3: When To Fly

My room is my refuge. It’s hardly bigger than my bunk, just one in a long row of stone cells, but it’s all mine. A water trough babbles along one side, a shelf on the other holds my books and robes, and sandwiched between is my bed and about enough space to turn around in.

It’s glorious.

I stretch out after washing, letting the cool night air blow in through my round window, fingers dangling in the trough. The temple makes its usual evening sounds in the water, comforting even if most of the people here despise me. It is the sound of home. Seers hold counseling sessions with supplicants from the city, overseers discuss news and legal cases, and senior monks drone sunset chants from the altars on the cliff. Tonight, much of it revolves around the upcoming wedding—Nerimes is marrying a Seilam Deul woman, forging an alliance between Serei and the technocrats from the mountains to the north. As usual, discussions are weighted with innuendo and hidden agendas—that’s usual since they killed my dad, anyway. The temple didn’t use to be this political. It used to be about maintaining justice, and guiding citizens, and defending the city. Now it’s all about who’s in power, and who wants to get there. I hate it, but I have to keep my ears open in case any of it spells danger for me. I haven’t forgotten Urte’s warning, to be careful while he’s gone.

I hear nothing unusual. One by one the voices drift into sleep, thoughts blurring like a sand painting in the tide. My mind doesn’t want to stop working over the events of the day, but eventually I drift, too.

Something startles me a while later—I can’t tell how long, but the stars have moved in the sky. My fingers are still in the water—I’ve learned to monitor the temple even while I sleep.

There—it comes again. A bird chirp, but in the water. I frown. That’s a very strange thought, especially at this time of night. Most of the minds in the water are asleep, thoughts fuzzed, though there’s some activity near the Deepling Pool downstream.

Then I hear a voice, clear and steady: There are three forms of water: ice, liquid, and steam. Our power lies in knowing when to freeze, when to flow, and when to fly. It’s distant, coming from far upstream, but I recognize the voice. It’s Urte, reciting one of the basic proverbs of Ujeism.

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The chirps come again. Like a little bird. His nickname for me.

I sit up, and the words repeat: There are three forms of water: ice, liquid, and steam. Our power lies in knowing when to freeze, when to flow, and when to fly.

To fly.

I start up, pulling on my robe, grabbing my staff. There’s some kind of trouble—whatever he was warning me to watch for. Maybe Melden or Erjuna, or a whole pack of them, come to take revenge. It doesn’t matter. My gut says run.

The window is too small to fit through, but I can slip out the front. My waterblind is perfect, even now—there’ll be no way to hear me. I’ll climb on the temple roof and wait till morning—

The door slams open, sandwiching me against the wall. I shove back, but whoever’s on the other side is too strong. Fear strikes hard and I take a deep breath, icing it with concentration. Time for that later.

I slip from behind the door onto the bed, dropping into Sleeting Rain stance. It’s like I thought—Erjuna’s in front, four or five students behind him, mostly from his House. Melden’s there too, the prick.

Erjuna attacks and I feint left, jabbing my staff forward into his throat. Without water connecting us, I can’t read his thoughts ahead of time, but I hardly need to. Erjuna stumbles back, choking, and a bigger one pushes in. They’re wearing boots. Oiled leather boots, impervious to watersight.

And banned in the temple. Where did they get them?

Fear twists in my gut. This is something more than a beating. Are they going to kill me? I ice the emotion again in steady breathing, setting this block of emotion next to the other, building a wall as we were trained to do. The big one lunges in, dropping his staff for fists. I jab my staff slow for his chest—he catches it, but that’s what I wanted. I swing around on the staff, scissor-kicking both legs into his forehead.

His head snaps back, but he doesn’t stop, arms reaching for me. I press back against the wall, feeling for the first time they may be too many for me. I’ve fought four at once, but that was with space, with the safety of Urte’s gaze on us. Now there’s nothing, but—

The water. Of course. I kick a foot for my trough just as Erjuna shouts something. If I can get my thoughts in the water, drop my blind and let the temple know what’s happening—

A staff jabs in, knocking my ankle away. Then big one has me by the leg, grinning, throwing me back onto the bed, away from the water. Floods. I fight, but the unhurt ones pile in, and panic starts to rise as their fists win out over my skill, their strength over my precision. I kick groins and clap ears and break Erjuna’s nose, but eventually they have me pinned.

Erjuna leans in, his voice nasal through the blood. “Should have taken a fall, sister.” He presses three fingers to my skull—Diver’s Bind. “Too late now.”