Questions had been raised about Braams’s fire. No one could match the heat or intensity he could produce, nor could anyone come close to his endurance. When Kan Fosso scrutinized Braams’s output and realized for the first time that the fire was in fact the result of minuscule controlled nuclear reactions, he, and subsequently the entirety of the Three Worlds, had shuddered. Braams was the first Initiate of the Seventh Secret since Keska Kessel. Certainly it must mean something. And it did, especially to those who knew the truth of Kessel’s prophecy. Initiates of the Fifth and Sixth Secrets had power over death and life respectively. Only an Initiate of the Seventh Secret had the power of Creation, the power to create, by force of will alone, a sun to initiate and sustain life. Or obliterate it in the act of remaking.
Braams had underplayed this revelation of his new status, taking what seemed to be an uncharacteristically humble tack, and focusing more on his future with the fighting circuit than on any special benefits that might be due to an Initiate of the Seventh Secret. The Church kept an eye on him, following his career and allowing him every freedom until the conclusion date of Kessel’s prophecy approached.
He had left Suur Cathedral, a disappointment to some for not continuing to pursue the Church life, an inspiration to others who reveled in the striving that the circuit fights represented. He was back now, head of Suur Cathedral, teaching the Secrets as well as the striving. Few could match his mastery of the aspect of the tiger. None could match his mastery of fire.
The sun, just below the horizon, sent up a red-orange spray that would soon sink into the ocean as well, but Iss was full and bright in the indigo dusk sky. Braams stood upon the beach, clad only in a pair of red trunks, his back to the water, the warm waves coming to lap at his calves and retreat again. Only some would make it to him. The assistant stewards, Kruuzrik Tuumz, Karrs Kromma, and Boors Adaksis, lying in wait on the way to him would prevent most from making it this far.
He could hear them coming now and so closed his eyes, allowing his perception to expand. There were nine of them in all. Good. Most, he knew, had studied the great cats, the tiger, the leopard, but a few had studied the eagle and the crane. He grinned, thinking of the crane, remembering fondly his days training with Kan Fosso. He longed to see Fosso again, but knew what that would mean: the arrival of the King of Spades.
Braams opened his eyes slowly. He saw the nine men fast approaching, the last of them limping, as they emerged from the curtain of lush foliage, padding soundlessly upon the yielding sand. To Braams, though, they came in slow motion. He noted each of them and in each of them a burning desire to succeed, but it was too soon. Few if any would graduate today, he could tell that already, but they had made it this far and that was something.
He received them with grace, ferocity, and his trademark grin. He used the palms of his hands, not following up with clenching, raking, or tearing fingers—it wouldn’t do to kill those he hoped would fight alongside him when the King of Spades finally came. Still, even with the supreme control he exercised, sometimes bones, most often ribs, came out cracked or broken. Geff Falstoff fell first, his ribs caving under a single blow, weakened by Kruuzrik Tuumz and his heavy fists no doubt. Falstoff collapsed languidly, thick blood overflowing from his mouth. Two of his fellows stopped their advances and carried him from the sloshing waves to a place of comparable safety, an act Braams acknowledged with an approving nod.
The others, though, more intent on attempting to defeat the senior steward of Suur Cathedral, were singleminded in their onslaught. It was immediately apparent, even with their greater numbers, that they could not hope to touch him with their physical attacks. Geff Falstoff lay unconscious, oozing blood from his mouth, Buurak Aareks clutched at his shoulder, his arm hanging limply, while he plied Braams unsuccessfully with kicks. The water hampered their movement while their own numbers created another obstacle. They should have known better, Braams thought.
Niss Kuuga was first to raise his Halo, but the rest were quick to follow.
Buurak Aareks was nearing exhaustion, but had patiently waited to bring forth his Halo, his skill with which far surpassed his skill with the crane. With the manifestation of Aareks’s Halo, everyone’s movement, including Braams’s, slowed. Everyone seemed heavier by degrees. The water had taken on the consistency of wet cement.
Braams eyed Aareks carefully. This was the most powerful manifestation of his Halo yet, and Braams was sure that the Fifth Secret lay in easy reach. Perhaps one student would graduate today after all.
Niss Kuuga, Gills Annasa, and Paal Kingaa fought their way clear of Aareks’s localized gravity. They joined hands, forming a small circle, and about them rose a monstrous Halo of yellow-orange flame, reaching four meters into the sky from their shoulders and lighting the surf-scoured beach with fresh daylight.
Riin Helsuun and Chuuster Somms had dropped to their knees, unable to resist Aareks’s power. With their increased weight, they felt their energy ebbing, being drained away, sucked down into the earth. Faaylin Olaff fell to Braams’s expert handwork while Pendell Faaiz bowed his head, calmly preparing something in spite of all the chaos surrounding him.
Aareks’s purple-black Halo grew more intense and the water and wet sand bowled beneath its influence. Pendell Faaiz put a hand to his forehead, struggling to maintain his concentration, and started to back out of the area of Aareks’s intensified gravity.
Braams was noticeably struggling against the pressure Aareks was able to exert, but Aareks was completely unaffected. He moved closer to Braams, attempted to deliver a number of kicks which were blocked, but was successful in delivering a short vertical punch to Braam’s midsection. Braams doubled over, both from the additional gravity working on him and Aareks’s substantially increased density. Braams looked up, a trickle of blood marring his genuine grin. Impressive. Area effect as well as multiple personal effects operating simultaneously.
The light and heat of the three acolytes’ fire was impossible to ignore. Braams turned his head stutteringly to look and his grin became toothy. He kicked at the ground, rising swiftly from the gravity bubble and hovered in the air above it.
“Fire,” he said, “is my domain. You have done an excellent job, Aareks. You pass. But it’s time to show all of you what a true Halo can become.”
Before he could do this though, Pendell Faaiz cried out and from his forehead, the center of his tight, thick Halo of white light, spouted countless swords of the same white light. They poured out of his forehead, the force of each straining his neck muscles—as yet undeveloped for this use of his Halo—and cocking his head back with each release so that the swords fanned up high into the blackening sky after the initial fusillade hammered into his intended target.
The white shafts of light were more than Braams had anticipated. Still in the air, he drew in his limbs, covered his face, and bore the onslaught. Cuts opened and welts rose upon his dusky skin. One of the lances passed straight through his stomach, out his back, and felt like it took his last meal with it. Liquid fire erupted within him and he knew that he might be sick for the next few days, but it was worth it. Two had passed tonight.
Floating there, without the slightest regard for gravity, Braams relaxed his muscles slightly, nodded to indicate his acknowledgement of the attack he’d just received, breathed in deeply, and exploded like a star coming into being. Surrounded by a great wheel of living orange-white fire, his back and neck were arched, his arms and legs outstretched. All who saw him were awed by the size of his Halo, radiating out not from his head but from his whole body to a diameter of five meters, and could not help but truly feel that this man was, right as they watched, communing with the divine and receiving the Entitlement of God.
The sudden consumption of local oxygen reduced Buurak Aareks and Pendell Faaiz to unconsciousness, but the other fire users stood their ground. Together they generated a shared triangular Halo, which, as far as Braams knew, was a first and worthy of no small praise. The intensity of the flame, though,
was not on par with what they faced. As a group, they launched their flame, an animate column rising from their shared Halo and threatening to scorch Braams at the center of his own. But threaten was all it could do. Braams cried out, flexing his might, and forcefully yanked the flames off target to spiral into his now-spinning Halo, a furious pinwheel sun hovering just over the soughing waves of Suurasso Beach. In mere seconds, the triangle Halo was extinguished, the three who’d made it vulnerable. Braams narrowed his eyes. The rotation of his Halo stopped, reversed, and unloaded streaming gouts of flame upon those who’d tried to do the same to him. In the end, due to Braams’s incomparable skill, the flames had been hollowed out, rendered to blistering, gale force winds, which bowled Kuuga, Annasa, and Kingaa over, knocking them several meters back, splashing them into the water, each singed and sunburned, but otherwise unhurt.
Braams’s Halo extinguished itself with a final revolution and he dropped back down into the calf-deep water. He grabbed Buurak Aareks in one arm and Pendell Faaiz in the other and carried them to the dry sand, where he deposited them, not too gently. He continued on to the first of the low trees, ignoring the crowd that had gathered to watch the final confrontation, held his stomach with one hand, bent, and vomited.
He turned, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, and addressed the assistant stewards within the crowd. “Buurak Aareks and Pendell Faaiz have grasped the Greater Secrets and will require advanced individual training. Niss Kuuga, Gills Annasa, Paal Kingaa are close and have developed what might be a unique, shared Halo. Who’s been working with them on this?”
“I have, Sar Braams,” Karrs Kromma said.
Braams fixed him with a stare and grinned. “I’m not surprised, Kars Kromma. None but you could have fostered this. It is impressive, but needs more work.”
“Yes, Sar Braams,” the other said, bowing.
“Was it intentional or accidental at first?” Braams said.
“Accidental.”
Braams nodded. “Do what you can to facilitate their growth, but don’t hesitate to consult with Chief Steward Stusson. There may be a precedent for this, or the four of you may be the precedent for this, but let’s not let anything stand in the way of their development, be it ego or ignorance.”
“Yes, Sar Braams,” Kromma said, bowing again.
Braams took a position before the crowd, making sure that all the acolytes had been recovered from the water and from further down the beach. “Listen up. Everyone who participated in tonight’s run is to be commended, especially those who made it here to the final stage. Those of you who didn’t, don’t be discouraged. Keep trying. Do your best, but remember also: not everyone can be Entitled by God. That doesn’t mean that you are less important than any another, that God loves you less than any other. It simply means that we are all men. We each have strengths and weaknesses. We each have a role to play in a story that is much, much bigger than any single one of us. Some of you will become fighters. Some will become tacticians. Some will become healers. Many of us will die in spite of our striving, in spite of the favor that God has shown us. This is how it has always been and how it will always be. But we cannot give up before we try. Each of us must strive in our own way, seeking Entitlement for reasons known ultimately only to ourselves and to God. The truth and purity of that promise to God—in addition to the blood and the sweat—are all that it takes. It sounds easy, but it isn’t. Two people tonight, Buurak Aareks and Pendell Faaiz, have shown that they have what it takes to understand the Greater Secrets. Take comfort in their success, and know that success is within your reach.
“Now let’s go back, fill our stomachs, and sleep the sleep of the blessed.”
• • •
Two days later, Buurak Aareks and Pendel Faaiz sought Braams at his private training grounds for advanced instruction. They walked the sandy path, pushing great palm fronds from their faces and shared a look when the sounds of Braams’s training began to grow audible.
A low roar came and went, as if from a tiger, running up and down the beach in pursuit of prey. Following the roar was an inevitable hiss which marked the sound for what it really was: Braams’s fire as it challenged and ate through the wind.
Aareks and Faaiz continued along the path until it opened upon a secluded beach, to which neither they nor any other current acolyte had ever been. What they saw, astounded them. Both had seen footage of Braams’s circuit fights, Aareks had even seen the Red Tiger’s final match firsthand two years ago against Kars Kromma on Iss at Sovros Arena, but here, unfettered by the confines of the ring or the proximity of thousands of spectators, Braams’s true power could be witnessed. They stopped, still half hidden by foliage, and gawked at what they hoped lay ahead for them.
Knowing what they did now of the prophecy, and seeing Braams filling the air with currents of fire, streams of liquid flame that soared and twisted according to his sweeping arm movements and more subtle hand and finger positions, there was no doubt in either’s mind that he was the one to lead them, to defend them, to see them to victory if victory could be had. And how could it not? Braams danced in place, spinning on the ball of his bare right foot, sending a coil of flame up into the air only to have it peak some thirty meters up and rain back down upon the sand, a pouncing tiger sent from the heavens, to scorch the silicon into a bowl of shining glass and leap back into the air again, always following the direction Braams’s clawed hands.
Braams conducted his fiery symphony, creating more and more currents, each of which taking on semi-independence, rising, crossing, falling, sometimes combining. He released one stream to create another only to return to the previous stream, reset its path, move on to still another until the sky was an intricate red, orange, and white stained-glass intaglio in three dimensions.
The heat from the blaze was becoming uncomfortable for Aareks and Faaiz. Sweat beaded and hung heavy upon them, soaking their simple white acolytes’ clothing, but all they could do was stare open-mouthed. They new that Braams was moving towards a crescendo.
And he was. Braams leapt up through his lines of living flame, sinking his fingers into this one and that, redirecting courses according to a plan only he knew. When he reached a height of five meters he slowed to a halt and hovered. He breathed heavily, his chest heaving with a slow deliberate rhythm, the look of satisfied exhaustion upon him. He inhaled sharply, looked to the sky and drove a flurry of palm heel strikes upwards, each of which too fast for either Aareks or Faaiz to see, but from each strike it seemed a new stream of fire was born. It was spectacular, the flames rose like an relentless salvo skyward. After moments of this, Braams composed himself, then cried out, howling with palpable, preternatural force. As he he did this, the currents of fire, some of them having run rampant for lack of control, stopped like snakes gripped by their tails, and started to recede. All the fires were reigned in, slowly at first, but with ever increasing force and speed until Braams’s enormous Halo—which until now, the two acolytes realized, had not been in evidence—became distinct: a raging pinwheel, powered by his endless cry, claiming all of its wayward progeny.
Braams was silent only when the last of the licks of flame had sunk into his spinning Halo, at which point he resumed his heavy but controlled breathing, his bright eyes, like smooth nuggets of gold, gleaming. He drifted back down towards the ground and assumed a cross-legged posture just above it as his Halo blew another bowl of glass beneath him and formed the cushion upon which he sat. He closed his eyes, bowed his head, and held his hands together as if cupping water before him, just above his lap.
Aareks and Faaiz squinted to see what, if anything, Braams held, staring for what seemed like a long time. Finally, the air grew heavy, and all sound became dull, muted. They regarded each other briefly, before looking again at Braams and the grain of light that had germinated, suspended above his hands. The reality-erasing flash preceded the boom, but only imperceptibly.
Before they could see anything, they could hear the trees rustling, recovering
from the shockwave that had knocked them both several meters back along the path they had come and dusting them with a fine crust of sand. Faaiz was first to regain the use of his eyes. He helped Aareks to his feet, escorted him down the path, and out into Braams’s presence.
“Welcome,” Braams said. His Halo was gone and he sat upon the glass, which strangely didn’t smoke or appear to be at all hot. “It’s best to avert your eyes, but your vision should return to you shortly.”
“Yes, Sar Braams,” Faaiz said. Then, tentatively, he asked, “That. . . That was creation?”
“The first step of it, yes. Creation is destruction, even to the vacuum of its birth, but from it we get all of this,” Braams said, waving his hand to indicate the sky, the sea, the sand, the trees.
“It was incredible,” Aareks breathed.
Faaiz nodded in agreement.
“It was merely an exercise, but thank you.”
Aareks was standing on his own now, rubbing the sightlessness from his eyes. “Sar Braams,” he said, “may I ask you a personal question?”
“Of course,” Braams said, standing.
“The night of the trial, you said that our success will depend upon the promises we’ve made to God. Will you tell us, Sar Braams, what your promise to God was?”
“Can you walk on your own, Aareks?” Braams said.
Aareks stood a bit straighter, nodded.
When Braams stepped from the glass bowl, the glass turned to powder, slightly discolored but hardly discernible from the rest of the surrounding sand. Faaiz gaped at this, but said nothing. He nudged Aareks, and the two followed Braams down to the water.
The Blood Solution (Approaching Infinity Book 3) Page 19
