Chapter 6

Jaran slammed his clay mug down on the table, sending orus wine sloshing over his wrist. “That was stupid. A warrior fights with his mind first. With strategy! You don’t risk your life on a fool’s plan that will leave you even weaker than you already are! When I was younger, I would never have…”

Lindon’s father went on, talking about the glorious days when he’d been one of the most promising sacred artists in the entire clan. They were alone in Lindon’s house, with no one to listen in, so Lindon nodded along and kept the mug filled. He already knew he’d been foolish.

He should have told his father and mother first. He was only blessed that they had been too confused to intervene, or they could have ruined everything in trying to save him.

How fortunate that they had left him alone.

“…don’t know what you were thinking,” Jaran continued, raising the mug to his lips. “So stupid.” With one hand, he roughly reached out and grabbed his son around the shoulders, pulling him into a one-armed hug. Lindon almost knocked over the bottle of wine.

“But it’s the best kind of stupid,” Jaran said, staring into his mug. “Only an idiot accepts a battle he’s sure to lose, but bravery and idiocy share a border. The son of a cripple might be a cripple, but the son of tigers won’t be a dog.”

Jaran coughed out a laugh, raising his wine as though for a toast. “They’ll soon see what a couple of cripples can do, son! A three-legged tiger’s still got a bite!” He downed the rest of his wine.

A golden rush filled Lindon from his core to his fingertips, like a pulse of fresh madra. His father approved of him. He hadn’t heard open praise from his father since he’d learned to walk. Certainly not since he’d first received his Unsouled badge.

Before Lindon could think of an appropriate response, Jaran upended his cup on the table, leaving it upside-down. That was even more of a shock; there was still half a bottle left. But his father leaned forward on the table, his expression turning as grave as his scarred lips would allow.

“You and your sister did well with the plan today, but I can’t be left out again. What do you intend for the Festival?”

Lindon had been more concerned about surviving the week with his honor intact, but he had given the upcoming Seven-Year Festival some thought. “The children at my stage will have better foundation techniques, but the Empty Palm gives me an edge in combat. I should be able to take first.”

“Empty Palm…” Jaran muttered. “Is that what you call it? Disrupts the enemy’s spirit with an injection into the core?”

He should have known his parents would see through it immediately. “Yes, Father.”

“You’re lucky. If you had cultivated any aspects at all, it wouldn’t have worked so well.”

Lindon rubbed his temple, memories of dream-like visions swimming in his head. “Kelsa put me on the ground with the same technique every time. I couldn’t trust my own eyes.”

“Of course she did. She’s a Copper, and you’re Unsouled. You can’t defend against her any more than an ant can stop a boot. If she had tried the same thing you did on Wei Mon Keth today, he wouldn’t have even noticed.”

That violated everything Lindon knew about the sacred arts, but his father wouldn’t be mistaken about something like this. “Surely when Mon Keth left himself undefended, Kelsa’s Empty Palm would have done far more damage than mine.”

Jaran’s fists tightened on the table. “Son, if that’s what you think, you came close to a harsh lesson today. A weapon held in ignorance only wounds its bearer.”

Lindon sat up straighter, a chill running down his spine. He thought he’d prepared for the morning’s duel as well as he could, but if he’d made a mistake…he really could have died.

“If it worked as you imagine, why doesn’t every sacred artist in the Wei clan use this Empty Palm? We could disable any opponent with one strike!”

“Because it’s difficult to strike the core,” Lindon said, knowing he was playing the fool. “The enemy would be on guard against it. I know it only worked against Mon Keth because he didn’t defend himself, and who would do that in battle?”

“You're missing the most fundamental reason. It's because your madra is pure.” He raised his hand, palm-up, where a hazy purple-white impression danced on his palm. His own power. “Our White Fox is formed from aura of light and dreams, and it will act according to its nature. Even unformed, you see.”

Lindon peered closer. As the energy danced in his father's palm, it gathered in the shape of a running rabbit, of a flag snapping in the breeze, of his mother's face. He thought he heard sounds, impossibly distant: the cry of a wolf, the panting of a man running for his life, the steady drip of water. The White Fox, unrestrained, tricked the senses by its very nature.

Jaran closed his fist, and the images vanished. “Untrained madra, that of a child or an Unsouled, is still pure. It has no form, and so it affects only the spirit...but it does so more naturally than anything else. There's very little defense against it. A strike from me would not have affected Mon Keth's core; if anything, it would have confused him for a moment before his own spirit rejected my influence. But yours influences the core directly.”

Lindon remembered a line from the Heart of Twin Stars manual, a note he hadn't given much thought: “How he cancels out the aspects of his madra, I have not yet deduced, but the result is undeniable.” The developer of the Empty Palm had come up with a way to purify himself in spite of his previous training.

Only a moment ago, he had worried that his ignorance may have taken him too close to death, but now he couldn't deny a measure of excitement. Of all the sacred artists in the Wei clan, only he had yet to absorb any vital aura. That meant he had capabilities no one else did.

His father saw his thoughts, and held up a hand. “Unfortunately, pure madra has only two uses. It can activate scripts, just as anyone can, and it shakes the spirit. That's all. For anything else, you may as well have no power at all. It's also incredibly difficult to strengthen your spirit without harvesting aspects from the world, and it typically requires elixirs or natural treasures. Like the fruit you found.

“If you cultivate aspects that exist in heaven and earth, you can soak vital aura from the environment as you cycle. That's how I do it, that's how your mother does it, that's how everyone does it. To keep yourself pure, you'd have to give up the easiest and most reliable way of getting stronger. Worse, you'd sacrifice your most dependable means of self-defense. A fire artist could burn arrows out of the air mid-flight, and a sword artist could strike them out of the air. An artist of pure madra would be helpless to affect the flight of an arrow. He would die as helpless as a bird.”

Lindon nodded seriously along with Jaran's words, but his enthusiasm didn't dim. It wasn't as though he meant to cultivate pure madra forever; he would start on a Path as soon as he was allowed. But this was an advantage he had now, an advantage that had gone to waste. Even an Unsouled wasn't entirely useless after all.

Having firmly driven his point home, Jaran drummed his knuckles on the table. “Your sister knew all this, so you were safe this time. But carelessness is a short path to death in the sacred arts, remember that. It's why a good plan is so important. Which brings me back to the Festival.”

Lindon thought for a moment before speaking, choosing his words carefully. “I plan to use the Empty Palm on my opponents. At the Foundation stage, they should have no defense, and I'll take first place easily.”

Jaran leaned forward, rapping him on the top of the head. It hurt more than he'd expected. “You said that before, but I was hoping you'd think this time. Acting without thinking is bad, but it's worse to think like a coward.”

Jibes and backhanded insults from his father were far more familiar than compliments. “Excuse my foolishness, Father, but I don't see the error in my words.”

“After the first strike, you always follow up with a second.” He laughed suddenly. “Like Mon Keth this morning, right? First hit lands, in comes your second one. You landed a hit today with your plan, with your sister's help and heaven's own luck. People see you as the Unsouled who beat an Iron. That's an advantage to you, which means you've got to strike again now. What can you get out of this?”

Lindon's body thrummed with hunger. The same appetite that Elder Whisper had woken by speaking of a new Path rose up in him now, a yawning void that demanded to be filled. This was his chance to snatch another piece for himself, to climb another step closer to everything he ever wanted.

He'd forgotten about his father, his mind racing from option to option. Could he leverage this notoriety into a request for training materials? He could borrow the parasite ring from the Patriarch, with the excuse that he needed it to prepare for the Festival.

No, he would have to appeal to the Patriarch directly, who wouldn't be able to show him favoritism. Lindon had fought with another member of the Wei clan, and thus not brought any honor to the clan as a whole, so the Patriarch wouldn't be able to reward him.

Maybe he could go to the Eighth Elder in the archive, and request a few minutes with the Path manuals. Not to take one, just to study and learn. But given the Eighth Elder's personality, he wouldn't be swayed by anything Lindon had done.

So it came down to one question: who had enough power in the clan to give him a gift and the motivation to do so?

A figure appeared in his mind, and he abruptly stood up. He froze when he remembered his father; even though this was Lindon's home, Jaran was both father and guest. If Lindon left, it would be disrespectful.

Jaran saw his dilemma and laughed again, flipping his cup over. “Go, wherever you're going. That's not the face of a coward, so my work is done here. And I have your wine to keep me company.”

Grateful, Lindon bowed his way out.

***

Lindon used the morning’s duel as an excuse to enter the First Elder’s home, which was readily accepted by the elder’s niece. She congratulated him on the way in. As soon as he passed through the door, he understood why the First Elder of the Wei clan would live here. It was the perfect place to cultivate White Fox madra.

Inside the hallway, mirrors shone to his left and right, reflecting his image in an endless chain stretching off to eternity. Foxfire flickered in the lamps, purple and white, casting phantom images on one mirror that weren’t reflected in the other. The effect, even one step inside the doorway, was like swimming in a sea of dreams.

The hall was perfectly straight, but Lindon still slid forward one careful step at a time, not daring to trust his senses. Since he’d trained the Empty Palm with Kelsa, he had gained a new appreciation for just how disorienting the Path of the White Fox could be.

As he moved deeper in the house, he passed more oddities intended to focus dream aura. One painting of abstract shapes reminded him of a stern face one second and a tight flock of crows the next. A snowfox statue seemed to follow him with its eyes as he passed. Clusters of chimes on the ceiling were interspersed with ribbons of paper, trailing his entry with soft whispers and fragile music. As sticks of incense burned, they produced conflicting scents; sweet like mint, acrid as charred paper, savory like a haunch of roasting meat.

The senses bent and warped in the house, and Lindon’s head ached after only a minute or two inside. He couldn’t imagine living under these conditions, but then again, he didn’t follow the Path of the White Fox. Maybe the First Elder was more comfortable here.

“Lisha?” the First Elder called from the other room. “What are you doing out there?”

A human voice gave Lindon something to anchor to, and he stumbled in that direction, running his good hand over the wall searching for a door. He found one, sliding it open.

The elder was inside, kneeling beside a low table, brush poised over a scroll. “I didn’t expect to see you again today, Shi Lindon,” he said, without looking up.

Lindon bowed over his broken arm. “This one begs your indulgence, honored elder.”

The First Elder waved his hand irritably. “Wait there quietly. I must reply to one of the esteemed Schools, who insist that we honor them by intervening in a problem that does not concern us.”

He had been ordered to silence, but Lindon took a risk. “A problem, First Elder?”

The elder rubbed a spot on his temple, glaring at the scroll as though it contained a death threat. “The honorable Heaven’s Glory School has lost no less than four disciples to abduction, it seems. Apparently an outsider is torturing and killing them for the secrets of their sacred arts.”

Despite the grim news, Lindon was somewhat excited. Torturing a rival disciple for secret arts only happened in legends. “Do they suspect the Wei clan?”

“No, no, don’t worry. This has nothing to do with us, and this certainly isn’t the full story, but they still want ‘assurances of our immediate and absolute compliance.’ The clans have enough to deal with without taking on the burdens of the Schools as well.”

“We’ll show the other clans our power at the Seven-Year Festival,” Lindon said, angling the conversation around to his point.

“As the Li and Kazan clans will seek to show us,” the First Elder pointed out. “The Kazan in particular are maneuvering aggressively for one of our farms by the river. They either know something about that farm, or they have some secret that allows them to act arrogantly. But the roaring tiger loses its prey to the tiger hidden in the brush. The Li clan has made no motion to improve its strength before the Festival, and that worries me most of all.”

The elder placed his brush down and straightened. “I forgot myself. These are not matters for an Unsouled. What brings you here, Shi Lindon?”

“This one has a request, honored elder,” Lindon said, bowing again. Then he dropped the humble speech and met the First Elder’s eye. “Today, I’ve shown that my ability reaches beyond my level of advancement.”

“You’ve shown that you can use tricks to embarrass a man more skilled and powerful than you are.”

“Honor by any means,” Lindon said, and the First Elder conceded the point with a nod. “I have every confidence in my ability to sweep the Foundation stage competition at the Festival.”

“As you should,” the elder pointed out. “You’ll be the oldest one competing by at least two years. That will win us no honor among the other clans.”

This was the very point Lindon had come to address. “The elder speaks truly. But this one wonders if the First Elder has considered the exhibition match.”

The victor of each stage won the right to challenge one competitor of higher advancement to an exhibition round. The Foundation winner could challenge a Copper, the Copper winner could challenge an Iron, and so on. It wasn’t a true contest, but rather a display of skill. Against a more advanced opponent, one could display one’s true ability.

The elder ran fingers through his long white beard as he thought. “It would improve our standing…if the Foundation champion from our clan could fight evenly with a Copper from another clan. If you could pull a trick like you did today, embarrassing another clan, then you would have earned a reward. What is your request?”

“A Path,” Lindon said simply.

“Out of the question,” the First Elder responded without hesitation. “Do you understand why we forbid Unsouled to practice the sacred arts? It’s for your own protection. You’re as likely to maim your own soul as to advance to Copper. Elixirs and training would be wasted on you. You would forever be the weakest one on the Path.”

Lindon was prepared to negotiate for a lower prize, but he sensed an opening here. As long as the elder was using reason to convince rather than making absolute statements, that left room for discussion. “The resources of the clan should obviously go to more promising disciples than I, but if I have defeated a Copper from another clan, then surely I’ve proven that I have as much ability as they do. If that’s true, then why should I be forbidden from practicing a path?”

Foxfire flickered in the corner of his eyes, showing him phantom motion that was as much in his mind, tempting him to turn his head. But he watched the First Elder as the old man thought. Hope grew with every second of the elder’s silence, and finally he opened his mouth to say, “You’ll be entirely on your own, you know.”

“If I may say so, being on my own has never stopped me before.”

The First Elder considered a moment longer, and then slowly nodded. “You’ll have access to the Path of the White Fox. I’ll have a copy made for you, so you don’t take resources away from other students. But, Shi Lindon, heed me: you must win.”

***

Iteration 110: Cradle

Suriel lurched from the Way into reality in a flash of blue light, floating at the high edge of atmosphere. A planet spread out beneath her like a childhood blanket, blue and green and familiar.

[Successfully arrived in Iteration One-one-zero,] said the ghostly Presence on her shoulder. It had come with the job, because no lone mind could control all the powers at Suriel’s disposal. [Local time is +5.2 deviations from standard.] She would lose time here, and communication with Sanctum would be delayed, so her journey would take longer.

But then, that was the point.

[What is the purpose of your visit?] the Presence inquired. It was an innocent question, as the Presence was innocent, but Suriel wondered at the answer herself.

[Recovery?] the Presence asked, and all over the planet, displays lit up in Suriel’s vision with diagrams and glowing ribbons of text. They marked artifacts of the Abidan, lost over the millennia, matching them to last known locations and possible uses. With a thought, Suriel declined.

[Education?] Places of historical and cultural significance lit like beacons, from the Arches of Dairan to the Twelve Rivers.

[Entertainment?] Sky dancers, spinning on clouds of wind madra, trailed Remnants like glowing streamers. An arrow pointed to a performance in progress on the other side of the planet. A play moved through the audience, actors in painted masks carrying prop daggers, sneaking around as though the viewers didn’t exist. A duel between two experts; one riding a stag with lightning for antlers, another carrying a spear of solid flame. The life and death of a nation rode on this contest, but she could watch from safety like an interdimensional voyeur.

[Business?] the Presence asked, and though it was equally innocent, Suriel imagined an accusatory tinge to the construct’s voice. Before she could stop it, details of Ozriel’s life spooled out on the spectral display, locations of interest blinking into being all over the planet.

The mountain under which he had been born in a dark chamber of stone.

The ruins of the library where he had once developed his own Path.

The pillars where he debated the ten greatest scholars of the day, leading three to commit suicide soon after.

The City of Anvils, sealed now, where he’d forged his first weapon.

The labyrinth where he died and returned to life.

The country home, buried beneath a meadow now, where his fury had first touched the Way.

Suriel wiped the display with a thought. She’d been a fool to come here in the first place. She was the Phoenix, not the Hound. The healer, not the detective. She didn’t need to find Ozriel—she needed to find his aftermath. The billions of people affected by his refusal to do his job.

Someone had to bring them back to life.

But here she was, shirking her duties in the safest world of all creation. Even Sanctum was more likely to fall to corruption than this place.

Cradle was the birthplace of the Abidan, and theoretically Ozriel could cripple their organization for millennia by destroying it, but crippling them was never his goal. Makiel didn’t understand that, though Suriel did. He would never return here, and he would not allow it to fall through his inaction. Of all the worlds she oversaw, this was the most secure.

[Then why are you here?] the Presence asked, sensing that Suriel needed another voice. From anyone else, the question would have been damning. She was a healer, the greatest in existence, and she was dallying on the way to a war zone. Thousands died in every second that passed here. If they remained dead long enough, even she couldn’t bring them back.

But he might be right.

Ozriel had done unconscionable things in the service of the Abidan Court. They were all in the name of order among the worlds, but anyone else would have been indicted for war crimes. Though she understood his rationale, she had never felt comfortable with Ozriel on the job.

Then he quit. Ozriel, the celestial executioner, had refused to demolish condemned worlds. The Reaper had hung up his scythe. The other Judges were out for blood, and they expected the same of her. But how could she blame him for not murdering billions?

[The corruption spread from his inactivity will affect trillions,] her Presence said, responding to her unspoken question. [If it is not curtailed, then it will soon spread to tens of trillions, until the Court is forced to implement quarantine procedures.]

That was why Suriel delayed. Not because she didn’t want to heal the dead and dying, but because the other six Judges would have gathered together. They would want her to vote on a world-spanning quarantine that would leave dozens of worlds without the protection of the Abidan.

It was the exact attitude that had driven Ozriel to leave.

She needed a moment to think, here in a world outside of it all. A world that, though it was torn in an eternal thousand-sided war, existed in isolation. For her, that meant peace. Time to consider. Maybe she could solve some small problems, as a break from the cares of an entire universe.

[Problems,] her Presence acknowledged, and constellations of dots and lines spread all over the planet. Spooling text and images showed Suriel all the wounds she could heal, all the small problems she could fix while ignoring the larger troubles that overwhelmed her.

Here, a monstrous eel undulated through the ocean, spreading clouds of poison over an underwater city. Ten thousand kilometers away, a plague devastated a spire full of white-clad pacifists. On another hemisphere, a kilometers-long azure dragon flew on a violent storm, moving like a hurricane toward a small kingdom.

The text showed her ten million people she could save: from rape, murder, genocide, slavery, starvation, ignorance, disease. Ozriel would try to save them all, and would fail, but the world would be better for his efforts. Makiel would leave those problems to mortals and focus on the bigger picture.

As Suriel stared at the web of information spread out over the planet, trying to decide, another star flared to life. It was red rather than blue, representing a crime that was fated to happen. She focused on it.

[Imminent spatial violation,] her Presence reported. [Domination of local inhabitants by an outside power is predetermined to follow.]

Someone who had grown beyond this world was trying to return to Cradle, using outside power to set up their own fiefdom in this relatively simple plane of existence. That was a grade three violation, something that the local Sector Control Abidan would address, but they’d take their time about it. This level of crime was far beneath her notice, but both Ozriel and Makiel would have agreed it was worth stopping.

It was perfect.

She took a quick stock of her appearance, to make sure that she wouldn’t start any myths by descending. Transparent gray ghostlines ran from the back of her head, twisting down her right arm to terminate in her fingers. Those would be strange, but not alarming. The Mantle of Suriel ran behind her like she’d tied a river of burning light around her neck, and she made that vanish. Her white uniform was seamless, a layer of inch-thick liquid armor that coated her from her neck down to her toes. It would be obviously unnatural, but shouldn’t alarm anyone. They would assume it was Forged madra, which was close enough to the truth. She left it.

She couldn’t bring her weapon, though it pained her. The meter-long shaft of blue steel hung at her hip, innocuous enough, but she couldn’t take the one-in-a-billion chance that she might somehow leave it in Cradle. With an effort of will, she banished it back to Sanctum.

Her long hair drifted around her, luminescent green and shining against the darkness of space. She toned it down to a deep shade of jade barely distinguishable from black, then focused on her eyes. Her irises had expanded to take up most of the sclera, marked with a ring of symbols that a few people on the planet below might recognize as script. They were tools to help her see the flow of fate, but they might advance the development of Cradle scripting beyond acceptable limits. Her eyes burned as though she’d pressed them against red-hot iron, but she endured, altering them to a roughly natural shape in a matter of seconds. They were still large and purple, but they looked human enough.

Suriel’s will flickered to the Presence, which acknowledged her command. [Plotting course to the fated violation. Destination: the Sacred Valley. Distance: one hundred sixty-two thousand kilometers. Engaging route].

In a streak of blue, Suriel took off.