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I would find another way. I had to. If she wanted this, we would find a way.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Kya
Normally, it would have taken Nikan and I two days to get to the city of Narh in Torx, but part of that journey required us to cross the Ahwey Lake. I hated water. Especially after my encounter with the Nagasai in the river during the Trial. And even though it would add additional days to travel around it, I refused to cross it.
Nikan knew this and tried to convince me that I should confront my fear to get to Narh faster. But this wasn’t something that I would budge on. Unless it was my bath, I began avoiding the element at all costs. Even then, I wouldn’t fully submerge myself.
Between his grumbling, he told me his recent assignment of working with the Sages and Scholars and traveling to Oryn. I tried to listen, but half of the time my mind was elsewhere. There was too much to think about. Too much to process. And I was getting increasingly irritable. I wanted to go back. I thought perhaps I was simply just tired and I needed a long rest, but it felt different. It was something I didn’t know how to explain. It felt like when Odarum called to me through our minds, yet different.
I had reached out through that light inside me and tried to talk to him but he remained silent. I tried not to worry about it. He said that he would find me when he returned. And I wasn’t sure if this was normal of him to just up and disappear like this for days on end. I assumed it was but it still bothered me that he wasn’t around like he had assured me he would be.
Nikan and I talked about what gifts I could have. I wished that I could have had some sort of guidance on how to even approach it. I tried everything to manifest my magic, but I didn’t understand how it worked. It wasn’t like my terbis where it came naturally. Other than bed-sinking-pranks, I had very little manipulation abilities, and I had to use an extreme amount of concentration and exert myself in order to do it. Moving and shaping…wasn’t my greatest strength.
I would have liked to have had something tangible and useful to others rather than just myself. That’s what the purpose of the magic was, right? So that I could have used it to protect a Nation.
I knew of no one alive that had honed the ability to feel vibrations through the ground. Though there had been records of past wielders having such abilities, none were alive that we knew of—besides me. Without a master to teach me, I had to teach myself. Over the years, Nikan and I would train with what little manipulation abilities I did possess. I could never do anything more than a novice, and people seemed to think that I was just cursed with weak abilities. But I never saw it that way.
Nikan and I had stopped for the night on the eastern side of the Nahale Forest just before dusk. As we unsaddled our horses, I told him of my concerns about manifesting my new magic. He knew nothing of the topic but offered to help.
“Let’s start with the basics of manipulation to see if you can access it that way and we can go from there,” Nikan said after leaving our horses under the shade of the trees. “Manipulation isdifferent from sensation. Both take great amounts of concentration, but I’m guessing that it’s a different form of concentration. How do you hone into the vibrations?”
I thought for a moment, thinking of how to explain it. “I don’t know honestly. I just do. I can feel a vibration and focus to make the sensation more intense, so that’s what my main focus is on, while dulling other sensations if needed. It just comes naturally to me.” I shrugged.
“Manipulation is definitely different. It takes full, uninterrupted concentration. At first. The more you practice, the easier it comes and eventually becomes second nature. Like wielding weapons, with time, it feels like it’s a part of you,” he said.
At that, I took my dagger from my thigh and threw it as it spun end over end until it embedded itself into the tree, narrowly missing the top of Nikan’s head. It was second nature to me. I barely had to think about it anymore.
“Exactly.” He smiled.
Nikan was the one to train Malina and me with both our weapons and our wielding. He would push us harder and harder, no matter how skilled we were. And after years of training, finally mastering our particular abilities, we would all push each other. Even though Nikan and Malina didn’t need the training for the Trial, they needed to be able to protect themselves, myself, and each other. Without having the people of a Nation, we only had one another to rely on.
“Try to feel for it, whatever it is, and concentrate on that. Does anything seem different for you since you were deemed Worthy?” he asked.
“Sort of. I can feel…something. But I can’t quite grasp that feeling. I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Good. Just try to center yourself with that feeling, even if you can’t grasp it yet. I don’t know how magic from the Gods works exactly, but it’s a start,” he said.
I nodded as I took a deep breath in and slowly let it out, feeling for the wispy lights inside me. But after a few hours and multiple attempts, nothing happened.
“Don’t worry about it. You’ll get there. All the Worthy do eventually. There’s a reason they wait for their magic to manifest before being sworn in as Lord or Lady,” he said with an encouraging smile.
“That’swhy they wait?” I asked.
“Well yeah. They can’t exactly protect and rule over their Nation much without it.”
“So…who rules until then?” I sat down by our packs, resting my forearms on my knees.
“Technically they still rule, but the Nations are vulnerable until then at least.” He sat down beside me. “That’s why, even in times of peace, their forces remain active. Especially when they get a new Worthy.”
“Because if their Worthy dies, their Nation is susceptible to being overthrown by another.”
“Precisely. Unless they get a new ruler.”
“One voted in like Atara,” I added.
Nik nodded. His eyes went distant, staring at the grass.
