“Thank you,” Sam said to her.
“It is my duty. My father asked and I obeyed. It is nothing more.” She did not say it with venom in her voice, but Sam winced as if struck. Perhaps she needed to work harder at hiding her irritation at this man’s existence, she thought.
Chapter 12
Dr. Walt called the other three together later that week to discuss what he had found in his research. As the four of them sat around a small table in the main building, and Skitter sat on the floor beside Sam, the doctor spread out a scroll and a few books. Speaking in Kasmali, which Sam had learned well enough to communicate in a simple manner, he said, “I have looked through everything I have. Nothing helped much. I’m afraid that even with the information about your travel here, Sam, I don’t have a good idea how to get you back.”
“Is there nothing you can do?” Sam asked, surprised with how whiny it sounded even to himself. “I’ve already been here for more than two months. Each night before bed, I try to go back home using the same things I did before, but can’t do it. Don’t you have any idea at all what we can do?”
“Aside from you trying to learn to use your apparent abilities again without help to transport yourself back, I have only a couple of ideas.” Turning to the mage, he continued: “Rindu, are there any records left at the Zouyim Temple? Anything that may explain how ancient vibratory masters used their skills?”
Stern-faced, as always, the Zouy answered. “No. Everything was destroyed in the Gray Man’s attack. All the knowledge of the Zouyim exists now in the memories of the few of us who surive. We have not met together for several years, since the Gray Man started sending groups of Collectors to search for us. Meeting is too dangerous. I have therefore lost track of all my brothers.”
“Well, then,” the doctor answered, “there is only one other thing I can think of. We must go to the Gray Fortress. We must infiltrate the very home of the Gray Man. He has spent years collecting all the ancient knowledge he could find. If there is anywhere there might be a solution to your problem, it would be in the Gray Fortress.”
Nalia stood abruptly. “Are you suggesting we attack the Gray Fortress itself? I have been there and I have seen with my own eyes what the Gray Man can do. He has only grown in power since he allowed me to leave the fortress alive. The only Sapsyr left alive of the attack force, I might add, and only by his sufferance. Do you suggest that we can succeed where one hundred Sapsyra failed?”
Rindu directed a look at Nalia and she sat down in a huff. If he didn’t know better, Sam would have said that he saw heat actually emanating from her face behind the mask. He agreed with her, though. It was a suicide mission.
“Now, now, just hear me out Nalia,” Dr. Walt said calmly. “I am not suggesting anything. I’m just telling you my ideas. If it is possible to get a look at some of the Gray Man’s store of ancient texts, it may be possible for Sam to go home. I do not suggest a direct confrontation. As you say, the Gray Man is very powerful, but in the years that have passed, you also have become more powerful. Perhaps together, we can sneak into the fortress, find the information we need, and then leave without being caught.”
“But,” Sam asked, “if the Gray Man is, as you say, from our world and he is avidly collecting all ancient information to find a way to go home, doesn’t that mean he doesn’t know how to go home? Wouldn’t it be a waste of time, possibly a waste of life, for no reason?”
“Ah, I see that you are clever, Sam. I’m impressed that you thought of that.” The doctor patted Sam on the shoulder. “However, I think he does indeed know how to go back home. I believe he is looking for other information, information to allow him to use the resources of both worlds to take control of both. I think with his information and your talent, there is a good chance that you can get back to Telani. After all, you made it here twice on accident because of fortuitous pockets of energy.”
Sam looked around the table. Rindu was as stone-faced as ever, showing no emotion at all. Nalia was shaking her head slightly, muttering under her breath. Dr. Walt looked at him expectantly, his bushy white eyebrows rising as if in question. Even Skitter had risen to stand up and was looking at Sam.
What do you think, Skitter, Sam sent. Do you have any ideas on how I can get home from what you’ve eavesdropped from my mind?
No. I don’t know of such things. It sounds very dangerous, though. Is your fighting better? Are you confident you can do it and live?
Sam thought for a moment and then sent back: I don’t know. Probably not. I have not done well in my training. I would have to rely on the others. That scares me more than going to the fortress.
Dr. Walt squeezed Sam’s shoulder compassionately. “This is probably the single most important decision you have ever made. It’s up to you, Sam. How badly do you want to get home? Is it worth the risk? You can always find a place here with us, as I have learned to do. There are worse places to be stranded.”
Sam thought of his home, of his friends. What friends? He had one: Nick. He thought of his mother, with no one else but Sam. Her health was good, but she had few friends so it was important for her that Sam visit with her often. What would happen to her? Would she be ok without him? What if he died here? Would she rather he risk his life to go back to her or to play it safe and just stay here forever?
She would want him to be safe, because she loved him. Just like he loved her. She would die inside if he never came back. She was probably having a hard time already with him being gone for several months. Anything was worth getting back to her. She had already lost so much, he could not allow her to lose him, too.
Sam fidgeted under the gaze of the others. Finally, he said: “Ok. I’ll do it. What do I need to do?”
The tension in the room seemed to lessen. Dr. Walt answered him: “Well, the first thing to do is for you to redouble your training. Hopefully it will not come to it, but if there is fighting to be done, you should be able to hold your own. And, of course, you should learn as much about using vibrational energy from Rindu as possible. He tells me that you have talent, but he has not yet been able to teach you to tap it.
“There is good reason to learn to do so. The most immediate is to defend yourself, but also you must learn to use the energy so that when we find the secret to getting you home, you are able to actually make it happen. It’s even possible that you might stumble upon the way to get back home as you get more proficient in using the vibrational energy. In that case, we wouldn’t need to go to the Gray Fortress at all.
“I don’t doubt that you are trying hard, but you must try harder. There will be no second chance in this.” Turning to Rindu and Nalia, the doctor asked: “Will you two accompany us? I will go with Sam even if it will be only the two of us, but your help would be very much appreciated.”
Nalia tilted her head as if she was going to speak, but Rindu lifted a finger. Just a single finger, and his daughter settled back into her seat. “We will help train Sam, and we will go with him to the Gray Fortress. Any action taken against the Gray Man is an honorable and important action. And, we of the Zouyim do not abandon our friends.” Looking at Nalia, he added, “Neither do the Sapsyra.”
Sam sensed that under the mask, Nalia was gritting her teeth. She, for one, would not be sacrificing anything for him. She would go along with her father’s wishes, but when everything went bad, she would let him die. He had no doubt. She would abandon him like everyone else in his life had.
He would show them that he could take care of himself. He would practice from early in the morning until late at night and pay attention to everything his trainers taught him. He had always been able to do anything he set his mind to, and this would be no different. He couldn’t wait to start training in the morning.
Chapter 13
Sam was up early the next morning, before the sun came up. He started with some light warm-up exercises and progressed into practicing some of the movements that Nalia had taught him. The very few movements she had taught him. He did not do
it to practice combat (Rindu would ridicule him for that), but just to warm up his muscles. Skitter had come with Sam out to the clearing to watch.
As the sun came up, Rindu appeared suddenly at Sam’s left side. Sam’s involuntary jump—and Skitter’s mental chuckle—made him feel the familiar warmth as he flushed in embarrassment. Rindu seemed not to notice.
“Today,” the master started, “we will try to get you to sense the rohw. Come sit with me.” Taking a seat on the soft grass, he beckoned Sam to sit in front of him.
“Now, what do you know of the rohw?” Rindu asked.
“Just what you have told me so far. It is the energy of the universe. It is motion in all its forms, beginning with vibration. It can be converted to other types of energy by a master who has unlocked its secrets, but at its core, it always remains vibratory.”
“Good. And what can you do with it?”
“It can do wondrous things, just about anything of which I can conceive,” Sam answered.
The ghost of a smile played across the Zouy’s mouth. “That is an answer of avoidance. And what can you do with it?”
Sam stared at the ground for a moment. “I…don’t know. I think we have reached the limits of my knowledge.”
“Have we?” The master’s unreadable gaze met Sam’s eyes. “Well, then, tell me not what you know but what you think.”
“I think that I need to know it first, to be able to detect it and feel it. Then, when I know it as well as if it was a part of my body, I would use it as any other part of my body, like another hand. It would not be exactly the same, as using my foot is not the same as using my hand, but it would be an extension of myself. That’s what I think.”
Rindu steepled his fingers and tapped his lips with them. “Yes, good. You have keen intuition. Now let us train you so your skill will be a match for it. As it is said: ‘The man who gets out of bed in the darkness of night to piss has started his day already.’”
Sam stared at the Zouy wordlessly.
“Do you not understand? Nevermind. Let us start. ‘To do something immediately is to do it now.’”
Sam consciously closed his mouth, which had somehow dropped open. “You just make these sayings up on the spot, don’t you?”
Rindu rolled his eyes. “‘Wisdom from a stone is wisdom still.’ And the course of wisdom now is to do as I say and not question.” His mock scowl was all Sam needed to get started.
“Good,” Rindu said. “Relax, and breathe. Have I not told you that in ancient Kasmali, rohw means ‘wind’ or ‘spirit’? Ancient masters knew the connection between breathing and the rohw, so any work with the rohw must start with this. Please observe.”
Rindu took an exaggerated breath through his nose. The size and shape of his nose made a peculiar whistling noise. Then, after holding the breath for several seconds, Rindu breathed out through his mouth, not forcing the air out but allowing it to flow out of his body on its own.
Sam noticed that the master was breathing deeply, far into the belly, as he had learned in yoga and qigong on his world. This, at least, was similar to what he knew. When Rindu asked him to breathe for him, he did so, and the master seemed pleased.
“Good. Now we must detect the rohw and its channels. Picture your breath as it goes deep into your belly. See it circulate through the many channels in your body, circling, always circling, and then returning to the lungs to be expelled. Do not force the breath, let it flow at a pace of its own. Continue to breathe and to picture the breath.”
After several minutes of breathing and relaxing his body as he did in his normal meditations, Sam felt the familiar “separated” feeling, the light-headed sensation that he was apart from his body but still within it. As he slipped deeper and deeper into his meditation, he felt heat on his face. Thinking that the sun had topped the trees, he opened his eyes, and instantly lost his calm, relaxed state.
For a moment, just before he lost focus, he saw that Rindu was glowing. Not just glowing, though, but actually putting out heat. He seemed like a small sun, sitting motionless and calm and radiating energy like he was on fire.
When he looked to the monk’s face, he saw those bottomless hazel eyes fixed on him. He gave a little jump.
“What did you feel?” Rindu asked.
“I…you…it was…” Sam sputtered. “I mean, I felt some heat, so I opened my eyes. You were glowing and emitting heat. It was amazing!”
A small twitch in the corner of Rindu’s mouth appeared and then disappeared quickly. Sam wasn’t sure, but he thought maybe that was as close as the man came to smiling. “Good. Very good. Most Zouyim apprentices take years to be able to sense the rohw in others, even one so strong as I. And how do you feel now?”
“Like I’ve run 20 miles. I feel worn out. Why is that?”
The twitch returned, and then disappeared again as rapidly. “It is your body compensating. It is using its own energy instead of tapping the rohw from other sources. It will get better, with time and practice. We will work on accepting energy tomorrow. For now, some physical exercise will do well in complementing our energy training.” Rindu’s stomach growled loudly. “After we eat. We have been motionless for three hours, after all.”
Sam was shocked. Three hours? It seemed like minutes. Looking at the sun being filtered through the dense trees overhead, he saw that it was true. He had a lot to think about. After eating.
A hearty breakfast of some kind of creamy soup, rough bread, and assorted fruits and vegetables later, Sam was ready for more training. “Will we continue now?” he asked Rindu.
“No. You and I will continue tomorrow. For now, you will train with Nalia in combat. You must become proficient in physical combat as well as energy use. The Sapsyra have developed combat into an art form, transcending most mortals. She is a living weapon and will help teach you how you can become a better fighter.”
Nalia came walking up and sat down. Masked head swiveled toward Sam, stopped, and then moved toward Rindu. “I am ready,” she said.
Sam gulped. He did not look forward to being beaten up for the next several hours. Still, maybe he could learn combat. Maybe he was learning already each time she beat him up. Isn’t that how they did it in the kung fu movies? The master punishes the student with rigorous physical challenges and beatings, only to reveal the secret training method the student was going through the whole time? Maybe that was what was happening here. He just needed to keep a good attitude and she would get around to teaching him something he recognized. He hoped.
“Attack me,” she said to him without preamble.
Oh no. It’s going to be one of those training sessions.
Three hours later, he lay panting on the grass, bruises smarting all over his body and small trickles of blood dripping from his lip and over his left eye. Nalia was standing, not breathing hard, clothes unwrinkled, no sweat darkening any of her clothing, looking as if she had been lounging about in the cool forest air the entire time.
“Do you still not sense how the battle sounds? Do you not recognize a pattern to the way I pummel you?” she asked. “I have been as predictable as a child playing with her siblings, but still you cannot block or evade a single blow. Why are you so incompetent? Are there no warriors in the pathetic world of yours?”
Irritated, Sam lashed out without thinking. “Yes, at least one. The Gray Man is from my world. Can he fight well enough for you?”
Her head tilted slightly to the side, as if thinking. Then, without another word, she turned on her heels and walked off.
Good job. Way to make an enemy of one of the only three people you know here that can help you.
Nalia had to go somewhere to be alone. She had preferred it when Sam could not speak her language, when he was just an ignorant savage. She thought once more about the situation she was in.
She had been trying to act correctly, she really had. She planned on starting with the basics, teaching Sam how to move correctly, how to read combat, how to hear the song. Each day, she told
herself, Today I will start teaching him as a novice Sapsyr. Today I will show my father and my order honor. And each day, when she saw the man there in front of her, beaten down from all previous sessions, but anxious that today may be different, she would revert to showing her superiority. Why was it so difficult?
But today, when she had pushed him beyond what he could endure, today, when he fought back in the only way he could, verbally, he had struck a weak spot. He had injured her, and it was her fault. She did not know what she was angrier about. Was it that he made the cutting remark, or was it that she pushed him until he did so?
She had always blamed herself for her mother’s death. If she herself would have died, then her mother would have been the one Sapsyr left to carry the Gray Man’s message. Her mother would be alive instead of her. Of course, Sam could not have known that, not have known that his strike had gone so deep, but she wanted to resent him for it.
The problem was that her actions lately were not as honorable as they should be for a Sapsyr. It was as if all the rage at the Gray Man, and her powerlessness and the running and hiding, were crashing down upon her all at once. And she was taking it out on Sam. She wasn’t even sure if she still suspected him of being a spy or assassin. She was just lashing out because of her own imbalance and lack of peace.
Hearing a sound, she turned quickly, ready to kill. She must have been out of sorts for someone to get within twenty yards of her like that before she sensed or heard them. Realizing it was Sam, she lowered her guard and relaxed, standing in a normal, non-threatening manner.
“I just wanted to say I’m sorry,” he said to her without preamble. “I know that you’ve had horrible things happen in your past, many of them related to the Gray Man. I didn’t mean to attack you like that. I’m tired and beat up and frustrated that I can’t seem to learn what I need to learn, so I overreacted. I know you don’t like me but I don’t know what I did to deserve your enmity. I don’t want to add to the list. I’ll try to be more thoughtful in the future. I appreciate your effort in training me and hope we can continue.”
Harmonic Magic Series Boxed Set Page 10