She’d been wrong about him. She was almost certain of that now. She had to stop judging people. But was that possible? Wasn’t interaction based, in part, on judgments? A person’s background and attitudes influenced how she responded to them.
The answer, then, wasn’t to stop judging. It was to hold those judgments as mutable. She’d judged Denth to be a friend, but she shouldn’t have ignored the way he talked about mercenaries having no friends.
The door slammed open. Vivenna jumped, putting a hand to her chest.
Vasher walked in. “Start reaching for that sword when you’re startled,” he said. “There’s little reason to grab your shirt, unless you’re planning to rip it off.”
Vivenna flushed, hair twinging red. The sword he had bought her lay on the side of the room; they hadn’t had much opportunity to practice, and she still barely even knew how to hold the thing properly. “Well?” she asked as he closed the door. It was already dark outside, and the city was beginning to sparkle with lights.
“The robbery was a cover,” Vasher said. “The real hit was that carriage. Denth promised the thieves something valuable if they committed a robbery and started a fire, both as distractions to get at the carriage.”
“Why?” Vivenna asked.
“I’m not sure.”
“Coins?” Vivenna asked. “When Tonk Fah hit the horse, it knocked a chest off the top. It was filled with gold.”
“What happened then?” Vasher asked.
“I left with some others. I thought the carriage itself was the distraction, and once it went down, I was supposed to pull out.”
“Denth?”
“He wasn’t there, come to think of it,” Vivenna said. “The others told me he was working with the thieves.”
Vasher nodded, walking over to his pack. He threw aside the bedrolls then took out several articles of clothing. He pulled off his shirt, exposing a well-muscled—and rather hairy—torso. Vivenna blinked in surprise, then blushed. She probably should have turned aside, but the curious part of her was too strong. What was he doing?
He didn’t remove his trousers, thankfully, but instead threw on a different shirt. The sleeves of this one were cut into long ribbons near the wrists.
“Upon call,” he said, “become my fingers and grip that which I must.”
The cuff tassels wiggled.
“Wait,” Vivenna said. “What was that? A Command?”
“Too complicated for you,” he said, kneeling and undoing the cuff of his trousers. She could see that here, too, there were extra lengths of cloth. “Become as my legs and give them strength,” he Commanded.
The leg-tassels crossed under his feet, growing tight. Vivenna didn’t argue with his insistence that the Commands were “too complicated.” She just memorized them anyway.
Finally, Vasher threw on his tattered cloak, which was ripped in places. “Protect me,” he Commanded, and she could see a lot of his remaining Breath drain into the cloak. He wrapped his rope belt around his waist—it was thin, for a rope, but strong, and she knew its purpose was not to keep his trousers up.
Finally, he picked up Nightblood. “You coming?”
“Where?”
“We’re going to go capture a few of those thieves. Ask them exactly what Denth wanted with that carriage.”
Vivenna felt a stab of fear. “Why invite me? Won’t I just make it harder for you?”
“Depends,” he said. “If we get into a fight, and you get in the way, then it will be more difficult. If we get into a fight and half of them attack you instead of me, it will make things easier.”
“Assuming you don’t defend me.”
“That’s a good assumption,” he said, looking into her eyes. “If you want to come, come. But don’t expect me to protect you, and—whatever you do—don’t try and follow on your own.”
“I wouldn’t do such a thing,” she said.
He shrugged. “I thought I’d make the offer. You’re no prisoner here, Princess. You can do whatever you want. Just don’t get in my way when you do it, understand?”
“I understand,” she said, feeling a chill as she made her decision. “And I’m coming.”
He didn’t try to dissuade her. He simply pointed at her sword. “Keep that on.”
She nodded, tying it on.
“Draw it,” he said.
She did so, and he corrected her grip.
“What good will holding it properly do?” she asked. “I still don’t know how to use it.”
“Look threatening and it might make someone attacking you pause. Make them hesitate for a couple seconds in a fight, and that could mean a lot.”
She nodded nervously, sliding the weapon back in its sheath. Then she grabbed several lengths of rope. “Hold when thrown,” she said to the smaller one, then stuffed it into her pocket.
Vasher eyed her.
“Better to lose the Breath than get killed,” she said.
“Few Awakeners agree with you,” he noted. “To most of them, the thought of losing Breath is far more frightening than the prospect of death.”
“Well, I’m not like most Awakeners,” she said. “Half of me still finds the process blasphemous.”
He nodded. “Put the rest of your Breath somewhere else,” he said, opening the door. “We can’t afford to draw attention.”
She grimaced, then did as told, putting her Breath into her shirt with a basic, and non-active, Command. It was actually the same as giving a half-spoken Command, or one that was mumbled. Those would draw out the Breath, but leave the item unable to act.
As soon as she placed the Breath, the dullness returned. Everything seemed dead around her.
“Let’s go,” Vasher said, moving out into the darkness.
Night in T’Telir was very different from her homeland. There, it had been possible to see so many stars overhead that it looked like a bucket of white sand had been dashed into the air. Here, there were street lamps, taverns, restaurants, and houses of entertainment. The result was a city full of lights—a little like the stars themselves had come down to inspect grand T’Telir. And yet, Vivenna was still saddened by how few real stars she saw in the sky.
None of that meant that the places they were going were by any means bright. Vasher led her through the streets, and he quickly became little more than a hulking shadow. They left behind places with street lights, and even lit windows, moving into an unfamiliar slum. This was one of those she’d been afraid to enter, even when she lived on the streets. The night seemed to grow even darker as they entered and walked down one of the twisting, dark alleys that passed for streets in such places. They remained silent. Vivenna knew not to speak and draw attention.
Eventually, Vasher pulled to a stop. He pointed toward a building: single-story, flat-topped, and wide. It sat alone, in a depression, shanties built from refuse covering the low hill behind it. Vasher waved for her to stay back, then quietly put the rest of his Breath into his rope and crept forward up the hill.
Vivenna waited, nervous, kneeling beside a decaying shanty that appeared to have been built from half-crumbling bricks. Why did I come? she thought. He didn’t tell me to—he simply said that I could. I could just as easily have stayed behind.
But she was tired of things happening to her. She had been the one to point out that maybe there was a connection between the priest and Denth’s plan. She wanted to see this to the end. Do something.
That had been easy to think back in the lit room. It didn’t help her nerves that, looming to the left side of the shanty was one of the D’Denir statues. There had been some of them in the Highland slums as well, though most of those had been defaced or broken.
She couldn’t feel anything with her life sense. She felt almost as if she’d been blinded. The Breath’s absence brought memories of nights sleeping in the mud of a cold alleyway. Beatings administered by urchins half her size but with twice her competence. Hunger. Terrible, omnipresent, depressing, and draining hunger.
A footstep cracked and a shadow loomed. She nearly gasped in shock, but managed to keep it in as she recognized Nightblood in the figure’s hand.
“Two guards,” Vasher said. “Both silenced.”
“Will they do for answering our questions?”
Vasher shook a silhouetted head. “Practically kids. We need someone more important. We’ll have to go in. Either that, or sit and watch for a few days to determine who is in charge, then grab him when he’s alone.”
“That would take too long,” Vivenna whispered.
“I agree,” he said. “I can’t use the sword, though. When Nightblood is done with a group, there’s never anyone to question.”
Vivenna shivered.
“Come on,” he whispered. She followed as quietly as she could, moving for the front door. Vasher grabbed her arm and shook his head. She followed him around to the side, barely noticing the two lumps of unconscious bodies rolled into a ditch. At the back of the building, Vasher began to feel around on the ground. After a few moments without success, he cursed quietly and pulled something from his pocket. A handful of straw.
In just a few seconds, he had constructed three little men from the straw and some thread, then used Breath reclaimed from his cloak to animate them. He gave each one the same command: “Find tunnels.”
Vivenna watched with fascination. That’s far more abstract a Command than he led me to believe was possible, she thought as the little men scuttled around on the ground. Vasher himself returned to his searching. Apparently experience—and ability to use mental images—is the most important aspect of Awakening.
He’s been doing this a long time, and the way he spoke before—like a scholar—indicates he’s studied Awakening very seriously.
One of the straw men began to jump up and down. The other two rushed over to it and then they began to bounce as well. Vasher joined them, as did Vivenna, and she watched as he uncovered a trapdoor hidden beneath a thick layer of dirt. He raised it a tad, then reached underneath. His hand came back out with several small bells, which had apparently been rigged there to ring if the door were opened all the way.
“No group like this has a hideout without bolt-holes,” Vasher said. “Usually a couple of them. Always trapped.”
Vivenna watched as he recovered the Breath from the straw men, quietly thanking each one. She frowned at the curious words. They were just piles of straw. Why thank them?
He put the Breath back into his cloak with a protection Command, then led the way down through the trapdoor. Vivenna followed, stepping softly, skipping a particular step when Vasher indicated. The bottom was a roughly cut tunnel—or, so she got from feeling along the sides of the lightless earthen chamber.
Vasher moved forward; she could only tell because of the quiet rustling of his clothing. She followed and was curious to see light ahead. She could also hear voices. Men talking, and laughing.
Soon she could see Vasher’s silhouette; she moved up next to him, peeking out of their tunnel and into an earthen room. There was a fire burning at the center, the smoke twisting up through a hole in the ceiling. The upper chamber—the building itself—was probably just a front, for the chamber down here looked very lived-in. There were piles of cloth, bed rolls, pots and pans. All of it as dirty as the men who sat around the fire, laughing.
