Nothing else seemed to offer her any direction, so she followed it. The trail directed her past the rows of pots and tins of all shapes and sizes—the whimsical, the practical, and the beautiful all shelved together with no discernible rhyme or reason. She lifted a lid and peeked inside. Nothing. She tried a few more, but all the pots she opened were disappointingly empty. She decided to quit before she stumbled across one that wasn’t.
The path, meanwhile, had grown insistent; the pale silvery light turned orange and schooled around her boots like hungry fish. Kneeling, she discovered that the path was made of luminous powder, and that a series of very fine, very shallow tracks notched the scuffed wooden floor. When the tracks rose nearly flush with the floorboards, moved by some unseen device, the clear powder in the tracks was pushed upward and activated somehow, following the carved patterns to make intricate designs. The track must have been flexible, to rise bit by bit, triggered by her step and knowing where she had paused. She was tempted to step off the path to see what it did to direct her back, but she worried that stepping off the path would mark the failure of some initiation test. What if the trail would simply give up on her, her only chance lost? She had dreamed about this opportunity for too long to allow that to happen.
Zae’s magical senses detected nothing malicious about the path or the powder, so she steeled herself with a deep breath, straightened, and followed. The path led behind the former shopkeep’s counter and she hesitated, conscious of violating the personal space of a long-gone proprietor. The powder turned bronze, the color of Brigh, as if to reassure her that it would be all right, so she pressed on. When she turned the corner, the path came to an abrupt end at a closed wooden door behind the counter.
Zae rested her fingers on the ornate lever-style handle for a few moments, savoring the anticipation. Then, she pushed down on the handle.
It was locked.
She tried it again, and this time, despite the adrenaline pounding in her ears, she listened.
Not locked. No. It was jammed.
Well, then. Locked and jammed were completely different things. One said, “Stay out!” and the other said, “If you can fix me, I’ll let you in.” And Zae was good at fixing things.
She set her satchel down on a plain, non-glowing span of floorboard, pushed her acceptance letter out of the way, and reached past it for her roll of tools. “Let’s see what we can do about you.”
Removing the door lever was the first step. The screws holding it in place were well hidden, flush with the surface and covered with paint to obscure their grooves. Zae had to scrape them clean first, and only then could she fit a tool to them and, with significant strength, get them loose.
Without the screws, the assembly came away easily. She set it aside, carefully placing the screws where they wouldn’t roll off.
Inside its housing, the mechanism of a door latch was usually simple. Not this door latch. It was nothing short of clockwork, which made it the first real, solid proof that she’d come to the right place. Something swelled inside her. Some combination of joy and adventure and joy at having an adventure.
Zae put on her goggles and flicked tiny levers on the sides to amplify their magnification. Now she could see the tiny gears more clearly. They were exquisite, and markedly similar to the gears in the construct that Apple had torn apart. She traced their workings from one to the next until she made her way to a particular gear with teeth too worn to catch against its neighbor.
With a surgeon’s precision and patience, she took apart the entire structure, setting everything down in careful order so that she could put it back together, until she got to the worn gear. She measured it. It was a nonstandard size, and with just the tools in her leather roll it would take her quite a while to make a new one. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a matter of just fixing it. With the teeth so worn, there was no material at the edges for the next gear to find; there was no way for her to build it back up, with the tools she had at hand, that would be structurally sound enough to last.
The gnome sat back. Frustration teased at her, but she treated it like the worn gear and refused to give it purchase. She’d made things with odd-sized parts before. There had to be something in her bag that would work, even if it wasn’t a perfect match.
She started laying out all her supplies in a neat spiral on the floor, digging past the acceptance letter in her satchel to feel for bits and various types of containers. She kept her healing supplies in vials, her tools in pouches, and her machining components in tins, so that she could at least find the right kind of thing by touch. After the fifth or so time she jostled the parchment out of her way, she finally took it out and set it aside. It rolled, just a little, halted by the recessed track in the floor.
The seal on the parchment was gear-shaped, as Zae had noticed when she’d first opened it. She had assumed it to be wax, but now that she examined it more closely she saw that it was only coated in a thin layer of wax. Even if she’d been careless with it, it wouldn’t have snapped like a proper seal. Its design, which she’d assumed was purely ornamental, was an outer ring with a smaller cog inside it. A miniature gear, just the right size for an overly convoluted miniature lock.
Carefully, the gnome freed the seal from the paper and snapped the inner ring free from the outer. A bit of buffing made it smooth and ready.
It fit.
With excitement buzzing through her, she forced herself to go slowly, putting the lock back together in the precise manner in which she’d taken it apart. When it was ready for its frontplate, everything fit back together perfectly. Zae tightened the final screws, put away all her things, and then gingerly tested the handle.
The door swung open on silent hinges, and the newest member of Alive and Ticking started down the stairs.
6
TEMPERING
KEREN
Keren fastened her cloak over her armor and set out with Appleslayer toward the Tempering Hall. She knew she didn’t need the full suit to protect her against wooden swords, but after the welcome they had received the day before, she wasn’t willing to leave herself completely vulnerable. As a compromise, she protected her torso, arms, and legs, but left her helmet, gorget, and pauldrons at home.
Her sword was a comforting weight at her side. While she was under orders not to engage, Tezryn had proven that whoever the other people seeking the artifact were, they were not under the same sort of constraint. This feeling of having her hands tied by mortal restrictions, yet not being certain whether following orders or breaking them would earn the displeasure of her god, was precisely the discomfort that had brought her to Absalom. She hoped to find a path of service better suited to her temperament.
The fountain Zae had remarked upon the evening before still looked like a sad pile of rotting oranges with water trickling out the top. It was clearer now that it was supposed to be a sculpture of artfully arranged stacks and bags of coins—representing the Merchants’ Quarter, no doubt—but Keren knew she would never be able to see anything but oranges in the curved and wrinkled surfaces.
None of the neighbors on the quiet crescent were out and about, and the only sounds were distant ones; Keren wondered whether she was leaving home too early or too late to mingle with the locals. A shift of light across the way caught her eye, but when she looked toward the neighbor’s front window where she had seen it, the curtains were closed.
Though perhaps only newly closed.
She followed the map they’d received the night before, retracing her steps with Appleslayer by her side. It was strangely quiet without Zae, and it was a menacing sort of strangeness. She was surprised to find she’d grown so accustomed to Zae’s tendency to take place names literally that she was doing it herself. She passed a pub called the Smug Owl, but it was less amusing to contemplate what an owl might be smug about without the gnome by her side.
Keren skirted through the edge of the Coins, avoiding the central marketplace but passing a few street vendors and shops that were already ope
n. She bought a doughy pastry stuffed with nuts and savory meat, and a few cubes of meat for Appleslayer. He ate quickly and nuzzled her hand to see if there was any more. She took her time, working on her pastry as she walked. The outskirts were quiet, and they took a leisurely pace.
The Tempering Hall, training ground for paladins and other holy warriors, was similar in architecture to the Seventh Church across the street. White, tall, and imposing, it glowed pink and orange with the last remnants of dawn fading to daylight in the clear sky.
She wondered how Iomedae had felt, returning from her test and seeing these streets, these buildings, with new eyes. She wondered how much ascension had changed her. She couldn’t imagine godhood doing anything but changing a person.
* * *
“Rhinn … Any relation to Julian Rhinn, perchance?”
Keren strode beside her new trainer, Appleslayer padding along obediently at her heel. She had known this would come, but hadn’t expected it so soon. “He was my father.”
“He taught me battle strategy at the War College. A fine man and a devoted knight.” Evandor Malik was blond, thick with muscle, and gentle of face. He didn’t seem surprised that Keren had used the past tense, and that at least was a relief. Keren had been raised among soldiers and knights, and was comfortable with their outlook on death. A typical townsperson generally assumed that other people experienced no changes in their lives while they were out of sight, and simply carried on until seen again; there was a default assumption that they were alive and unchanged until proven otherwise. A soldier had to accept that anyone they had fought beside, trained beside, or drank beside might have fallen in battle at any time since. Word of a comrade’s death, therefore, might not be welcome, but was never entirely a surprise.
“And now you’re going to be training his progeny, so you’ve come full circle.”
“Indeed, the thought occurred to me,” he said, and Keren caught the faintest hint of a smile. She wished she could say she recognized him from the War College, but so many soldiers had gone through her father’s classes. She could only be certain that he had not been in her year.
“Do you train the combat mounts, as well?” While Appleslayer was technically Zae’s mount, he was also Keren’s battle companion. The Tempering Hall trained all manner of beasts for combat, and if the signs were correct, combat was something they were sure to see again soon.
Evandor led Keren to an open archway toward the end of the long hall, and gestured for her to enter. “Not I. This is the way to our stables, where your lively young chap here will be receiving his training.”
Keren knelt to ruffle Appleslayer’s ears and meet his trusting gaze. “Listen and obey, yes?”
The dog parted his jaws, tongue lolling out in a smile.
“Good boy.” She stood, gestured for Apple to heel, and continued on.
The hallway led to an interior courtyard, where an elven woman in leather armor was practicing lunges with a wooden training sword against an unarmed opponent. Though the courtyard was ringed with occupied horse stalls, the unpleasant odor Keren associated with stables was strangely absent.
“Sula Charish,” Evandor said. “Houndmaster. She’s one of our best.”
They waited for Sula to finish sparring. The woman’s movements flowed like water, with a confident grace that could wear down rocks or opponents with equal tenacity. Much of Keren’s prowess was rooted in her strength and endurance, but Sula’s was in her reflexes and speed. Keren found herself wanting badly to spar with the trainer, yet fearing it at the same time. The unarmed opponent anticipated her moves, dodging and weaving, but after a few minutes it was clear to Keren that Sula was holding back. It looked more as if they were dancing a choreographed routine.
Something subtle changed, nothing that Keren could identify any more precisely than just a feeling in the air, and the dance became a fight. Sula’s movements were still fluid and sure, but now her opponent was flustered, hesitating a bit too long here and only barely rolling away from the wooden blade there. She tapped him across the back and a voice called, “Hit!”
It belonged to another onlooker, one whose stillness Keren hadn’t noticed behind the motion of trainer and trainee.
The bout ended with a clasp of hands and a few exchanged words. The unarmed man strolled toward the onlooker, nodded to him, and exited through a door at the far side of the courtyard. When Sula put up her sword and turned to them, it was clear she’d been aware of their silent presence for some time. At Sula’s gesture, Keren walked Appleslayer over to her, where the elf extended her palm for his inspection. Up close, Keren looked for beads of sweat on Sula’s forehead or chest, but saw none. It was as if the bout had been no more than a stretching exercise to her.
Appleslayer’s plumed tail wagged fiercely, and he sat sejant—his front upright but his haunches on the ground, like a great heraldic lion—with the quiet whuff he made under his breath when he was deciding whether or not to bark in earnest.
Sula dropped to a partial crouch and put her hands out, palms toward the ground. Apple immediately mimicked her pose, barking happily. The elf grinned at him, and Keren felt some small pride in the dog that he recognized the invitation to play. Sula lunged toward him and he bounded back, then circled her in ridiculous leaps and hops. She feinted a few more times, watching his reactions carefully, then leapt after him and started a brisk game of chasing, tackling, and chasing again. This was rougher than the dog could play with his little gnome, and he ran and played at his full capacity, wagging and bouncing and returning for more each time she let him go. Keren knew how to train horses, and had been able to teach Apple a few of the basic commands, but she hadn’t spent enough time around dogs to know how to play with them. At least, not like this. Now, she was resolved to learn.
While they ran about, the man who had refereed the sparring circled the ring to join Keren and Evandor. He was slight, all wiry muscle and smooth skin, a little taller than Keren, with black hair so thick that it held itself in a plait down his back without need for a clasp. He wore garments of simple white and brown cloth and his feet were bare. A rough, undyed canvas satchel hung over his shoulder.
“Crusader Rhinn, this is Omari,” Evandor said. “Omari trains at the Irorium, the arena dedicated to the god Irori, over in the Foreign Quarter. He finds our ways too crude to train here, but he brings over his brethren for sparring practice.”
“It’s mutually beneficial,” Omari said. He had sized Keren up from across the ring, and apparently felt no further need to look at her. His sharp gaze followed the elf and the dog. “You armored crusaders don’t get much practice with opponents who fight unarmed, and if we’re to learn to dodge a sword then we are honored to learn from the best. Houndmaster Charish teaches animals to fight, so who better to teach humility to overconfident men and women?”
“You’re suggesting your students are dogs?” Keren asked.
“I believe that comparing ourselves to dogs is one of many ways to know ourselves better.”
Irori was the god of perfection, Keren recalled, and everything about his servant reflected him. She wondered if she reflected Iomedae so clearly.
Keren had never seen Appleslayer worn out before, but eventually he flopped over onto his side, tongue lolling and barrel chest heaving. Sula stroked his coat and murmured something to him that made his tail thump happily against the ground, then brushed her hands off on her thighs and approached the three humans, her breath barely quickened.
“He’s a gem. Where did you find him?”
Keren considered tempering her answer for a moment, but decided that Sula’s response to the unaltered truth would be interestingly telling. “Undergoing surgery in my kitchen, in Lastwall. After which he destroyed a basket of apples, which is how he got the name Appleslayer.” The trainer’s face remained impressively neutral, so Keren continued. “My companion is a healer. She stitched him up, and I helped train him as her riding dog. He’s got some combat experience, and he’s a good m
ount, but I’ve trained him as far as I can—he’s no a horse. I’m happy to turn him over to someone who specializes in dogs.”
To Sula’s credit, her only reaction to the story was the slight lift of one eyebrow. “I’m happy to work with him. Come by when you’re finished for the day and we’ll chat. Evan, don’t work her so hard that she forgets.”
Keren turned to Evandor in time to see that faint grin pass across his face again. “You have my word. Shall we?”
Keren exchanged farewells and followed him from the courtyard. To Keren’s surprise, he led her not to another training yard, but toward the street.
“Given up on me already?” she asked, only half jesting.
“Hardly. We’re going for a walk.”
“A walk?”
Something in Keren’s expression made him laugh. “It’s not a trap, Rhinn. Just a walk. You’re not as simple a creature as the dog. I’m not going to just teach you tricks and hope they’ll come in handy someday. First we discuss. Then we move into the field. So. I know what you’re looking to learn. Now I want to hear it in your words.”
Keren couldn’t fault his logic. She stepped out into the sunlight, squinting while her eyes adjusted. “I’ve been trained in mounted combat and foot combat. I’m a Knight of Ozem, dedicated to Iomedae in word and deed, but I’d like to…” She made a gesture with her hand, but even she didn’t know what it meant, so it was futile to think Evandor might interpret it.
Yet, he did. “In word and deed. But in spirit?”
“It brings me shame to say it, but I’ve never felt that spiritual connection for myself. I believe in her, I devote myself to her. I was born to do so, and I don’t regret my path. But the more I see how Zae—my companion—communes so fully with her god, and channels her holy energy…”
“And so you’ve made your pilgrimage here, to where Iomedae ascended, to find that kind of connection.”
Keren nodded. “Partly. And even here, I feel immense awe, but I don’t feel … Her.”
Pathfinder Tales--Gears of Faith Page 5
