Rajni Vedbhushan's page

The voice startled him. No one was supposed to be here. Least of all himself. He began to form his weapon.

"That won't help you here." the Old Man said. Rajni's weapon, now fully formed, teleported to the Old Man's hand, then promptly disappeared.

"How did you know I'd be here?" Rajni asked of the Old Man.

Ignoring the question, the Old Man replied, "How did you know you'd find what you were looking for?"

Rajni thought for a moment. "I didn't. I knew there was something worth knowing in here, so I came. It wasn't difficult to see that this text was more valuable than the others," he said, indicating the parchment, "What happens now?"

"That depends on you. Here you stand, in a nexus of secret truths. A warrior, but I see you have some understanding of what you have seen," he said, indicating Rajnis hands, around which shifting patterns were materializing.

Rajni looked with a start, wide-eyed. "What is this?"

"You've seen one small piece of the pattern that links everything, and everyone. There is more, much more, to be seen... by one who looks."

Rajni looked at the man. Skin like the sole of a boot, hair white like milk. Piercing eyes ringed by cracks reminiscent of the great salt flats. "I'd look for more."

"Good. When you come again, wear these," said the man, throwing him a bundle of robes.

"Who are you?" Rajni asked of the Old Man.

"Parashurama," came the reply, "I grow tired. Return tomorrow." With that, the man turned away, and simply disappeared.

Rajni looked at the robes, put them on, and walked out the front door and into the night air.

***********

Darkness.

In the practice arena, Rajni crouched in the long shadows punctuated by torchlight, intent on hearing any sign of Nagesh. Nagesh was the next-most skilled member of his class in the Monastery of Hungry Shadows. Nagesh hated Rajni for having bested him at their last duel. Nagesh had always had a superiority complex, bristling at every perceived slight as if he was too good for this place. Rajni, on the other hand, simply focused on his own training, which infuriated Nagesh even more.

"I see you, Raj," Nagesh's voice crooned, from everywhere and nowhere.

"Yet you keep your distance."

A sharp exhale in anger gave Nagesh away a second before the strike. a small blade whizzed past the blur where Rajni's head was a split-second prior. He ran, not quite quietly enough, towards one of the pools of light. The sound attracted Nagesh like a shark to blood in the water.

"You think to hide in the light?" Nagesh taunted.

"Better than hiding in the darkness," replied Rajni.

No sharp exhale this time, but he imagined the blow well-struck. He leapt from the darkness and into the light, as a diver would surface for air. The shark was on his tail, however. His tattoo glowed with warmth, covered by his clothing, and only he sensed it. His vision became sharper, but filled with shades of possibilities a heart's beat in the future.

One such shade grew more distinct, and he raised his blade to parry an incoming dagger, thrown from the pool of darkness at the light's edge.

"You do nothing but provide me with a target. Why don't you fight?"

"A target you have yet to hit, Nagesh," Another dagger whistled through the air, dissipating after biting deep into the wood behind Rajni. "Your anger blinds you."

"I'll not be goaded so easily. You cannot throw your ridiculous blade, and you cannot chase what you cannot find. You will bleed from a thousand cuts," came the voice from the darkness. Not moving, watching from around a corner. The outline became less muddy in the darkness beyond the flame's reach.

Another dagger came and went, then another.

"You cannot dodge forever, Raj. You tire."

Electing not to respond, Rajni focused on the darker shadow. It moved between three particular spots. The pattern had emerged, as Parashurama had taught that it would.

He closed his eyes, blocking out all but the trajectory of Nagesh's movement. He could see when the dagger would fly. Half a second before that moment, Rajni reached out his hand and a beam of black light leapt out at Nagesh. Though he had aimed at the body, it struck Nagesh in the leg and threw him off-balance, causing him to careen into the corner he had planned to hide behind.

"That was no blade, scum. I will have you expelled for this!" Nagesh screamed, sharply inhaling through his teeth as he attempted to rise. One of the instructors emerged from the shadows, pulling a brightly-glowing stone from his pocket to light the wound. The instructor silently placed a hand on Nagesh's head, and his eyelids closed peacefully as the instructor's other hand drew poultice from a small pot tied to his belt and smoothed it over the weepong wound on Nagesh's leg.

In focusing on the scene he had caused, he missed the instructor coming up from his own flank. Not that he would have noticed normally, anyway. The instructors were shadow incarnate.

"You have received outside instruction, I see. Your eyes show the Seer's touch. You think yourself so accomplished here that you may train elsewhere in your clearly over-abundant leisure time? You think yourself a champion for having bested the prattling son of a noble? You think the answers can be seen in others before they must be seen inside yourself?" The questions, though asked in an even tone, were deep-cutting accusations.

"No, Grandmaster. I thought to seek more knowledge. To know more than the art of the blade," Rajni responded with a mixture of deference and desire to stand his own ground.

"You seek more knowledge before you have absorbed what you have been given. Your reach exceeds your grasp. A fine trait, if tempered with wisdom and experience. Very well. You will take the next test early. Report to the cells." The instructor said, turning and disappearing around a corner.

Rajni's heart simultaneously sank and nearly burst from his chest. The test was simple, remain in a dark cell, devoid of outside stimuli, and search within oneself for the period of seven days, one's only bodily sustenance being bread and water. The maddening part, which caused the most students to fail, was the fact that they could walk out at any time. One had to make due, and dive deep into one's own mind, to pass their time with some semblance of peace. To Rajni, this was a chance to prove he was ready for the next tier of instruction.

***********

"Congratulations might be in order, were circumstances different."

Rajni looked at the masked instructor, the gold patch marking him as a senior instructor.

"Circumstances?" Rajni asked. It was difficult to think of anything but food and water after just emerging from seven days in his dark cell.

"Yes. The grandmaster has sent me to escort you from the grounds. Nagesh's family holds a good deal of sway here, even among we who did not cater to such in the past. But times are different. You are not to return while Nagesh remains here."

"What am I to do then?"

"That is for you to determine. You are no longer a student here. Leaving the city is likewise recommended, Nagesh's family wields more power outside of these grounds than it does within them. Come, a parcel has been prepared for you to leave with."

With parcel in hand, Rajni found himself in disguise at the Vault of the Eye, and he revealed to Parashurama what had happened.

"That is troubling, but a new environment will increase your understanding," the Old Man answered the question Rajni hadn't asked yet.

"Are you sending me away as well?" Rajni asked, worried.

"In a manner of speaking. There is knowledge outside of even these halls. Sail north, to the mouth of the Sellen River. There is someone you must see. You will recognize them when you see them."

"Then what?" came Rajni's reply.

"You will go from there. I will send word if the situation changes here. Perish the thought of this place from your mind. When the one who wants you dead is gone, your Grandmaster will inform you through me."

Rajni looked surprised.

"You think the respected masters of two learning institutions do not know each other? When you displayed what you had learned here, he knew where to come with the information. Go now. Knowledge awaits." The Old Man reached for a book on the shelf, then disappeared.

Rajni, puzzled and thoughts now revolving around his future, left the Vault and proceeded to the docks. He kept an eye out behind him, in case any of Nagesh's retainers planned to ambush him, but none materialized. Spending the last little bit of coin he had on boat passage and meat on a stick from a street vendor, Rajni boarded a ship bound northward through the inner sea.

After weeks of working on the vessel to earn his meals, Rajni was pleased to step foot on solid ground once more. There had only been one port call since he departed Jalmeray, and with no coin he was scarcely able to enjoy it. Now he was in a border town, Holver's Ferry.

Surely this is the place, he thought to himself. He looked around for anyone who might have knowledge of the Old Man. Seeing nothing but fishers and porters, he headed to the village proper to look for educated individuals.