Unfinished, page 3
She smiled, looking up at him. “Your purpose? I thought your purpose was to train additional sword masters.”
“Has it been?”
She frowned, and then she realized something. She saw it, and had not before.
Imogen had no idea why she had not seen it before, but as she looked at Master Liu, truly looked at him, she saw something about him that was familiar in a way that she had not expected. It was familiar in how he reminded her of Benji, even of Abigail, in his bearing and the power that he possessed. It was familiar in how he had offered his guidance, and how he had made a point of trying to encourage rather than force. It was familiar in how he had pushed her along the way.
“You’re Porapeth,” she said, shaking her head. “I don’t know how I didn’t see it before.”
“You were never meant to see it before,” Master Liu said. “And we have offered as much as we can to this land, but now our time is at an end.”
“Why?”
“Because our time is at an end,” he said. He looked up at the mountainside. “Very few knew that we were here.” He breathed out slowly, heavily, and then he let out a frustrated sigh. “That was the purpose of the sacred temples, after all. We could offer our guidance, and we could watch, influencing those who had the most potential within the Leier homeland, and from there…” He smiled again, and he blinked, silver flashing in his eyes so much like it had in Benji’s. “But now even that will come to an end.”
“Why here?”
“You haven’t learned?”
Imogen snorted, and she looked up at the mountainside before turning her attention back to Master Liu. “If I had learned, I wouldn’t be asking the question.”
“Because this is our homeland, Imogen Inaratha. The Leier, and the Koral, are all descended from the Porapeth.”
Chapter Three
Master Liu looked over. He smiled at her, and there was a hint of amusement in his eyes, an expression that Imogen remembered from the time when she had worked with him while in the sacred temple. He was a little older now, though she couldn’t easily tell it. He hid that age well. He had been ancient when she had first arrived at the tiger temple, and he looked even more ancient now.
“We can’t be Porapeth,” she said.
“Oh, it’s not quite as straightforward as that,” he said. He swept his hand off to the side of the mountain and started moving along the narrow path, forcing Imogen to keep up with him.
Every so often he would pause, tilt his head to the side as if he was listening to something, in a way that reminded Imogen of Benji, before he continued onward. She wondered if perhaps he actually did listen to the wind in the same way that Benji did.
The third time that he did it, Imogen paused and did the same thing. She began to listen to the wind, thinking that if there was some sound on it that she might be able to determine, she should take the opportunity to do so. It was what Benji would have wanted for her, but then Benji had barely shared with her any way to use the Porapeth abilities that he had gifted to her.
“I’m not saying that we’re Porapeth,” Master Liu said. He looked over at her, and when he did, there was a twinkle in his eyes, but no silver flashed this time. So whatever else he might be, he certainly wasn’t Porapeth in the same way as Benji or Abigail. “Only that we are descended from them.”
“You knew Benji,” she said.
“I think knowing one such as him is difficult. I knew of him, and there were times when I could have sworn that I had heard him speaking to me, but knowing him would require knowing a power that is vast and unknowable.” He looked up at the sky before he turned back to Imogen.
In that moment, Imogen found herself wondering how much Master Liu knew. Could he know that Benji was gone and that she saw him in the stars? Could he know that she believed that Benji had not truly left them? The wind whispered around her, and Imogen listened to it, thinking that perhaps it tried to share something with her. There had been so many times when Benji had seemed to be there in the back of her mind, laughing, even taunting her.
But he was not there now.
“There was a time when the Porapeth guided us,” Master Liu said. “It was a time before the sacred temples. It was a time before our people had become so divided.”
“Our people aren’t divided.”
Master Liu smiled, but it was a sad smile. “We live in villages stretched all over a land that is fragmented. The only thing that unified us was the sacred temples, along with a desire to destroy the magic that we blamed for what happened. But even in that, there are those of us who question whether that is all that we believed it to be.”
“Why are you telling me this now?”
“Because I think that you must know. And because even before the attack on the temples, we have been under assault. There are those who have tried to destroy the Leier, and not the Koral, as we have always feared.”
“You know my feeling on the Koral.”
It was one thing that she had shared when she had saved Master Liu, having felt that she had needed to do so because it made a difference to how others viewed those that were with Imogen. Sword and shield. That was what she had told the Koral and the Leier traveling with her, and she would not have been the leader that they needed and deserved if she had not offered them the protection that they were deserving of.
“I’m not talking about the Koral,” Master Liu said. “What do you remember about the attack on the sacred temple?”
“Well, it was an attack on more than just the tiger temple. All the temples were targeted.”
“And I’ve told you that there was a reason. Something there that they wanted to access.”
“Some hidden power,” Imogen said. It had to be an enchantment, she suspected, though she wasn’t entirely sure. Perhaps it was something else.
Her mind raced through various possibilities, given what she knew of the sacred temples, along with what she knew of the Porapeth power. She had felt what Benji had done when he had gifted her power. What if something similar had been done to the sacred temples?
Timo, along with the other Sul’toral, had been after power. What if they were after that kind of power?
“It’s hidden power, and it is a kind that few understand.”
“You are saying that this power is Porapeth power.”
“I’m saying that it’s possible. We have been in possession of this power for long enough that I can’t even tell you the origin of it any longer. At this point, it’s difficult to know if it is some descendant of sorcery or if it truly is something greater.”
“So you question whether it could be an enchantment as well.”
“What do you think each of the temples had? The tigers were all enchantments, and they carried a kind of power that was always meant to defend our land. Ever since we were fragmented.”
“Fragmented from what?” she asked.
“It is so long ago that I don’t even know. None of us do. The records don’t speak of it. The only thing we have that tells us of what once existed for our people is the Heart.”
Imogen smiled. The Heart of the Leier was a place that had once been the stronghold of their people. None knew how to reach it. At least, she had always thought that to be the case.
“You know how to find the Heart.”
“All the sacred sword masters know how to find it. And it is something that you should learn as well now that you are one of the sacred sword masters. There are so few of us now.”
“Why would it matter if I knew?”
“Because there may come a time when you need to find the Heart.”
“What I need to do is find a way to bring the Leier and the Koral together before anything else happens. I don’t know what Timo intends—”
“Do you think Timo is the only one you need to be concerned about?”
She took a deep breath. “I’ve seen what he is willing to do. He targeted Benji the Elder. He targeted the branox queen,” she went on, explaining briefly about the branox and what they were. “And he was here. My brother, who should not have chased this kind of power, has become something more. It was bad enough when I thought him only a Toral, but now he has learned enough to become even more powerful than that.”
“Why do you think that is?”
“Because he’s chasing power that he should not…” She shrugged. “He’s no longer my brother.” It pained her to say that, much like it pained her to acknowledge the fact that Timo was not the young man that she remembered him to be. He could not be. And yet she still struggled to hate him the way that she knew she should hate the Sul’toral. “I don’t know what he thinks he can accomplish, but whatever he’s after, he must be stopped.”
“In that we agree, Imogen Inaratha.” Master Liu stopped, looking out over the landscape.
From here, Imogen could almost make out the remains of the tiger temple. The peak was only one over, near enough that she could see the wind swirling, the snow coming with it making it difficult but not impossible for her to make out the remains of the temple. It had collapsed, leaving few of the structures remaining, though some of the power that had been stored there did linger, and Imogen could feel it when she stretched out with Tree Stands in the Forest, using her sacred pattern to plunge deep into the mountain itself in order to detect that power.
But that was not all that she could feel.
When she took the time, which had been less and less lately, Imogen had started to detect that something about the mountainside itself had begun to shift, leaving her scarcely able to feel the sacred patterns that she knew were buried within the mountain. Some part of her homeland had started to change.
Maybe that was what Master Liu was trying to tell her.
“I’ve lived on this peak for so long. I thought I would die here, though perhaps not quite so soon.”
“You don’t have to look to the end, Master Liu.”
“Not yet, but there are times when I feel that my days are numbered. I suppose that Benji the Elder knew the same thing. I can almost hear it on the wind, feel it on the snow, and even within the trembling of the avalanches. It all whispers to me, telling me that time has started to run out for me.”
“So you do have a Porapeth ability.”
“Not quite like the rest, but enough that I understand. And now I want you to do the same. You have to look and see why things have started to change. You have to learn what your brother intends, but more than that, you have to understand whom he serves.”
She started. “There was a time, when he was searching for the power of the Toral, when I would have thought that he had been chasing a Sul’toral, but now I don’t know. I have started to wonder if he serves anyone.”
“Everyone serves someone,” he said.
“Even the Porapeth?”
Master Liu’s brow furrowed, and he looked out. “Once, I would have told you no. Now I don’t know. What if they do? We know the Sul’toral chase another power, and that in doing so, it has strengthened them, given them access to sorcery that they should not otherwise have, but I can’t say with any certainty about the Porapeth.”
“Not all of the Sul’toral are sorcerers,” she said.
“Your brother would be the first in a long time. I don’t know the Sul’toral, and so I can’t speak of the kind of power that they possess or that they are chasing, but I can tell you that there has long been stability. It makes me wonder why things have begun to change, and why such stability has started to shift.”
The wind began to swirl again, picking up. Imogen turned, looking out and listening, trying to feel for anything that might be there, but she did not hear or detect anything more on it. She tried to find the lines of power that were hidden on the wind, knowing that there had to be some sense of the possibilities that were there, but as she focused on it, she did not pick up anything.
Benji still had to be there. She believed that he was, but she could not feel him, despite knowing that he was out there.
“I wonder if perhaps you can be the one to look for Timo,” Imogen said, looking over at Master Liu. “I need to protect my people. That means that I don’t necessarily have the time to do anything more. I can’t chase down the Sul’toral.” Which meant that she also couldn’t chase down Timo. There was a part of her that actually felt good about that. She didn’t want to hunt her brother, though she knew that somebody would have to. “He might respond to you in ways that he has not to me.”
Master Liu leaned forward, taking a deep breath, and he tipped his head, once again looking as if he was listening to something on the wind. “I believe your brother is beyond reach, unfortunately. But your brother might be the key to finding an answer that has eluded me and what I can see. Perhaps he would provide an answer that even Benji the Elder could not see.”
“Which is what?”
“Which is who is responsible for this attack.”
There had been a time when Imogen had thought that the culprit was Abigail the Lost, but she no longer did. Abigail wanted… Imogen wasn’t entirely sure what Abigail wanted. She had only learned that she feared death. But Abigail had not been responsible for all of it.
At least, she had not been responsible for what had happened recently.
“What about you?” Imogen asked.
“Unfortunately, what I’ve seen is that I cannot be a part of what is to come. I am a part of what has been. That doesn’t mean that I can’t help, though.” He smiled, and he motioned for her to follow. “Let us sit by a fire. Let us talk. And then we will need to go our separate ways, Imogen Inaratha.”
“The people need you, Master Liu. They need the sacred sword master.”
He smiled. “Then it is a good thing they have one.”
Chapter Four
The snow swirled around them more heavily. They had stopped again to start another fire as the chill in the air had become too much for Master Liu. Now the fire crackling before them had started to sputter, the energy of the wind, the cold in the air, threatening to put it out. Eventually, the fire would fade, and they would have to leave the mountainside. Not before Imogen had answers, though. She was determined to get those answers.
A strange trembling began to build.
Master Liu looked behind him, his eyes staring, going a little distant.
She recognized that. It was the look Benji had often carried when he had stared off into the distance, trying to see secrets that had been there. What did he see now?
Imogen got to her feet, closing her eyes, focusing on the sacred patterns she might be able to find. Tree Stands in the Forest, and she focused on the sacred pattern that Benji had demonstrated, using that to try to find something more that might show her secrets that were out there, the possibilities that existed, and she saw leaves fluttering, branches that twisted, and possibilities. But she didn’t know how to chase those possibilities.
“How do I use this power?” she asked, looking over at Master Liu.
He had gotten to his feet as well, and he stood with his back to her, staring up the mountainside. “Unfortunately, Master Inaratha, we will not have an opportunity to discuss that. It seems that I must go.”
“You must go?”
The trembling came again, and Imogen frowned, and she focused on what was there.
He nodded. “There’s… something. I’m not sure what it is, but I must go and see if there are others like me who survived. We are the past, but we may impact the present—and the future. Now, if you don’t mind, I will take your blade.”
She held on to the slender blade that he had given her and felt a pang of regret that she was already going to have to give it back. But it was his, wasn’t it? He had only given it to her, so there was no reason that he couldn’t take it back.
She started to hand it to him, and he shook his head. “No. That is now your blade. I am talking about the other one.”
She unsheathed the blade given to her when she had become a First, holding it tightly. The hilt was familiar in her hand, and it had conformed over the years to her grip, so that she felt so comfortable holding it. The notches blazed in the daylight, but now they felt almost meaningless.
“Why?” she asked him.
“Because this is what I must do.”
“What’s out there?”
“You need to defend the people,” he said. “I have been watching you for a long time, Imogen. I have been watching for you to progress, and I have hoped that you would find a way to follow the path I saw as a possibility.”
“Benji was never able to see a path for me. Why can you?”
“I’m not sure,” he said. “But the path is there. I can see it. I’ve always been able to see it. When you first came to me in the temple, I was able to see your potential. And that is why I pushed you the way I did. That is why you were guided the way that you were. We knew that you had that potential within you. You had to find it, embrace it, and accept your fate.”
“I’m not sure that’s true,” she said.
The ground trembled again. Imogen looked up, and she tried to focus, thinking about the way that she could use the same power that Master Liu did, wondering whether or not there would be anything that she might be able to do to help her see anything. She tried to focus on the sacred patterns she had under her command, but even as she did, there was nothing for her. Nothing other than a hint of possibilities. And within those possibilities, she saw several different branches beginning to fade, withering, as if they were dying off.
Whatever was out there was dangerous.
Was it dangerous to her, though?
Imogen wished that she had a way of controlling her ability to look into that distance, into the future, and see the possibilities, but she didn’t understand it well enough. Not nearly well enough. And as she focused on what was out there and what she could see, the trembling came again. Each time that it came, more of the branches began to wither, began to fade.
