Kaavl Conspiracy (13 page)

The temptation to run
outside and practice kaavl nearly overwhelmed Methusal’s better sense. She wanted so badly to beat Behran. One final practice outdoors might make all the difference in winning the Game.

She hesitated, and thought fast. Could she do it without being found out? One risk was being spotted by the crop tenders. Could she escape the notice of Barak and the others on the crop plateau? She listened hard, but only heard three men digging near the Rolban River, near the intersection of the crop plateau and the cliff. Even if others were near the bluff’s edge, she might escape notice if she ran out on the plain and darted from bush to thick tagma bush to the kaavl plateau. The tallest of the bushes stretched one length high—a little taller than a large man.

Timaeus would be on duty for three more hours. She could practice for two hours, and be back before anyone was the wiser.

Finally, the cool voice of reason spoke. What if Petr found out? Or Kitran? She was already walking the fine line of expulsion from the Games.

But if she couldn’t practice fully, why play the Tri-Level Game at all? Clearly, she needed more practice. Behran had already proven twice that he could beat her.

The desire to go out overwhelmed her, and she closed her mind to the voice of reason. Mind made up, she glanced once more into the Great Hall and then darted into the bright sunshine. No one stopped her. The sun felt warm and delicious on her face, and she ran like the wind to the first tagma bush and ducked behind it.

No shouts. No cries of alarm.

She glanced back at the entrance, and also at the plateau above it where Barak and his helpers worked. No one was in sight. Now was her chance. She sprinted from bush to bush until she reached the far plateau, and then slipped to the far, southern side.

Still, silence reigned. No one blew the warning horn. She had escaped!

Methusal sprinted to the short distance to the top of the narrow, lonely plateau. It was a hill with the top chopped off, plunked down in the middle of the plain. It was also the starting plateau for the Kaavl Games, and her personal, favorite place to practice kaavl.

Cool wind caressed her cheek as she took the final steps to the top. Not another soul was in sight, and a scraggly bush hid her from view from Rolban. Sprigs of hearty vegetation spread their thin, pointed leaves toward the sky, drinking in the sun’s warm rays.

Her worn moccasins pressed lightly into the tan, gritty soil. A new hole was forming in one. She’d mended both moccasins so often that the soles now consisted of overlapping, worn patches. Soon she’d need a new pair, but hopefully these would last for a good while longer, since skins were in short supply, thanks to the thefts.

She crossed to the eastern side of the plateau and glanced down the steep, rocky face. Tomorrow the Kaavl Games would start—right here.

Her gaze lifted and swept across the network of tough, scraggly bushes that dotted the plain until it collided with the black bluffs to the east, which were a good twenty minutes away running time. This was the playing field, and within it rested her future.

She sat cross-legged on the uneven earth and made sure the scraggly plant hid her from the view of the Rolbani crop tenders. She opened the parchment Kitran had given her yesterday. He’d written two instructions. The first was: “Heighten sensory awareness.” The key senses of kaavl were vision and hearing.

The second instruction read: “Heighten awareness of others in relation to yourself.” “Others” referred not only to people, but to any tangible object. Awareness also included the ability to measure distances between herself and another object.

Methusal concentrated and gazed across the plain. Below, about ten lengths away, squatted a small apte beast. Its fur was short and dusty brown in color, and easily blended into its surroundings. Its arms and legs were mere stubs—barely longer than her little finger—and tiny striped ears bristled from its round, furry head.

It was time to practice her newest kaavl skill.

Concentrating still harder, Methusal
carried
—mentally calculated the distance to the apte, and then projected her hearing and fanned out in an area surrounding the apte. It was almost as if she stood in the very place the apte crouched, and heard everything the apte heard. She could not carry with vision, so she concentrated, hoping to break through on that front as well. Few people over the centuries had ever been able to carry with one—let alone both. Only the Old Kaavl Master, Mahre, had accomplished this.

Rustlings in the stubbly, straw-like vegetation to the east caught her attention, and her eyes strained to see what her ears recognized as coming. It was a low, fast wriggling whip beast.

The apte saw the whip beast the same instant Methusal did, and hopped rapidly, as if its short legs were made of springs, into a nearby bush and disappeared neatly from sight.

Silence.

The long, thick whip beast couldn’t tell where the apte had gone, and neither could Methusal. A victim of a short attention span, the whip writhed away to search for fresh prey.

But where was the apte?

Suddenly she saw it, and Methusal almost lost her concentration by laughing out loud. The round little beast was perched high in the bush. Now, how had it climbed up there? Maybe it had hopped up and become stuck? No. Even as she watched, the small creature dropped to the desert floor and rapidly hopped away—in the opposite direction from the whip beast.

The sun sank lower in the sky as Methusal practiced. She also concentrated on the less important senses—smell and touch. Already her nose could discern smells and pinpoint their origin by taking into consideration three things: the direction and strength of the breeze, coupled with the intensity of the fragrance. That required a lot of concentration, however.

The sun hovered a finger’s width above the far, western mountains when she finally felt ready for the last step of today’s practice. Only an hour of daylight remained. She’d need to make the most of each minute. Right now she needed to exercise her body and four senses to the fullest, so she could win the upcoming game. And she’d practice close and long-range kaavl awareness at the same time.

Methusal scrambled lightly down the rocky hillside, concentrating fully on each footstep and becoming sharply aware of the placement and texture of each surface she trod. At the same time, she fanned out her hearing range, trying to capture sounds near and far simultaneously, and to determine their distances from her, too.

The moment her foot touched the plain, she began to run, breathing lightly, moving effortlessly, toward the distant bluffs. Tuning each of her senses keenly into her environment, she felt sharply aware of each twig or stone she stepped on, and the placement of every bush, rock and small boulder she approached and passed. Her ears strained, catching the movement of an apte beast sixty lengths away, and then hearing the whistle of the wind sighing through a cluster of bushes twenty lengths to her right. She worked hard at trying to assimilate stimuli from three different locations at once.

It strained her concentration to the limit, to constantly receive and decipher simultaneous sources of input. Capturing three different sources at once only happened twice on her run to the bluffs, and she felt pleased with that. As hard as she tried, though, she knew there were still a lot of things she missed. But she felt confident that she’d detected the most important details.

She approached the base of the far cliffs. The sound of rushing water filled her ears now. The Rolban River. Really, at this point, it was little more than a stream, because it was only a length across right here. High on the crop plateau, it watered Rolban’s crops, and provided all the water for Rolban’s needs. It began as a rushing waterfall high in the Rolban Mountains, and gathered into a deep blue lake a half day’s hike from Rolban. The river flowed from the lake, following the contours of the Rolban Mountains until it flowed down next to the crop plateau, and then cascaded in a waterfall downhill, and then rushed out into this stream that followed the bluffs south.

Methusal scanned the stepping stones across the stream. Dry and safe. The water level was lower now than she’d ever seen it before. Hopefully next winter would bring more rain. She sprinted across, and then stopped and gazed up the cliff face. She took note of the dark shadow in the bluff above. It might provide her with the winning edge in the kaavl game. It was a cave—a unique one—and hopefully an advantage Behran knew nothing about. She retraced her steps and headed back.
Her breathing was still even, steady, and silent—t
he result of long years of regular running. Panting would give away her position to her competitors in the Tri-Level Game.

Reaching the plateau again, Methusal glanced at the descending sun. Her best time yet. Soon it would be time to return home.

Her sharpened kaavl senses suddenly detected the “whoosh” of flying beast wings, and she turned north. Her heart accelerated. The dark flying beast was flying straight for her!

She stiffened. Flying beasts avoided humans…so why would this one attack her? It banked, and circled in low, lazy spirals over her head.

Could it be?
With a smile, Methusal pursed her lips and emitted three high, sharp chirps

The flying beast continued to circle, but it flew lower now. Methusal drew in a breath to whistle again.

Three sharp chirps sounded from behind her. Startled, she spun. A tall, blond-haired giant of a man had gained her plateau, and now strode toward her. Uneasiness jolted
through her. She carried no weapon. He was stranger—a rarity
in Rolban—and he carried himself with sure confidence.

Either her concentration had slipped just now, or the man was very, very good at kaavl. Her unease deepened as he neared. Swiftly, she scanned the newcomer.

The man looked to be almost thirty, and he thankfully stopped two lengths away. He was powerfully built, with lean, sleek muscles, and he wore bleached leather clothing. The wind kicked up the edges of his short, white-blond hair, and his high, wide cheekbones emphasized the angular planes of his face. He was good looking, if one liked harsh, unusual features. His nose was straight, with a small hump in the upper quarter. Perhaps once broken and never properly reset. He exuded an overwhelming sense of power and purpose—far more than any man she’d ever met before.

His eyes…Methusal’s appraisal stopped short, and for a second she froze.

She’d never seen such a pale blue before. They were the freezing, pale blue of a glacier. A shivered started, deep in her soul. A warning. She wasn’t empathic like her mother
and sister, but something told her this man would be a danger
to her.

She struggled to ignore the illogical feeling. The stranger’s face gave no clue to his thoughts. His disturbing eyes assessed her; as though she were being sized up, and perhaps assigned a threat level.

A rush of wings, low and close behind her, broke into her unsettled thoughts. The blue-black flying beast glided in and settled on the stranger’s shoulder. Its bright eyes darted, and its feet shuffled, as if realizing it had come to the wrong person.

Feeling protective, Methusal chirped twice, sharp and fast. At once, the beast opened its wings wide—an impressive length from wing tip to wing tip—and swooped to Methusal’s offered forearm. Sharp claws pierced her leather tunic. The beast felt heavy on her arm.

“A pet?” A harsh note grated through the stranger’s words.

Was he sneering at her? Methusal couldn’t tell. She couldn’t read the stranger at all, and it made her feel uneasy.

“Beasts are happier free.” She examined the wing with light, delicate fingers. The last chips of clay had worn off, and the wing appeared strong.

“It was injured.” Strange, how he didn’t ask it as a question. As if he was supremely confident in his powers of observation and deduction.

“Yes,” she admitted. “But it’s fine now.” She stroked the beast’s smooth, glossy head. It stared at her with unblinking black eyes, and lifted its beak to the wind.

“I found one as a boy.” The stranger spoke in a curious, grating voice that smoothed out as he talked. “Its leg was broken.”

“Did you help it?”

His light eyes narrowed, as if displeased by her question. “As much as I could. It was killed soon after.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It is the way of nature, for the weak to fall prey to the strong.”

“But those with the greatest strength will show mercy,” she returned.

“So you know the writings of the great Kaavl Master.”

“Mahre came from Rolban. We know all of his ways. At least, all we can from his writings that remain.” She didn’t mention that she was his descendant.

He smiled, but it didn’t reach his chilly blue eyes. “You refer to the elusive
Second Book of Kaavl
. Rolban, then, has not found it?”

“How could we? The Dehriens took it during the Great War.”

“Ah, yes. My ancestors.”

Methusal’s curiosity sharpened, and so did her hearing, because she heard footsteps climbing the plateau now. “You’re a Dehrien?”

His small smile seemed to mock her ignorance. “I am Mentàll Solboshn, Chief of Dehre.”

She swallowed in surprise. “I see.” Methusal took note of his small entourage of three that had just crested the plateau. “Then you’ll want to see my uncle, Petr Storst.”

“Yes.” A small pause elapsed. “Doubtless I will see you again.”

“Doubtless.”

The pale eyes cooled to ice. Shadows cast by the swiftly setting sun cut his angular face into predatory planes, and Methusal felt another frisson of fear. Who was this Dehrien Chief? He’d been polite, but only just. Perhaps her parents were right not to trust the Dehriens. Maybe she’d be wise to give him wide berth. She watched him stride down the hill, in the direction of Rolban.

The sun was setting. Only a few minutes remained to practice kaavl. The Dehrien Chief might tell Petr that he’d seen her on the plateau. Although he didn’t know her name, a description would provide Petr with her identity.