Binarius (22 page)

“
All right, well we’ll give
Kaolin’s head a rest and work on some fabrication. This can be
useful for many things, but mostly you will need to use it at the
end of all of this.” She waved her hand in the air as to indicate
that all of this was somewhere in the room with them and could be
seen. “It is imperative that you learn how to do this or there
won’t be a point in continuing your training. Do you
understand?”

They were both serious now. Lazata
didn’t need to explain to them what they needed to do; the
Epiphanous had already shown them. This was the last thing they
would do once everything else had been done. This was the end
before the beginning. They needed to combine both of their spectral
gifts.

Firinne lightheartedly begged
Kaolin not to shock her as they touched their hands together in the
empty space in front of them. They would work from the floor up,
and with their eyes open.

They were now four inches from the
floor and the electrolifi was entwining itself into the fractals of
the Quartz — pulsing and striking. Farther up they went; a foot
now. Firinne’s hands began to shake. In the background she could
hear Lazata encouraging her to keep going.
Breathe
, she told herself. They were
at the point now and it was over. They pulled their hands apart.
Standing between them, about four feet high, was an
electrolifi-krystallis. Kaolin was smiling at her, and she smiled
back.

The crazy old lady was standing
away from them, rocking on her toes like she was a five-year-old.
“I don’t think even the Clandestines themselves knew how incredible
you two would be!”

It was all so very incredible but
would it be just as incredible once they were out there doing it?
Would they be able to handle it? Firinne wasn’t so sure, and she
had a feeling that it wouldn’t be as easy as sitting in a cozy room
with a bowl of incense. She resolved that she would talk to Kaolin
later and insist that they practice every night before bed, just in
case.

The next day, while they were
eating before training, Lazata explained to them that the last door
was specifically for Kaolin.

“
Why just me?” he
asked.

“
Because the Leviticus child died
during the Ascension. There were supposed to be three of you to
carry out the last task.”

“
I wondered about that,” Firinne
mumbled.

“
Kaolin, have you ever tried to
move anything with your electrolifi?”

“
That’d be a, no.”

“
Well, today you will have to try.
In the last room are objects ranging in different weights and
sizes. You will need to practice all day today to try to move the
lightest to the heaviest.”

Kaolin looked nervous.

“
So what will I do today?” Firinne
asked.

“
I want you back in the combat
room. Keep training with your bow, but I want you to take your
sword in there as well, and freshen up your skills
today.”

“
All right.”

They parted ways and Firinne gave
Kaolin a reassuring smile;
you can do
it.

The day dragged on and Firinne was
having problems putting much effort into her training because she
was so worried about Kaolin. He was younger than she; Lazata or the
Clandestines or the world was putting too much on him. She knew
that he was strong, stronger than most kids his age, but it sure
seemed like a lot. They didn’t have a choice though, and she
continued to remind herself of that. So whatever happened today in
that room, good or bad, she would do everything in her power to
support him in any way that she could.

After one of the longest days she
had had in a while — the ones that just drag on and on forever;
endlessly; it was time for evening’s feast. She sat down next to
the fire as Lazata came out with bowls — soup again.

“
Where’s Kaolin?”

“
He’s still in there.” Lazata
said.

“
Should we wait for
him?”

Lazata shrugged. “Give him a bit.
If he hasn’t come out by the time we are done eating, you can go
and get him.”

Firinne had scraped the last
spoonful of broth. She set her bowl down, took his bowl in her
hands, and filled it with soup; still warm from the fire. About
five feet away from his door, she heard him yell and then heard a
crash. Firinne peeked her head through the door and saw that Kaolin
was on his knees — surrounded by a ruin of objects. His shoulders
were bobbing up and down.

“
Hey, little guy.”

He jumped a little and then wiped
his forearm across his face. “Hey.”

“
How’d it go today?”

“
How’s it look like it
went?”

“
That bad, huh?” She sat down next
to him on the floor. Everything around her was scorched, but the
stones beneath her were like ice.

“
Fir, this isn’t just some average
bad day. This is the future of everything we’re talking about. I
couldn’t lift anything! Not a damn thing! What am I gonna
do?!”

“Well, I don’t know what you are
going to do, but I’ll tell you what
we’re
going to do.” He was looking
at her now. “We are going to go to our cave, eat some soup, and get
some sleep. Tomorrow, I’m going to come in here with you and we are
going to figure this thing out. I promise.”

“
But what if we can’t!”

“
We don’t know that yet, so there
is no point in discussing it.”

“
But…”

“
C’mon, it’s my turn to get you
off that floor.”

As they walked by Lazata, Firinne
gave her a reassuring look.

Back in what was now their room,
Kaolin immediately scarfed down his bowl of soup while Firinne
crunched on some almonds. When they were finished, he looked at her
expectedly.

“
Yeah, I’ve got an idea.” She
said.

“
What’s that?”

“
Maybe all of this doesn’t have to
be just on you. Maybe if I can get in your head as you’re doing it—
well, I could transfer some of my spectralin to you so that you can
levitate the objects?”

Kaolin thought for a moment. “It’s
worth a try.”

“
You can’t give up yet. We haven’t
even started.”

“
I know. I’m just—

“
Trying to adjust yourself to the
idea of who you are destined to be, even though on some microcosmic
level, you’ve known all your life?”

Kaolin chuckled. “Yeah—
basically.”

“
Get some sleep, little
guy.”

“
Oi! Don’t call me that!” He
protested.

She loved bringing the boy in him
out; a small triumph between friends. “You’ll get used to it.” She
smiled at him before turning onto her side and falling
asleep.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-FIVE

Your Accelerating Weakness

Firinne
was standing in the corner of the room with her arms crossed, as
she observed Kaolin. After a while, she saw what had led to his
frustration during the previous day. No matter how hard he focused,
he wasn’t levitating anything. If anything, he was just
electrocuting all of the objects that were in the room. Each had
its own electric-birthmark, now. She couldn’t understand how Lazata
thought that he would be able to levitate objects with his
electrolifi. It didn’t make sense but she knew that regardless of
what made sense or what didn’t (because hardly anything made sense
anymore) that they had to try.

“
Stop Kaolin. This is
pointless.”

“
You think?” he said
sarcastically.

“
Let’s try my idea now.” She said
as she stepped behind him. She wasn’t sure how this would work. She
placed the palms of her hands on his shoulder blades.

“
If you start to feel anything
when I am doing this, I want you to try again. But only if you feel
something. Okay?”

He nodded.

Firinne closed her eyes and focused
on that place they had both traveled to, in order to speak to each
other. She knew that this time, Kaolin might not be there but that
was okay. She saw the lights, felt the pull, and grasped the
calm.

Here it goes…

“
Fir, I can hear you in
there.”

“
I guess we don’t need to try so
hard at this anymore. All right, I’m going to start now so when or
if you feel it, begin.”

Firinne couldn’t see that it had
worked, but it had. Kaolin had connected to the lightest weight,
and with his silver cord of electrolifi, it was rising into the air
almost effortlessly.

Out loud he said, “Firinne open
your eyes!”

As soon as she did, the object fell
with a pitiful clunk to the floor.

“
I guess we just have to make sure
we are together when the time comes to do this?” Firinne
said.

“
Yeah I guess so…we should ask
Lazata about it.”

According to Lazata, because of the
help that Firinne had given, Kaolin was able to connect to the
electrolifi that lives in all objects, and create such an intense
power, that the object momentarily became weightless. But for some
reason, he was not able to do it on his own. Over the next couple
of days, Kaolin was supposed to practice with Firinne, and by
himself. Either way, Lazata was confident that everything would
work out the way that it was supposed to or how the Clandestines
had foreseen it to. In addition to the leviticus practice, they
would continue their combat, weapon, and spectralin fabrication.
They had this last day left to train, and that scared the shit out
of them; playtime was over.

So they trained, they practiced,
they perfected, they pushed themselves to the limit every chance
they could, and when they hit the limit, they made themselves stay
there for five minutes longer; fleeting permanence.

By the end of it all, the
Epiphanous, The Clandestine Guardians, and Lazata had made them
into something worth reckoning and perhaps, something worth
believing in.

At evening’s feast (their last
one), Firinne had something that she wanted to discuss with
Lazata.

“
So how does the Aldithenih faith
play into all of this?”

“
What’s that?” Kaolin
asked.

Firinne had forgotten that Kaolin
had lived alone for so long and hadn’t ventured past the forest.
“It’s a type of belief system that came into existence just before
the Blacken arrived.”

“It’s not a belief system…it’s a
fallacy. As I’m sure you have postulated, Aldithenih was created by
the Blacken as a preemptive attack on Fia’s people. You see the
logic don’t you? Give the people a grand delusion that looks like
hope, and once they’ve latched onto it long enough, you reveal
yourself. It was masterful…because once the Blacken came, the
people were so sure it was sent by the faceless God, and it,
therefore, strengthened their misguided faith. Now that those
followers have seen some of the destruction that the Blacken has
caused, they waste their efforts justifying their faithfulness to
Aldithenih, rather than leaving it all behind, admitting they were
duped, and using their efforts to fight the Blacken. They’re in
complete denial, and mark my words,” She shook her crooked finger
at them, “they’ll stay there until they absolutely
cannot
any
longer.”

“
I completely agree with you. And
what’s worse is that the Aldithenih also obstructed the connection
the people had with Fia before the Blacken sent this illusion to
them. When I was at Archen — one of the most disturbing things I’ve
seen. All of the women were cloaked and everyone stared at me like
I was a savage.”

“
It’s oppressive. Don’t you ever
let anyone make you feel like you are a savage for having a close
relationship with Fia. It’s probably good that I will never travel
to Archen in these times…I probably would’ve been stoned-to-death
because I would have called them all traitors!”

Firinne smiled at that. “You know
my Uncle is one of them…I don’t know what’s gonna happen to him
after all this. I’m so angry at him because he made the Aldithenih
more important than family, but I don’t want him to get
hurt.”

“
There’s so much at stake here,
but we can only hope for the best. We have our own kind of
faith…the faith that we rest in The Ethereal Collective. Above and
beyond our capabilities, the rest is left to the collective.” She
leaned over and squeezed Firinne’s hand.

Kaolin broke the silence. “How
could people be so — so, dumb?”

The last evening’s feast with
Lazata was ended with hysterical laughter.

As they lay under the moist stones
of their cave-chamber, it became apparent that they were both
anxious for the day that followed. They had talked about it
briefly, planning out the details, a few times but all of a sudden
it was the eve of it. Firinne knew that the Blacken was expecting
them; it had been expecting them for a while. The only explanation
for taking Citrine was that somehow, along the decades, the Blacken
had been privy to the Clandestine’s wisdom. The Blacken tried to
capture Firinne before she could get to the mountains, and in the
process, the Blacken had actually accelerated all of it. It was
still so incomprehensible to them that something as powerful as the
Mist of Blacken could be afraid of them, but perhaps the bigger
point was that the Blacken was afraid, and it seemed only accurate
to say that if something has fear, then it also has
weakness.