A Hollow Mountain (The Brightest Shadow Book 2), page 21
"I don't want that. Right now, I just want the day to be over."
"I think you do want me, but you're lying to yourself because of who you think you are." Natala watched him carefully. "Without pretending anything, do you think I chose you randomly, Slaten? If I only wanted a man for protection, I could have chosen countless warriors in this village."
"Don't. Don't try." Slaten rubbed his eyes roughly and then stared directly at her. He shouldn't give her any opportunity, but... "I will help you escape in exchange for the Bloodskin arts you know. But if this was all a lie, I will neve-"
"It wasn't all a lie. But how can I ex-"
"Let me finish. If you were doing nothing but manipulating me, then I want nothing else to do with you. If that's all you want, then stay silent. But if there was anything real here, I'm giving you one chance to prove it. Or one chance to manipulate me. Choose carefully."
Natala considered him carefully, but surprisingly briefly. Then she leaned over the corner of the room and placed the Neyet board between them and spoke rapidly. "Your version of the game is superior to the original, but flawed. Skilled players will trap each other at the start, and if pieces advance deeper, there are really only a few viable choices for any given position. I lied about being fascinating by your ingenuity."
That had not been the approach Slaten expected. Despite himself, he looked down to the board as she began demonstrating positions.
"Before you arrived, I devised a version of the game myself. You begin by placing several pieces on the outer rim in turns, to avoid the initial trap. The rules allow you to choose your movement, but in addition you can choose to move pieces through the curls of the spiral, going backward but threatening other pieces."
Slaten's eyes widened as he realized how substantial such a change would be. Despite its spiraling shape, the Neyet board was essentially just a curled line. Natala's version of the game cast movement in two dimensions, vastly increasing the complexity of the game.
"I flattered your version of the game, Slaten, but this much is true." Natala took a breath and stared directly at him, without any emotion. "When I saw that you made your own rules, I was happy. You may not believe me, but I was glad when I saw someone else play Neyet and react in the same way that I did. That may not be what you want, but it is what I have to give."
For a long moment he stared back at her. The words certainly seemed authentic, lacking any fawning adoration but speaking to a real connection similar to the one he'd thought they'd shared. Yet that unemotional approach would be exactly what she would attempt if she wanted to manipulate him.
Natala sat back and sighed. "I see. I tried."
"I would like to believe that, but you must understand that everything you say will sound like manipulation now. That barrier is inescapable except through manipulation. No matter how many layers of thought, I can always recede to a deeper layer of skepticism, unless you defeat that cycle by gaining control over me."
"Or unless you trust me."
"Yes, but you didn't trust me."
To his surprise, Natala smiled. Her expression and posture became much more relaxed, or at least she feigned relaxation. She grabbed one of the blankets and curled up in it. "You won't believe me, so I'll just say whatever I want. I think I prefer this to manipulating you. And I meant everything I said about hoping you survive the raid."
She retreated to a corner and pretended to sleep. Slaten took one of the remaining blankets and struggled in vain to find a comfortable position. Everything was worse than it had been when he stepped into the room, and he still wasn't sure if he'd rather be trapped in the deception.
Chapter 16
-
"The Coldstep clan is the largest in the range, depending on how those numbers are determined. Many clans barely replace their own numbers, but the Coldsteps have continually grown. Because they are ill-suited to large scale operations, they periodically break off weaker portions into branch clans with derivative names. Collectively they are a formidable force, and the core Coldstep clan is capable of living at heights that only Steeljudges could survive."
- Scholars of the Blue Mask
-
Though Tani's journey began in fear and trepidation, every day that passed without incident slowly bled away the scars of trauma. She suspected that the true danger now was growing lax and stumbling into an ambush, but she took it as a challenge of discipline.
Her rationale for traveling unaccompanied proved sound, in the end. Alone and using all her tribe's arts, she could pass through the mountains close to invisibly. Early on she did make an error and saw a group of raiders, faces covered in fierce red paint, yet they passed her by even though they must have seen her. Perhaps they sought more valuable prey, since she imagined that she must look like a boy to them. She still vowed to avoid all such encounters in the future.
As she traveled, she focused all her attention on her arts of perception. The Nelee possessed many such skills, but her master had instructed her to focus on a single one: the Duusha Eye. It was oddly named, for it did not involve her eyes at all. Instead, it seemed to mimic the way the skittish duusha scanned their surroundings for predators at all times.
They had vicious horns if they were attacked. So did she.
Every evening she removed her master's case from her pack and ran her fingers over the rough wood until she knew every splinter. Though the texts within were the most valuable object she possessed, she used the case itself to gather the many arts scattered before her into a unified practice.
Some Nelee could so cloak themselves in shadow as to be nearly invisible, but that art escaped Tani's grasp. All her experiences of careful movement ran up against stronger emotions that made her sein flow in improper patterns. Instead of attempting some grand art, she focused on tamping down her sein so that she would be invisible to the expanded senses of others.
Once she did so, she discovered that the world became strangely quiet, as if the flow of her sein had been her own heartbeat pounding in her ears. When it finally ceased, she found a deeper silence than she had known existed. Instead of a river, the sein within her rippled like a quiet pond.
In that stillness, she found herself simply watching the mountains around her in joy. There was a grandiose beauty in seeing the rolling waves of trees beneath her, yet she also found a majesty in the rocky cliffs and even the charm in the stark, ice-clad peaks. When she reached a high point, she could see even further than in the plains of her home, yet the scope of seeing so much of the world rendered so small left her breathless.
Those moments were not distractions, they were the heart of her practice. Tani drew them into herself like precious gemstones and watched them sink into the pool of her sein. When they reached the bottom and the ripples ceased, she realized that she had attained something new.
As she walked, she felt a deep awareness of the sein all around her. Occasional raiders passing on nearby mountains struck at her senses in a way she struggled to describe, like a twinge in her back. When she was completely still and silent, she could even feel the simple animal sein of the creatures that moved through the mountains. Not well enough to identify most of them or count the birds, yet she had never known it was possible to feel such untrained sein.
With the new awareness opening to her, Tani felt increasingly secure moving through the mountains. She might not be able to fight the raiders if it came to that, but they would never find her this way. As she learned how to move more securely in a purely physical sense, that allowed her to move more swiftly and even run at times.
Perversely, her progress only made her thirsty for more. She felt as though she was on the threshold of a significant breakthrough, yet it evaded her. When she lay still at night and contemplated her sein, sometimes she almost believed that she could hear it, but other times she felt some sense she could not name, somewhere between her master's practices and the Duusha Eye.
She needed to focus on one or the other or she would only wander blindly between the two. Yet she struggled to make the decision, wishing that she had her master with her for guidance. Over and over her fingertips caught on the rough edges of her case.
Still, it had been a long time since she had traveled in such peace. Humans and mansthein still killed one another, and the raiders still threatened, yet still she was happy. She found her mind turning to the old techniques that Jaer Krylyl had taught her... and there her contentment faltered.
That technique had not been her master's, but she had taken it up solely to defend herself against the Hero's terrible light. She enjoyed the practice, but it served no other purpose.
And there, she had not truly advanced at all.
~ ~ ~
Tree boughs brushed past her, little more than caresses now that she could move through the trees easily. She had left the small path she had been following because she had a strong sense that something lay before her. Her arts had not developed so far that she could be certain, yet she felt as though there was a concentration of sein ahead.
In the mountains it would take much longer to travel that distance, however, since she needed to descend into a nearby valley to reach what she felt. Between herself and that point, she knew that something else existed, like motes of dust in the light. Who exactly it might be, she couldn't say, but she thought that she had come far enough that she should observe. Perhaps she had finally left the territory of raiders and might find normal people.
When she advanced, she felt one of the motes swirling around her. For a moment Tani thought that someone was moving impossibly fast, then she realized that it was a confusion within herself, as when the world seemed to spin. Her sense was still so abstract, she struggled to focus on the particular...
Such as the raider with a spear charging directly toward her.
Tani drew her knives automatically as he lunged out of hiding. She saw only one spear and it seemed that he intended to fight with it directly instead of switching to another weapon. When it stabbed out toward her, she desperately swept her sickle knife up to deflect it.
And did so easily. As Tani continued to deflect the series of spear thrusts, she realized that she had the battle well in hand. Her opponent clearly had some sein training, attacking with real power and speed. Yet his skill with a spear was clumsy compared to the vicious assault she remembered from Subenor. Since then, she had only grown swifter and stronger, so even his aggressive tactics were little threat to her.
If he connected, the blow could still be mortal, however, so Tani played it safe. She waited until she saw the perfect opportunity and then hooked the tip of his spear with her sickle knife. When it stopped moving for a moment, she reached out and grasped the shaft with her hand.
Though the young raider tried to pull away, he was only slightly stronger than her. She pushed, sending the butt of his spear against his side, and then tore it from his hands when he stumbled.
Tani stepped forward, her sickle flashing to end him. He barely managed to throw himself away from her swipe, landing on his back and staring at her in horror. Imagining how many innocent people he must have seen in the same position and then killed, Tani advanced with her knife ready.
"Please, no!" Someone dashed from the trees and Tani braced herself for a strike, but it was an unarmed young woman. She threw herself in front of the raider and stared at Tani with trembling determination. "Don't hurt us!"
The tension drained out of Tani and her hands slipped to her sides, letting the spear clatter to the stony path. Though the two of them looked physically similar to the raiding clans she had seen, they carried a different air about them. Certainly, she doubted that any Bloodskin men would inspire women to put themselves in danger for them.
As Tani put away her sickle knife, she examined the two of them more carefully. They were roughly the same age, and at first she thought they might be partners, but they both had exactly the same dark green eyes. Perhaps siblings, then. If so, the sister hesitantly helped her brother return to his feet while they watched her as if she was a wild animal.
"I don't know what clan you're from," the young woman said, "but you should go. Even if you kill us, this village is protected by the Steelbones."
"You're part of the Steelbone clan?" Tani kept her hands away from her sickle knife so as not to intimidate them, but couldn't manage a smile. To her surprise, both of them shook their heads and the brother spoke.
"We're just a village. But we have an agreement with the Steelbones. If any raiding clans harass us, they strike back."
"Yet you attacked me."
He shrugged awkwardly, not meeting her gaze. "You could have killed us. Revenge later wouldn't protect my sister."
Sighing, Tani did her best to smile. While traveling alone, she had smiled often, yet doing the same in the presence of other people felt strange. "I am not associated with any clan. My name is Tani of the Nelee, and I am merely a traveler through your mountains. May I join you?"
She saw the tension leave them, though the brother looked uncomfortable until she gave him back his spear. For a short time afterward she held tension in her shoulders, as if it had all been an elaborate trap, but that gradually faded as she spoke with the two of them. They had left their village to gather herbs and locate an animal that had escaped before running into her.
The sister was called Cabari and the brother Rubako, and they seemed to have a bond that would have been admirable in a Nelee village. As they walked, Rubako carried a large basket and Cabari retrieved various plants to place within it. From their implications, Tani gradually learned that their village was so small that it didn't even have a name, they merely struggled to survive in the mountains.
Though she wanted to ask them about the Steelbones, talk of raiders seemed to make them uncomfortable. Since they were the first friendly people Tani had met in the mountains, she held off on those topics until they trusted her more. It seemed likely that they would take her back to their village once they were done.
"Oh, there he is!" Cabari abruptly clapped her hands and pointed. Tani immediately spotted a tall stone spire... with a strange creature perched on the top.
"What exactly is that animal?" Tani peered at it closer. It was a large beast with four legs ending in cloven hoofs that clung to the rock as if by some mystic art. The most striking trait was its long dark hair, though she noted two straight horns on its head.
"That's a woolly bicorn." Cabari drew herself up proudly. "You probably haven't seen a woolly one before because they usually only live in the coldest mountains. They grow even bigger, some big enough to ride, but we raise the smaller ones here."
"And they're damn hard to catch." Rubako cursed under his breath as he walked to the spire and attempted to chart a way to climb it, though he struggled to find a handhold. His sein arts did not seem to help him in that, though he did heft a large rock as if to throw it.
"Rubako, no!" Cabari rushed to grab his arm. "You'll injure him!"
"I'm just going to knock him off."
"That rock is much too big! And the fall itself might hurt him."
"They fall off the cliffs sometimes. They'll be fine."
"But we lost a bicorn last week! We can't injure another."
While they argued, the bicorn let out a bleat and released a stream of rank pellets. Tani wondered if it mocked them, though she saw little intelligence in its eyes. In any case, she decided that it was time for her to take a hand. She might not be able to grip the stone like the bicorn's hooves, but its position was not so high, not for her.
In one leap she landed atop the spire. The bicorn tried to kick at her, but she grabbed it by the horns and pulled it into the air. She was surprised at how heavy it was, heavy enough that without sein, only a strong man could have lifted it.
For a time it struggled, bleating at her, but eventually it hung limp. Tani jumped back down beside the siblings and gestured with the animal. "Will this do?"
Cabari laughed and clapped her hands again, while Rubako retrieved a rough string and tied it around the animal's neck. When Tani let the bicorn back down, it only bleated a few times, tugged on the string, then settled into line behind them.
"Do you have many woolly bicorns here?" Tani asked. Rubako shook his head.
"Wish we had more. But the Steelbones take them as payment, and we can't breed more fast enough."
"How much do they require you to pay for protection?"
"It's not so bad," Cabari said, but her brother shook his head with a dour expression. Tani found herself wondering exactly what kind of protection this was, but again decided not to press the matter. She seemed to have earned her place with them by recovering the bicorn, so she hoped to forge lasting ties.
When they reached the village, her first thought was that it looked a miserable little huddle of shacks, but her impressions soon filtered through the smiles she saw on the siblings' faces. This was home, for them, and that was what mattered. They returned the bicorn to one of several pens around the village, though Tani immediately saw how the bicorn might have gotten out. Rubako grumbled something about meaning to fix the fence.
Otherwise, the village contained little. A few villagers eyed her but didn't approach. One pen had a hutch that looked as though it contained another type of animal, though she couldn't see in while walking past. None of the houses were larger than the others, but there was a large structure that Cabari called a barn and said they needed in the winter. Given how cold it was, Tani had assumed they were already in the season of winter, but for some reason this made the two of them laugh.
"Please, come inside." Cabari smiled at her and stopped at the door to their house, swishing her skirts shyly. "We don't have much, but you look so hungry."
Tani couldn't deny that her rations and hunting had thinned, so she gladly accepted the offer. The siblings lived alone in their parents' house, after a raider attack took their father three years past. It was modest at best, every surface and object carefully cared for and mended many times.
