Narune blinked, then glanced over the seats toward Warmaster Jhul, who was eying the cacica. He didn’t look pleased.
“Well,” Cacica Yabisi said. She rested a hand on her hip and curved it like a stormdancer. “Allow me to reteach you the same bitter lessons I’ve learned so that no one again forgets why we have oaths against the Halfborn!”
She glanced down at Tessouat, and the elder spiritseer nodded once. She then seated herself without another word, which seemed to only confuse the spectators more. Warmaster Jhul’s eyes narrowed.
Narune turned back to Ikenna and Tessouat, his tail somehow swishing even faster.
“The cacica grants you a boon because of what you face,” Tessouat said to Ikenna. “Honor demands that we offer it to both of you, but it was chosen to weigh specifically in your favor. You may also withdraw and face another opponent if you so choose.”
Narune and Ikenna eyed each other, then Ikenna shook his head, “Spiritseers fight monsters like the halja all the time; I might as well begin with this one.”
Narune’s jaw clenched but he kept his peace.
“Then your boon: You may call on others to aid you, though each must be without a path, not yet sentinel, warden, or warrior.”
Narune stared in shock as waves of cold dread pulsed through him.
Ikenna nodded. “Who will fight at my side?” he boomed dramatically.
Narune’s heart sank further as many of the other youths stepped forward. Some looked eager for a chance at additional favor while others simply glared at Narune, and more than a few were obviously either siblings, or close friends with Ikenna. In the end there were eleven fighters arranged against him.
Halfborn or not, the match had become so unbalanced that it’d be worth nothing more than a joke in either of their stories. Surely, they had to see that? Or did Cacica Yabisi think he would flee?
“You are also allowed the right to withdraw,” Tessouat said to him, striking at the thoughts in Narune’s mind. “There would be no shame in doing so now.”
Narune was tempted, but dismissed the idea after a moment of thought. The match wasn’t completely hopeless; his mother had trained him to fight multiple opponents because warriors often found themselves fighting several halja at once. Also, he didn’t need to win. He just needed to prove his bravery and skill, and simply accepting these unfair conditions should show more than enough courage.
Besides, giving up would mean throwing away his dreams willingly… and if he was going to lose them one way or another, then they’d have to tear them from him. They were all he had left now, so Narune would hold on with all his might.
He steeled himself and straightened, then shook his head in response to Tessouat’s words.
“Seas and skies aflame, Naru.”
Ixchel rushed into the Proving Grounds. Fury rippled across her face as she gestured impatiently for a spiritseer to hand her a spear. They didn’t comment on her arrival.
But Narune did. “Ixchel,” he said harshly as conversation began picking up. “This is—”
She pinched his lips closed and then crossed her arms. “What this is, Naru, is monkeyshit, and you’re a fool for rolling around in it. But if you’re going to do it anyway, then I want to show off too.”
Even together, their chances of winning were slim. All she had done was condemn herself to humiliation and probably a severe beating. “Thank you,” he said anyway.
They turned, readying to face the eleven others who had spread out on the far side of the Proving Grounds. However, that wasn’t to be the end of the day’s surprises.
Kisari ran over to them. Narune and Ixchel stared in surprise.
“What are you doing!” he shouted, raising his arms. “No! Go back. You’re not a warrior.”
“Eh, neither are you, really,” she shot back. “Which is exactly why I’m allowed to be here.”
“This isn’t a game, Kisari.”
“I know that,” she snapped, eyes narrowing. “But do either of you? Tell me, will you surrender easily?”
Narune and Ixchel exchanged a look. Ixchel had probably already won enough glory, but she wouldn’t leave the field before Narune did.
“No...” they both said sullenly.
Kisari nodded as if it were obvious. “So they will hurt you. I’m not going to sit there and watch it happen.” She glanced at one of the spiritseers. “Give me a spear.”
“It’s not against the Ritual’s laws,” Ixchel said slowly. “She’s not a warden yet, and she’s seen us fight often enough.”
Narune glared at her. “Oh? And that’s all it takes to become a warrior?”
Ixchel shrugged.
“Give me your memories, then,” Kisari said to him. “It’ll be a step better. But even if you don’t, I’m not leaving the two of you alone.”
She spoke with a ferocity that surprised Narune, and even Ixchel raised her eyebrows. Kisari coughed and toyed with one of the flowering vines in her hair, her expression softening.
“I know I’m being a burden,” she said quietly. “But I couldn’t just sit there and do nothing...”
“You’re never a burden,” Narune said with a grim smile. He glanced at Ixchel, who nodded in agreement.
Narune clasped her forearm and Kisari did the same, then he hastily gave her as many of his training memories as he could find. They were scattered and blended with so many others that it would have taken a lot of effort and time to isolate them. So, he just gave her everything he could find and with it went so much else, most of it pointless, some of it a little embarrassing, all of it a worry for later.
Narune also passed on memories of his mother’s training and all the times he had practiced in secret for this very day. She relived them in a flash, then the memories nestled within hers.
Whether Kisari ended up making good use of them would be up to her. Warriors spent a long time growing accustomed to battle; things like testing the limits of their bodies and balancing spatial awareness, positioning, and movement together. This was a messy shortcut, and, if anything, would make it harder for her to refine her warrior lore because his memories mismatched her body, but then Kisari never intended to become a warrior anyway.
He pushed one final thought into her mind as they finished, Thank you, Kisari. I’ll make it up to you, I promise. Anything you want.
I’ll remember, Kisari flashed back smugly.
Ikenna frowned at them as they parted. “We’re facing two Halfborn now? That’s not fair!”
“Not fair?” Ixchel said. A short, humorless laugh rose from her throat. “She isn’t a warrior and you still outnumber us! I’m going to thump you twice as hard for saying something so stupid, Ikenna.”
The youth gave her a look, but remained silent and took a stance. Narune glanced at Tessouat. The spiritseer elder’s face was passive and he seemed to be waiting for each side to ready themselves without hurry. Around them, the crowd began to murmur, and Narune’s twitching ears caught their gossip.
Everyone seemed to be wondering what the cacica’s words and the unprecedented changes to the Duels could mean. Narune spotted Warmaster Jhul’s stony face but caught the look in his eyes and swallowed; if the cacica noticed or cared, it didn’t show.
Should I really go along with this? But fleeing would color him a coward and force him into his oath; barred not only from ever becoming a spiritseer, but also a warrior or even a warden.
It would be a crushing—maybe even lethal—blow against everything Narune hoped to accomplish. And Kisari and Ixchel had joined them on their own… What are you afraid of? Maybe Kisari would earn a little more respect for her show of courage, and Ixchel had more than enough glory to spare if she somehow didn’t gain more from all this. And the Ritual is just a contest, a match without real danger.
Decided, Narune glanced at his two friends, who nodded, then signaled their readiness to Tessouat.
The spiritseer glanced at Ikenna, who also signaled that he was ready. Tessouat’s hand rose and he
shouted, “Begin!”
Chapter 11
Colibrí blinked. The massive golden orb stared back at her.
“You’re… alive?” Pure, undiluted delight flowed through her. Enough that she fell to her hands and knees. Oh, stormless days!
“Unfortunately, I am not.”
The voice was feminine and musical. It echoed from everywhere without distance or origin, and Colibrí’s mind struggled to make sense of that.
Colibrí shook her head. “I… don’t understand. You’re here in front of me, moving and speaking!”
“This is true, but the fact remains that I have been dead for a very long time now.” A raspy sound filled the air, like hissing melodic laughter. “I persist because of the illusion of life I have woven through my flesh.”
An illusion of life? Colibrí frowned as her head spun. She pressed her hands against her eyes. What… is this? Am I going mad? What other explanation could there be for any of this? This strange place and the Guardian before her, dead-but-not?
“Have the tribes forgotten that I swim in the currents of the Unseen Flow?” the Guardian asked.
“Of course not, but...” She shook her head. “Forgive me, Guardian. None of what you’ve said makes sense. Death is death.”
“The best lies are those that are indistinguishable from the truth, or eventually become them. This means an adequate illusion of life is no different from life itself.” The serpent let out another of her odd laughs, her wide wings trembling to Colibrí’s left. “Though, if I am honest, my illusion is far more fragile. I would not need to be brought as low as before for it to tear and allow my flesh to once again grow cold.”
Colibrí nodded and slowly returned to her feet. “So… you're real? Truly?”
“An interesting question to ask a creature of deception, but allow me to calm your heart and mind in honor of our shared oaths. I am real and before you now.”
Colibrí nodded, excitement now rushing through her, and her tail wagged in show of it. “Then my prayers have been heard!”
The Guardian was silent for a moment, then her slitted pupil returned to the canopy and she huffed. “I did not call you to me. In fact, I spent most of the day redirecting you away with my illusions, but you stubbornly always found your way back here.”
“Well, I’m not sure why. We were patrolling for corruption, not looking for you.” In spite of everything, Colibrí felt her face heat up. She had wanted to find answers, not more questions, but now the Guardian was telling her that not even she knew why Colibrí was here. “But if you weren’t waiting for me, then what are you doing?”
“Dozing. Thinking. Enjoying the view.”
Colibrí’s tail and ears fell limp as she stared at the great serpent. “What?” It wasn’t what she had expected to hear from the protector of the islands, first and greatest and among all warriors.
“I am enjoying the canopy. Do you humans not stand and admire the sea from time to time? It is the same; look how the leaves surge like waves and make their own kind of music. How the faint light hits them in a peculiar yet beautiful way, and so many things flit across the branches, oblivious of their part in the whole. Ah, the court of the tree-lords is always pleasing.”
There was a change in the note of the Guardian’s voice and it took Colibrí a moment to realize what it was. She growled. “You’re nipping me! I’m sorry, Guardian, but this is hardly the time for jests.”
The Guardian gave a huff and slowly rose, twisting upright, and then stretched out her wings. A loud groan filled the air, then the wings snapped closed, folding behind the Guardian like a great mantle. She curved down, turning so that one eye remained trained on Colibrí, and then hissed. It was the sound of the wind before it became the storm.
Colibrí frowned up at her. “Where are the others, by the way?”
“Safe; I had no desire to meet with them. You, on the other hand, are only here because the forest desperately wants you to be. As for myself, I am waiting for the elder halja that killed me, and it, in turn, waits for its own ripe moment to pounce. Anything else?”
“Eh, no…” Colibrí said, ears flattening as all the things she had insinuated leaped back at her. “Uh, I didn’t mean to—”
“The tribes have kept their oaths for a very long time. It is only fair that you ask after mine, but I assure you that I honor those oaths in my own way.” The Guardian moved to glance around, up over the swirling whirlpool of root-roads. “Now, I imagine there is some purpose behind why the forest brought you to me.”
“I’m still not sure it did, great Guardian. As I said, I was looking for halja and corruption, yet I arrived here...”
The Guardian sighed. “You are Halfborn.”
It was an accusation, not an observation. Colibrí bent at the waist, arms spread out, palms facing up; free of weapons and so offering peace and respect. “It’s a complicated part of my story, Guardian. The former cacica spared me as a sproutling with the hopes that I could serve her replacement some way.”
“Not so complicated at all, then.”
Colibrí slumped. “Eh, that’s maybe true.”
“I know more of it than you believe. The forest whispers without end, and from time to time I am able to understand its gossip. That was how I learned of the day when Cacica Yabisi realized you could never be an answer for the war, because in saving her life, you revealed yourself to be a catastrophic gambit at best.”
Colibrí could do nothing but agree, so she kept her silence. That had been the last time she had felt the warmth of Yabisi’s embrace. The young, trembling cacica had cried as they held each other—terrified not of the halja that had almost killed them, but of Colibrí.
“I do not know what you hope to accomplish, but surely you understand now that you risk making things worse?”
Colibrí peered up at her, legs spaced apart, and braced as if the Guardian’s words were a blow. “Stillness is spreading across the outer forest. I seem to be the only one finding the festering sores though, and they’re appearing far from the Primordial Wound, very near to Kayuya Village.”
“Ah...” the Guardian said. Her voice sounded troubled.
“Is it because I’m Halfborn?” Colibrí asked.
The Guardian hissed and her wings unfurled for a moment. “Possibly. I have always suspected that the crippled spirits of Halfborn are the result of the land attempting to claim some humans for itself; perhaps as a translator or a champion, but whatever the reason, we know now that it mostly failed.”
“Why does the land continue to shape us, then? Why not try something else?”
“Because what you deem as nature is merely an ocean of Creation, one that is also the spirit of every land; instinct binds it in the same way instinct binds all that comprises it. For instance, the land cannot understand unity against a greater threat; it might see you as an important ally in the war, but think nothing of a moss wolf ripping out your throat, because that is life.
“I imagine this weakness is why the land desperately sought to claim some humans for itself, and for better or worse the wilderness seems to still believe it necessary.”
“What am I to do, then?” Colibrí asked bitterly. “Even if the forest brought me here, I still don’t know why.”
“May I taste your memories? Perhaps I can offer some advice, and it does seem as if the forest believes you are doing something meaningful.”
Colibrí nodded, then blinked as a massive presence engulfed her mind. It was like being adrift in the vast sea, but the sea was made of thoughts and power. She had a sense of being lost, at the whim of the forces around her; calm now, but at any moment a storm could come and she would be helpless before it.
Is this how it feels to Narune when I do this? she wondered as the Guardian sifted through her memories with unnerving ease. It ended after a few brief moments, and the Guardian was left curving deeper, her sinuous back like the peak of a hill and her head drooping closer to Colibrí. The Guardian’s wings half-unfurled as her e
yes grew distant.
“You know exactly what you must do, Colibrí. You are merely unsure whether you should be the one to do it, and that I cannot say,” the Guardian declared. “Hunt down the predator hunting you, for it seems he is tied to the Stillness you are finding. Perhaps he is even their tender. The creature’s name is Peacemaker.”
Colibrí frowned at the name. “You’ve seen him?”
“I have. He comes every so often to probe my defenses and make another attempt at seducing me away from my oaths. He too is a creature of the Unseen Flow, but wields it as if he fears it. This is why you are able to sense his sorcery; it is like emptying the entire jar of paint instead of using a brush.”
“Could he be disguising the Stillness with sorcery, then?” Colibrí chided herself for not considering this before, but it went against everything she knew about how the Flows of Creation and sorcery worked.
“I do not know,” the Guardian answered. “Let us hope not. Sheltering Stillness using Flow would demand a frighteningly intricate spell. One rivaling my own abilities.”
Suddenly, it seemed like there would be more sleepless nights in Colibrí’s future. It was difficult to hunt prey without knowing at least a little about its nature, but she knew nothing about this Peacemaker other than he could apparently wield sorcery, somehow; that was both unprecedented and unnerving, and she didn’t know what it meant or what to think about it.
Colibrí sighed.
“Calm, warrior. You have been gifted a boon, if nothing else, for I believe you are being guided toward corruption by the forest itself. If so, then no illusion will keep you from it.” The Guardian let out a dry laugh and flapped her wings, both sounds echoing throughout the pit of whirling roots. “Life is cruel to force the tribes into such a corner that we would consider using the Halfborn again, but so be it. Know that I will be watching over you closely—and unhappily.”
The Guardian spoke the words without malice, but they still felt like a slap across Colibrí’s face. Even now, after so fervently holding her warrior oaths close, after trying so hard to simply do the right thing, what she—no, all warriors—were shaped to do, everyone still only saw her ears and tail, and the dark story trapped within her blood. Even the Guardian.
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