The Questing Game f-2

by James Galloway

  Allia turned in his grasp and looked into his eyes. There was concern in her eyes, but there was also a hint of hope, too. "We'll talk about this later, deshida," she said gently. "But for now, you have my word. I won't raise a hand against her unless you tell me I can."

  "That's good enough for me," he said in the common tongue, then he let her go. She settled her desert garb about her calmy, then sheathed her sword in a single easy movement.

  "I will not kill her," Allia said. "At least not now."

  Jula gave the Selani a calm look, but said nothing.

  "This is going to get messy," Camara Tal said. "I think we'd be better off just trussing her up and shipping her back to Triana. Let Triana deal with training her."

  "Triana would kill her," Tarrin said. "Any of the Were-cats would. They know who she is and what she did to me."

  Jula paled visibly, and put her eyes on the table.

  "That's right, Jula. You have a long way to go before you redeem yourself in the eyes of your new family. If you don't learn what I have to teach, I'll kill you. If you run away, I'll kill you. If you manage to get away, some other Were-kin will kill you. You can't hide from us, and you won't live long alone. Your only chance is to stay with me, and give me every reason to keep you alive."

  "I already told you I'd obey you, Tarrin," she said meekly. "I'm not stupid enough to challenge you. I tried that twice before, and look where I am now."

  "Why did you accept her?" Allia demanded in Selani, obviously realizing that Tarrin had taken her as his child. "She deserves no such mercy!"

  "I didn't do it for her," he said quietly. "I did it because I had to. You've said it many times, Allia. Honor is a person's choice, but duty is a person's burden. Honor and Blood."

  Allia sighed. She had taught him the meaning of that obscure phrase, a phrase used by both the Selani and the Vendari. Duty's reward was honor, but its cost was blood. In this case, its cost was the withholding of a punishment that should have been meted out.

  "I understand, my brother," she said quietly in common.

  "I'm glad someone does," Camara Tal grunted. "I hate it when you two do that."

  "It used to drive my father crazy," Tarrin said absently, glancing at Allia. "Since there's not much to do for now, I'm going to leave you to talk about this. Allia, I want you and Dar to stay here and hear what they have to say, so you can hear what happened before you got here. I'm taking Jula out for a while, so we can talk privately. And to get her some clothes. That robe won't cut it."

  "Be careful, my brother," Allia said. "We will talk when you return."

  "I'm looking forward to it," he told her, patting her on the shoulder. "Jula, come with me," he ordered in a strong voice.

  Without a word, Jula rose from her seat. She gave Allia a wide berth as she passed by her to reach the tent flap, and Tarrin herded her out.

  She was quiet, and she kept her eyes on the ground. It was very faint, but he could sense her fear and anxieity through her bond. He'd been hard on her, but he was still angry, and that was making him probably a bit more harsh than he needed to be. She had just been restored from her insanity, and he hadn't taken that into account. The pain of her memories was still very raw, very fresh, and he was rubbing salt in her wounds. She didn't deserve any of his sympathy or compassion, but his duty to raise her properly chided him for being harder than he needed to be. He didn't like her. He still wanted to smash her for what she did to him, but his duty prevented it. If he gave in to his emotion, he would be surrendering himself to his own animalistic impulses.

  Honor and Blood.

  "I don't like you," he said in a growling tone.

  "You've made that abundantly clear," she said with a sigh. "I never had anything against you, personally, Tarrin. I did what I did because I was told to do it." She glanced up at him. "I actually liked you."

  "You liked me so much you treated me like your personal pet when you had that collar on me," he growled, glaring down at her.

  "All I can say is I'm sorry," she said quietly. "We were on opposing sides."

  "Not anymore," he told her. "Now that you can reflect on what happened to you, what do you think of the ki'zadun now?"

  She was quiet for long moments. "I think I'd like to poke out Kravon's eyes and dunk him into a vat of acid," she replied in a low, emotional voice. "Slowly."

  "I can only promise that I'll try to help you. You may not like me, and you may find me harsh, but I won't throw you away when I'm done with you."

  "I believe you," she said sincerely.

  "When this is done, we can part ways and never see each other again. You just have to deal with it until then."

  She was quiet. "I tried to hold off the madness once before, and I failed. I won't go insane again. I just won't. If you think there's no hope for me, I want you to kill me."

  "You didn't understand what was happening," he told her. "I'll teach you what to do to live with your other half. It just takes discipline."

  "It didn't help me the first time."

  "You didn't know how to apply it."

  "I'm afraid, Tarrin," she said with a trembling voice. "I can feel it on the other side of the wall you created in my mind. It's sitting there, waiting for it to weaken. It wants me, it wants to enslave me again. I'm afaid of it."

  She stopped, putting her clasped paws to her chin, and he saw that tears were forming in her eyes. She was serious. She was desperately afraid of the Cat. She had lost to it once before, and it drove her insane. "I remember everything. Everything. I was worse than an animal, and I could see it all. But it had me trapped in my own mind, making me watch as I did-"

  Tarrin put a paw on her shoulder. She flinched at that contact, but then she looked up at him. His expression was neutral, emotionless, but the paw on her shoulder was gentle. "What's done is done," he told her. "If you let the past rule you, it will destroy your future. You'll never make it if you can't accept that."

  "It's not easy," she sniffled.

  "No, it's not. And it never gets any easier. I carry any number of my own burdens." He looked away from her. "I won't be much of a teacher. I'm half wild myself. My way of dealing isn't the best way, but it's the only way I can show you."

  "I won't thumb my nose at it, Tarrin, believe me," she said sincerely. "I'm not going to give up before I try. I'm just afraid of failing."

  "There's nothing to be afraid of," he said calmly. "One way or another, you won't go mad again."

  She looked up at him. "You're right, I suppose," she agreed. "One way or another. I'd welcome that other way, if it comes down to that."

  "Let's hope not," he said.

  "Let's hope," she agreed. "I, see you still have those. Why do you wear them?" she asked, pointing to the manacle on his wrist.

  "They remind me what you did to me," he said bluntly. "They remind me what happens when I let down my guard, or trust people I don't know. They keep it from happening again."

  Jula looked at her feet. "I didn't know it affected you like that," she said quietly.

  "If people call me a monster, it's because you made me this way," he said grimly, picking up her chin and forcing her to look into his eyes. "These manacles sit on my wrists and remind me of the price I paid for trusting you. Even now, I can't bring myself to trust anyone I didn't already know, and I'm just as quick to kill a man as I am to greet him. The term Triana uses is feral."

  "I know what that means," she said. "I guess I'm the same way, now. I can't bring myself to trust people anymore. Not after what Kravon did to me." She looked up at him. "If that's the way you feel, why do you trust me now? After everything I did?"

  "I don't," he growled. "But I have you bond, and that means I have power over you. You can't lie to me. If you try to betray me, I'll know long before you can hurt me."

  "I guess I deserve that," she sighed. "I wouldn't trust me either. But I trust you, Tarrin. I don't know why, but I do."

  "You'd better," he told her. "Let's get you some decent clothes." />
  "What I want is a nice dress."

  "Give up on that idea," he said. "A dress doesn't suit a Were-cat. Especially not with what we're going to be doing."

  "But I've never worn a pair of pants in my life."

  "Now's a good time to learn."

  "I'll look like a boy."

  "Take your shirt off. They'll see the difference very quickly."

  Jula blushed.

  "Being feminine doesn't suit a Were-cat, Jula. Our women aren't feminine. They are female. There's a big difference." He glanced at her. "Sit down."

  Tarrin sat down cross-legged on the grass perfunctorily. Jula stared at him for a moment, then seated herself demurely in front of him. "It's time you understood a fundamental truth," he said, holding out his paws. "Being a Were-cat is living in two different worlds. We have two halves. The human half," he said, holding out a paw, "and the Cat." He held out the other. "The key to our lives is the balance between these two halves. None of us are entirely human, and on the other hand, none of us are entirely cat. The balance is different inside each of us. Some of us, like me, are feral, more dominated by our instincts. Some, like Kimmie and the way you are right now, are almost completely human. The balance is everything. To find balance inside yourself, you have to surrender some of your humanity, but not so much that you can't control your instincts." He lowered his paws. "You went insane because you wouldn't allow yourself to find that balance. You rejected your Cat half, you tried to control it. You can't do that. The more you fight against it, the stonger it becomes. In order to control it, you have to let it control you."

  "That's illogical."

  "That's why it beat you," he said calmly. "Logic has no place in this, Jula. You're dealing with a wild animal, whose entire world exists within its instincts. To keep the Cat from dominating you, you have to allow it to influence your actions. Unless you placate it, it's going to fight you for control. That's where the madness begins." He stared right into her eyes. "The Cat is tireless and relentless. It's a predator, a hunter, and if you oppose it, it will turn on you. I'm sure you already know that."

  She shuddered visibly and nodded.

  "I'm not saying you have to abandon everything you held important as a human. What I am saying is that you need to expand yourself to allow the Cat to have its place within you. That's going to change you. How much it changes you depends on where you stand after you find your balance." He held his paws up again. "What's important is that you don't fight against these changes," he stressed. "I'm not very happy with how I changed, but it's how it happened, and I have to live with it. If I don't, I'll go mad. There are going to be some general alterations, common throughout our kind."

  "Like the aggression."

  "Aggression is an outward sign of our predatory instincts," he said simply. "We are hunters, Jula. Hunters are aggressive. If they aren't, they starve to death. As a lot, we tend to be direct, and have little patience for fools or liars. We're also very independent, and we tend to be very short-tempered."

  "I remember Jesmind," she said reflectingly. "She had enough temper for four people."

  "Jesmind is not too far from the norm of our kind," he told her. "I guess I represent the extreme. I have no temper."

  "I've noticed."

  "Don't push it," he warned. "Since we're part animal, it flavors our outlook. You'll find a great many human customs to be silly or ridiculous. In time, you'll lose some of that learned behavior. Modesty is a good example. Your learned femininity is another. You aren't a lady anymore, Jula. You're a female. The only difference between you and me are the instincts that motivate our genders."

  "What do you mean?"

  He looked at her. "Take off your robe," he ordered.

  "What? Tarrin, we're sitting in the middle of a field! People will see me!"

  "So?"

  She blinked and gave him a startled look. "It's improper!"

  "You're thinking like a human, Jula. Take off your robe. I'm not asking you, I'm telling you."

  Blushing furiously, Jula rose up her knees and unbelted the robe Sarraya conjured for her. She slid it off her shoulders and let it fall to the ground around her, then settled back down.

  "Why are you embarassed?" he asked.

  "Maybe because I'm sitting here naked," she said in a hot tone, glaring at him.

  "So?"

  "What do you mean, so?" she snapped.

  "So what if people can see what you hide under your clothes? Can they touch you? Are they going to do anything you don't want them to do?"

  "I don't want them to look," she told him.

  "You're thinking like a human, Jula. What does the Cat care about being naked?"

  She looked at him, then looked down at the ground between them. "It doesn't care one way or the other," she said quietly.

  "There," he said gently. "You've just communicated with your other half in a cooperative manner. Was it all that hard?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "I asked you what the Cat thought about being naked. You looked into that part of yourself and found the answer, and you did it without struggling against what you found there."

  She stared at him a long moment. "I, I did, didn't I?" she admitted. "Why didn't it seem combative?"

  "Because you weren't trying to force your will on the Cat," he replied. "No matter what you think, your instincts aren't evil. They are simply instincts. Once you understand them better, you'll find it easier and easier to allow them to influence you without controlling you. Regardless of what you may believe, they are a part of you. They only cause trouble when you try to ignore them. Remember, the more you fight against them, the stronger they become."

  "I wouldn't allow myself to listen to them, so they took me over," she concluded. "My, for such an illogical being, that's a very logical step."

  "More or less. Another thing you should understand is that your human instincts didn't fade away. They're still there. And when your human instinct coincides with your cat instincts, you'll find them nearly overwhelming."

  "Like what?"

  "Self-preservation," he said calmly. "That's a common instinct. So are the maternal instincts of a female."

  "I take it the urge to reproduce is also a communal interest."

  "It is, but it's guided by your human interests. Were-cats-all Were-kin, for that matter-aren't wanton harlots and philanderers. At least not all of them," he corrected. "You'll understand after a while."

  "I understand now," she said. "Before I went mad, I had-let's say that I was very much looking for a man. But no human can satisfy me that way. I'd kill them, or turn them Were. I did try a few times, with some men that weren't afraid of me or had no idea of the danger, but it just didn't feel right."

  "They weren't Were-cats. Both your sets of instincts would object if you tried to mate with someone outside your own species."

  "I guess," she agreed. "I think that frustration only helped drive me over the edge. I was looking for something I couldn't have, and it made me angry."

  "Why didn't you turn someone Were?" he asked curiously. "There was nothing stopping you."

  "I don't know," she said, folding her arms beneath her bare breasts and looking away from him. "I did think about it a few times, but it seemed… wrong. I can't explain it."

  "You weren't ready to destroy someone just for one night of fleeting contentment," he surmised.

  "I suppose. It's as good a reason as any." She glanced at him. "Can I put my robe back on now?"

  "If you need to ask, then the answer is no," he replied bluntly. "I'm going to break you of that annoying human trait the same way Jesmind broke me of it."

  "How is that?"

  "Practice. A Were-cat isn't that concerned about nudity because the clothes don't change with us. When you learn to shapeshift, you're going to be naked. When you change back, you'll be naked. And you'll stay that way until you get back to your clothes. There's no way you'll get around being seen, so it's best to get over any feelings of modesty you
have right now, before it distracts you when I teach you how to shapeshift."

  Jula blushed. "It's bad enough like this," she said quietly.

  "Then I'm not challenging your modesty enough," he said. "Stand up."

  "Tarrin!"

  "I said stand up!" he snapped at her. "As you settle into your instincts, you'll lose this penchant for modesty. You're not going to run around naked all the time," he said quickly when she gave him a shocked look, "but you won't be embrassed to be seen nude in public. Were-cats wear clothes, until they need to shapeshift. Then the clothes come off."

  Jula gave him a slightly challenging look, then did as he commanded. She stood up. Tarrin looked at her calmly, staring into her eyes, then blatantly looked her up and down. She looked much different than he remembered. She had been soft, feminine, slim. Now she was thin, with knotted abdominal muscle. The muscles in her arms and legs were defined, but not massively developed, gaining that inhuman strength that was the gift of his blood. She looked like a Were-cat, not a human. A very attractive Were-cat female, at that.

  Her tail lashed behind her, a clear sign of her discomfort, but he said nothing. He simply looked up at her for a long moment, then made a circling motion with his hand. An obvious order for her to turn around. She glared at him, but she did as she was told, turning her back to him and setting her feet together in a stiff posture. Her tail writhed as he looked at her back and her posterior. He was doing more than staring at her to make her feel umcomfortable. He was sizing her up, getting an idea of her body, something he'd need to know when he taught her how to fight. She was smaller than him, not as strong, but she was fast. Speed techniques, with some leverage and power training. That would be best for her. Teach her how to fight better with her claws, but also teach her that her claws weren't her only weapons.

  All matters aside, he had to admit. Jula had a cute butt.

  "Sit back down," he told her calmly. "Can you still use Sorcery?"

  "Yes," she admitted, sitting down with a defiant look in his eyes. She sat down cross-legged, like him, and her eyes dared him to look below her neck. "It took me a while. I had to learn how to touch the Weave all over again. After I changed, it altered my sense of the Weave." She placed her elbows on her knees and leaned on them, then propped her chin on her paws. "I'm actually stronger now than I used to be. I seem to have a greater limit for building power to weave flows as a Were-cat than I did as a human."