Lost Truth

by Dawn Cook

  Alissa winced. “Oh. Only five. I haven’t been at it very long.”

  Keribdis seemed smug. “Well, he couldn’t have taught you any other wards of defense. He hardly knows them himself, the pacifist that he is.”

  The woman’s condescending tone fanned Alissa’s ire into a slow smolder. “Actually, I saw several when Bailic tried to force Ese’ Nawoer to do his will, but Talo-Toecan asked me not to practice them.” Her eyes narrowed. “And I haven’t,” she added, her tone bordering the belligerent.

  Connen-Neute grinned. “Alissa can do healing wards, too. And hide one fielded ward within another. She knows almost everything.”

  Lodesh turned away, his shoulders hunched and a hand to his forehead. Everyone went silent, and Alissa’s indignation turned to alarm when the Masters glanced worriedly among themselves. “The Navigator save us,” Beso-Ran whispered, the ribbon of fear in his voice making Alissa cold.

  “What the Wolves was he thinking?” Keribdis said. “I warned you Talo-Toecan’s methods of teaching were dangerous, and this proves it. We were right in confining him to instructing Keepers. He has made our transeunt dangerous and unpredictable. If this is what he does when no one is watching, I would wager that rogue student that put the Hold in an uproar a while back was his, not Redal-Stan’s.”

  “Actually, that was Alissa,” Connen-Neute said softly.

  “What!”

  Alissa’s hands were clenched in her lap. Masters had begun to quietly join them as Keribdis’s voice drew them like wasps to honey.

  “That’s how my sentience was returned,” Connen-Neute said. His eyes were wide, as if he was afraid to say anything but afraid to stay silent, too. “Alissa accidentally crossed the patterns for tripping the lines and shifting, putting her in the past until, ah, Lodesh and Strell found a way to get her back. She accidentally brought my consciousness back with hers when she returned.”

  No one said anything, and Keribdis began to pace, stirring the assembling crowd to whispers both verbal and non. “What has he done?” Keribdis said, and Connen-Neute went ashen. Alissa swallowed hard.

  “Hold up, Keribdis,” Yar-Taw said from the back. “Talo-Toecan has taught Alissa to think past what we accept as possible. Ashes, shifting to the past? What did you use, Alissa? A septhama point?”

  Keribdis spun. Alissa blanched at the anger the woman made no attempt to hide. “That’s Redal-Stan’s watch,” she whispered, and Alissa clutched at it hanging about her neck. “You wore my boots. You rode my horse! That was you?” Her face hardened. “How dare you!”

  “Redal-Stan gave it to me,” Alissa whispered as she stood in sudden fear. “Tidbit was the only horse I could get on. I’m sorry about your boots.”

  “Keribdis,” Yar-Taw said as he pulled himself upright. “It was over three centuries ago.”

  “I am not concerned about a horse!” Keribdis shouted, spots of red on her cheeks. “She stole Connen-Neute’s sentience!”

  Yar-Taw frowned and crossed his arms in front of him. “She only moved it. See? He’s not a day older.” He glanced between Silla and Connen-Neute. “Perhaps it was a good thing.”

  Keribdis’s red skirts flared elegantly as she paced. “Connen-Neute,” she said, and the young Master jumped in alarm. “You said Alissa pulled your consciousness back from the past? How?”

  Connen-Neute straightened, and those near him pressed back to make a space around him. “Well—ah—actually . . . I pickabacked my consciousness on hers.” He winced. “You see, Strell was playing his music—”

  “You pickabacked?” Keribdis exclaimed, and Alissa’s stomach clenched. “Talo-Toecan allowed you to pickaback? I’m surprised she didn’t kill you or burn your tracings to ash!”

  Connen-Neute’s eyes were wide. “It wasn’t Talo-Toecan, it was Redal-Stan,” he rushed. “See, she was in the past, and when we, or she rather, shifted to get back, I was dragged along, my consciousness slipping into my feral skin in the future, or now, rather. It’s, uh, not as complicated as I’ve made it sound. And it really wasn’t her fault.”

  Keribdis shook her head, glancing over the silent crowd. Alissa wondered how many of them recognized she was inflaming the issue. “This is heinous,” the tall woman said, and Alissa drew herself up. “What’s to stop her from doing it again? Perhaps she might go back and steal Silla’s consciousness!” She pointed into the crowd. “Or yours!”

  Alissa started to panic. Eyes wide, she looked for a way to escape, seeing only frightened faces with golden eyes. Strell put both his hands on her shoulders, and Lodesh stood beside her.

  Yar-Taw laughed into the sudden tension. “Don’t be so melodramatic, Keribdis. Alissa isn’t going to hurt anyone. Stop frightening the child. You’re embarrassing me.”

  Several Masters chuckled, and Keribdis went white in rage. “You’re blind, Yar-Taw!” she whispered intently, her ebony hair swinging. “Don’t you see? We have no control over her! She woke Ese’ Nawoer. An entire city of cursed souls! Her mind is warped by her own admission. She doesn’t know how to properly shift or communicate. She’s mixing wards with disastrous results.” Keribdis spun to her. “And Talo-Toecan is to blame. The incompetent fool! He should have come for me when the transeunt stumbled in, expected or not.”

  Alissa’s fear vanished, replaced with a hot anger. Keribdis was finding fault in her instructor. They had abandoned him and now blamed him for everything their absence precipitated. No one was standing up for him. Not one.

  “He taught me because he thought you were dead,” Alissa said, the coldness in her voice drawing all eyes to her. “Bailic managed to kill everyone else. You left Talo-Toecan to be trapped in the Holden. He taught me because he didn’t want all of your skills to die with him—”

  “Trapped in the Holden?” Keribdis said.

  “Bailic—” she said angrily, as the woman focused on her, but Keribdis turned away.

  “See what he’s done?” Keribdis was saying. “The bungler, the fool of a dreamer? He has subverted our transeunt, making her uncontrollable and a threat to us and our way of life, not to mention single-handedly destroying the Hold.”

  “That’s not what happened!” Alissa said, outraged that no one was listening to her.

  “Perhaps we should go back, then,” Neugwin offered.

  “No!” Keribdis exclaimed, and Alissa wondered at the panic that flashed across the Master. Then more quietly, she repeated, “No. There’s no need. If the Hold is empty and the transeunt is here, there’s no need.” She shook her head as if taking on an unwanted burden. “I’m not going back until I’ve fixed what he’s broken.”

  Alissa’s heart pounded. “I’m not broken!” she exclaimed, shaking off Strell’s support. “Talo-Toecan is a good instructor. He’s kind, and generous with his teachings. And I like him. None of my failings are his fault! He, he—” Her words cut off. They were all staring at her.

  “Excuse me,” she said stiffly. Eyes suddenly hot with threatened tears, she rigidly walked to the edge of the crowd, her bells loud. The people parted before her, and she passed back under the sun without seeing any of them. The air freshened as she left the press of people. Never looking back, she strode down a path to the sound of surf. She felt awkward and ungainly in her Master’s clothing. Why had she bothered? she wondered, her head pounding as she refused to cry. They would never see her as anything other than nothing.

  18

  Feeling drained, Alissa sat in the dark on the dew-damp beach and ran her fingers over Talon. The small bird had found her shortly after she left the shelter. No one had followed the bird, for which Alissa was grateful. Everyone respected her desire to be alone. There was an occasional touch on her thoughts as Lodesh checked on her. For this, too, she was thankful.

  Alissa dropped her hand from Talon as the wind gusted. Clutching her arms around her drawn-up knees, she stared into the fire. She had coaxed it back to life as the sun set on the other side of the island, and the flames shifted fitfully. Several baskets lay nearby
, their contents forgotten in the excitement of their arrival. Alissa had finished stringing the hard berries but wagered no one would notice. Despondent, she rubbed a pinch of sand between her finger and thumb to try to rub out the red stains.

  The sand looked like snow in the starlight. Tall and whispering, the stiff grass on the dune behind her added to her feeling of isolation. The surf sounded louder now that the light was gone. Alissa fed the fire another stick, eyeing the tinge of green from the salts in the wood. How could I have been so innocent? she thought as she wiped her hand free of grit on her Master’s vest. Connen-Neute had warned her. Useless had shown her. Why had she thought Keribdis would treat her any differently?

  But at least she was able to hide Beast from Keribdis.

  Talon perched upon a basket and kept a silent vigil on the stars as if memorizing their unfamiliar pattern. Depressed and hungry, Alissa rubbed the bump on her hand where the bones had been reset years ago. It seemed an entire lifetime since Bailic had broken them.

  She hadn’t liked the reminder she could hold only a fraction of the fields everyone else could. Pride prompted her to form a loose, permeable field in the center of the fire. It was an old game. To see a flame curling up the inside of a field was fascinating. Especially when the flame was blue and green.

  Slowly the heat filled her field to make a swirling globe of fire. It was difficult to find the balance of making the field strong enough to contain fire but delicate enough not to snuff it out. It had taken her months to learn the skill, but filling her fields with fire was an easy way to visually tell how many fields she could hold at once.

  Alissa watched until she was sure enough air was getting through her field to keep the fire alive. Satisfied, she added another, sitting atop the first. It immediately filled to channel the flame higher than usual. The third field she set amongst the coals. Determined to hold six this time, she added a fourth. Her breathing slowed as her concentration built upon itself. Feeling warmer than the fire could account for, she added a fifth.

  Talon chittered a warning. Alissa dropped her fields. “Who’s there?” she said, hating the urgency that crept into her voice. A shadow drew to a stop at the crest of the nearby dune. It was too broad of shoulder to be Connen-Neute, and she felt a pang of fear.

  “It’s me, Yar-Taw,” came the Master’s soft voice. “May I join you?”

  Alissa said nothing, wondering what he had seen.

  “I apologize,” Yar-Taw said as he stood unmoving. “No student should hear another Master find doubt with their instructor. We’ve been alone so long, we forgot.”

  Alissa let out her breath in a puff as she turned away. Yar-Taw seemed to take that as an invitation. Slipping to the base of the dune with a good portion of sand, he came to sit beside her, facing the water. She ignored him. She had nothing to say and wanted him to leave. Strell’s pipe came faintly over the dunes, and she wondered why he was playing for them.

  “Don’t think too harshly of us,” Yar-Taw said as he stacked the empty bowls to put the strung berries on top. “Most are frightened.”

  Alissa raised her head in surprise. “Of me? Why?”

  Yar-Taw shrugged using only one shoulder. “Student Masters are held in check by withholding wisdom. And you have some very strong wards at your command.”

  She nodded, but it didn’t make her feel any better. “Talo-Toecan believed he was the last. He didn’t want your wisdom to die with him.”

  “Yes, well, we knew we were alive. And the sentiment is that he used our questionable existence to further his beliefs.” Yar-Taw hesitated. “His outspoken views concerning . . . ah—” His brow furrowed. “Talo-Toecan holds some very unpopular beliefs concerning how to best bring about a resurgence of our numbers. In order to maintain the balance in the conclave, he was never allowed to instruct any but Keepers, and those were blessedly few, your father among them. He was a lot like you. I see now why he left the Hold. We wouldn’t have let him have children with your mother if we had done a proper profile on her signature.” His brow rose. “But I don’t suppose you know . . .”

  Alissa poked the fire. “Redal-Stan told me you divided humanity into three groups to gain control over the traits critical to bring a Master up from a human. And how you did it,” she added, her voice hard. They had massacred the coast. They had also been responsible for the plague of madness that cut the world’s population by two-thirds and resulted in Lodesh’s curse. All for the same ugly reason. Keribdis wanted to reduce the population again, and when Useless had stood against her, she took the conclave and left.

  Yar-Taw made a soft sound as he rubbed his chin. “Redal-Stan told you?” he asked, sighing as she nodded. “Then I’m sure he gave you the entire story.”

  She reached out to soothe Talon’s sudden chitter with a gentle caress. “P, C, and F,” she said, giving the three traits their designation to prove she knew it all.

  “What are we going to do with you?” Yar-Taw said, his light tone softening his words. “Between Redal-Stan and Talo-Toecan, you know almost everything. I noticed Talo-Toecan even taught you pyre fields. I wasn’t aware he was skilled enough to even explain them.”

  He had seen! Alissa thought, her alarm easing when she found no recrimination in his gaze. “You mean making a field that contains fire?” she said, watching him to be sure she hadn’t mistaken his emotions. “Yes and no. Talo-Toecan gave me free rein to experiment with fields. I think it was to pacify me, but I took him at his word. He, uh, doesn’t know I can make them.”

  Yar-Taw’s face went slack. “You figured it out on your own?”

  Alissa winced, hearing his surprise. She had done it again. “Yes,” she said softly. “Bailic could sculpt dust in sunbeams using multiple fields. I wanted to do the same, but dust makes me sneeze and gives Strell farmer’s fever. So I thought I might be able to do the same with fire.” She looked up, finding his face holding that carefully blank look she had seen on Useless so often. “So far I can only make five.”

  Yar-Taw pulled his legs to sit cross-legged. “The size of your fist, as you were?”

  Seeing he had taken a teaching stance, Alissa relaxed somewhat. “Five isn’t enough to make anything,” she said, willing to show him if he asked.

  “Show me?” he said, and she smiled hesitantly.

  Settling herself straighter, she made a fist-sized bubble, then another, continuing to stack them until she had a tower of flame rising twice as high as normal. Holding them, she glanced at Yar-Taw for approval. His brow was furrowed in surprise. Thinking she had done something wrong, she dropped the fields and the fire fell to its original shape.

  “I didn’t know that could be done,” he said, his gaze going to her. “Extending the fire, I mean. Pyre fields are usually used only for funerals.”

  Alissa drew back. “Funerals?”

  Yar-Taw’s eyes looked like flame in the fire’s glow. “That’s how we collect the source from a deceased Master,” he said softly. “Otherwise it would be lost to the wind and soil. How else could we find enough source for our Keepers?”

  She twisted her face in aversion, not liking the idea she had been practicing such a field, even if by mistake. And her source. It was from a dead Master?

  “Alissa. Wait,” Yar-Taw said, seeming to rush to capture her attention. “You show great potential for them. Not many Masters have the patience to cultivate a field large enough to be useful. I can,” he continued, pride seeping into his voice. “I’m the only one, now.” His brow furrowed. “I’d like to guide your progress in this area.”

  A nervous feeling went through her. “I don’t know,” she said, but pride pulled her gaze to his. “I promised Talo-Toecan I would only take instruction from him. And to take another’s source?” She shuddered. “It feels wrong, especially from the dead.”

  What Alissa thought was a relieved smile came over Yar-Taw’s face. Nodding, he said, “I wouldn’t be so much instructing you as explaining the philosophy behind such a task. Talo-Toecan isn’t
in a position to provide this. Exchanging students is a common practice when a student shows proficiency in an area his or her original teacher isn’t skilled in. I won’t lie to you. It’s difficult to steel myself to perform such a task. Much more so than the decades of practice needed to manage a field large enough to be useful.”

  He dropped his eyes to the sand. “With Talo-Toecan’s permission, I would explain to you the philosophies behind the skill. Connen-Neute lacks the patience, and Silla is too involved with—her own battles. Seeing your distaste brings back all my own fears I had thought safely put to rest.” His expression pleaded with her. “It’s a necessary skill, Alissa, and it will give you status. Status you’re desperately going to need.”

  Alissa ran a finger over Talon. She had promised Useless to take study from only him.

  “But if you won’t take instruction from me, then . . . listen to me when I sit by the fire—from time to time.” Yar-Taw smiled lopsidedly. “And don’t stop practicing.” He hesitated, then asked, “How big a field can you make if you concentrate on one rather than five?”

  A wry smile came over her. For a society so influenced by rules and laws, they certainly had a knack for getting around them. Glancing up, she read his excitement at the possibility of passing on a skill no one else wanted to learn. “I don’t know,” she said softly. “I’ve only tried small, multiple fields.”

  “Try one?” he asked, his eyes seeming to glow. “I’d like to see how far along you are.”

  Alissa squirmed. It was the first glimmer of approval she had seen in any of them, and she wasn’t ashamed to pursue it. Returning her gaze to the fire, she formed a field. Concentrating, she forced the field to widen, struggling to keep the strength of it even as it expanded. Beginning to sweat, she pushed the bubble of thought farther, surprised when she managed to encompass the entire fire. The flames licked up the sides to make curling loops where they reached the edges. She felt the heat grow inside the bubble of thought, and she relaxed the strength to allow some of it to escape.