NationStates Jolt Archive

Then Ankharaon, First of the Prophets, was filled with the Thought of the Kash'ha Kimazaret, He of the Law. Thus spoke the Kash'ha;
"Behold, the Shining City burns with Our Will, and the Wards that you have written here shall burn upon its walls for aeons. But all the works of Man are imperfect, Redeemed by Our Creator though you be; the Wards that you have written here must be kept, lest they fail.
"Thus let all your children and your children's children, all those who bear the Sacred Fire, keep well the Wards."
Harmakhaz spoke unto the First of the Prophets;
"Yet all the works of Man must someday fail - even these Wards that we have written here. Someday the Accursed One shall again be free. What, then, are we to do, Great Lord?"
Thus spoke Ankharaon, First of the Prophets, though the Thought of the Kash'ha was gone from him;
"Then shall be Tshreighan and the ending of the World. Upon that day, Harmakhaz, you must have Faith."

-- Book Four, Chapter Twenty-Three, Verses Nineteen to Twenty-Two; the Book of Origins

Central Yaghkhantali Suburb, Deep Tsarai, the Ktaiya-Aten, Tsaraine

For a moment all is silent about the suburb's central shaft. The emergency sirens have stopped, and the rubble has reached some measure of stability. Dust trickles down from the cracks in the dome above, and whitens the lower balconies of the shaft where the floors above have given way.

The people are no longer screaming.

In the sudden, shocking silence Sifraís tsaIrrhast can hear her breathing, harsh and ragged, and her heartbeat, loud and rapid. Arrhythmic. She fumbles in her coat pocket for the emergency needle, finds a vein with practised ease, just like the doctors showed her, just as she's been doing the past ten years, since this heart condition became evident. It's an odd touch of the routine in the midst of this disaster, but were it not for the needle she'd be just another casualty by the time the emergency services arrive. The emergency services must arrive soon, surely?

Her heart quiets, becomes steady, and Sif takes stock of her situation. The shaft doesn't seem likely to collapse any further, and from the cool, dry feel of the air the emergency air supplies must have come on. She doesn't know if the main air shafts are sealed, or how long the emergency air will last. But the emergency services will surely arrive well before that becomes an issue.

She thinks her leg is broken, and wonders if this is shock. You're not supposed to move broken limbs, are you? That's fine with her. She doesn't want to look at it, much less move it.

And then - a sound like the roar of fire, like continual thunder, like a primeval scream. Her heart hammers, and over the blood roaring in her ears she can hear the rubble beginning to move again, before that other sound grows loud enough to drown out all others, loud enough to become simply incomprehensible noise, and the demon rises up from the shaft.

There are no such things as demons but it can be nothing else. It is inhumanly beautiful, eight feet tall, its skin pale and hard and polished as an alabaster sculpture. Androgynous, narrow-shouldered and narrow-hipped, it smiles the quiet, enigmatic pleasure of an Akhenaten or a Mona Lisa. Its hair is a sheet, a cloak of white-hot fire which billows out behind it as it rises unsupported through the air, as easy as she might ride an elevator. Its eyes are burning light from edge to edge. Something clicks and Sif recognises it suddenly; she has seen it in the frescoes of Rukine temples, and knows its name from government news. That the Ascendancy once created beings bearing that name seems now laughable, a travesty compared to this transcendental glory. She speaks the name, a whisper, an exhalation;

"Ea."

That still, ivory mask of a face, those burning eyes, turn and catch her gaze. Sif quails, knowing that she is unfit to speak its name; it seems all too right to fall on her face before it. The Ea, if the Rukine Book of Origins is correct - and how can it not be, in the face of this evidence? - created humanity to serve them. How can she resist that?

"Sifraís."

Its voice is smooth as honey, underlain with the crackle of fire; she can feel it in her bones. In that voice her hated, archaic full name is a thing of beauty. "Come to me, Sifraís. Come to me, and I shall take you to -"

"You cannot have her."

This voice is rough and grating, a mere flap of skin shaping air squeezed from sacks of flesh; quite hideous, compared to the glorious voice of the Ea. The speaker steps within her view; a man in the traditional long coat, with the very traditional - nearly as archaic as her name, in fact - braid of a citizen-lord down his back. With that white hair he could be Ktrazirha and twenty, or Tsakh and sixty. He is facing away from her, staring up at the Ea; impossible to tell. Before that great and terrible Presence he looks so very, very small.
As the A
The Ea spreads its arms, turning the full force of its gaze upon the interloper. "You cannot stop me, Arschan."

"I can try."

"You will fail."

Ea and man are wreathed and wound about with fire, with glyphs which leave scorched afterimages on the air. They spit forth jagged words of light which sizzle and fade before they touch the other. The man - Arschan - somehow does not fall before that onslaught; he launches himself through the air at the demon, grappling it about the legs, and the two crash into the shattered ruins of the floor a level down, on the far side of the shaft. Sif could just see them over the broken edge of the floor; the Ea a whirling shape of fire and alabaster, the man a magpie flutter of black and silver. The Ea is atop him, and Arschan is hurled backwards to crater the wall. Surely he must be dead, but no, he moves; he leaps, in fact, lands on the ball of one foot, spins and sends the other cracking into the demon's jaw.

As if it is truly more stone than flesh, the Ea's skin splinters. It shakes its head and howls words that hang incandescent in the air. One pale arm snaps up to snatch at Arschan's boot; he gasps counter-spells as the demon slams him into a pillar and both vanish in falling rubble and clouds of dust.

Now he must be dead, and Sif finds that her breath has caught in her throat. The Ea is rising again, speaking afresh its burning wards, and suddenly Arschan too is rising, throwing himself at his foe to hurl both across the shaft to smash into the rubble a quarter of the way around the shaft from where Sif lies.

They roll, and as the Ea struggles to the top Sif sees that the landing has turned its skin to a cracked and splintered ruin; light, or fire, of an angry blood-red is seeping forth to sizzle on the broken floor. It slams a fist down and Arschan twists, the fist cratering the floor by his ear; he kicks upwards, and the demon is thrown - no, actually flips - backwards with a whirling arc of fiery hair, landing on its feet. Arschan too is on his feet now, leaping forward with an uppercutting hand wreathed in burning glyphs. The Ea blocks with an upraised forearm - there is the crack of breaking skin, a gout of shining blood - and sends a scything leg to knock his legs out from under him. He spins as he falls, his foot lashing out to knock the Ea square in the chest, and the demon staggers back.

Sif realises that the demon is unused to such physical combat; otherwise Arschan would surely be dead. He is keeping it off-balance, denying it the time to use the magics which will certainly kill him.

The Ea is speaking those words now, mellifluous syllables dripping from its lips and flashing into existence around its head; but Arschan has an iron bar in his hand - broken from the shaft's railing, perhaps - and brings it around in a tight arc. The Ea blocks with the same damaged arm, and the bar smashes into its upraised palm, leaving the hand a shattered ruin. Jabbing out with its right hand, it catches Arschan in the gut, knocking him onto his back. It steps forward and Arschan twists, striking upwards with the bar, scissoring out at its legs. Now the Ea is on the ground and Arschan is rising, stabbing down with the jagged end of the iron bar. He strikes it through the shoulder, leaving jagged ruin, but the Ea twists and seizes him by the neck, swinging him about and over its head to smash into the floor. The bar goes flying, skittering over the floor towards Sif. She stares at it dumbly before reaching out to pick it up; the heavy bar is a comforting weight in her hand.

Cat-quick, the Ea is upon Arschan, smashing down with its good right arm. He rolls and dodges the blow, reaching out to grab its foot, and rises, roaring with effort, as he swings the demon about in a great arc and hammers it into the wall. Both are slower now, coughing out their words of warding as they close once again. The Ea springs and lands in a crouch, spinning with one extended leg to knock Arschan's feet from under him, and this time the man is not fast enough.

Arschan groans, scrabbling at the floor for purchase to lever himself up once more, but the Ea steps forward and stamps one alabaster foot into his chest.

"The girl," it says, "Is mine."

And it stops, eyes flaring bright in shock, as Sif brings the iron bar down upon its head. The light that is its blood gouts forth, splattering fading sparks which scorch her coat and arms. Arschan is muttering words again, leaden things which hang in the air and make all the little fires flare up. The Ea's incandescent cloak of hair whirls about and enshrouds it, shrivelling to a point, which sparks and dims and goes out.

"The hell I am," Sif gasps, dropping the bar. Her broken leg slips and she falls - a sickly crunch as her leg impacts the floor, a wash of pain, and then darkness.

Esakkhen Krisyakerisikh Academy, Inghkari Suburb, Deep Tsarai, the Ktaiya-Aten, Tsaraine
the next day

-Click

"- At which point there was no further activity of any sort until the emergency services managed to break through the rubble, some minutes later."

Arkhreif Ivrezhan Ishairn, the ultimate head of Tsaraine's security services, waves a hand and the screens go blank.

"Now," he continues, "It's obvious we have a problem. I should like Master tsaKandrassan to lend us his thoughts, as it is obvious that the Krisyakerisikhi know somewhat more about this situation than do we."

At the far end of the table from Ivrezhan, tsaKandrassan sighs and nods wearily. The Krisyakeris Master looks worn, and like many of the assembled Corps-Commandants clearly hasn't had any sleep since the previous night. In his red-and-gold coat he looks something like a Rukine priest, or a feudal lord who's stepped out of the past. The books before him reinforce that archaic air; even Ivrezhan, who regards himself as fairly tolerant, frowns to see the Master consult the Book of Origins. Faith has no place in the governance of the State.

"Where to begin?" tsaKandrassan mutters.

"Start with what it is that destroyed Central Yaghkhantali yesterday morning, then, and why it is that a member of your Academy happened to be in just the right place to stop it. And how it is that he was able to stop it."

"Very well. When the Kash'ha Kalazimorchan rebelled against God Above, he created the Ea to serve him; and the Ea created humanity to serve them. When mankind rebelled against the Ea, the First of the Prophets sealed Kalazimorchan and all his minions within Kel Akara'ant, the Burning City; "but all the works of man are imperfect ... the Wards that you have written here must be kept, lest they fail.""

"I'm not sure what bearing this has on the attack on Yaghkhantali, esar tsaKandrassan." Kasene tsaKinai, scowls at him. The Arkhreifane of the Interior has no time for gods.

"What attacked Yaghkhantali was an Ea, esen tsaKinai, escaped from the Burning City."

"I do not believe in fairy-tales, esar. And that book is a fairy-tale!"

TsaKandrassan sighs. "The existence or nonexistence of God Above and His Kash'hai is a matter of religious experience and thus impossible to quantify. What is true is that there are ... beings inimical to humanity, and that these beings may be called monsters, or demons, or Ea. I am a religious man but I am unable to believe that they created mankind; but you can see on that screen that they exist, whether or not we believe in them. Likewise there is evidently somewhere that they must come from; Kel Akara'ant is as good a name as any.

"Likewise, you know that in other nations there are beings that may be called monsters, or demons, or even angels. You know that other nations have a thing that they call magic. What you did not know is that so do we."

"I have always considered what they call "magic" to be merely some obscure branch of science, imperfectly understood," Ivrezhan remarks. "The world must run on reason; all our science is based upon it. That it should not be underpinned with reason is ... unreasonable."

"Then it is science," tsaKandrassan replies, shrugging. "How well do the Researchers understand Kymnari theory, for example, even now? That there are things in the universe we do not understand does not mean we must go back to hanging iron above our doors to keep the spirits out."

"Although we did agree to meet here, in your Academy, because you assured us it was safe from such incursions - and I did notice that your doors are iron ..."

"Perhaps I used the wrong example, then. And yes, this Academy is designed to keep out malign influences; so is any building based upon the old, traditional architecture. In the old days, people feared the voices in the dark. It is superstition, but it seems to work - perhaps because it reflects some underlying principle of science," tsaKandrassan nods to Ivrezhan, "Or perhaps because we believe in it - or they do.

"Anyway. That is what we face. As to why esar arEktarekht" - he nods to Arschan - "Was present, well ... if you will bear with me for some more recent history? When the Glorious Revolution toppled the old feudal lords, Kail I used the Temples as a scapegoat, before he outlawed the faith completely. You know there were such things as Temple mages, although I expect you thought them to be the confidence tricksters and faith healers common to any society. This was not so, of course; the Sacred Fire was, and is, real. They were central to the faith in those days; the Book of Origins states, after all, that the wards on the Burning City must be kept. If the wards were to fall, the Burning City would release its prisoners, and the end of the world would be at hand.

"So the Arkhaeron of the time hid the Temple mages and their learning in a place he knew the revolutionaries would not find them - the Krisyakeris Academies."

"Because you are very good liars," the Arkhreifane of the Interior suggests.

"Among other things," tsaKandrassan agrees. "And so the Academies kept the Secret Fire through four and a half centuries, and through the Obsidian Event. We kept it hidden, and taught those with the talent to learn what we could, although I dare say our knowledge has dwindled since the Revolution. And we kept the wards, as best we could; the entirety of the Mother Country is protected against the demons."

"Until now," the Arkhreifane says. "It can hardly be legal, in any case, to maintain such a conspiracy against the State."

"Against the State, esen?" tsaKandrassan asks. "Whatever else we teach, Krisyakeris remains a code of duty and honour. We have kept these secrets for the State, and not against it."

"Besides," Arschan speaks up, "The prohibitions on witchcraft were stricken from the books a century ago. There is nothing actually illegal about what we do."

"I'm sure they can be reinstated, esar arEktarekht," Kasene growls.

"That might not be wise, esen tsaKinai," Ivrezhan replies, "If it's true that the Academies have been protecting us. Until now, indeed. Esar tsaKandrassan - if your wards have held so well, why then do we have this disaster in Yaghkhantali?"

"The Ea are clearly very powerful," tsaKandrassan says, "And this one was clearly weakened, or Arschan would not have been able to defeat it. If our wards did that much, then clearly they still have some use. Alternatively, it might have been summoned here. Or the doors of Kel Akara'ant may be opening."

"Let us not put forward the end of the world as an explanation without more evidence," Ivrezhan sas hastily. "Unless your magic gives you a hotline to God Above, that is not a scenario we can do anything about."

"Unfortunately, God remains a subject for personal belief," tsaKandrassan replies. "The Secret Fire may be proof of His existence, or merely proof that the universe is a stranger place than we would like. We shall put aside the question of Tshreighan and world's end, then - yes, Arschan?"

The much-bandaged Arschan arEktarekht sits up with some difficulty. "The Ea wanted esen tsaIrrhant," he says. "I think it forced a hole in our wards for her."

The assembled brass turns to regard Sif, who'd been sitting down at the corner of the table, doing her best to be ignored. She shivers under the weight of that regard, and remembers the words of the Ea; "Come to me, Sifraís. Come to me, and I shall take you to -"

"But why would it want me?" she asks, feeling very insignificant. "There's nothing special about me."

"That is a very good question," tsaKandrassan says, "And one for which I would dearly like an answer."

Esakkhen Krisyakerisikh Academy, Inghkari Suburb, Deep Tsarai, the Ktaiya-Aten, Tsaraine

"It occurs to me," Ivrezhan says to tsaKandrassan, "That your secret might have been kept, had esar arEktarekht not been on hand to defeat this ... Ea."

"The secret might have been kept," tsaKandrassan agrees, "But if we allowed the Ea to rip their way through the city at will, it would mean nothing. And how long could it last, after such a disaster? We have relied upon your rationalism, your disbelief in the unnatural to hide us. The moment you had someone capable of seeing the wards, the secret would be out - and unless I am much mistaken you would have spent some effort to find one, after this."

"You would be correct in that assumption," Ivrezhan smiles. "For that matter, there are some who have been arguing we have needed a defence against the ... unnatural for some time. Arda has self-neutralised as a threat, thank god, but the Osage barbarians have recently begun some kind of resurgence, and then there's those strange goings-on in Kajal and the Planum Australe, on Mars ... plus the Elves, the C'tan, the Yvresse, the Roanians, the Arpeans, the Cetagandans, the Scolopendrans, and god knows who else ... though not, as far as we know, the Iraqstanis, for which we may all be thankful.

"Few of those are actually our enemies, but we can trust not a one of them. If any of them found some pretence to attack us through supernatural means, we would be quite defenceless ... save your wards, tsaKandrassan. It appears we should be thanking you."

The Arkhreifane of the Interior scowls at that. "I do not like any of this," she interjects. "It is madness and I will not have it!"

"Apparently we have it, whether we will or no." the speaker is a hard-eyed woman in the black-and-grey of Security, bearing the silver braid of one of Ivrezhan's Corps-Commandants and, oddly, the white braid of a Researcher-Commandant as well. "Under the circumstances, esen, I'd advise that we organise some kind of official defence."

"Thank you, Akhusha," Ivrezhan says. "I'm certainly willing to form some kind of agency under the aegis of Security ... presuming, of course, that you're willing to co-operate with us, Master tsaKandrassan?" His tone suggests that non-cooperation may have unfortunate consequences.

TsaKandrassan spreads his hands, smiling ruefully. "I suspect that we have little choice, now the secret is out. And if the Ea are breaking through our wards at will ... it would be best to have trained battle-mages, which we are not. We keep the wards, and we have some facility at counter-spells and exorcisms" - he nods to Arschan - "And some minor battle magics. But nobody has practised the old war-magery in centuries; it would blow away our cover," he smiles, "Along with most of the landscape. Too many of the Temple's books were lost in the Obsidian Event."

"I'm sure we can find or build you a facility at which to train, with whatever special architecture you require."

TsaKandrassan raises an eyebrow. "Well, thank you."

"Akusha," Ivrezhan turns to the hard-eyed Corps-Commandant, "I'll need however many of your telepaths you think are capable enough to help us."

Akusha nods. "I can get you six, maybe seven. The rest may still be useful if you want to suppress knowledge of this event."

Arschan, for lack of a better word, boggles at the Corps-Commandant. "You have telepaths?"

Ivrezhan grins. "You Krisyakerisikh aren't the only people who can keep a secret, esar arEktarekht. And speaking of secrets, I hold you all to keep this in the strictest confidence; do not tell anyone. We've been telling the news services that it was a gas pipe explosion, and it's best that it stays that way. We don't need people afraid of the monsters under the bed."

There are nods from around the table.

"We may want to get allied assistance with this," one of tsaKinai's staff suggests. "The Britmattians know more about it than we do, after all."

"We're also fairly certain that the Britmattians supplied the Osage with dragons, back when the barbarians were a real threat," Ivrezhan replies. "We cannot trust them entirely. But it is worth consideration." He turns to regard Sif. "And if the Ea came here for you, esen tsaIrrhast, be assured that we will discover why."

Perhaps he means it to reassure, but it sounds more like a threat.

Krrha-Dirhazhi Airbase, Skirré Mountains, the Ktaiya-Aten, Tsaraine

It's past midwinter, and the days are gradually lengthening as the year crawls towards the autumn equinox and Herghadt Ktohr. But it's not yet thaw, and up in the Skirré Mountains there's still heavy snow carpeting the ground, and on the gnarled beeches which have thrust their way up through the concrete of the base courtyard. Sif navigates the cracked paving with difficulty on her crutches, following Master tsaKandrassan into the shelter of the surrounding veranda. The ceiling here is cracked and sagging, and the paving is thick with sixty years' worth of leaf litter, but at least it's out of the wind.

"I don't understand why I have to be dragged out here," Sif complains, tucking her hands into her sleeves. "I'm an art restorer, not some kind of wizard! I work in a museum! I can't think what the Corps-Commandant wants me for."

"You're here because, until we figure out why the enemy wants you, I quite frankly don't want to let you out of my sight."

Vystrez Khvanoi is a small, tidy man, economical of movement and pragmatic of mind. Sif has yet to see him between tasks; he moves quickly and quietly, giving the impression that he might as well vanish into some interdimensional storage space when he has nothing better to do. He's solidly second-generation, and a clone, reinforcing the impression she has of him as some kind of human robot. Sif wishes that Ivrezhan Ishairn had found someone else to head his mage corps.

"Stay with tsaKandrassan, and don't wander below; we've heavy machinery operating there and you don't have construction site clearance."

And he's gone again, walking away rapidly and vanishing inside the base.

"We must all do our duty," tsaKandrassan comments. "Unfortunately Corps-Commandant Khvanoi is the sort of person who thinks it's improper to do anything besides one's duty."

"He gives me the creeps," Sif replies. "Have you noticed he never calls ... them Ea, or demons, or anything? It's always "the enemy"."

"They are our enemies, and all humanity's. And I suspect that the Corps-Commandant is uncomfortable to find himself in a world that no longer seems to follow the precepts of science. I do not think that he is a religious man."

Sif tries to imagine Khvanoi in a temple, or married, and nods. It's hard to think that the man might do anything but his job.

"Why are they setting up the base here, anyway? It's a dump!" she changes the subject, waving a hand around the crumbling courtyard and the squat concrete towers around it.

"I think Arkhreif Ishairn's reasoning is that refurbishing an already constructed base would attract less attention than constructing a new one. I believe they mean to keep the trees as well, to maintain the illusion from the air, and from satellites. And this is already a Security facility; they got it from the Air Command - Division Eight, back then - sometime during the Obsidian Years, when the paperwork for everything was being written again. Division Eight built it after the last war, when the invasion made everyone realise that they needed more bases in the Mother Country itself; and defensible bases."

TsaKandrassan nods to the massive concrete towers, with their flak turret emplacements and machine-gun nests. The guns are still up there, rusted lumps of metal fused in place.

"And then, of course, the Obsidian Event blew away the old Commonwealth - the edge of the burn is on the other side of the mountain - and it was abandoned."

"You know a lot about it," she says. "Surely you're not that old?"

He laughs. "I'll be sixty-four next June; I was born a few years after the Event, in Karazhian's Protectorate. No, I just like to know about where I am."

They sit in silence for a time, and then tsaKandrassan speaks again.

"Arkhreif Ishairn has asked me to teach you what I can."

"You mean Krisyakeris? I learned a bit when I was twelve - I wanted to play Kzetrhaisha, but my mother wouldn't let me. It's funny, that unarmed combat is less dangerous than sport, isn't it? And I learned a bit more when I was eighteen. The memory palace, that sort of thing."

TsaKandrassan smiles. "The way some people play it, Kzetrhaisha is armed combat. And yes, the martial side of Krisyakeris, eventually - not now, of course" - he indicates her broken leg - "But it's good that you know some things already. I didn't mean Krisyakeris, though; I meant magic."

The idea seems bizarre.

"But I can't do magic! I mean ..." she waves her hands, trying to encompass the whole vast inarticulate impossibility of such a thing.

"Most people can, actually; or the number that can is highest among the Tsakh. It's a matter of training, and of learning to see. Ideally you would have attained mastery of Krisyakeris first, of course, but what Security demands ... besides, it seems I've managed to become a secret agent at sixty-three, so I'm sure you can become a mage at twenty-six."

"Oh." Sif is lost for words; how does one respond to that? They are all of them off the terrain of what used to be possible, somewhere out within the broad fields of the impossible. TsaKandrassan is a little way ahead, scouting out the paths.

"Shall we begin, then? Sit down; make yourself comfortable. As comfortable as possible, at least, given the surroundings."

"Learn here? Now?"

"Do you have something else to do?"

She sits, spreading out the skirts of her coat over the damp leaf litter, and folds her legs as she learned to do at the Krisyakeris academy, when she was twelve. TsaKandrassan nods, and mirrors her pose before her.

"Good. Now, close your eyes. I want you to visualise your surroundings, this courtyard as accurately as you can."

That's comparatively easy, for one who's learned to build the memory palace. The courtyard rises up behind her eyelids; the trees are there, the walls there, I am here ...

"Now. The walls, and the paving, and the trees, and the sky - everything you see - bears writing on it. And what is written is this ..."

His voice breaks off in a long string of alien words, a language softer and more mellifluous than Sekhel, with a burr under it of vibrating vocal cords, a crack of consonants. She is reminded, suddenly, of the voice of the Ea; "Come to me, Sifraís. Come to me, and I shall take you to -"

Suddenly she sees the words, written over every tree and wall, over tsaKandrassan's body and over the grey depths of the sky. But not, strangely, over herself; her own body is quite devoid of those words, those Wards. Sif wonders why that is, and shivers.

"Now." tsaKandrassan's voice, speaking Sekhel now, interrupts her thoughts. "See that outside what you see is the rest of the base; that outside the base is the mountain; and beyond that the plains, the cities, and the entirety of the Mother Country. And beyond the Mother Country, the other worlds of the Ascendancy; Mars and Io and Tenebris and Sahel Ai and Geri II, Freki IV, Geri III, Adranthe ... and all these places, all these worlds, bear written upon them the words ..."

That incantation again, and Sif sees the words extend in a glittering skein across time and space, across all the worlds and territories of Tsaraine. She can see, now, the way those enveloping wards form a wall, a barrier between the universe of man and the lines, the trajectories which veer off sideways through other dimensions to -

"Stop!"

The worlds and words held in her mind vanish, and she opens her eyes. TsaKandrassan is leaning forward, with something akin to concern in his eyes.

"I'm all right," she says hastily, although her heart is beating fast and the beats are becoming arrhythmic. Damn. The needle is in her pocket as always, and she cracks off the plastic cap, fumbles at her sleeves to push them up.

"Let me help," tsaKandrassan says, and she allows him to fold back her sleeve, although his fingers are rough on the pale skin of her arm and she does not like to be touched. She finds the usual vein, slides the needle in, depresses the plunger. Feels her heart slow, and return to the usual pace and rhythm.

"I have a heart condition," she explains to tsaKandrassan, shaking off his hand, pushing back down her sleeve.

"Oh. You should have said something before - Sif, there are dangers in looking too far, or too deeply. They are always watching for some advantage. And they already have some interest in you."

Krrha-Dirhazhi Airbase, Skirré Mountains, the Ktaiya-Aten, Tsaraine

"And then you bring your arm down, like this." tsaKandrassan demonstrates, and Sif copies him carefully. The Master flows through the katas of the Krisyakeris with the expertise of long practice. "Good. One-two-three-four-five!" He spins about, and strikes. TsaKandrassan, Sif thinks, is enjoying playing the wizened master on the mountain-top, for all that Krisyakeris is not Shaolin and the Tsakh are not Chinese. It must be a change from the day-to-day bureaucracy of running his Academy.

"Very good. And now ..."

She recites the words he's taught her in the oldest tongue, the tongue she knows must be that of the Ea themselves, feeling more than hearing the buzz and crackle of it. The words wind about her arm, golden threads which spark and fade almost immediately into eye-hurting afterimages. The fire does not last, when she tries it, anywhere near as long as when tsaKandrassan speaks the words; he says it is because she is still learning. The ghosts of it seem to work well enough.

Sif turns and spins and strikes as he has showed her, lashing out with the echoes of fire. TsaKandrassan smiles; "Very good ..."

Thus are her afternoons spent, as the Master teaches her the arts of the Secret Fire, the oldest tongue and the spells that are spoken in it, and the more physical manifestations of the Krisyakeris. In the mornings a much-lined, unfriendly woman named Karezhdña instructs her in the more subtle skills; the rules of musculature and anatomy that make the supreme control of Krisyakeris possible, the subtle tricks of face and gesture that enable one to conceal one's emotions and one's thoughts; and the tricks of seeing that enable one to discern the lies in the faces of others, to see hidden threats and to react quicker than thought. Karezhdña also instructs her in the finer details of the memory palace, and the various other mental tricks by which the body may be coerced to exceed its limitations. She also attempts to drum into Sif's head the hard, archaic code of the abnegation of the self, the selfless duty which, their physical prowess aside, has made the Krisyakerisikhi such potent weapons over the years.

She finds most of this scarcely more interesting than she did when she was twelve or seventeen, and learns it as well as she can to get it over with. TsaKandrassan's lessons are more interesting; the physical skills are at least useful, and the secret arts are fascinating. Sif finds that she wakes, occasionally, with the words of the oldest tongue on her lips; she speaks it in her dreams.