Spin of Fate, page 10
“My keiza,” Aranel said, staring at his reflection in horror.
Aina peered at her own. Unlike Aranel’s keiza, which had gotten a shade duller, Aina’s remained unchanged.
“You’re in Malin. It doesn’t matter anymore,” Aina said, looking around the crater.
It was crude and primitive, this hideout. Bare of the frills and finery she’d gotten accustomed to in Mayana. Aina took a liking to it at once.
One thing stood out in jarring contrast to the rest of the dwelling: a massive banyan tree on the islet at the lake’s center. Its trunk rose from the ground like a pillar of solid gold, ribbons of blue flowers dripping from its branches.
“I grew it from a sapling I brought over from Mayana.” A rich voice caught them off guard as Zenyra emerged from an entrance behind them.
Her copper hair was tied in a thick braid. She wore a knee-length linen tunic over dark breeches, and a simple necklace of colored beads. Her muted garments did little to cover up the air of nobility and power she exuded. “I wanted to prove that beautiful things could thrive in Malin too, if given the chance.”
She smiled at Aina before looking to Aranel. “I expected one new recruit, not three. But Mayani are always welcome here, and I must confess…” Her gaze rested on Meizan, and she inclined her head slightly. “I have long thought of enlisting a Malini to our cause.”
“So you’ll let them join?” Aina asked, relieved. She’d dragged Meizan in here, but a part of her worried Zenyra might turn him away.
“Of course,” Zenyra replied. “They certainly possess the chitronic skill, if what I witnessed on Merumarth serves as any indication.”
“You saw that?” Aranel asked. “How?”
“I was monitoring your progress from afar,” Zenyra said, “planning to intervene if things looked too dangerous.”
“Why didn’t you?” Meizan asked hoarsely. “You could’ve stopped—You could’ve saved—” He broke off, sounding more lost than angry.
“His clan,” Aranel said. “I think they were nearby. Got caught in the lavafall.”
Zenyra’s smile faded in an instant. “No…how terrible…” She closed her eyes, lips moving in a silent prayer. “I shall search for them myself,” she told Meizan once she was finished. “If they still exist, I will find them.”
If they still exist. Aina shuddered to think of the alternative.
“Tragic as it is about your clan,” Zenyra continued, “there is little I can do to help them until the lava cools, and even less I could have done to stop that explosion. An explosion the three of you did a commendable job surviving on your own. You have what it takes, which is why I permitted you into Incaraz.”
She gestured around the crater. “This is the main Balancer hideout, where we train new recruits in preparation for missions. We have about a dozen villages as well, scattered across the realm. They house Malini children and those injured in the war. Much as I would like to keep it all in one place, the smaller size is easier to conceal. Too large a chitronic shield would become weak and unstable.”
“That’s an incredible shield,” Aranel said. “To keep out all the low—the enemies.”
Aina glared at Aranel for his slip. “Kaldrav’s soldiers were here a few hours ago,” she said. “Do they know about the hideout?”
“They are not a threat,” Zenyra said. “The soldiers prefer not to linger under the fumes of Merumarth and only pass through this area on occasion. The shield protects us from them, as well as from the volcano.”
Aina gave a dubious nod. She couldn’t imagine any shield would be enough to hide from the sadistic king, but Incaraz had remained standing all this time. She glanced at Meizan, but he didn’t seem to be paying attention as he stared listlessly at the golden banyan.
“What happens now that we’re here?” Aranel asked. “When might we take these missions you spoke of? And visit the villages?”
“While I commend your enthusiasm, you have a few moons of training before I can allow you outside Incaraz,” Zenyra said.
Aranel bristled, and Aina felt a similar spike of outrage.
“A few moons!” she cried, thinking of her mother. “I don’t have that much time.” She looked to Zenyra in dismay. Though the Balancer leader had made no promises, Aina had assumed she would help search Malin for her mother.
“You are not ready,” a male voice cut in. A trio of uppers, all clad in cream tunics similar to Zenyra’s, approached from the lake. They walked across its surface as if it were firm ground.
“For a group of aspirational Balancers, you entirely destroyed the stability of Merumarth,” said a strapping young man with hair like shards of diamond. Flowing patterns inked his dark skin in a tapestry of waves, fish, and seashells. “Your overreliance on chitrons endangers you and those around you. You must adapt your channeling methods before you’re permitted to leave Incaraz.”
“Don’t be so hard on them, Hiraval,” his companion said. She had crescent eyes and delicate features, her keiza a swirl of ruby. “If I recall, you and Taralei set fire to Martharan less than an hour after you entered.”
“I had nothing to do with that,” Hiraval said primly. “Taralei was acting the fool, per usual.”
“I needed light!” protested the third arrival, an apple-cheeked young woman with hair that rippled to her waist. “So as not to drown some poor insect while I relieved myself.”
“So instead you burned down their homes,” said Hiraval.
“It was an accident, for Sherka’s sake!” Taralei waved him off. “Reimi, you saw what happened.”
“Reimi and I saw nothing but a foolish attempt to control the will of Azyaka’s chitrons,” Hiraval replied.
Aina watched them bicker with interest. Hiraval’s tattoos suggested he was from Amaratir, while Reimi’s wooden sandals and the hairpin peeking from her topknot both looked unmistakably Nishakian. Taralei spoke with the lilting accent of Kirnos, but Aina couldn’t be too sure, since the Lotus Kingdom attracted a wide variety of people from across the realm. Aina hadn’t interacted with many young Mayani, with the exception of Aranel, who always tried to act older, smarter, and more important than he was. At least these three seemed normal.
Taralei turned to Aranel with a cheeky grin. “Well, if it isn’t Kirnos’s finest. I’m shocked to see you in Malin, Ran, looking and smelling like a toilet. Whatever would your brother think?”
“He would think you flippant as ever, cousin,” Aranel shot back.
Cousin? Aina looked between Aranel and Taralei. They both had tan skin, golden hair, and the same long, straight nose. She could see the resemblance.
“Why are you here?” Aranel asked. “I thought you ascended to Paramos!”
“I meant to,” Taralei said. “But I met Zenyra near the torana, and she convinced me to join. Paramos will be ever open to me, but how many chances does one have to visit a lower realm? I’m surprised you followed me here, little Ran. Never imagined you’d leave Sam’s side.”
“Don’t call me that,” Aranel muttered. “I’m here of my own choice. I certainly didn’t follow you or even expect you to be a Balancer…”
“What did you mean before, when you said Azyaka’s chitrons?” Meizan addressed Hiraval. “Malin is called her realm, but what do the chitrons have to do with it?”
“An excellent question,” Hiraval began, and Taralei and Reimi exchanged a dark look.
“Hiraval was training to be a priest before he joined the Balancers,” Taralei said. “Never ask him about the seitarius or you’re in for one of his sermons.”
“They’re long, and he can be very enthusiastic,” Reimi added.
“Or as enthusiastic as Hiraval can be,” Taralei amended.
“You already know that chitrons arise from living consciousness,” Hiraval said, ignoring the other two, “and exist bound to their creators’ souls. But grains of sand and drops of water possess neither consciousness nor soul. Whose soul, then, are the chitrons of the universe bonded to? The chitrons of rock and river, of land and sky?”
Meizan remained silent, though Reimi and Taralei were shaking their heads.
“The incantation you say before channeling,” Hiraval prompted. “Can anyone repeat it?”
“Beloved Sherka, please lend me your strength,” Aranel supplied. “No one says it much anymore, but the deity to whom you appeal differs across realms.”
“That is only half the incantation,” Hiraval said. “The full verse goes, ‘Beloved Sherka, please lend me your strength and light my consciousness with your soul.’”
“That’s just a prayer,” Aina dismissed. “It doesn’t actually mean anything.”
Hiraval tensed, and Taralei gave a chuckle. “Careful, Aina,” she warned. “Don’t blaspheme in front of the almost-priest.”
“What is a prayer,” Hiraval asked, “if not a request to the ruling deity of your realm? In this case, to share a tiny, insignificant portion of their chitrons. A portion of their soul.”
A silence followed Hiraval’s statement, and Aina could not believe her ears. “Are you saying the seitarius are…real?”
“As real as anything else that exists in our universe.” Hiraval’s dark eyes glittered. “Sorken the Majestic. Sherka the Benevolent. Azyaka the Fierce. Andraken the Undaunted. For centuries, they have lain dormant within the core of our realms. That is why they are known as the seitarius—the Planetary Beasts. Their souls comprise what we refer to as the consciousness of the universe. It is their chitrons you harness when you channel the environment.”
His words sent a frisson down Aina’s spine. She’d always dismissed the Planetary Beasts as fictitious beings, alternate forms of worship since Toranic Law was too abstract. The verse inscribed in the temple of Kirnos came to mind: and thus the realm was split to four by will of Beast who made it.
Was that meant to be taken literally? Aina felt another frisson as she imagined Azyaka the nagamor, deity of Malin, a colossal snake slumbering deep within the earth. Her thoughts then turned to Andraken, the roach of Narakh, with thousands of eyes and countless legs, each the size of a tree. Something of such terror, at such scale, could not be real.
“It’s a religious sermon,” Taralei said. “Don’t take it as truth, you three. Hiraval’s not even an ordained priest.”
“I was two days from anointment,” Hiraval objected.
“Consider yourself an ordained Balancer,” Zenyra said lightly. “Enough talk of the seitarius. Hiraval, Taralei, Reimi, show our new recruits around Incaraz and to their quarters. Once everyone is settled, and bathed”—she cast a look at Aranel—“you are to commence their training.”
She then turned to Meizan, whose face had resumed its blank facade. “Let us speak before that. I would like to know more about your clan and their whereabouts. I promise, I will do everything in my power to help you.”
“I need your help too,” Aina reminded her. Meizan’s situation was more dire, but she had waited over a year to reunite with her mother.
Zenyra offered her a smile. “Join the training for now, Aina. I will find you at sundown.”
* * *
An hour later saw them bathed, changed, and gathered by the edge of the lake for their first training session, the granite walls of Incaraz looming above. Aina, like Aranel, had been grateful for the new clothes. Meizan still wore his blood-splattered old vest, though he’d traded his ratty blue tunic underneath for the Balancer one.
“You want us to what?” Aranel asked once Hiraval had explained the first exercise.
“Run up the wall to the top of the crater,” Hiraval repeated. “If you do it to our liking, we might let you skip this part of training.”
“I’ve been running up bleeding walls since I was four,” Meizan said.
“I can fly across clouds,” Aranel said at the same time. “I was junior cloudsurfing champion.”
“Runner-up to champion,” Taralei reminded him. “Prince Mirya of Tahamur beat your time by half a second.”
“By cheating.” Aranel sniffed. “This is preposterous. I did not come all the way to Malin to waste my time on rudimentary chitronic techniques.”
Aina resisted the urge to bash his teeth in. Aranel was more bearable with his mouth shut. Maybe once she learned to channel properly, she could find a way to muffle his voice. He had a nice face, after all. Removing the sound would be a vast improvement.
Though he did say he was inspired to join the Balancers because of me.
“I expected Zenyra would be teaching us something a bit more sophisticated,” Aranel went on. “Neutralization, immunotherapy, perhaps even psychosomatic stimulation.”
Aina had no clue what any of that meant. Unlike Aranel and Meizan, she was thrilled at the simplicity of their training. No one had coached her thoroughly on chitronic basics. Her mother had given up when she realized Aina wasn’t a natural like her, focusing instead on physical combat.
“Zenyra’s too busy to oversee new recruits,” Taralei said. “You’re stuck with us for the next couple moons, till you’re at a level worthy of her time.”
“We’ll move on to advanced techniques once we see you’ve mastered the basics.” Reimi pointed to the caldera wall. “Now then, up you go.”
Aranel and Meizan swiped their keiza and raced one another up, leaving twin trails of evenly spaced indentations in their wake. Aina ground her teeth as she waited for her chitrons, painfully slow to activate.
By the time she started climbing, the other two had already reached the top. Aina ignored their scrutinizing gazes as she scrambled up, clumsily shaping the rock underfoot.
“You fail,” Hiraval barked once Aina had finished. “All three of you. Try it again.”
Aranel dropped to the ground and crossed his arms. “Is this some sort of prank?”
“I’m leaving,” Meizan said. “This is a waste of time.”
“What did we do wrong?” Aina asked. “Rather, what did they do wrong?”
Hiraval gave Aina an appraising nod. “At least one of you is willing to acknowledge your issues. Watch now. I’ll demonstrate how Balancers climb.”
Hiraval swiped his keiza and darted up the caldera wall on his toes. The rock remained smooth, without shaping itself to support him.
“How did you do that?” Aranel demanded. “Are you even channeling?”
“Of course I am.” Hiraval sped back down the cliff, leaving no mark upon its surface. “But instead of maintaining the bond throughout, I created it for only the split seconds during which I touched the rock. And rather than releasing chitrons through my entire foot, I used only my toes, channeling a tiny portion of the rock’s chitrons to thrust myself up.”
“What’s the point of that, beyond showing off?” Meizan asked. “Your way isn’t any faster. And all that extra control seems mentally exhausting.”
“Mentally and physically exhausting,” Taralei said. “Since precision channeling relies more on your natural speed and strength to compensate for the reduced chitronic thrust. But don’t worry, we’ll toughen you up. Your training schedule includes running laps, lifting stones—”
“Running laps with stones strapped to your calves.” Reimi grinned. “That one’s my favorite.”
“But why bother?” Aina asked. She could hardly manage a normal channeling without misshaping her surroundings. This precision nonsense sounded unnecessarily difficult.
“Can you repeat the First Principle of Chitronic Equilibrium?” Hiraval asked.
Aina stared at him blankly, while Aranel shot up a hand. “The First Principle,” Aranel recited, “states that when chitrons interact, they transfer their energy until it is evenly spread out and all chitrons are rotating in the same direction at the same speed. This is referred to as a soul’s average chitronic spin.”
Upon finishing, he glanced at Meizan with something akin to triumph, only for the other to turn promptly away.
“Well said, Aranel.” Hiraval looked impressed. “Now consider the ambient chitrons of Malin, which spin opposite to those of Mayana. Opposite to your own. Whenever you bond to them, their energy interferes with and counteracts your own, slowing your chitrons and burdening your souls.”
“Zenyra invented precision channeling as a method to minimize interaction with the chitrons of Malin,” Reimi said, “thus reducing this risk.”
A stark silence followed, until Meizan said, “My soul spins the same direction as the chitrons of Malin. There’s no reason for me to learn your method.”
“Actually, there is,” Reimi replied. “Experience tells us the chitrons here are less malleable than those of Mayana and have a propensity to sow chaos. Given you’ve lived here longer than we have, you’d know better.”
Meizan nodded after a long moment. “There were instances in the past. When the chitrons didn’t always do what I wanted.”
“Ha!” Aranel said. “So it wasn’t just me who struggled.”
“I didn’t struggle, you pestilential—”
“Here are your Balancer checklists.” Taralei raised her voice over their bickering and handed Aina a scroll wrapped in white ribbon before tossing the remaining two at Aranel’s and Meizan’s heads. “Also includes your shifts for lookout duty.”
Aina unfurled her scroll and read over the techniques. Precision climbing, running, and shielding; concealment; stun beams; and something marked as classified.
“How are we expected to train,” Aranel grumbled, “with lookout duty every couple nights? At least eight hours of uninterrupted sleep is required for optimal channeling performance.”
“You’ll do what you’re told,” Taralei said, while Meizan cracked his knuckles, glaring mutinously at Aranel. “Mastering this list is a prerequisite for taking missions outside. You can channel safely within Incaraz because the shield largely protects us from the influence of Malin.”
“But it’ll take ages to learn all this,” Aina exclaimed.
