stretch the fabric of time.” Nev said and got to his feet. “It should be easy,” he added with a smile. “Your mind controls time on a subconscious level already, you are just knowingly taking over.”

  They rode the rest of the way to Herra without talking. Nev enjoying his surroundings and Gwaynn lost in thought. It was near mid-day when they topped a slight rise and the trees suddenly thinned. Directly below them lay Herra. Even from this distance, Gwaynn could tell it was bustling with activity. Many ships lay anchored along the Parm.

  “You practice…I will wait,” Nev said and led them down to the city. “But do not be tempted to use this power in a fight; to do so and not succeed would be disastrous. Plus it may take years for you to master the concentration needed to become coherent. In a fight, manipulating time would take too much of your concentration away from the actual here and now. This is not to be used lightly, and for now, no one else is to know of it.”

  This was the first time Nev had ever forbade him anything, but Gwaynn had no inclination to rebel. What the Tar demanded made sense, and Gwaynn knew he would have kept such knowledge close, even without the warning.

  Herra was alive with activity, not only were nearly all the inhabitants of Noble Island descending upon the small city, but there were people of means from many lands arriving to watch the upcoming Competitions. Gwaynn saw banners from all the major Families, including the Palmerrio, from the northwest, the family Toranado from the west, as well as some minor families like the Cassinni and the Rhodono’s. There were likely others, but in the swell of the crowds, Gwaynn was not aware of them upon arriving. He also saw a host of others from the many islands, including several Travelers and they even bumped into Putal, the High Scholar.

  “Your training is going well?” the old man asked, with a look that clearly revealed his disapproval of Gwaynn’s chosen path.

  “Very,” Gwaynn and Tar Nev said as one, and Putal could only
nod and continue on his way.

  They passed by countless booths selling all manner of foodstuff, drinks, crafts and wares. Many a crier attempted to catch Gwaynn’s attention and perhaps any coin he might have on him, though some instantly grew somber as they caught sight of Tar Nev. Whispers tumbled about in their wake. It took Gwaynn nearly an hour before he became accustomed to the looks of awe he was getting from those who recognized his Master. Many a merchant quickly offered free drinks and sweetmeats when their eyes landed on the famous Tar. Gwaynn took his cue from Nev however, and politely declined all offers, at least until they came to a large tent set up on the northern outskirts of Herra directly off the main road. Nev guided Gwaynn into the tent and they quickly found a table, though moments before all had been taken.

  “Nev!” yelled a large man with extremely bushy hair and a long dark beard. He had black eyes, which sparkled behind a particularly large nose, which was faintly tinted red. He moved quickly forward, a smile on his large face and grabbed Nev in a bear hug. The man actually lifted the Tar from the ground. Gwaynn watched the entire greeting in stunned disbelief. Up until now, few were even bold enough to greet Tar Nev, let alone swallow him up in a hug.

  “Good to see you again Jon,” Nev said when he was finally released. He was smiling broadly at the much larger man, who ushered them both deeper into the tent and showed them to another table near a long bar.

  “How’s the Carol-Anne?” Nev asked, as a pint of dark ale was set before him. Gwaynn was not truly surprised when a similar pint was placed before him.